By Matthew Matola | Development Associate
Home to more than 500 of Rwanda’s most vulnerable orphaned youth, the Agahozo-Shalom Youth Village heals its students by providing them with the skills and loving support they need to imagine a better future. Life Enrichment Applied Programs (LEAP), one of ASYV’s four program areas, helps us to achieve this by encouraging our kids to explore their own unique talents through extracurricular activities and student-run clubs. This summer, our students brought LEAP to life in many exciting ways, including the ASYV Champions League, an intramural sports competition, and an original play performed at the Ubumuntu Arts Festival in the capital city, Kigali!
The ASYV Champions League brought our student families together for a friendly sports competition. With the theme “Together We Can!”, we believed that the Champions League would bring out a spirit of camaraderie and teamwork within our student families. By playing on their family’s team, our kids learned how to work together. The Champions League also gave our kids more quality time with their family mamas, who served as each team’s compassionate and confident coach.
Kicked off on May 11th, the Champions League proved to be an entertaining and engaging experience for our kids. All of our students took part, with some playing and others leading cheers and songs from the sidelines. Basketball, volleyball, and soccer games continued throughout the summer months, with our mamas providing emotional and moral support. After the final round concluded on July 30th, we gathered at the Lily Safra Amphitheater to congratulate the winning teams and MVP’s. Students and mamas had many good things to say about the Champions League, with Mama Asterie commenting that she was pleasantly surprised by her kids’ eagerness to take on leadership roles.
The Ubumuntu Arts Festival offered our kids a similarly enriching opportunity. Running from July 13–15 at the Kigali Genocide Memorial, the Festival is an annual celebration of what it means to be human. This year’s festival invited performers from around the world to share human stories, promote peace and healing from violence, and provide training and mentorship to artists. Pieces included “Love in the Time of Revolution,” an examination of the love story between Nelson and Winnie Mandela during their struggle against Apartheid in South Africa, and “Soul Seekers,” a video anthology of asylum seeker interviews collected by an Iraqi refugee living in Belgium.
Agahozo-Shalom’s students added their own voice to the festivities with an original play named “Gritenity.” Performing on the festival’s opening night, our Isano Isangiwe theater group told the story of Jack, a businessman who has lost his friend and accountant, Zambu, under tragic circumstances. Following Zambu’s death, Jack is alone and afraid that he will never find another employee as honest or trustworthy. What follows is a parable about the importance of honesty in the face of temptation, a story told through the artful combination of theater and dance. By performing one of our core values, integrity, on an international stage, our kids shared not only what they have learned in the Village, but also their own experience with healing.
Together, the ASYV Champions League and Isano Isangiwe theater group speak to the range of opportunities LEAP makes available to our kids. Athletic and artistic talents are embraced in equal measure, with each and every one of our students learning that their passion is worth celebrating. These programs build our students’ sense of self-confidence, healing past traumas while preparing them for life after graduation.
We hope you enjoyed this brief look into our Life Enrichment Applied Programs, a vital resource to our students. If you would like to learn more, we invite you to follow the links below. Murakoze cyane (thank you very much)!
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