By Phares Mutembei
Children from schools around Nairobi recently had fun during the colourful Urafiki-Sora Kite Festival held at Ngong Hills.
The festival organised courtesy of Japanese Embassy was a unique opportunity for children to learn the art of making kites using materials imported from Japan and locally available material.
Urafiki is Swahili for friendship while Sora means sky in Japanese.
A week before the festival was held officials from Japan Embassy visited schools in Nairobi teaching the children and their teachers how to make and fly kites of different sizes.
They also made kites using locally available materials after which they coloured them.
The children then boarded their school buses and headed to the windy Ngong Hills, to fly their kites!
“I have been learning how to make a kite for the past week, I am here to see how high I can fly my kite!” said young Jeremy Lance from Greenyard Academy.
Jeremy joined hundreds of others in releasing their kites into the sky with shouts of joy as they flew majestically to the sky. Some flew really high, as the young flyers released strings to make them go as high as possible.
“Look, look, mine is really up!” shouted 8-year-old Eunice Kendi, a Class 3 pupil at Serare School, Ngong.
The schools that participated were Sharp Education centre, Shangilia Mtoto wa Africa Children’s, Mountainview School, Divine Mercy Catholic school, Riara Springs School, AIC Ngong Hills Primary school among others.
