Becoming The Motivation

CJ, South Africa

Goal Click and UNICEF UK collaborated on a series that highlights the impact that Soccer Aid for UNICEF has on children around the world. In an effort to protect children from the impact of climate change and environmental degradation, UNICEF South Africa has partnered with Canoeing South Africa, with the Grootbos Foundation identified to implement the Sport for the Environment and Climate Change programme.

The Grootbos Foundation is a non-profit organisation, established in 2003 with the vision of conserving the unique Cape Floral Kingdom and a mission to develop sustainable livelihoods in the communities through ecotourism, enterprise development, sports development and education. The Development Canoeing Programme for 8-15 year olds is run on the Klein River in Stanford in partnership with the Stanford Canoe Club. It teaches basic water safety and water conservation, and gives opportunities to participate in local and national canoeing, marathon and sprint regattas throughout the year. “CJ” started with the program in 2017 and is now competing nationally and internationally.

Can you introduce yourself and tell us about your sports journey?

My name is Sibongeleni, otherwise known as “CJ”. I live in Stanford, I am 18 years old, and I started canoeing when I was 12. Before canoeing, I was playing soccer but the people that I was playing with were older and too rough for me. Back then I was that short, skinny guy and I ran fast. But I had bad friends, who were smoking and drinking all the time. After a while, I did not see the reason to drink and smoke. I said, “This is not for me. I do not have any money and I am drinking to impress my friend. OK CJ, just do your own thing. Stop playing soccer. Play something else.”

One day I was going to the river to take a swim. I saw this guy, I thought he was going to steal something, but he was going to the river to paddle. I did not know what paddling was. He told me everything. He told me not to drink and smoke. I decided to follow him to see what the hell he was going to do. We went down to see some of the people out there and a lot of the boats.

This guy introduced me to the coach, who asked if we wanted to join the club and if I knew how to swim. I said “yes, I can swim”, but I did not know how to swim. I was lying. I was scared to say that I was really scared of the river. A lot of people died in the river and there were stories of huge snakes.

But I wanted to try. Maybe this might be the opportunity to do something else instead of smoking and drinking. It was 2017. I kept this from my mom - she didn't know I was doing the sport for two or three years. She always said a lot of people die in the river. She did not want to lose me because I was her only boy. But at the end of 2018 I told her about it and she accepted it, because I had someone to guide me and I was accepted at the club.

In 2019 I started attending the first races in Pretoria. That was the biggest moment of my life. I had never seen so many boats. Until then I was not taking canoeing seriously. But then I started taking training seriously because there was a lot of competition there and I was inspired by that. I was training, training, training, training. 

In 2021 I went to the SA Sprints and I had trained so hard for. I used to be the slowest person in our club, but now I am King of the Sprints. I got a bronze medal and my coach and family were so happy for me. 

Then we had the SA Sprints here in Lomond in the Western Cape. The race was the best ever. It was the first race I ever won. It was the race where I got nominated for the Olympic Hopes Regatta in Slovakia in September 2022.

That is when people here in Stanford started noticing the canoe. It was like “wow, this sport is taking you somewhere”. Back then, people were saying “you are going to die in that water. Come on, you are black. Black people don't deserve to be on the team. Only white people deserve it.”

I was training in all weather conditions. I started training in a gym which helped me a lot. I got some sponsors for my clothes. I do not have many clothes - the only clothes that I have are from canoeing. 

In Slovakia, there were only white people out there. I am a rare dude. I was the only black person out there. I went out there and tried my best. I showed what I can do, but it felt like it was not enough. I had fun out there, meeting new people from Canada and the US. I did not like the food, because the food was tasteless. It does not taste like the food that I eat here at home. There was no salt.

When I came back from Slovakia, there were welcome back signs. Everyone was asking how it went. I was so, so, so, so, so embarrassed. Everyone was celebrating for me. There were a lot of people there.

My coach gave a speech about me saying that I pushed hard to be there. My coach inspired me a lot and that day I became like a star here in Stanford. People stopped saying “you're going to die in that water”. People are often taking you down until you shine. I will take the compliment. 

What did you try to capture with your photos? Was there a wider meaning with the photos? 

The photos show my house, my mom, my teammates, and some photos on the river. One teammate SK is really funny. The reason why I go canoeing every day is to see him. He always lies to us, but it is fine because he is funny.

