Summer 2010 - Back in the U.K

Welcome to the CKI blog……number 8 we think!

It’s been a while since our last post, so we thought we’d update you on what we’ve been up to since we arrived back in the U.K at the end of May.

STUDIO

Over the summer we finally managed to move into a studio, which has been a big relief for Mia and Sian (and their families!), as this means most of the CKI workshop resources can now be stored there instead of in our bedrooms/houses! The CKI studio is in Hamilton House (above the Canteen) on Stokes Croft. At the moment it looks more like a mini version of Scrapstore, but we’re getting there!

WORKSHOPS

Since we returned to the U.K, CKI have run several workshops including;

• · Eco-Veggie Fair, Harbourside, Bristol – 29^th May &

• · Action Aid Event, College Green, Bristol – 1^st & 2^nd June

• · St. Pauls Adventure Playground Re-opening – 19^th June

Keeping the theme from the Youth Arts festival in Zambia, at these workshops we looked at the environment and made ‘Animafwafwas’ costumes from recycled cardboard boxes for the children to wear.

At the Action Aid event and St.Pauls Adventure Playground, we were also lucky enough to have Biggie and Natalie from Nomakanjani Arts to run storytelling and dance workshops with the children alongside us. We met Biggie, Natalie and the rest of the talented Nomakanjani Arts group in Lusaka. They work closely with Barefeet Theatre and are fantastic performers! It was great to have Biggie and Natalie work with us while they were in the U.K! For more information about Nomakanjani Arts please visit www.nomakanjani.org

• · Presentation/workshop at Golden Valley Primary School

We worked with 2 Year 3 classes, looking at life in Zambia. The school were just launching a link with a school in Ngombe compound, which is the same area as the community school we work with in Lusaka. We were able to show photographs and share experiences with the children about Ngombe.

• · Secret Garden Party Festival, Cambridge – 23^rd, 24^th & 25^th July

We made a giant baobab tree with the children, and decorated it in chitenge fabric. We also looked at recycled artifacts from Africa, and used our own recycled materials to make flowers, mandalas and musical instruments.

• · Harbourside Festival, Bristol – 31^st July & 1^st August

In the relocated children’s area on Castle Green, we made another giant Baobab Tree which was decorated with chitenge by children and families, and used recycled materials to make; mandalas, flowers and musical instruments. We were also lucky enough to have Michael & John from Zambia with us for the weekend! They performed Zambian dancing, and brought the children’s instruments to life with drumming and singing! Michael and John are facilitators for Barefeet Theatre in Lusaka, whom we have worked with each time we have been in Zambia. They are currently studying on a theatre course at Hope Street in Liverpool. For more information about Barefeet Theatre please visit www.barefeettheatre.org

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

We have also been taking stock of the last year and getting ready for our forthcoming AGM, which is due to be held on Weds 27^th October in Bristol. Details coming soon!

The first part of our AGM is for CKI members only, so if you would like to be invited along please contact Mia on ckimembership@hotmail.co.uk to find out how. Membership costs only £12 per year (that’s the equivalent to only £1 per month over a year!), and entitles you to regular updates, invitations to events/exhibitions and the AGM, as well as the chance to be part of the decision making process and vote on the CKI management committee. It is also a way of making a regular donation to a great organisation!

The second part of the AGM will be open to the general public, and will include a presentation from Mia and Sian about their last trip to Africa, as well as (hopefully) the preview of a short film from the last trip.

We will also be able to update you on plans for CKI’s future, and how you can get involved/support the project!

Now the busy summer is over, we are about to start planning our fundraising for the coming year. We recieve no statutory funding and rely on donations, membership subscriptions, grants and fundraising events. If you would like to get involved or have any exciting fundraising ideas/opportunities please get in touch!

On a personal note…..

As you can see the summer has been a busy time for CKI, as well as for both of us (Sian and Mia) in our other work. As you may know, although we would like to be able to work full-time for CKI when we’re back here in the U.K, unfortunately that’s just not possible for us due to funding at the moment. As a result, as well as running CKI and delivering workshops as and when, we both also have other jobs to earn a living. Luckily most of these other jobs tie-in quite well with our CKI work! For those of you that may not know……..

Mia has been running her own successful business Creative Kids Workshops for many years, providing creative workshops and activities for children. The summer is jam packed with festivals and community events in Bristol and around the U.K, at which Mia (and her colleagues) provide exciting hands-on creative activities for children and young people of all ages.

Sian started working for African Initiatives in June of this year as Global Education Project Worker. This includes working with schools and running community action days looking at global issues, learning about other countries and cultures and breaking down stereotypes.

Thanks for reading, and we hope to see you at the AGM on 27^th October!

Sian and Mia.xx

Kenya - Part 2 - Nairobi

NAIROBI

Sarakasi Trust, Nairobi

After an overnight train journey from Mombassa which we both got ridiculously excited by, we arrived back in Nairobi for the last few days of our trip. As well as doing a bit of sight seeing and giraffe feeding, we visited the Go-down Arts Centre in the Industrial Area, and the Kazuri (meaning ‘small and beautiful’ in Swahili) bead factory - a fair trade business set up to provide employment for local women, particularly single mothers.

We were also lucky enough to visit a fantastic organisation called Sarakasi in Ngara. Sarakasi Trust is a performing arts development organization working toward building capacity in the arts sector in Kenya. Established in 2001, Sarakasi runs and outreach and training program working with children and young people in the slums of Nairobi.

Through performance (mainly dance and acrobatics) Sarakasi supports numerous dancers and acrobats from the slums, by providing opportunities where they can use their talent as a source of revenue. They also run a training programme which offers those who show a real commitment and talent to enable them to become trainers themselves, and inturn fantastic role models for the young people they are working with (much like the Barefeet facilitators in Zambia!). As well as all this, Sarakasi runs an annual arts festival in Nairobi (‘The Sawa Sawa Festival in May), and have a well developed international exchange programme which has given hundreds of performers the chance to perform around the world. The organisation has several other projects, including; working with visually impaired musicians and deaf acrobats; a circus dedicated to working with those affected by post election violence and an African Yoga Group.

Sarakasi have recently moved into ‘The Dome’ in Ngara where they have a fantastic space including; a theatre, dance studio, radio station, recording studio, apartment for guests, offices and bar. It was really inspiring to see how their dedication and hard work has paid off, and they now have such a fantastic space to use! We were lucky enough to see the acrobats rehearsing when we dropped into The Dome, and we were so impressed by them! We couldn’t help but think how fantastic it would be for African Dance Factory (from Barefeet) to work with them!

For more information about Sarakasi please visit www.sarakasi.org

Prison Workshop

We were also lucky enough to go along to a workshop with some of the Sarakasi facilitators at a men’s prison in Nairobi. After getting on the most AMAZING matatu (bus) we had ever been on (UV paint inside and out, music booming out, a huge flat screen T.V behind the driver and small TVs on the back of each seat like an aeroplane playing music videos!), we arrived at the men’s prison where James, Morris, and Mark lead a workshop with the prisoners involving yoga, acrobatics and break dancing! We were really impressed by how much the prisoners had learnt in only a few months and how engaged they were with the workshops. It was obvious that not only did the prisoners gain a lot from these workshops, but that they have become an important part of their rehabilitation programme.

Thank you so much James, Morris, and Mark for inviting us to come along and see the fantastic work you are doing!

Hospital Workshop

The following day we were lucky enough to be invited to see another of Sarakasi’s fantastic projects, where a team of performers work in the paediatric ward of Kenyatta National Hospital. Kenyatta Hospital is the biggest hospital in Kenya, with patients coming from all over the country for treatment. The main goals and objectives of the project are to contribute towards a positive awareness of illness and ensure a meaningful stay in hospital. This is done by providing entertainment and activities for the children during their stay including; singing, dancing, drama, clowning, puppetry, magic, storytelling, interactive games and visual arts. Sarakasi also work in several other hospitals and day care centres in Nairobi, offering entertainment and activities to children.

We arrived in the middle of a performance to around 50 children, and 10 minutes later Sian was dragged up onto the stage to dance on her own in front of all the children, parents and staff who were watching! As you can imagine she was mortified by this, but managed to pull out some ridiculous moves to entertain the kids! Mia luckily managed to avoid this embarrassment………next time it’s Mia’s turn!:)

After seeing the Sarakasi group have the children in hysterics and up dancing around with huge smiles on their faces, we were given a tour of the paediatric ward. With around 30 children (plus mothers who stay) in each ward, few resources and not enough medical staff it is obvious that the Sarakasi workshops are the highlight of the children’s week.

Thanks to Ferny and all the others Sarakasi facilitators for inviting us to see their work in the hospital……..a great group of creative people with a wicked sense of humour!

Sarakasi is a fantastic organisation, and an inspiration to us both. It was great to be able to see first hand the work they are doing in Nairobi, and we have lots of ideas about how we could work with them in the future! Thanks to Jane for putting us in touch with them, and to Marion and everyone else at Sarakasi for being so welcoming! We hope to see you again soon!

We had a brilliant time in Kenya, and met some wonderful, creative and inspiring people! Our visit to Kenya will bring a new element to the work of Creative Kids International, not only in links made for the future collaborations, but in the experiences we can now share with children and adults we work with in the U.K.

Bristol, U.K

We are now back in Bristol, England and have already begun workshops/talks at schools, events and festivals. If you are interested in having Creative Kids International workshops/talks at your event, school or group please get in touch with us on creativekids.int@hotmail.co.uk

We will keep updating this blog so you can see what we get up to in the U.K, and how things are going for the next trip to Africa!

