News

London Teenage Poetry SLAM 2008

AWEMA teemed up with Lynk Reach for the final of the London Teenage Poetry SLAM 2008. AWEMA helped in the co-ordination and running of the event. The day was a great success with seven schools participating in the finals. The highest scoring team was LAMMAS who earned the prize of going to Chicago on a poetry visit.

All the schools were fantastic and they along with the audience and the Chicago judge and visitors were really excited to hear all about the future plans for the SLAM event. It is hoped that next year the SLAM will be include all nine regions of England with one team from Wales and Scotland and Ireland coming on board as well. Watch this space!!

Gower Folk Festival 2008

This was the sixth event/festival that AWEMA has held as part of the Heritage Lottery Funded, Young Roots Project called Mwana Watu Kwa Abertawe. The project works with young people from Swansea to participate in key cultural events.

Fourteen Young People attended The Gower Folk Festival as part of this project. The group signed in and boarded the bus to the festival. Tony Beddoe, Principal Organiser of the Gower Folk Festival, welcomed everyone off the bus and the group was treated to traditional music to start with at ‘Come all yee.’ The group then watched the puppet show at the theatre and walked around the Gower heritage Centre looking at things such as the woolen mill, water wheel and animals.

After a well earned lunch, the group felt refreshed and several young people decided they wanted to try their hand at throwing a pot at the pottery workshop. Next on the agenda was music by Meridian, a three member band playing pipes, fiddle and piano accordion. Finally the young people finished the trip off at a spoon workshop with Pat Smith, playing the spoons on their arms and legs at various angles changing rhythms constantly. Great fun!!! 

Welcome to Timbuktu

On 21 May 2008 AWEMA were very pleased to host members of the Tuareg Tribe from Timbuktu. The guests from the West African nation of Mali visited the AWEMA Cardiff office on their way to Hay-on-wye. Hay-on-wye was twinned with Timbuktu in 2007.

Fahro Malik, CEO of Lynk Reach, a sister charity with AWEMA, brought the three Tuareg Tribe members to meet with the AWEMA team. AWEMA made sure that the tribe tasted something Welsh and as such they were offered Welsh cakes to welcome them to Wales.

Lynk Reach has been working with the people from Timbuktu to completely fund the building of a school in Aglal and have already built a bore-well there too. This work was been funded through a memorial trust named ‘Lynking the Worlds Together,’ which pays tribute to Tony Finch a co-founder and first Chair of Lynk Reach.

 

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