Red Cross Blogs

International Youth Camp (2) – HINIVUU

By Chris Jefferies
December 16, 2009 at 10:35 am

Guest blogger: Amutha Rasapalan. Amutha and myself were participants at the Kenya Red Cross International Youth Camp 2009. Here she describes her experiences on the Tuesday and Wednesday at the camp!

Hi, this is my first Red Cross blog and I feel so fortunate that I have such an amazing experience to share with you. This is our second day at the youth camp, after our daily wake up call at 5:30am and group workout on the beach, everyone is wide-eyed and bushy tailed for day two (Tuesday) activities.

The title by the way is how volunteers at the camp have been greeting each other (using the initials of the seven fundamental principles) – the movement even has its own language –woo hoo!

Highlights of the camp today included discussions about the Kenya Red Cross youth policy. A staggering 70% of Red Cross volunteers in Kenya are young people and all the wonderful delegates at this camp are leaders of volunteers and projects in their local branch. Therefore this was a session that generated a lot of opinion. The leadership that young people have in Kenya is definitely something other societies need to aspire to. As Shadrack (Kenya Red Cross Regional Youth Officer) said – “A society that ignores its youth ignores its own existence”.

The interest by volunteers to ensure they have a voice through their branch, area and national youth councils is incredibly refreshing.  Young people feel empowered and this leads to intrinsic skills being achieved such as public speaking, reasoning etc as well as meaningful projects being delivered which meet the needs of the vulnerable.  

After a morning of intense debate, the afternoon was all about volunteering in action. We did a beach tidy! Did you know crabs feed on seaweed? – Burying seaweed back in the sand was fun especially when it ended up in one huge sand fight! Chris definitely looked worse for wear by the end! However by the end of the week I’m sure he’ll get his own back.

Wednesday

Today has been a whirlwind of contributions.  It started with each National Society and Kenya Red Cross region sharing the work that their young volunteers do.

Here’s a brief sum up of interesting aspects from Kenya. If you’d like to know about other National Societies then just leave a comment!

In Kenya, they have a four part youth programme made up of the following strands:

• Promotion of life and health: This encourages young people to improve their health and lifestyles, and the health of their surrounding communities. Activities include HIV & AIDS awareness, first aid training and disaster preparedness.
• Community services: The Kenya Red Cross encourages young people to develop social responsibility and awareness of the environment through projects such as tree planting, peace building and climate change awareness.
• Promotion of local and national friendships and understanding: As young people make up such a big majority of Kenya Red Cross volunteers they are encourage to build friendships and network both locally and globally (this youth camp is part of this!)
• Dissemination of Red Cross principles: Young people educate other young people about the work of the Red Cross.

By the end I really did feel like I had been around the world in 80 minutes! Chris and myself were also given the opportunity to explain the work we do here in the UK. We knew we only had ten minutes to share, so we decided to make a display with all the information and photos we had brought! I tell thee, Bluetac – is an incredibly invention – our display stayed up for the rest of the camp in the sweltering heat!

We received two big cheers during our presentation. They were for the fact that we now have first aid on the school curriculum and are attempting to get International Humanitarian Law (IHL) on the curriculum as well.

The day didn’t end here. Drug addiction, especially Heroin, is a crisis in many parts of Kenya. A Red Cross volunteer came to share his experience as a recovering Heroin addict. He told an incredibly moving and emotional tale and left us with the question: How may of us would give a drug addict a clean syringe? 

We are halfway through the camp and it’s incredible how well everyone gets on and how close everyone is becoming. The Kenyans have been wonderful hosts and all the delegates are really enjoying each other’s company.  The evening ends like every evening in Kenya with music, dance and laughter!

I will sign off today with my local name, that the Kenyan delegates have given me – Nanjala! Now I really feel at home!

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Tags: international youth camp, Kenya, kenya red cross

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