Scouts Honour - article from SA Country Life, June 2004

Richard van Ryneveld scouts out the Scouts and discovers a movement in step with the times.

It was a hot summer's day in the Boland and the Dutoitskloof shimmered in the heat. Around me the excited voices of boys and girls rang out as they swam, the braver ones sliding down a long rock chute into the deep pool at the base of the granite waterfall.

“Can you imagine sitting around in a shopping mall on a day like this?” said Sean De La Hunt of Somerset West as he clambered up the rope for another go at the chute. No I couldn’t, and as a matter of fact and spending the weekend with this bunch of youngsters made me realise how privileged I was to be living in our great country.

Stuart Ravenscroft who is in charge of the beautiful 250-hectare Hawequas Scout Ranch, which lies on the slopes of the Dutoitsberg, had invited me to come and get a taste of what modern Scouting was all about. I joined the Scouts and their Scouters for a weekend of hiking, games, lectures and practical experience, learning what it takes to become a leader as the youngsters took part in a Junior Leadership course at their Scout training grounds near Wellington.

My first lesson was that the Scouts are now open to both boys and girls. Brian February, the Area Commissioner for the Western Cape explained to me that, "Scouting is open to girls and is gender sensitive. It is also representational and gives a voice to all our communities, the youth, the disabled and both men and woman, in its leadership."

So all you young Okes out there, head down to your nearest Scout Troop and join up now - there are girls. Actually, Scouting has been open to all since 1999.

I asked Emma Chadderton, one of the Scouters leading the course and an Assistant Troop Scouter at the 3rd Pinelands Troop (in the old days you had a Scoutmaster and Assistant Scoutmaster, now replaced by Troop Scouter and Assistant Troop Scouter), to tell me a little bit about her joining the Scouts.

" I joined in ’99 the moment that it was opened up to girls,” says Emma with a laugh. “My father was a Scout and so was my brother and wanted to join in the adventure… I was in the Guides but their programmes were not challenging enough for me. I wasn’t particularly interested in a Folk Dancing badge or a Hostess badge – not that I’m knocking Guides, but I really loved Scouts from the beginning.”

Emma continues, “It wasn’t always easy in the beginning as ‘us’ girls were underestimated and I think we provided a wake-up call to the guys because they soon realised that we were as capable as they were.” She goes on tell me how much she has got of Scouting: the friendships made with people from different cultures and creeds, the adventures at events like the annual Kontiki raft building, and the life skills that she has learnt through these experiences.

Over the course of the weekend, which included everything from a hiking up the mountain to cooking their own meals at their Patrol campsites, to fun time at the river and at a campfire, I learnt more about what Scouting means to the ordinary boys and girls and men and woman who help run the organisation.

I learnt that there are more than 28 million Scouts spread around the world in more than 150 countries, all of them governed by the Scout Promise and the Scout Law. As Brian February explains, “Scouting is education for life. It compliments the school and the family, filling needs that are not met by either. Scouting develops self knowledge, the need to explore, to discover and to want to know. In Scouting, young people discover the world beyond the classroom, tapping the skills of others, and passing that knowledge on.”

One of the Scouts helping the Scouters on this course was Sean De La Hunt. Chatting to him during the weekend, I discovered he had attended a World Jamboree in Thailand. The experience shone in his eyes as he told me, “Ja, the South African Scouts are very different to the Americans. For example, we are much more outdoors and adventure orientated. Over there it’s more of a cultural thing… they go to museums and visit historical sites and stuff.”

I was to learn a lot out in the Boland mountains that weekend. My pre-conceived ideas about Scouting were turned completely upside down as I observed and talked to a wide range of Scouts and Scouters. I found that many of the Scouters (Adults in charge of a Troop) were young professional people who had been to university or technikon and had come back to give of their time and skills back to Scouting.

Take engineer Andre Montauban, for example. We were chatting about his job as an engineer and he explained, “I use the life skills I learnt in the Scouts every day in my job, especially leadership skills. These were learnt on courses like this one." He goes on to tell me about the friendships that were forged at Scouts and how these friendships endure to this day.

As we chat, Manelisi Jack, a young man of 26, who is now the Assistant Troop Scouter at 3rd Guguletu Troop, quietly adds, “It’s amazing what its done for my own life, the socialising and the friendships I have made: camping, hiking, going to places I would never have dreamt of, and an inner feeling of self-confidence.”

I see this self-confidence in many of the youngsters. As we sit on a sandstone ridge amongst the mountain fynbos, I speak to Caitlin and Carmen, two youngsters who were obviously great friends. It turns out that Caitlin had travelled to Portugal representing her school at a gymnastrada and Carmen had represented South Africa at a youth congress in Seoul.

Another youngster telling me all about the Senior Scout Adventure that takes place in the Cedarberg every second year, said, “Where else can you go rock climbing, flying, paint-balling, parasailing and do a course in marksmanship, but in the Scouts?”

It isn’t all just fun: Scouting has a social dimension too. Scouting is about participating in the development of society and respecting the dignity of others and the integrity of the natural world.

I was reminded of what Brian February had said to me earlier: “Scouting is education through learning by doing,” and after pointing out all the challenges faced by our youth, such as poverty, HIV/Aids, unemployment and single-parent homes, adding that, “What I have seen is that Scouting helps people to face these challenges.”

Brian went on to explain what he had got out of Scouts as an adult. “You know,” he said, “as parents we are often cut off from our kids, but I have found Scouting to be a wonderful way of opening the channels of communication between parent and child. I grow all the time and learn so much from all the youngsters I have the privilege of sharing my knowledge with over the years.

I was at an outdoor exhibition recently and I met a man who said to me, 'Scouting... they were the best years of my life.' The payoff in Scouting for me comes when I get the chance to pin a Springbok Scout Award on some proud Scout, or when I meet someone who has made a success of their life and I realise that I knew them as a young Scout.”

As I puffed and panted up mountains, slid down water chutes, tried to sing along in tune around a roaring campfire, nattered to youngsters and adults from a kaleidoscope of backgrounds and finally fell into a deep sleep after a long and fun-filled day, I couldn’t help but think about the last message Lord Baden-Powell, the founder of Scouting, passed on to his beloved Scouts: “Try to leave this world a little better than you found it."

I think old B.P. would have had a gentle and knowing smile on his face had he been up there in the Dutoitskloof that weekend, seeing his words coming alive in these fine people.