WATCH: Creativity at his fingertips, as Ivan aims to fold 1 000 cranes

WHEN it comes to nimble fingers and an eye for precision, there’s just no beating 12-year-old Ivan Williams of Glenwood. Ivan has accepted a challenge to fold 1000 paper cranes in the One Thousand Paper Crane Challenge to raise money for his sister’s hockey tour to Ireland and for the children with cancer charity organisation, CHOC.

Ivan, a Grade 6 Glenwood Prep pupil, started his unusual hobby of folding paper (origami) three years ago.

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“Some of the kids at school could fold ninja stars and I wanted to be one of the kids who could do it, so I learnt how to fold them and was so excited to show my sister when she got home from school! From there I found more advanced challenges in transforming ninja stars and then learnt how to make paper cranes, hearts, roses and water balloons, which are pretty fun to make. I filled the couch in the lounge with my projects! As if the challenge of folding paper wasn’t hard enough, Ivan also set out to challenge himself into folding the smallest crane he could. “So far the smallest one I can make is 4.45mm,” he said.

The folding of the paper crane involves 19 steps and Ivan can do this with a piece of paper measureing only 8mm square. His family believes this may well be an unofficial record as the smallest paper crane folded totally by hand by a child, at least, using only his fingers without the aid of tweezers or needles.

Ivan’s One Thousand Paper Crane Challenge to raise funds started on Saturday, 12 August and will extend over a period of three months.

“I challenged my classmates and teacher, Katherine Palmer, to dare me to do this and so far everything is on track. I am very excited! At first when I thought about making 1 000 cranes I felt it was unreachable. I will need to make 10 cranes a day, which I can manage,” he said. It takes Ivan around three minutes to complete one crane.

Raising funds for charities through the One Thousand Paper Crane Challenge was made popular through the story of Sadako Sasaki, a Japanese girl who was 24 months old when she was exposed to radiation from the atomic bombing of Hiroshima during World War II. As a result, she developed leukaemia and, at age 12, after spending a significant amount of time in a hospital, began making origami cranes with the goal of making one thousand, inspired by the senbazuru legend.

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In the fictional book Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes, she only managed to fold 644 before she became too weak to fold any more, and died on 25 of October 1955. In her honour, her classmates felt empathy and agreed to complete the rest for her. However, in the version of the story told by her family and classmates, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum claims that she did complete the 1 000 cranes and continued past that number. There is a statue of Sadako holding a crane in Hiroshima Peace Park, Japan.

To complete the task as a group is considered quite a feat, so for Ivan to do so alone, and in the space of three months, it will be a real challenge.

Ivan will fold his last 20 cranes on 18 November at Glenwood Village Market from 10am to 3pm. He will also have the paper size and tiny crane on display and will do a couple of demonstrations. He will ask for a donation of R10 for each crane.

“We are very proud of Ivan and the fact that he can do origami. He is always doing unusual things. He also loves the Rubik’s cube and playing video games and loves his art, singing, drama and maths. We encourage the community to be there on the 18th to see Ivan in action and help him raise funds,” said mum, Claire Williams.

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