City of Joy

CITY OF JOY is going to be a safe house for up to 100 women and their children in Bukavu, Eastern Congo. It is being built by V-Day (Eve Ensler), with support from UNICEF. The UN Spouses Bazaar in May 2009 donated $11,333.00 towards this project.

City of Joy will give safety to women who have been treated at the Panzi Hospital for severe injuries resulting from sexual violence. Many of these women will have been left infertile, incontinent, infected with AIDS, and cast out of their own communities. They will find care and respite here for up to 6 months, where they will live together as a community.

CITY OF JOY design mimics the typical Congolese village, with a cluster of 10 small structures where women will live and sleep, an orchard, an area for livestock, and many communal spaces to gather for learning, talking and sharing.

The Recovery Programme is innovative and holistic. Women will have access to group therapy; storytelling; dance; theater; self-defense; comprehensive sexuality education (covering HIV/AIDS, family planning); gardening; public speaking; leadership and advocacy; human rights; ecology and horticulture. South Kivu Women's Media Association (know as AFEM) will run a radio station out of the City of Joy and train women in radio reporting and broadcasting.

There is also a possibility that a local newspaper may provide the women with a monthly space to write about issues important to them.

Community service in the village surrounding the City of Joy grounds and Panzi Hospital will be an integral part of the Recovery Programme. Economic empowerment is a priority — V-Day are currently considering a number of options for creating a City of Joy line of clothing or goods. When women transition out of the City of Joy, V-Day will take measures to stay connected to them and provide them with support, either via solar cell phones given to them or through informal networks of communication.

V-Day are also exploring the feasibility of helping women who leave the City of Joy to set up community centers in their villages as a means of economic empowerment. One idea is to display the products they sell at a crafts market at the City of Joy every three months.

UWaN will continue to report V-Day's progress.