There is a photo of my mother and her pigs, she is feeding 20 or 30 pigs. She started a business with two pigs and selling meat. Then two pigs became six pigs, And it just goes on and on. She feeds the pigs, slaughters them, makes some food, and then sells meat to other people to make money. Sometimes she goes to town to sell some meat there.

My mom also works on a chicken farm. She sometimes leaves home at 8am and comes back at 2am in the morning. She says the money on the chicken farm is not enough to feed all of us, so she started selling meat.

We often sleep without knowing where food is going to come from next. Sometimes I sleep without eating. Everything is hard. But this is the life I am living now.

My mom is making a little money to feed all of us - me, my sister, and my two cousins (from my mother’s sisters). They do not have their mothers, so my mother took them. My mother was the only one who knew how to take care of children.

My other sister has a boy. If I do not make world champion, that boy is going to be world champion. One day I am going to train that boy. If I do not make it, that boy will make it. Somewhere in my family, somebody's going to reach the top.

My mom is a single parent. I wish I had known my father. He died when I was three years old. That affected my mother. She became poor and did not have a man to feed all of us. I did not know what was going on back then. My mother was crying all the time. My father was a very good soccer player. In my community everyone knew my father, he was a soccer star. 

I go to school at 7am and come out at 2.15. I am behind on my grades right now and I am not happy with that, because I have been in schools in a few different places. I arrive home at 3pm and have 10 minutes to fix everything, eat, to wash my shirts, and pack my clothes for canoeing. It takes an hour to get to the club. You can see the route I take to get there. We train from 4.30 until 6. I get home around 7.45. I used to be scared when I was walking alone. Now I am used to it, it is just life.

Why is canoeing so important to you and your community? 

Canoeing is important to the community because it keeps people from doing bad stuff, like drinking, smoking or stealing. Canoeing is taking your time to help yourself.

Canoeing is the best sport I have ever played. I am going to stay with it and do canoeing as a career. Since I started, a lot of people have wanted to join in. A lot of kids started when they saw me going overseas. They see that canoeing is taking people somewhere else. The trips are the best, going with friends and teammates.

It is helping the community because not a lot of black kids did canoeing. So more black people started wanting to canoe instead of playing soccer.

What impact has the Grootbos Foundation program had on you? What does the program mean to you?

The Grootbos Foundation helped me a lot with clothing, shoes, tickets, and sponsorship. My mother did not have money to buy me these things. They support all of us at our river and our club. They have been with us a long time. They have inspired me a lot with what I eat and how I dress and always trying new things with training.

How has canoeing helped you learn about climate change? What do you think needs to be done to help fight climate change?

I am worried about climate change. People sometimes just do not care about the world. They just think about now and do not think about the future, about how their kids and grandkids could be living. Are they going to be healthy? Are they going to live on this same earth that we are living on? We must take care of this Earth because it is the only home we have. But we are polluting the water. And we need the water to survive, like we need air to survive. The people that are messing everything up do not appreciate what they have been given. We can start by teaching a lot of kids to look after their communities. 

I learned a lot from my coach. Rodger is the best man that I ever met in my life. He is an honest and caring person, he is like a father to me actually. He tells me to take care of the places that I live in, the river, and the community. If I see paper on the floor or a plastic bag in our river, I can pick it up. Even if it is not yours, that will help. That became a habit to me. 

Canoeing helped me learn about climate change. Our rivers are polluted with plastics. A lot of fish are dead out there. I have seen a lot of animals out there killed by litter. Sometimes when we get time off our coach invites us to clean the river and pick up the plastics. Our coach tells us we must just keep the river clean, so animals can live in it and we can train on a clean river without plastic.

What are your ambitions?

The thing that I want is actually to become the first black world champion. The first black person that wins the world championships. I have never seen a black person win the world championships before. I want to get youngsters to look up to me and be the motivation for them to do the sport and not to be scared and never give up. 

One day I am going to put food on the table for my mom. That is why I want to do this sport as a career. 

What do you think the future looks like for sport in your community and country? What do you want to change? 

I love sports. But the kids out there, instead of doing sport, they look up to the elderly people who are not motivating them. They are just drinking and smoking - and the kids are just looking up to them. What I would love to change is for the kids to look somewhere else. They can move forward instead of being stuck in one place and doing the same thing as the elderly people do. For example, they can do sport and canoeing.

Nobody in our club smokes or drinks. Actually, they must be like athletes. I want all children in my community to be like sports people. We need kids to be healthy. I cannot really tell the future, but that is what I wish could happen.