World AIDS Day

by Thomas Bwire

Kibera was not left out in joining the entire world in celebrating the World AIDS Day.  In different parts of the community, one could easily see white mounted tents, that acted as temporary centers for voluntary counseling famously known as VCT.

In Kibera the main celebration, an event aimed at creating awareness, fighting prejudice and improving education, was held at the DC grounds. World AIDS Day is important for reminding people that HIV has not gone away and that there are many things still to be done.

At the Uweza Center, the youngsters too were not left behind as they dedicated this day in passing the message to their fellow age mates using a small drama that used “sheng” language which is a mixture of Kiswahili and English words combined.

Their story had a family set-up that involved a father, mother, their only son and a house help who assisted in house chores. Behind the scenes, the house help had slept with the father and the son on different occasions. After many months had passed, the father and the son became sick and the house help's secret was exposed when a neighbor she used to work for had come to pay a visit to the host family.  The neighbor exposed that the house help had the HIV virus when she used to work for her

Part of the skit went like this:

Neighbor: This house help is suffering from HIV, you guys didn’t know that she is positive?

Father/Son: (Looks surprised and astonished, as they both shake their heads sideways)

Son: Oooh my God I slept with her and I thought all was fine.

Father: What? You have slept with the house help??? Me too.

Househelp: I'm sorry, I feared to tell you for fear of rejection and being stigmatized.

Father/Son: We are all infected with the HIV viruses, God help us (they fall slowly to the ground as they weep).

At that point, a counselor walks into their home and tries to console the father and the son that having slept with their house help should not be the end of the world.  She advised them that they need to visit a VCT center to get more information and if they agree, to get tested to know their status.

Once at the VCT center, they agree to be tested after having been counseled and vow to change their bad ways.

It was a story that gave a significant group at the center the opportunity to pass a message to each other with a hope to change and help educate their peers.

Get Together With A Purpose

by Thomas Bwire

The mood at the center this afternoon was adorable as pupils who had just cleared their primary national examinations known as Kenya Certificate of Primary Examination (KCPE), sat in one of the classrooms as the blaring sounds of reggae music could be heard from the Sony music system. It was a great way to kick start their long holiday as they await the result of their exams after Christmas period.

In the Kenyan education system, it takes eight years of primary school, and then the pupil sits for national exams that will enable him/her join high school education for a period of four years.

But as for now, the pupils present at the Uweza Center sat on the benches smilling, while for some, they took moments to chat with their friends. Since the outside weather was sending some signals of heavy down pour, Becky Gitau the Generation-T Club teacher took charge of the programme and asked everyone to step outside so as benches could be arranged for everyone to get enough space.

Once everyone was seated, food was served, and the menu comprised of cooked rice famously known in Swahili as “Pilau.”  This is a kind of delicacy is cooked with some meat inside and tastes delicious. Chapati too was part of the menu as well as a glass of juice to wash the food down the throat.

As the pupils sat and ate their meal as one family. I took the opportunity to talk to some of them and get to know their expectations, now that they are done with primary school.

14 year old Fredrick Mwandindo from Kibera Primary School expressed his joy of joining other pupils in the get together and believes he will perform well in his exams. I did ask him what he aspires to be in life.  "I want to be a professional footballer in the near future as I believe I have the talent, and God willing one day I can also play for bigger teams like Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester United,” says Fredrick.

15 year old Willis Nyabuto from Jamhuri primary is happy being part of Uweza family.  "I love to be part of  the Uweza team as I get to learn a lot from my teachers and I want to become a scientist when I finish high school so as I can discover earth and space” notes Willis.

The climax of the day was when Fidel Ouma, the Center’s Prefect, gave a small speech of encouragement to all present and encouraged them to be kind to each other and always value the motto of discipline.

What are children in Kibera grateful for?

