KL is a 17 year old Syrian adolescent who moved to Cairo after the war took place in Syria.

As all Syrians who were forced to leave their homes, remembers the exact date in which he left his home on 13 November, 2012.

When KL moved to Cairo, he was only 14 years old.

As he moved with his family and without his father, KL began to earn his family’s living by working in parking lots, supermarkets, grocery stores and hairdressers.

“I had to work, though I faced many problems to find a job, Some days I returned home with 2 pounds and this was all I succeeded to get”

In 2015, His mother saw an announcement on Facebook for an “Interactive Theatre” asking for volunteers by CARE in a CSO near their house.

“Though I was a little bit not sure that this is a true training, I gave myself a chance to have something new!”, He added “I felt at the beginning that I do not belong neither to the place nor participants and that I am a stranger as I always feel”.

But this feeling has been dramatically changed after the third session of the training.

“This spirit I have felt in the group brought back the same feeling I used to have with my friends back in Syria”.

During the first stage of the training in which the trainer helped the participants to get closer to their personalities and memories, many hurtful memories were passing in KL’s mind.

KL remembered the sexual harassment incident he faced when he was 8 years old. As he described, a man took him in a hidden place and forced him with a knife to take off his clothes.

KL mentioned that the perpetrator threatened him that he will be killed if he told anybody about what happened.

That was not the only memory that crossed his mind, KL also remembered his two close friends who died in front of his eyes in Syria.

“I became accustomed to scenes of blood and murder, I need help!”

After some sessions and getting involved in acting, KL’s character has completely changed, He became more optimistic about his future.

His smile began to appear for the first time since he came to Egypt as he mentioned.

He found new friends and his talents appeared. Moreover, He became a defendant for the cause of the project and combating Sexual and Gender Based Violence.

“I became more close to problems that Syrians face and I feel I have a role in changing my community”.

The interactive theatre training has helped him overcome his inner pain and awful incidents he faced in his life.

KL, as per the trainer’s evaluation, has a great potential in acting and in interactive theatre.

The trainer and his colleagues always encourage him before and after the performance.

The young man’s scenes are met with loud applause from the audience every time he conducted theatre performances.

“I have retrieved my dreams and I have a role model, our theatre trainer”.

KL offers help in many scenes in case of absence of his colleagues. He has been a co-trainer for a new theatre group for women in the same project.

Moreover, he was recruited as a theatre trainers in a Syrian local NGO working in Egypt. KL’s dream is coming true.

He described the “Interactive Theatre” training as a turning point in his life and apparently it will be.

NB: KL is not the real name of the young man as per her request due to the sensitivity of the incident he faced

What could EGP100/ a day do for a family of seven members? Khadra Mostafa, a married woman living with her husband and five children in Dayrout El-Sherif village, Assiut governorate. The oldest girl is 16 years old is getting married soon, and the youngest is a 5-year-old boy. Large families tied with small income are a main feature of local communities. Khadra’s family speaks for the status quo of thousands of poor families in Upper Egypt. Her husband, Sherif works as a baker. He has been moving from one working place to another. Khadra and Sherif used to fight all the time about money. This has quickly turned into violent discussions. Endless discussions triggered silence. Khadra in dire need for money has stopped asking her husband for money not even for her diabetes medication. She ended up going into a coma. The family remained with zero income for long time.Amal Bokra/ Hope for Tomorrow association made an announcement about the EU sub-grants. Khadra submitted an application. She has always loved soap trading. Before getting married, she used to sell and buy ready-made soap. But she could not make soap at home. “I did not know how to make it. No one taught me”, she explains. First, her husband refused the home-based business. He could not stand the idea of people constantly visiting the house day and night. Things changed overnight! One day, her husband left his job for over a month. “Suddenly, he stopped pouring his anger on me: he realized that I can make money on my own. We don’t argue about expenses anymore”, she said.
Zaynahom, head of Amal Bokra association explains that the grant covers the largest portion of the capital needed for the business while the applicant pays the rest to ensure her seriousness about launching the business. In addition to the grant, Khadra received a 3-day training at the association premises to gain the necessary skills for soap making. At the beginning, it was not easy: “I spoiled two mixes and kept crying all day. At the end, I was able to fix them. They were all sold out”, she explains. “Today, I gain EGP 800/ month. I pay the house rent. I spend the rest on food and education of my children and save some money for my daughter’s wedding”, Khadra adds.This small business has just unleashed her mind to think about bigger dreams. She is now dreaming of expanding her business and buying a new house. “What would happen to my children if I die? I do not want to leave them on the street. We need to have our own house”, she highlights. Howaida Nagy, Project Manager at CARE explains: “CARE is keen on providing women participants with capacity-building trainings as we will not contemplate with providing money to participants. Our goal is to offer sustainable interventions to the target groups that would have impactful sights on their livelihoods for years to come.”

210 young men and women have been engaged in monitoring the performance of local grassroots organizations in Beni-Suef and Assiut during Hayat Kareema project period (2016- 2019). The community-based monitoring model is designed to build trust between CARE and local grassroots associations on one side and between project’s participants and associations on the other side.As part of the Governance Programming Framework, CARE introduces social accountability tools for the first time in Egypt. Partners are fully engaged in ensuring transparency, access to information and compliance to all forms of community-based monitoring mechanisms. “The model offers a space to citizens to help improve local development processes in the most impoverished areas of Egypt”, Dr. Refaat Abdel-Kerim, Governance and Civil Society Advisor at CARE Egypt says. Youth described how impactful it was on their characters, lives and improving the project’s final deliverables. Mohamed Farag-Allah, coordinator at Hayat Kareema project, explains: “I learnt a lot through this experience. I learnt about procurement, tenders, filing systems. I have better communication skills”. Trainings included communications, accountability concepts, report writing, conflict resolution, field monitoring, input tracking, and public hearing management. Despite signing contracts between CARE and grassroots associations clearly stating that the community-based monitoring mechanism is an essential part of the project. Yet, associations had a difficulty cooperating with young graduates playing the role of monitors at the beginning. Directors of associations are used to receive inspections from government entities not youth. That is a precedent of its kind.
“It is not easy for associations to receive a bunch of fresh graduates coming to spotlight mistakes and expose them to the community and CARE, or at least this how they thought we are coming for. However, when we explained that we are here to help, provide technical support and improve their performance, they started to cooperate gladly”, Ahmed Mohamed, former facilitator at the project says. Monitoring incorporated meeting with project’s participants, discussions with association’s team and documentation review. When bugs surfaced, the monitoring team starts discussing with the team at the association the means of adjustments. Then, the whole thing is reported back to CARE. If the association does not make the necessary amendment. A public hearing session is organized. “Associations lack the experience and technical knowledge. Some of them do not own a laptop. Others do not know how to write reports”, Ahmed underlines. Said Hefny, director of Ayadi El-Kheir association at Beni Soliman village, Beni Suef previously described young graduates as “a bunch of kids inspecting the association’s work”. He quickly changed his perspective when he realized the true objective of social accountability. “They –the youth- became our contact point with the community. At some point, they redirected our attention to more unprivileged areas in the village. They transferred best practices from one association to the other”, he explains. So far, 18 public hearings sessions were held with the main purpose of providing a platform of interaction and dialogue between grassroots beneficiaries, local CSOs, local authorities and local business community. Most CSOs applied the required amendments.