C4C (updated with photos)

I always seem to get emails from unknown people, either at my own personal email address or the Buddies email address. Most are just spam emails - promoting things like viagra and the likes. Sometimes I open a particular email and the first thing I get to read was "Enlarge your p***s." Sheeesh!!

There are also a lot of those emails telling me that I just won millions in UK pounds or US Dollars from lotteries I never even participated in. And then there are emails purportedly coming from bank managers or lawyers or beneficiaries of a deceased person (who died in a plane crash or something to that effect) needing my help to transfer the amount out of their country into my account; after which I'd get a certain percentage of the millions left behind.

If any of those were true, I'd be richer than Bill Gates by now.

Nowadays, most of the time I'd either just delete those emails or mark them as spam before even reading them - especially if the sender's name sounds "foreign". And if those emails come with subject lines like "Hello" or "Submit your claims" - chances are those emails are sure to be marked as spam. Some time back I almost deleted an email coming from a Dick Grayson with the subject line "Hello". Luckily I still clicked on the message and from the preview pane I saw "Hello Kak Pi" in the message! So I read that email and apparently it came from Nightwing, a fellow blogger!

Recently I received another email which I almost deleted. The sender was a Ben Kasozi. At first I thought it was another one of those emails seeking my help to transfer some funds out of their country into my bank account. But the subject line "Sponsorship" caught my eye and so I decided to read it.

Ben had actually read about our Education Sponsorship for Children programme and wanted to know if he could apply for the children under his care. Well, our sponsorship programme only covers children of our own clients and as such we couldn't cover the children he was talking about.

Ben Kasozi is actually a volunteer from Kenya who, together with a few other volunteers, started a project called C4C (Children for Children) early this year. They started by interacting with street children and slum dwellers in the kayole slum located in the eastern side of Nairobi city through music and dance. By playing guitar and singing, they managed to attract many children across the slum. They then decided to gather the children (many of whom were orphaned during the bloody ethnic war) and formed a children's choir. They composed songs to educate the masses about children's rights and other major social issues. The children's choir perform in concerts around the city. Through this project, they are currently assisting 17 children including 7 who are HIV positive.

The volunteers formed a pool of donation in June this year, where they'd go around to collect used clothes, shoes and other necessities for the needy children but they realized the children cannot depend only on handouts. So they came out with a child sponsorship programme (possibly something similar to the one Buddies is doing) BUT to date they have yet to receive any sponsorship for the children.

Well, I can't help them with sponsorship, but I am now in contact with a volunteer in Kenya. And we will try to arrange to send our Buddy Bears to the 7 HIV infected children mentioned by Ben.

I also have a photo given by Ben (of the whole group of children in the choir) but since I have not got Ben's permission to show it to the public, I shall not include the photo in this posting.

*Updated 15/10/08 - Ben has given me permission to publish the photos, so here comes photos of the C4C children.

It's always nice to see them smile, isn't it? Cute, aren't they?

Personally, I feel they are carrying out a very interesting project... gathering the children from the slum and forming a choir - singing songs about children's rights and other social issues. At least the children would feel useful and that's good for their self esteem.

Those reading this blog and wish to help or to find out more info, you can contact Ben Kasozi via email or telephone: +254 728697400.