Yesterday at their meeting, Thomas explained to the members of the Uweza Journal Club that Uweza supporters in the United States would be celebrating Thanksgiving, a day to reflect and give thanks. We asked them to think about and write down what they are thankful for.  Given the tough circumstances these children are living in, it's incredibly moving to see that most of them are thankful to be alive.  We are humbled by their response and reminded not to take anything for granted.

We are incredibly grateful to all of our supporters worldwide for supporting programs that are truly changing lives.  It is because of you that we are able to do everything that we do.  If you are celebrating today, Happy Thanksgiving!

Ready to Shine

Thomas Bwire is a Kibera resident and a radio journalist.  He currently works with a local FM station called Pamoja FM based in Kibera as a News editor. He joined the station in September 2007.  He has also had some extensive training in Holland with an international training in broadcasting journalism from Radio Nederland Training Center and Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) based in the Hague.

Thomas has recently joined the Uweza team to initiate a journalism club for youth. The journalism club will provide youth from Kibera the chance to learn valuable skills such as research, writing and photography.  They will be researching and writing pieces for their own periodic newsletter, which will provide them with a platform to learn and speak about issues and topics that are important to them. 

Thomas will also be a regular contributor to the Uweza blog.  Below is his first post about the first meeting of the Uweza journalism club.

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The afternoon weather was hot as I arrived at the Uweza Foundation gate at 2.45pm, with a mission to kick start the journalism class at the center. The center located at Karanja Road, shone with its blue colors painted on the walls. To welcome me was Mr.Moi the Program Manager in charge of the center, and as I sat in his office, we got to exchange greetings and catch up on how the day had been earlier.

Not later, some of the pupils started trickling into the compound some in pairs, while some came on their own. In no time, I headed to one of the classes and met my pupils eagerly waiting to hear from me.

First things first, I did start by greeting them and telling them a little bit about myself and this was followed by a simple exercise of knowing each other.  This is how it was done, pupils paired into two and asked their partner about themselves on issues ranging from their names, likes, dislikes and what they expect to learn while with the club. The response was amazing as the whole class got to know a new person that they had never known before. Some of them said how they love to eat fish, some love to travel and some wanted to be journalists and to read news while they finish school. "Amazing sentiments there," I thought to myself as we moved on.  The class had a total of 15 pupils ranging from ages 12 to 15years old.

After getting to know each other, suggestions for in house rules were put across and all agreed to abide by them, Here are some of the house keeping rules, perhaps to give you the better feel of things here in Kibera, "be patient, respect to people’s property, obey your teacher, co-operate, no chewing, no gossiping" and the one that stood out was "listening to each other."

Very insightful there as proposal to set the rules came from the participants themselves, and hopefully they will be followed to the latter. Day one presented the participants to get to know what news is with the following elements in storytelling,” who, what, why, when, where and how,” with practical example from one of the local daily newspaper as we read through each line to identify these elements.

  To close the day’s session, each participant had an opportunity to read one story to help to identify how the key news elements were used in stories. Time  flew so fast and as we winded up, many of the kids were reluctant to leave, but before they left, a simple assignment was given out, and here it comes, "write a simple story with not more than 100 words, but include the key news elements."

Look out for our next blog next week where we shall post some of the first ever written stories done by our Uweza Journalism Club.

milk & honey shoes for Uweza

Kate Mara has created a shoe for milk & honey and ALL of the proceeds from the sales of the shoes will go Uweza.  We are so excited and grateful to Kate for selecting us as her charity recipient and hope you will check out (and buy) her beautifully designed shoes!

Check out the shoes on milk & honey's website : http://www.milkandhoneyshoes.com/signature-collection/kate-uweza.html. 

Intern Blogging - Week 1

William Ochieng, is a Kenyan college student, studying Community Development at  The Kenya Polytechnic University College in Nairobi.   As part of his studies, he must complete an internship with an organization working on community development.

William started interning with Uweza two weeks ago.  We have been doing our best to keep him busy with interesting work and he has been a big help to us.  As part of the internship,  he will be writing weekly blog posts detailing his work and what he is learning.

