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Thursday, April 22, 2010

More pictures of workshop in Batir





workshop for children in Batir village






Anaya, Rena and Hanan gave a music workshop for 60 children in a kindergarten in their village Batir.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Article

An article was published on www.silwanic.net
You can read about the music workshop in Dheisheh camp for children from Silwan and Dheisheh at the following link:

English:
http://silwanic.net/?p=2147

Arabic:
http://silwanic.net/?p=1958

Thursday, April 1, 2010

Music workshop in Batir

Today was the first music workshop given by three members of the new MwB women group from Batir: Anaya, Rena and Hanan.
They did a wonderful job with the seven boys, age 12-14, that performed dabke, a traditional Palestinian dance, before the workshop started.
The workshop leaders made music with the children while singing, using body percussion and sticks. They finished the workshop with the "who is the leader" game, in which the children take turns in being the leader and showing the others movements and rhythms, while the child in the middle has to guess who is the leader.
Although the boys were a bit hesitating before we began the workshop ("what do you want to do with us....?") they immediately joined once we started, had lots of fun and asked us when the next workshop would be!

making sounds and rhythms with sticks

Playing the "who is the leader" game

Talents in Batir!

Today I was very lucky: Anaya, Rena and Hanan from the new MwB women group invited some very talented youth from their village Batir to share their traditional culture with me.
Seven boys, age 12-14, danced dabke, a traditional Palestinian dance, and Esra' , a young girl, recited the poem "Afwan Fairuz". The poem is about the longing for Jerusalem.
Batir, the village where Esra' lives, is only ten kilometers away from Jerusalem, but she and many other Palestinians are not allowed to enter this city.
She recited the poem with lots of emotion and musicality in her voice and one of the women in the audience told me she got the shivers while listening to her beautiful voice.

Esra' reciting the poem

The dabke of the boys was very impressive. They worked in a very mature way with each other and showed different dance techniques.

Boys from Batir dancing Dabke in the
Batir Center for Women and Children


Fabienne van Eck
Local Project Manager