Eunice found a baby, when we travelled to Lake Nabugabo, near Masaka
Eunice is now 16 and has completed her “O” levels. She may be quiet on this blog, but that is because she has been concentrating on her exams this year, yet, this year has been also very productive for Eunice on the project.
Of all our members, Eunice is the most talented in music. She is a Christian and has been singing in the church choir for many years. Other of our members have musical potential – Peter, Samuel, Gilbert, Charles and others – but Eunice has the real in-built talent, but this has not until recently been a priority of hers. Eunice lives in Kisenyi, Kampala’s biggest slum district and she lives in perhaps one of the most dangerous parts of the slum. Her father died a few years ago and Eunice, as the youngest, was left alone to look after her mother, who is unable to find work and thus can earn very little each month and hardly enough to pay the meagre rent on her home in Kisenyi.
Fortunately for Eunice an NGO, MYDEL – Mengo Youth Development Link– had their offices near to where she lived and they were able to support her in the early period after her father died. MYDEL are a great organisation that does sports and theatre for youth and also now runs an orphanage for children in Nansana. MYDEL are also important to us, as they have provided us with one of best trainers – Alex Obeki. So, Eunice learnt much from MYDEL and it may have been them that helped her develop a vision to support the street children of Kisenyi with an orphanage.
Eunice has performed many times now at the Sheraton Hotel in Kampala
Here are five of Eunice's 30-strong dance group for
Through MYDEL and her selfless drive to help other children, Eunice has gained supporters from all around the world and she has also worked very hard to keep her free place at Kampala Music School and improve on her flute and keyboard-playing this year. An orphanage is a tall order for a young person, so she has been working on two social projects, while on the Butterfly Project – one is for girls – music and dance and the other is art for boys, as Eunice is quite a talented artist too and taught Gilbert much of what he knows about shading.
While Eunice needs our support for her family, she has been incredibly self-sufficient on her project and has never requested any financial support for her own work in the community. She has impressed with her ability to negotiate a rehearsal place and also to compose original material for her singers.Last year she was also one of our three selected members to represent all young people in our part of Kampala on the subject of positive living.Eunice has performed many times now at the Sheraton Hotel in Kampala
Whatever path Eunice treads in future, it will not be a selfish one and I believe we should seek out young people, prepared to give of themselves for free and encourage their work. If you want to be one of these and support Eunice, then write to this email.
- Eunice is our most international citizen – she knows more people from outside Uganda than any other member.
The Butterfly Project 