Feel free to leave any questions, comments, or words of encouragement for William in the comments section!
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It has been a busy schedule for the last 2 weeks at Uweza Foundation. I have been able to interact with Kibera Agenda 4 Business Savings group members. It comprises of persons with integrity who are business oriented. The group deals with savings and loaning of funds to the group members. It is through loaning and savings that they are able to uplift their level of living standards through businesses to a comfortable life. In the group activities I was involved in calculating the total savings each person has saved and total loan given out.

I also met the parents of the sponsored children in the Uweza Sponsorship Program. The staff of the organization emphasized on the cleanliness of the children sponsored by the organization when going to school.  When the children are clean, they perform well in class and help the organization get a good reputation in the society at large. At the meeting I took minutes of the agenda which was a bit hectic because I couldn't memorize the parent's children's names.

During the Uweza Football team party, I took some photographs which was a fantastic day.  The team was position 1 at the Amani tournament.  Also I did some office work like arranging and filing of documents.

I have learned a lot of many things in the organization. First of all, people should join hands to form a large pool of resources in the Kibera microfinance through the Kibera Agenda 4 Business Savings to facilitate in the actualization of its dream.

Second, the organization is working to its level best to uplift the status of children by offering evening tuitions. This enables the children to ask questions to their tutors about what they didn't understand in the classroom.

There is also a good working relationship among the Uweza staff as all of them give time to express their news.

The organization responds immediately without hesitation to child's health and tuition fees. This is taking the child to hospital/chemist for medication.

I have also learned that children need to be given time to realize their talents through soccer and activities like drawing.

Trip to Korogocho

With all the media attention and thousands of NGOs, it is easy to forget that Kibera is not the only slum in Nairobi.  Korogocho, which means "crowded shoulder to shoulder" in Kiswahili is estimated to be the third or fourth largest slum in Kenya with a population of 150,000 to 200,000 people living in 1-1.5 square kilometers. It is located about 11 kilometers northeast of Nairobi.  

The slum directly borders Dandora, Nairobi's principal dumping site, which presents concerns of health issues and human rights violations for the slum's residents.  A study by the United Nationals Environment Programme of 328 children and adolescents living and schooling near Dandora found that around 50% had respiratory problems and 30% of them had blood abnormalities that indicated high exposure to heavy-metal poisoning. 

At the same time the dumping site creates opportunities for income generations as both children and adults living nearby scavenge for and resell garbage for a living.

(image source: lightstalkers.org/caroline_kaminju) 

Yesterday was a national holiday in Kenya and children had the day off school so our coaches arranged for all Uweza teams to travel to play with teams from Korogocho.  

The kids, as always, had a great time. The day of matches was a great opportunity for them to get out of Kibera  and it also kept all the kids occupied and busy on their day off from school.

Good Luck on KCSE!!

We want to recognize Dennis Odhiambo (left) and Johnson Musyoka (right), two very dedicated and studious Uweza football players that started their Kenyan Certificate of Secondary Education (K.C.S.E) exams today and will be taking them for the next three weeks. Scores on KCSE play a huge role in determining whether or not a student will be able to continue on to university, which school they can attend, and if they will be able to get loans/scholarships.

Good Luck Dennis and Johnson!

Two Uweza teams bring home trophies!!

Today has been a great day for the Uweza Soccer Program as two of our teams have, for the first time in Uweza history, won first place in a tournament! Three Uweza teams, Under-16 girls, Under-15 boys, and Under-13 boys competed in the annual peace tournament held by Amani Kibera. Amani means peace in Kiswahili and according to their website: "this unique initiative continues to engage young people of different ages, ethnic and religious backgrounds to utilize their diverse sporting and cultural talents to promote peace and inculcate a culture of non-violence." In 2009, Uweza's Under-10 team won third place in the Amani tournament.

Uweza's girls team played great defense and did not allow any goals to be scored against them. They won their final match 1-0. The Uweza Under-15 boys team also played great defense and won every single match they played in penalty kicks. The Under-13 team played great as well but were unfortunately defeated in the semi-finals.



