Fauza grew up in a dysfunctional Muslim family in the Namuwongo slum. In her middle teens, she was in a dance group and using drugs, barely getting by.
She joined Touch the Slum in January 2021 and is now on staff as the Lead on our Media team and a documentary film maker.
This is her story.
Blessings,
Jennings
PS It costs $35/mo for us to take a girl like Fauza through Skills for Life, where they can become literate and learn a vocational skill that will allow them to earn a sustainable living. By donating today, you can impact these girls for the rest of their lives!
This week is the end of our first-ever term break. Normally, we end one term on Friday and start orientation the next Monday!
There were a lot of reasons for the break this time, but rising food costs are the number one. It seems like every month we look at the food budget and try to figure out what we can cut or reduce or substitute while still offering a daily meal to all the students — often the only one they get in a day.
Today it was, “Can we cut back on rice and do more posho? How about cutting g nuts and doing more cowpeas?” We try to make sure that the girls are getting a complete protein, and there are foods like silverfish that we need to have for our nursing residential teen moms. Of course, we’d like to offer more variety and fresh fruits and vegetables than we can until the farm starts producing.
Skills for Life is FREE to our students, and that’s not going to change. We provide the instruction, the materials and supplies, and other support that’s needed. Completely free.
But none of it is free to us!
If you’ve been thinking about making a donation and haven’t yet, now is the time! We’ve got some great projects on DonorSee for supplies, medical care, and more. You can also make a donation on Donorbox in any amount, or sign up to be a monthly donor. We use 100% of your donations (minus processing fees unless you donate those as well) on the project, always!
The buttons are below — we so appreciate your support!
Bob Ditty is an international award-winning photographer and film maker who lives in Uganda. Through mutual friends, we connected with him a couple of years ago and asked him to do a shoot at the Ross House compound and around the Namuwongo slum. First covid and then a bout with malaria delayed his visit – UNTIL TODAY!
But equally as exciting is that he is mentoring Fauza and Monica Angel, the two girls in our Skills for Life Videography class. They are training to be Namuwongo’s first-ever female videographers, and having someone like Bob spend time mentoring them, as well as letting them shadow him as he works, is absolutely priceless.
I woke up this morning to photos and videos like this one. Bob demonstrating, explaining, encouraging, answering questions… For two teenagers from the slum, this is an experience that could change their entire lives.
One of our core philosophies is that we empower our teen girls to create lasting, sustainable change in their lives. We provide OPPORTUNITIES which give HOPE and SKILLS, and those things drive CHANGE.
Bob’s visit will bless all of us with amazing images and video, and give us a glimpse into our work with new eyes. But what it is giving Fauza and Monica Angel is literally life-changing.
