The first of 2010's volunteers arrive safely in Kenya

Bryn and Helena have arrived and settled in to their 2 month placement in Kenya. They will be assisting the Ingrid Education Centre and then moving upcountry to stay with the Tumaini community in western province close to Mumias helping the work of Amanda Flanagan.
They were also joined yesterday by 2 Facebook friends and volunteers for an australian youth sports organisation that provides a "unique non-violent way of disciplining kids through mixing sport with social skill development". Imbuhira (2nd right) and Ruthy (centre) work in the city and volunteer whenever possible. We're hoping to link up Ingrids into the youth sport activities as well as assisting Michael Nam's football academy in Naivasha.

We'll be updating you regularly but you can click onto the FaceBook group for more photos.

Kick it back to Kenya

Last Summer Philip (centre of pic), a PE teacher at Catcote School in Hartlepool, volunteered in Naivaisha, along with colleague, Andrew (right), delivering football coaching sessions and assisting with a local man's dream to create a football academy for the street kids.

They made strong links with the coaches over there, including their FIFA-trained local host, Michael. All three see football as "a fantastic tool to help the children develop socially and physically".





Since his return to the UK, Philip has been discussing the issues he witnessed with his own pupils, who decided they would like to help. As a class they decided on the project name ‘Kick it Back to Kenya’. They hope to receive donations of old boots, shirts, balls, cones "anything that you might consider to be worthless could be priceless to a child". They have posters around their local sports centres and are contacting the local media to raise publicity.

On March 21st the Catcote School will be participating in the Sports Relief Mile in Hartlepool, a chance for the young people involved to raise money to send over the first collection of items. Anything that can be donated would be extremely appreciated. Please contact us if you can help.

Shamba planting and more trees

Thanks to the generosity of certain bikers [you know who you are] and the awesome attitude and proactive Jedi force within director Douglas, "now free and can breath after two days busy working on the Shamba planting and fencing" we can all see the results.

Douglas tells me "Now the Shamba is secure and free from cattle getting access ....It took ten men to fence the shamba today and 13 women and men planting yesterday."

And you can see the skill and the collaboration involved in getting results like this in only 2 days. This is real innovation that comes from only a little bit of support. Ingrid Angels runs a feeding program so each of the children attending classes can be fed a meal. A generous G.A.Y.E (Give As You Earn) commitment is now covering costs for this program but suggestions and discussions went on about the centre becoming more self-sufficient. No sooner had this been discussed and Jedi Douglas got to work!

There is another Shamba next to this that can be used to plant a tree nursery and hosts from last Summer, CWOSUP and Edward Wata are hopefully advising Douglas on getting into a govt-funded tree nursery  programme to further increase funds. Edward has an established nursery in Yala, western Kenya.

[Ruth watering seedlings]

Shootback in Mathare Valley

The Mwelu Foundation is a self-help group operating in the Mathare Valley slum of Nairobi, founded by born-and-raised Mathare resident Julius Mwelu. Julius became involved with Lana Wong's Shootback Project at the age of 12, a well-funded project teaching photographic skills to children in the slum. Through photography Julius has managed to educate countless people around the world about what life in a slum is really like. The Gallery depicts this extraordinarily and the Foundation have had three films accepted into the Kenyan International Film Festival (KIFF). Ghetto Girl, Flying Toilet and Inevitable Pain will be shown along side other entries in various locations in Nairobi.



"Children have vivid and important stories to tell, and cameras are dynamic tools for this expression. Lana Wong started the Shootback Project to help give young people in Mathare the means to tell their own stories.

Here's an example of their work by Stephen Ochieng aged 12 :



The Shootback Project continues to train young photographers in Mathare today and their photos are displayed both in the slum and in international shows. Introduced by colleague and volunteer, Kami Munderu, AVIF hopes to assist this fantastic work by possibly sending volunteers starting next month.

Embracing and saving newborn lives in Kayole and around the world

Happy New Year to you all and what a fabulous idea already virally hitting the internet!

Resembling a baby-sized sleeping bag, crucially, the "Embrace" includes a warming device that can be removed and heated in a pan of water over a wood fire in only a few minutes. Once charged, the device "will keep the baby at a constant 37C (98F) for more than four hours".

Incredibly the product isn't even readily available yet but the word is out. Roll out will begin in Indian communities, but we'd like to purchase a number of these low cost devices that WILL help to save the lives of premature and underweight babies born in the area served by the ArrowWeb Hospital, a community hospital in the Kayole-Soweto region of the Nairobi slums. Providing in and outpatient care, laboratory services and an urgent-care centre to more than 34,000 patients, approx. 250 a week, with very little funding, ArrowWeb has a dire need for incubators. Albeit very necessary these life-saving devices are also very expensive and hard to transport safely, even when offered freely by organisations such as AID 2 Hospitals Worldwide. We are raising funds to purchase a supply of the "groundbreaking, inexpensive solution", designed by students at Stanford University, US.

Donating through our JustGiving site is simple, fast and totally secure. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to us with Gift Aid on top (of every eligible donation by a UK taxpayer).

Please dig deep and help save some precious lives. Just click the widget below: