Hey Jim - has Dennis migrated over here yet? I'll send him a quick heads up. World AIDS Day is December 1, so alas we'll miss it together - but hopefully get some activities planned together, perhaps a strong Vermont-Kenya link!

And huge thanks to you and Allison for your wonderful support of this effort, on many levels! We will certainly plan to see out at Middlebury if not before. I am also going to try and throw a little Dinner for Dennis - I know its a hike, but maybe one or all of you can make it, depending...?

Cheer - and yes, Congratulations Dennis! Ticket is in hand :)

Hello Jim and all

It will be my pleasure to ensure thatb whatever i learn in Vermont will be shared here in Kenya and am looking forwad to knowing you guys better and create stronger links.

Best Regards.

Dennis

Yeah, sorry, I got the event wrong. It's a name I can't spell, so I'll wait for Allison to chime in.

I know its not very late to send my congratulations to you Dennis for the wonderful effort and opportunity that you got to go to CAbot.To Lars and all who made this a success may u all be blessed. Hope to hear more from you Denno

Congratulations Dennis and all the best in your trip!!

Thanks Moses and Ronald will ensure that i present your issues on PT also Ronald if you have tiles that i can take to Cabot it will be really great hope to meet with you before going so that i can be able to tell people what you are doing with PT here.

Best regards Dennis

Ronald, is it possible for you to start a discussion thread here about your work? i don't know enough about it, and i'd love to learn more! in fact, i'll start the thread and kick it off with some of our O.net discussions.

Dennis, we have our first "event" on your itinerary planned: Rory Turner (who we will hear more from I am sure) has invited us to make a presentation to his students, possibly others, at Gaucher College on the 25 October. Can you put this on your calendar? Rory will be posting more information soon.

Working backward from this date, I think we should plan to be in Washington, DC on the evening of the 23 October to meet with the Womens Collective, the organization my wife works for, the Booker T. Washington high school, a theater group using the Playback methodology (do you know this?) to raise awareness about AIDS, and some other groups to be determined.

After DC we'd head to Baltimore and then New York City to meet with Global Kids, the Playback Theater crew there, see a Broadway play and meet my dear auntie Ruthie, my cousin Katie who works for the NYC Health Department, and have some good food :)

How does this sound? Its alot of driving - but I think it'll be fun!

We are all really excited about Dennis and Lars coming to Goucher! I should have more information soon on this.

Lars the plans look really fantastic i have no concreate plans yet, will work with your etienerary to fit in any other visits. looking forwad to meeting you Rory

Dennis, things are coming together well on my end. Can you please send me a 1/2 page to 1-page biography? Not a CV, but something in narrative form that describes you, your work, and your background (education, interests, accomplishments, etc)? we should get these to Rory soon.

Also, i have spoken with dr mwita at Princeton and we are tentatively booked for the 23/24 october. tim thomas (who is leaving Staying Alive Foundation at the end of September) is looking at the 28 or 29 October as possible dates to meet you (he is on travel before that) and also trying to set something up at the UN Population Fund.

Matt Naylor is in Austin, Texas and going to work with Courtney and (Sally was it?) to see if they can fly you out there for a couple of days before you head out November 2.

Lars will send this 1st thing in the morning i am in a cyber now and they are closing down so will write it down and then paste it here for you and the others also dominique at razoo,

Great bro!

I'd love to connect when you're in the NYC area - what would the dates be? Would you like to try to do some Peace Tiles? I would!!

hi michele - what with our schedule the way it is, i won't have much energy for making art. we should be in NYC the 28,29ish if everything works out. i won't speak for dennis, but for me dinner or coffee somewhere would be just fine :)

Eating is almost as good as making Peace Tiles ;-)

Keep me posted - that would be great!!

Lars and Michele It will be great to meet with you and am ok with food, Dennis

Hello Lars Thanks for all the support if you can copy this to razoo also it will be fine.

Well let me start by saying that I have a big passion for community work, which I started while I was still in high school, I have been doing activism work on health issues from 1998. during that year we started a group called ANFORD, which originated from youths in high school who wanted to help youths who are younger than them from making mistakes that they made during there time, at this time working with other young people and proud to be Africans I learnt a lot about involving the community in solving problems that they face. ANFORD stands for African Nations Foundation for Rural Development. And as we started it we had the vision of making more Africans realize that they can solve there own problems and they do not need others to help them but at the same time they can partner with others to achieve there goals and solutions to there problems. While in ANFORD is started a department there that used theatre to address the problems and challenges affecting the communities around us with the approach of participatory theatre where all of us were involved in the solution, while doing an outreach PATH employees approached me and recruited me to work with them in there outreaches, ANFORD was a school based program which was started by students and up to date it is run with students.

