Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
A 1-hour drive from Johannesburg, rolling amber hills replace the concrete and skyscrapers of downtown. This is Tarlton. Here Vutlhari Chauke, the woman behind the agricultural business VT Harvest, is fighting against gender stereotypes and disempowerment, and she is bringing other women along with her.
Down a long dirt road, 10 greenhouses stand out against the slanting light of the afternoon sun. Women bend over crops of rocket, mint,...
Megan Gieske
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Disclaimer: This story contains accounts of gender-based violence.
At just 13-years-old, Siyabonga Khusela was confronted with the reality of gender-based violence (GBV).
After a fight with Siyabonga’s step-father, Siyabonga’s pregnant mother arrived at the hospital to deliver her baby. With high blood pressure and other injuries, “she passed on,” Siyabonga said. “The least that the doctors could do was to protect my baby brother.” He was just 13-years-old when he...
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Disclaimer: This story contains accounts of gender-based violence. Each of the girls mentioned has agreed to share their stories in the hopes of inspiring others.
In Cape Town, South Africa, young girls are reclaiming their voices and their power. Their motto is “wathint’abafazi wathint’imbokodo,” which is isiXhosa for “you strike a woman, you strike a rock.” At The Justice Desk’s Mbokodo Club, young survivors of gender-based violence between the...
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Behind the Table View police station in Milnerton, Cape Town, the Community Intervention Centre, painted a dazzling white, shines as a beacon of hope for women fleeing gender-based violence. Two women, Tam and Duduzile, sit in the welcome area. They are champions of women’s empowerment who are retelling their stories to anyone feeling trapped in the same circumstances they faced.
The mission of the Community Intervention Centre (CIC) is...
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Tony Elvin, IKhaya Le Langa’s founder, sits inside the retro 1950’s style eatery, “The Sun Diner,” after Langa, which means “the sun.” It’s flanked by two repurposed shipping containers, one a bright cobalt blue. He’s nurturing a puppy that arrived at IKhaya Le Langa’s gates the day before. It’s not hard to tell that IKhaya Le Langa, in part, means “home.”
That’s what Elvin wants the IKhaya Le Langa...
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Just outside Somerset West in Asanda Village, South Africa, Rachel Kolisi and a woman named Grace stand side by side in a three-room home unpacking boxes from the Kolisi Foundation. The two represent women who won’t back down — unrelenting and unfailingly humble. Together, they unpack boxes filled with blankets, toiletries, and clothing from the foundation for a woman fleeing gender-based violence, who will be staying in Grace’s...
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
In South Africa, women are at risk.
South Africa has one of the highest rates of violence against women and girls in the world, and a femicide rate that is five times the global average, with an estimated 12.1 in 100,000 victims each year. South Africa’s gender-based violence statistics (GBV) are equal to a country at war.
South Africa held its yearly 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence,...
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
On Steve Biko Street, taxi horns blare and horse carts trot down Gugulethu’s busy main road. But over a high wall, a woman has grown an oasis of green in the highly-developed, urban landscape of Gugulethu, where almost 100,000 share just 6.42²km (or 2.5² miles) of land.
It’s here in Gugulethu where Nomonde Kweza, or “Mama Nomonde,” is reclaiming her agricultural heritage, and teaching her community to support...
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Two young men in Langa are taking a stand against gender-based violence by mentoring and educating young boys.
“We need to educate men about gender-based violence and gender equality, so women and young girls can be free,” explain the two co-founders of #LangaforMen, Siyabonga Khusela and Luyolo Lengisi.
Siyabonga and Luyolo are young, just 21 and 22. They started #LangaforMen in response to the violence against women they witnessed as...
Megan Gieske is a storyteller and photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Ntombi Mbinda gestures around the kitchen in her home; it’s a room only of women. One woman bends over a pot, stirring the day’s rice. Another cuts vegetables, their headwraps shine brilliantly in the slanting light of the afternoon sun.
The women — Theodora, Lorna, Phindiwe, Nobuntu, and Noxolo — arrive every weekday at 8:30am to begin cooking from Ntombi’s home. Outside the kitchen, a garden Ntombi planted...