Getting Concordia moving

Getting people who traditionally don’t believe in exercising just for the sake of it to do so is a rather ambitious goal, but a Concordia resident has made it his business to get his community moving.

Thembalethu Xolani has opened what is arguably the first official gym in the northern areas at a marginal cost after observing that the youth in the area “focus so much on alcohol”. So he took it upon himself to give them something less destructive to focus on while benefiting from it in the process.

“This has been well received – I have a total of 150 members to date and the numbers keep growing, but my biggest challenge is that the space is becoming too small as more and more people are joining.”

He has had to hire three instructors to keep up with demand, two of whom are local and one from Cape Town.

After spending years in Cape Town working in the hospitality industry, Xolani decided to move back home and make a life for himself here, starting off with a bottle store in Concordia in 2015.

He said his heart has always been in Knysna and its people, which is one of the reasons why he wanted to start a gym in the area – to inspire the youth to lead a healthy lifestyle.

His wife Deketso and his daughters Zintle and Ntlantla aged 11 and 7 are still based in Cape Town.

Locals have fully embraced the new facilities. One such is Thandi Songai who said the facilities are within reach, affordable and are what is needed by the youth in the area.