19/02/08

Tigers Club is Ten Years Old!

There was a big party in Kampala on Saturday 16th February to celebrate the Tigers Club’s 10th birthday!

Early reports are that it was a great success!
 
The show that the boys from Tudabujja half-way home had devised told the story of a boy who ran to the streets after he lost his father's bicycle. They did three shows which were well attended. At the afternoon performance on Saturday, we were excited to welcome many of the foster mamas and children as well as some of the older boys who are now living independently. One young man even came with his son. It was particularly encouraging when one boy, who had been resettled earlier in the week, came with his mother and grandmother. This boy had run away from his father's home after his parents had separated. The mother was so grateful to be reunited with her son, it seems the father's family had not told her what had happened. She was so encouraged by what Tigers Club is doing that there is a possibility she will become a foster mama and take in another child.

A more in depth report will posted here as soon as we receive it.

RETRAK’s Pioneer Project Celebrates 10 Years

If you’d read the dazzling review of the performance ‘Home Street Home’ in Uganda’s leading paper, The New Vision, you’d have thought an amazing, professional theatre company had come to town. Well, they weren’t professional but they were amazing.

On 28th February 2008 the Tigers Club Project celebrated being a registered charity in Uganda for 10 years.

To commemorate this great occasion, the boys and staff at the Tigers Club worked with a Ugandan cultural organisation (Uganda Heritage Roots) to create a play. The boys began by telling their individual stories to the team about why they left home, experiences of life on the streets of Kampala and how they had moved on. The staff shared about the Tigers boys and project.

UHR took anecdotes from the real lives shared with them and created one story which was creatively told by the Tudabujja boys using drama, dance and music. The result, ‘Home Street Home’, was fantastic. The current boys at Tudabujja are an incredibly talented bunch and were able to portray funny moments and dreadful times in a really moving but entertaining way. We were so proud!

The boys absolutely loved devising, rehearsing and performing. It was a privilege to see a few of the shyest boys taking the lead roles and growing in confidence through the process. The hostel boys also contributed a dance which they had created themselves, and the boys at the clubhouse drew pictures of street life to inspire the artist designing the back drop.

Three performances took place and the response was excellent each time. We were delighted to have the whole ‘Tigers family’ watching: the heroes that are foster families; ex-Tigers boys who are now independent – one with his son; the hostel boys; current street children who have found Tigers; members of staff, past and present, and many of our long term supporters. The event was used to re-launch Uganda’s Friends of Tigers Club, through which people have renewed or begun supporting Retrak in Uganda.

Another memory for the boys was the excitement of being able to drink as many fizzy drinks as they liked for the days of the show as Coca Cola had sponsored the event!
Not so healthy but lots of fun! For all of the boys it was a chance to be part of something fun, significant and rewarding… just another way in which RETRAK is enabling street children to realise their potential and discover their worth.

Photos to follow soon.