In reward for their victories, both teams won large trophies, 7 pairs of shin guards (an Uweza first!), jerseys for their coaches, and new soccer balls.



The kids were so excited and are preparing tomorrow for a victory parade where they will cheer and carry the trophy from their training ground to the Community Center.

Congratulations Uweza teams!!



More photos from tournament have been posted here: http://uweza.org/gallery/amanitournament.html

Kibera Connection Project - Hawaiian and Kenyan pen pals

As part of our Kibera Connection Project, students that study at the Uweza Community Center have been exchanging letters with students in 7th grade at Punahou School in Hawaii. Both groups are really excited to have pen pals so far away and are learning a lot about each other and their respective countries!


Here are some examples of the letters the students have written:

Teava, Ke’ala, and Alana from Punahou School, Hawaii


Hello, we are your new pen-pals from Hawai’i! Aloha means hello in Hawaiian. Our names are Teava, Ke’ala, and Alana. We are 7th graders from Punahou School. We are extremely excited about being your pen-pals for the coming months and we have many questions. We look forward to learning a lot from you!

Keʻala is 13 years old, and loves to play American football, basketball and volleyball. He also enjoys going to the beach. He has an older sister. His favorite subject in school is P.E and he would like to be an engineer when he grows up. His favorite food is hamburgers. Alana is 12 years old and likes to go to the beach, read, and horseback ride. She has a older sister and her favorite subject in school is science. She wants to be a veterinarian when she grows up. Teava is 12 years old and his favorite hobbies are swimming, reading, and playing video games. He has a younger brother. His favorite subject in school in improvisation and he hopes to be an actor when he gets older. His favorite food is Sicilian pizza and he wants to live in Italy one day.

Hawai’i is an island in the middle of the Pacific ocean that is part of the United States of America. Our state is known for our beautiful beaches, many tourist attractions, and unique Hawaiian cuisine such as plate lunches, loco mocos (hamburger with rice and gravy) . A popular hobby many Hawaiians have is going to the beach and doing things that take advantage of the fact that we are surrounded by water such as swimming, surfing, or getting a tan. Surfing is an ancient Hawaiian sport where you stand on a board and ride a wave.

America is a large country on the equator with 50 states. Our president is Barack Obama and our capital is Washington DC. We use dollars and cents and inches and feet for money and measurement. Some things many Americans love doing are playing sports, watching TV, and eating. America is known for freedom, football, and food. Some foods America is know for are hot-dogs, hamburgers, and pizza. America has also pioneered the film and fast food industries in the 1900s. We look forward to learning more about Kibera from you.

We had a great time writing this letter and sharing with you. We do have a couple of questions for you. How old are you? Are you a boy or girl? What are your favorite hobbies? What is your favorite food? We thank you for your time and we canʻt wait to hear back from you!

Sincerely,
Ke’ala, Teava, and Alana

David Johnson from Uweza Community Center, Kibera

Dear friends Keala, Alana, and Teava,

I am greeting you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. How are you all. I hope you are all fine. My name is called DAVID MUTHUWI JOHNSON. The main purpose for writing this letter is to appreciate your letter that you sent to us.

Furthermore, am so happy to know your names and how life is in your country. I would also like to inform you how life is in our country Kenya. Here is full of happiness, full of joy and also peaceful. This is because every body here is allowed to do his/her commitments and hobbies in peace.

First, I would like to introduce my hobby to you before telling you any other thing else. My hobby is to watch cartoon and practice my favorite subject maths. I also like eating chicken which is my favorite food too.

In our country, we have got so many interesting things e.g. wildlife and also cultural ceremonies. These are the most leading producers of government revenue. In our country, we also have cool and hot climate which can also be good for you too. For more information, you are invited to our country in order for you to see the big five which are also part of the wildlife. You will also be able to see the lakes with hot springs e.g. Lake Bongoria.

Yours Lovely,
David M. Johnson