Last Saturday, December 22nd, Ethiopia Reads held a Children’s Reading Festival in the large beautiful grounds of Ababa’s Villa*, an historic guest house in Ferensay Legation neighborhood in Addis Ababa, to promote reading, early grade literacy and reading to children to families as both important and fun.
Nearly 250 young children from two schools and an orphanage in the neighborhood attended, along with 70 parents. With storytelling and reading, games and competitions for children and their families based on stories they know, cartoon characters and inflatable jumping castles we had fun activities for them all throughout the day.
Girum Ermias, a famous Ethiopian movie star and Mary Jafar, a well-known local children’s author, came to read to the children, and another famous actor was “Story Father” for the day, telling stories, singing songs and playing games with the kids. Many other guest who are interested in our work also came.
Such fun and inspiring events for families are quite rare in Ethiopia, and help develop the reading culture that is our mission and also awareness of Ethiopia Reads valuable work. It was such a great success and there were so many children had fun around stories and books, we plan to hold more.
*Our sincere thanks to Eyerusalem Gedlu, owner of Ababa’s Villa, for proposing and hosting the event! It would never have happened without her! http://www.abbabasvilla.com/
