Where is Shutka ? What's the Daily Care Center ?

Chouto Orizari, usually called Shutka, is a municipality of the city of Skopje in Macedonia. In 2013, 70% of the population of this district belonged to the Roma community, this represented 30,000 inhabitants. Thus, Shutka houses the largest Roma community in the world. It is also the only existing Roma municipality. Moreover, it hosted the largest refugee camp during the Kosovo war.

This neighborhood is very poor and the living conditions for its' inhabitants are hard. Most of the houses are built with recycled materials and have neither access to running water, nor to the electricity. The population is young and many children are forced to work with their parents or trying to survive alone in the street.

The Daily Care Center is a day care center that supports children from the street. Everyday, the center hosts children who are committed to go to school. Today, the center provides activities to one hundred and ten children aged from three to seventeen. Eighty-five of them go to school. Thus, the center contributes to the preparation of street children in order to permit them to go to school.

Also, an important communication work is done with parents for letting them know, understand and accept the rights of their children.

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The center works like a house's life, there is time for everything. First, the children eat, wash themselves and get clean clothes. Afterwards, the children are divided into three groups according to their level of knowledge.

In each group, they receive an appropriate academic monitoring, homework help, but also they benefit of dedicated time to creativity workshops.

This concept gives a framework to the kids' everyday life where they can learn how to live together, how to communicate without shouting and fighting and it offers them a normal children's life. The center empowers the children to become successful learners and to give them opportunities to leave the witches circle of poverty.

The success of the center is made possible through the outstanding work of four women: Irena, Alexandra, Maja, Vasilka. They manage the daily operations of the center and demonstrate an unwavering determination to provide the best to the children.

However, the center has a lack of funds and it is often impossible to organize activities outside of the daily structure or to allow children to discover a new environment. Although Shutka is a part of Skopje, its population lives almost isolated and many children have never experienced the chance to leave the neighborhood.

This reality has convinced us to help the center's team to implement a wonderful project : offering to the children holidays far away from their daily lives, in one of the places that makes the reputation of Macedonia through the world, Ohrid.

We need your support to make it possible so that the children can enjoy their first holidays !

The holidays !

We want to offer five days of vacation in Ohrid to forty children from Shutka. These holidays will be an opportunity for these children to discover an iconic place of their country.

Ohrid is one of the oldest cities in the country, dating from antiquity and which is still very well preserved. The city has many remarkable sites such as Saint Sophia Cathedral, monasteries or archaeological sites.

Children would discover some of the history of their country through these relics from different eras. They'll also enjoy the lake and wide open spaces that surround the city to do outdoor activities.

Des vacances pour les enfants des rues !