After high school I was not able to go to college because of lack of school fees, so I managed to work with PATH under a project called IMPACT which was being funded by FHI, I was trained as a community mobilizer, facilitator and enactor, its while doing work with them that we formed REPACTED after the project came to an end. We are now doing most of the things from the perspective of the community and mostly we are trying to see what the problem in the communities is, with the government telling donor that we have achieved 98% of awareness messages, we are using theatre to see what is still missing because we are still having new cases of infection.

Because of my activism in health issues related to youth I represent the youth at the Constituency Aids Control Committee which is under the office of the president and as at now I am moving a motion that in there next funding which they are getting from the World Bank they tell the public specifically how much money they have for the youths in relation to health matters, I have also been helping the groups here to be accountable to every cent that they get.

I am an award winner with Staying Alive foundation under MTV, a finalist at the New York Film festivals with the last time a short movie that we made in Toronto.

Briefly these are some of the things I have done and what I can talk about myself the list can go on and on.

Very exciting to see the world coming together like this. So glad you are able to come speak in the US, Dennis. Have a wonderful journey.

Dennis, I took a stab at squeezing your great story into a more formal "bio." Can you correct any errors, and add anything that you think should be here, and then I'll share with you, Rory, Mwita, and others as a word.doc? Thanks!

---

Dennis Kimambo is a passionate and gifted community educator who has been active in health issues since his high school years in Nakuru, Kenya where he was born. The founder of two community-based education and self-development organizations, Dennis has deep experience in participatory theater, facilitation, and mobilization. He is an award-winning writer and director who has received support from MTVs Staying Alive Foundation and was a short-film finalist at the New York Film Festival.

In 1998 Dennis and his colleagues founded their first student-led, peer-mentoring association called African Nations Foundation for Rural Development, or ANFORD. The inspiration for this effort originated from high school youths who wanted to help younger Kenyans avoid some of the mistakes that they had made during their time, as well as to cultivate pride as Africans. Today, the vision of ANFORD remains much as it was from the outset, which is to make more Africans aware that they can solve their problems on their own, and at the same time they can partner with others to develop new solutions to the problems they face achieve their goals together.

Through this experience working with other young educators, Dennis learned real-time about community involvement strategies and techniques to engage people in problem-solving. During this time with ANFORD, Dennis became interested in theater as a mode of community education and founded a successful outreach program that uses participatory theatre techniques to address the problems and challenges affecting the communities around us.

In the process of running his outreach programs in theater, the international not-for-profit organization PATH approached and recruited Dennis to work with them as an outreach specialist for their IMPACT project, funded by Family Health International. Through this program, and without formal college-training, Dennis was trained as a community mobilizer, facilitator and enactor.

With these skills and experiences under his belt, Dennis formed REPACTED when the PATH project came to an end. He is now running several programs at the community-level within a context in which the government is telling donors that Kenya has achieved 98% of awareness messages. To “fill the gap,” REPACTED is using theatre to uncover community barriers to problem-solving around issues like HIV/AIDS infection which, despite early signs of progress, persist.

Because of Dennis’ activism around youth-related health issues related he has been invited to represent young people at the Constituency Aids Control Committee under the office of the President. In this capacity he is moving a motion that in the next round of World Bank funding the government must inform the public specifically how much money they will have for youth programs in relation to health. At the same time, Dennis is a strong advocate for accountability and has been helping youth-focused organizations to better report on the grants they receive.

This looks ok Lars you are great with words.

Okay, great - getting a version to you in word, and off to Rory. Cheers, Dennis!

This is brilliant Dennis and Lars! Good work to you both. People here are getting excited about meeting the two of you!

Now Lars, I need a bio/blurb about you too, when you can.

Carpe diem

yep - will send you a single word file rory - thanks! and, i am completely thrilled to be meeting you at last, along with your students - thank you so much for arranging this opportunity.

A single word file or a single Word file? :-D

I as thinking the single word file was THANKS!