By Peninah | Director
"I joined safe spaces when i had lost hope in life and lost in street life.My Mother died when i was 7 years from injuries inflicted by my father during home fights.At the time of death after one of the fights,he tied us on the bed with a rope and left.I was rescued by my grandmother 4 days later so weak out of hunger and my moms corpse almost starting to decompose in the house.My grandmother took me to our rural home and she passed on 2 years later. I was left alone and fear of dying of hunger i went into the streets and joined other girls who were doing prostitution.Life was so unbearable having to serve 3 clients in a night at the age of 12 years.My body was aching all over the next day.I was saved by one of the clients,as i explained to him about my situation. He took me to Safe Spaces programme.Safe Spaces enrolled me into a primary school and found me safe home where i live up to today.I will be completing my High school next year through scholarship support in safe spaces and i want to be a Doctor in future to help many children in our community who cannot afford medication when they are sick.I have gone through alot of Reproductive health training and awareness in the programme and i feel that am a leader now and my first task is to go and talk to the other girls i left in the streets besides teaching the young girls in the programme every weekend".
Tracy-17 years
Safe Spaces provides a unique space for holistic growth for girls living in the slums.We reach 200 girls every week through our lifeskills and reproductive health programmes and sports programmes.we support 60 girls with part High school fees and 10 girls will be completing Automechanics course by the end of 2015.Every Holiday we hold workshops in photography and filming,computer literacy and basketball camps for more than 300 girls to help them continue growing positively and with skills and also to keep them busy from idling in the community and being pressured to act otherwisely by their peers.We also help them do their homeworks in the office as there is no enough space in their homes.All this is made posiible by your generous support and we thankyou so much.
This is what one of the girls Leaders said in a community forum
"In terms of world leaders,i would like them to know that young people are not just simply leaders of tomorrow,we are already leaders and members of our todays society,our views matter,we need avenues to express them and a guarrantee that we have freedom of expression.when we are treated as full partners in development issues,real change will result"
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