It isn’t every day that Almancil International Rotary Club (AIRC) members and guests can enjoy dinner at a five star hotel restaurant and be entertained by a performance of urban dancing. This was the case recently, however, when a group of youngsters from the Mud@ki Project were invited to perform at the Conrad Hotel. AIRC has been providing financial support to Mud@ki for the past three years, first for Yoga lessons and, more recently, for a dance teacher, Sra Etsânea Raquel Fortes.
The Mud@ki Project, now in its 7th year is a social intervention Project, financed by Programa Escolhas. It is supported by eleven local bodies including. town hall, parish council, parish, school cluster, ASCA, Re-food Almancil, Algarve University, the Portuguese Institute of Sport and Youth, Romanian and Moldovan Immigrants Association (DOINA) parents association, CPCJ an organisation for the protection of young people and, of course, AIRC. The aim of the project is to promote activities which are known to have effective results such as children’s healthy development, the social inclusion and integration of children and their families, investing in school support, parental co-responsibility and participation and citizenship.
Chair of AIRC Community Services Peter Hinze said that “whilst urban dancing and yoga may not at first appear to constitute charitable projects, I’ve visited the Mud@ki project many times and seen first-hand how these activities have benefitted our local youngsters, many of whom have come from diverse backgrounds. All of us who had the opportunity to see these young people perform for us at the Conrad were hugely impressed by their emerging talent and their discipline. We even had the kitchen staff come out to watch the performance.”
