Community development through Arts and Creative Education
What is Haba na Haba?
The Haba na Haba project is geared towards establishing well-organised arts activities for youth, while at the same time using arts to educate the community. The project activities are open to all, regardless of relig...
Community development through Arts and Creative Education
What is Haba na Haba?
The Haba na Haba project is geared towards establishing well-organised arts activities for youth, while at the same time using arts to educate the community. The project activities are open to all, regardless of religion, race, tribe or political affiliations and aim to give youth an opportunity to express and develop their artistic potential. Since the project members are mainly youth who come from very poor families, no registration is required to participate.
Where is it?
Haba na Haba is based at the old MYSA office in Eastleigh, just a few metres from the Mathare slums.
We perform and interact
Community Open Theatre
Every Saturday the Haba na Haba project holds a two hour Participatory Educative Theatre show, including, acrobatics, music, dance and drama. In order to reach both the young and the old, these shows are mainly staged near a market. The skits(short plays) developed are audience participatory. The audience maintains the power to decide what direction the skit should take, which allows open communication between community members and the performers. Usually a discussion erupts, which gives our peer educators and counsellors an opportunity to elaborate further about the issues affecting the community. On several occasions we have performed for audiences of up to 1000 people
Schools Interactive Theatre
The Haba na Haba project also organises Participatory Educative Theatres in schools often concerning reproductive health education, which is not taught in schools. Many youth will opt to get answers to their questions from their peers and this information is not always correct.
All teachers and students attend the shows, thus encouraging discussion between the performers, teachers and the students.
Interactive wall at the MYSA office in Eastleigh
In conjunction with the Kuona Trust, a network of Kenyan artists, the wall is repainted quarterly. Subjects include:
Women empowerment.
Rape.
Education
Alcohol and drug abuse.
Images are the main focus, since not everyone can read in English and Swahili. At the end of the wall is a small blackboard where community members who can write are able to put down their comments and highlight other areas to focus on.
We are looking for other walls within the slum for interactive imagery.
We empower artists and the community through education.
Trainings and Rehearsals
In order to prepare shows for the community we have daily evening rehearsals conducted by a professional theatre director. The director also spends time with individual artists and helps to develop their other potentials such as poetry, mime and story telling.
Performing Arts Workshop
In conjunction with professional theatre teachers, we conduct workshops to build capacity among our members, which enable them to understand art and its potential as a development tool.
We promote arts and culture
Monthly Children’s Theatre
This develops old African tales into theatre pieces that are easy to understand and trigger discussion. So far the project has held four successful shows with over 800 children attending. Subjects include the role of children in society, their rights and the need to give them opportunities.
Watoto WanaSay Festival
This is a five day event organised by children for children. The organizing committee is comprised of children: one boy and one girl selected from each of the sixteen slum areas in which MYSA operates.
The festival aims to educate and sensitize the community on children’s rights,
give children an opportunity to learn new skills and techniques, and develop new leaders by letting the children take control.
Why Dance, Music, Drama and Acrobatics?
Personal development
One of the most effective and entertaining ways to exchange important information is through the arts. Dance, music, drama and acrobatics activities also offer youth a chance to develop, to express creativity and to showcase skills and special talents. All these help in personal development, physically, mentally and creatively.
Social integration
The arts, just like sport, draw a big audience. Arts promote unity and solidarity amongst generations. Arts erase differences in race, religion, gender, age, political affiliations etc. Among the youth who are always the most affected, music, dance, acrobatics and drama are a means of social integration.
Communication and documentation
The history of many African communities is not documented; thus the arts were, and are still used as a means of passing information from one generation to the other.
Since many Africans have this connection and exposure to arts, the Haba na Haba project adopted folk media as the medium of conveying information to the community.
