Kabuthu Girls' Hostel Project: Completed!

We are excited to bring you news of the completion and handover of the girl’s hostel (Phase 1) and moving in ceremony which was held on Monday 23rd October at Kabuthu. 

With the bunk beds and bedding in, and the finishing touches placed on the building, it became time to hand over the boarding hostel to the girls of Kabuthu Community Day Secondary School. The handover event was attended by the TA (Traditional Authority/Senior Chief), Village Chiefs, School Committee, Community Representative (Richard Mdyetseni), Teachers, Learners, and Grieve and Ann from Build a School (our partnered organisation). 

The handover involved speeches and performances by the girls before they moved into the hostel. The girls were very happy to move into a safe and comfortable space where they can live whilst they receive an education at the school on site. They wish to send on their well-wishes and gratitude to all the donors of this special project. 

We are pleased with the completion of this phase of the hostel and relieved that the girls of Kabuthu have somewhere safe and comfortable to sleep.  They have already started work on their own front garden for the hostel, and we are pleased that they are making themselves at home. 

This hostel marks a new start. It is now the home of 40 girls, and will be the home of many more to follow them. It is the outcome of hundreds of volunteer hours, thousands of kind and generous hearts, and a community's labour of love. The project has been no easy feat: it has been stalled by famine, halted by flood rains, and slowed by the effects of poverty. But it now stands complete and ready, as a symbol of determination for the education and empowerment of girls. 

Thank you so much to all involved in this special project. As the largest project EGG has completed, it would not be at all possible without the support of our fantastic EGG community and donors. We are so grateful, and the girls of Kabuthu are so grateful too. 

We wish to share with you a poem written by Mary Banda, one of the girls who has moved into the new hostel. She wrote this for the opening ceremony:
 

A CRY OF HAPPINESS

Let me cry
tears of happiness
I used to cry
tears of sorrow

When in my room
men used to enter
seducing and stealing
mine was a cry of sorrow

Let me cry now
tears of happiness
when a merciful hostel
has wiped my tears of sorrow
thank you donors and all well wishers

Girls let us cry in harmony
tears of happiness
for Education for girls
will be achieved

If you educate a girl
you educate the whole Nation
Education is the key to development
Malawi will be developed

Let me cry tears of happiness