Don't forget you can join our facebook group by searching for CREATIVE KIDS INTERNATIONAL, and follow us on Twitter by searching for CreativeKidsInt.

For photos of previous work and events please visit www.myspace.com/creativekidsinternational

Thanks so much for reading!

Sian and Mia.xx

Kenya - Part 1 - Gillgil & Mombassa

Welcome to blog number 6…..the final blog from our last trip to Africa! Apologies it’s taken a while to get this one up, but we’ve been very busy since we arrived back in the U.K a couple of weeks ago.

GILGIL

Saidia Children’s Home, Gilgil

Two days after the fabulous festival week in Lusaka, we left Zambia and headed for Kenya! After a few hours sleep in Addis Ababa, we arrived in Nairobi on 5^th May. We headed straight to Gilgil, a town approx 100 miles North West of Nairobi in the Rift Valley, with around 20,000 people. After buying a few materials in the local shops that evening, the next day we headed to Saidia Children’s Home. Saidia was set up in 2004 and is home to approx 54 children ranging from 6 months to 18 years. The older children attend local schools during the daytime, and the younger children attend nursery in the mornings at Saidia.

Saidia also runs an outreach program in Bondeni, which started off as a feeding program to give the children in this area of Gilgil at least one meal a day. The program has now grown and has its own building, two nursery teachers and caters for approx 70 nursery children. They also run a Granny Club supporting grannies that are looking after their orphaned grandchildren.

For more information about Saidia please visit www.saidia-gilgil.org.uk

After collecting a few final materials and a trip on a motorbike taxi in the morning, we spent the day at Saidia. We visited the feeding centre in Bondai, where we were met by a nursery full of very excited and welcoming children, and after lunch we ran a banner making workshop with the children at Saidia. After drawing around their bodies, the children used kanga (colourful fabric worn by many women in Kenya) and paint to decorate the banner. One of the banners remained at the centre to hang in the dining room, and the other we’ve brought home with us to exhibit and show to children in the U.K.

The Sanata Charitable Trust (Sanchat), Gilgil

The following day we visited Sanchat Restart Centre also in Gilgil, which is home to approx 40 children ages 2 – 20 years, mainly boys at present. The centre offers accommodation and rehabilitation through counselling and access to education/training.

Sanchat also have two secondary schools (a boys and a girls) in Gilgil, with approx 250 children in each school, ages 6 – 19 years. The trust has also recently set up a new project enabling local women to earn a living through printing and making bags for sale. These are now being exported worldwide, and there are lots of plans in progress working with the community to enable people to become more self-sufficient and creative!

For more information about Sanchat (The Sanata Charitable Trust) please visit www.sanchat.org

We spent the afternoon at the Restart Centre, and again made 2 colourful banners with the children, one to stay in the centre and one we brought back with us.

The aim of these visits was to make some links with new organisations who are interested in developing the creative side of their work with the children they support. It was lovely to spend some time at the centres and meet the children and staff, who all seemed to enjoy the activities. This was just an introductory visit to see if there is scope for developing the work in the future. Both centres were keen for us to return next time we are in Africa, and we would love the chance to spend more time working with them in the future!

We would like to say a huge thank you to Mary, Terry, Hettie, Angus, Jane and all the children and staff we worked with for making us feel so welcome in Gilgil! We hope to be back there soon!

MOMBASSA

Glad's House, Magongo, Mombassa

After a few days in Nairobi we headed to Mombassa on the coast. Although we managed to go to Kenya during its rainy season, we did squeeze in a few days (some rain, some shine) at the beach just south of Mombassa, where we were woken every morning by naughty monkeys trying to get into our room!

On our way back to Nairobi we stopped off in Magongo, just outside of Mombassa to visit a project called Glad’s House. A fairly young organisation, Glad's House is in the process of building a centre to accommodate children that live on the streets in Mombassa. At present they run drop-in sessions during the daytime for the children (mainly boys) to come for food, activities (especially sports), support, rehabilitation and access to training.

For more information about Glad’s House please visit www.gladshouse.com

We visited during a drop-in session, to see if and how we could develop working with Glad’s House in the future, and also took along some resources to leave there. All the children drew a picture about Kenya, and we made a gallery in the tin shed currently used for the drop-in. The children were really engaged and relished the opportunity to get creative! We also did some face painting, which always goes down well! Glad’s House plan to start building their centre over the next few months, and this would be a great opportunity to be involved with developing the creative aspect of their work with the children in the new centre. We would love to be able to spend more time working with them next time we’re in Africa!

We would like to say a huge thanks to Vicky, Liz and Bokey for setting up this link, and to all the children and staff we worked with at the drop-in! We hope to be back there soon!

To find out about what we got up to in Nairobi, please read the next blog......

Thanks

Sian & Mia.xx