Nicofeli Tigers football team gets new jerseys!

The Nicofeli Tigers football team is roaring and ready to go with their fierce new jerseys, with customized tiger design and football-league quality logo, services designed and donated by friends in the USA. They received 75 new jerseys on Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2009.

The design was created by Antonio Garcia of www.goodnighttv.com. An adult version of the t-shirt will be sold online, with any proceeds returning to the club in Kibera.

Remaining needs for the team include a medical kit, modest transportation costs to regional matches, and proper footwear for the kids. If you would like to help sponsor the team or even donate for one of these needs, please contact the club directly at: nicofeliyouthclub@yahoo.com

To visit a related photo album which features more photos of the kids in their jerseys, a special lunchtime feeding day that served 100 residents, and kids from the affiliated Hope Library enjoying their growing collection of 3,200 books: link here.

Hope Library Phase II complete, with 2,200 more books!

Good news! The biggest shipment of donated books so far has arrived at The Hope Library in Kibera. More than 2,200 books arrived safely after a long journey via shipping container from the USA.

The books were gathered in Chicago and forwarded from other locations around the states by Ron Reason and his vast network of friends and sponsors, and were shipped along with a much larger collection of donated goods by the American Friends of Kenya. (Thanks, AFK!) To read a related blog entry about how Facebook helped make all this possible, go here. The books were carefully screened to be of most utility to the people of Kibera, and fall under categories including history, biography, geopolitics, women's studies, African and African-American authors, poetry, health, and lots and lots of classics, fiction and kids books.

Book donations are now on hold as Nicofeli/Hope pursues its dream in Phase III of its development: the procurement of a secure permanent facility, from which to operate the club's many programs that aid the community, and to house the impressive collection of books with proper shelves, lighting, and chairs where residents can relax and read. If you would like to help with this ambitious phase of our development, please contact: nicofeliyouthclub@yahoo.com

To see an inspiring photo album of the kids enjoying their books, go here.

'A library is changing Kibera' - profile in The Standard

A Sunday Magazine story in The Standard newspaper detailed the launch and early successes of the Nicofeli Youth Club library in Kibera. Link here for that article, and link here for a personal essay from Ron Reason, who assisted with the founding.

We're up and running! Kibera's first library

With more than 1,000 books on hand, Kibera's first library, affiliated with the Nicofeli Youth and Kids Clubs and housed at St. George Orthodox Church, is officially up and running! You can see photos of the kids enjoying the books, and director Osir Caleb and volunteers working with the kids, logging the books, and getting things rolling. To donate books, sporting goods, or other materials within Nairobi or vicinity, contact Osir Caleb at nicofelikidsclub@gmail.com. To donate money to be used toward shipping quality used books from the states, visit this page for more information and a quick link to PayPal. Thanks for visiting this blog, and for your support!

Nicofeli Youth Club Profile

BRIEF BACKGROUND OF THE CLUB

Nicofeli Youth Club’s present programmes were shaped by a planning process undertaken in 2008 immediately after the post-poll skirmishes, documented in the plan and budget 2008-2010. Although a two year perspective was taken, objectives were set to a one-year time frame ending July, 2009, and financial requests were likewise limited to one year. Nicofeli Youth Club is a Community Based Organization (CBO), duly registered by the Government of Kenya.

The club started in the year 2007, but became active the year 2008, immediately after post poll skirmishes, and so far has enrolled about 200 youth on board. The club’s motto is “Promoting Youth’s Talents Through Access to Youth’s Right to Extracurricular Activities.” But access to these activities are limited by weakness in the system, e.g. insufficient personnel unevenly distributed, with the poor getting nearly 1%, if any; affordable facilities; complexity of procedures; remoteness of professional personnel and socioeconomic characteristics of the population, e.g. low functional literacy levels, ignorance of rights, and of course poverty itself. Furthermore, the education, cultural, gender and social systems tend to be perceived by the ordinary youth as an instrument of state authority, oppressive, complicated, slow and remote.

Fundraising underway to ship books

A holiday fundraising drive is underway via the art gallery within(Reason): a contemporary art and photo space, in Chicago, to raise monies to help ship books to the Nicofeli church library in Kibera. For more information on how you can help, visit this page. [Above: Volunteer Jessica Gilbert helps package books in preparation for shipping from Chicago.]

Welcome! About the clubs

The Nicofeli Kids Club and Youth Club are up and running! Founded and directed by Osir Caleb, the clubs are a venue for kids of the Kibera slum of Nairobi, Kenya, to have access to after-school arts, reading and sports programs. If you would like to learn more about helping, please email nicofelikidsclub@gmail.com and we will get back to you right away!