Lighting the way for CANSA’s Relay For Life

When someone you love becomes a memory, the memory becomes a treasure.

Prior to CANSA Relay for Life on 10 and 11 October, friends and family will honour memories of loved ones they have lost to cancer in an emotionally charged luminaria ceremony.

Hundreds of white luminaria bags, decorated with special tributes to loved ones who have lost the battle to cancer, will be placed around the relay track on the night of the event and a candle inside each bag will be lit, representing the light that person was to the world before they passed on.

Among those paying tribute, will be well-known philanthropist, Ruth Lovelock, who lost her mother, Collen Naismith, to brain cancer in February 2008.

“The world could do with more people like her. She was the secretary of the Methodist Church, she stood by what she believed in and she would always help,” said Mrs Lovelock of her mother.

For Mrs Naismith, it was just short of a month from diagnosis to death, but her profound desire to make a difference in the lives of the homeless and the hungry lives on in her daughter.

Members of the community who wish to purchase luminaria bags can contact Ruth Lovelock on 083 779 0476. Luminaria bags cost R10. For more information on the Relay for Life contact Mona Maharaj on 073 756 2480 or Estella Naicker on 079 256 7570.