Weblog

Get Real Training classroom up and running, thanks to you!

We did it! Thanks to your kind and generous contributions, we were able to purchase two computer screens, a permanent screen and a mobile screen for Get Real Training. All of these are already being actively used, as you can see in the pictures in the latest photo album. 

The classroom screen - The GRT classroom is being actively used. Get Real Training is currently providing training to staff from Tanzanian Civil Society Organizations in the basics of documentary making. 

Two computer screens - The new editing station is placed in a quiet part of the office so that whomever is working there does not get disturbed. In the picture in the photo album a student is practicing editing software for the making of a short documentary. 

The mobile screen - The mobile screen is also being actively used already. Get Real Training, in collaboration with others, organizes two movie nights per month at two locations in Dar es Salaam. The picture in the photo album shows Filamu Lounge at Nafasi Art Space in Dar es Salaam, screening Buena Vista Social Club on the new mobile screen. Get Real Training will also use this screen for off-site training activities and workshops.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

We are so exited about this and cannot thank you enough!

Please continue to follow us on Facebook and our website: www.getrealtraining.org

In my last update I announced the opening of the new Get Real Training office. By now we have settled in and are very happy with this new location.

New Projects

One new project that we are very proud of is a project with an organization called Femina HIP (http://www.feminahip.or.tz/), where our Tanzanian students together with international volunteers have done vox-pops which are aired on national TV!

Our (now) weekly open air movie nights, in collaboration with other creative organizations, are very popular (and say for yourself, it is hard to resist watching a movie under the stars!).

New training projects with NGOs who want to learn how to make documentaries and awareness films about their projects also continue to take place.

The good news

But now the really good news. Word of Get Real Training traveled down the grapevine and reached Samsung in Norway. Upon learning about GRT they have decided to donate 20 computer screens (old models)! This is of course fantastic news and incredibly helpful, it is more than we have been looking for through our 1% Club project!

There is a small ‘but’ that we have struggled with since we received the news , because we still have to ship the screens to Tanzania, and we do not yet have the financial resources to do that.

Change in 1% Club project

Knowing that the 20 screens will be on their way within at least the next 6 months from now, we feel that we no longer need to continue our fundraising for more screens with 1% Club. We discussed with the GRT team here in Dar, and 1% Club in the Netherlands, how to best use the money already raised.

We want to look at our reality now, with future planning in mind. GRT currently has many requests for training, but we are still not able to do full training at our own premises. Therefore what we would like to suggest is that we now purchase two additional computer screens here in Tanzania, so that we can (slowly) get started with full computer sets in the editing room. With the remaining budget that we already raised through 1% Club we will buy two projector screens, one for the classroom, and one mobile projector screen for trainings outside our office.

We will have spare screens this way, once the Samsung screens from Norway have reached here. What will we do with these? One thing that we have realized is that the youth organization, Dogodogo Center for streetchildren, we have worked with, are very underequipped and we would like to donate 4 screens to them, so that the students can continue to practice their skills. The other screens will be used as backup screens in the office, and can at times be used during training at location, since editing is often best done on two computer screens, and NGOs or other customers may not always have a spare screen.

Thank you so much for your support!

We hope that you are excited about these new developments as we are, and that you are happy with the new allocation of the budget.

Please continue to follow us on Facebook, and on our website, and THANK YOU again for your generous contributions!

Back after a long period of silence! Sorry for the long break in communication, both Irene and I traveled for several months, but now both of us are back in Dar and we are ready to give you some updates. Because even though we were not online here, good things happened!

First good news is that Get Real Training just moved to a new office, shared with Gaba Art Centre in a very central part of Dar es Salaam. This is very exiting to us, as the new office is larger and brighter than our previous place, and easier to reach for our students. There is also a nice outdoor space where we can create events, and where students can practice outdoor filming. Pictures will follow soon.

Second good news is that Get Real Training was donated quite a bit of (used) equipment in Norway, including two computer screens for our classroom! , We also received 2 DV players, one iMac, several educational books on film making and 50 films (DVD) for our library.  This means that we now only need 8 more computer screens to finish our classroom. With the current donations of 620 Euro, this means we are looking for an additional 1100 Euro.

Meanwhile, one of our freelance trainers continued to train the former street children at the Dogodogo center for street children. They made huge progress, and we are now reaching out to professional production companies in Dar to find internships for them.

I posted a new video on our page, see also: http://www.youtube.com/user/GetRealTraining  It is a video made by an organization in Tanzania that works with street children and that received training from Get Real Training.

Mussa is a short documentary about Mussa and his life in the streets of Dar es Salaam before he was taken in by the Dogodogo Centre. Mussa is one of the boys in the Romeo and Juliet video that we made for the European Film Festival in 2009. While Mussa is not one of the current students that we train at the center (he is too young), the six boys who currently receive training all have a similar story.

We can give them a chance to learn a valuable skills, and to give them a future. Do you support us?

Why did I choose this picture for our project? I think it is one of the best pictures Get Real Training has. I love it.

The boy is a former street child who participated in the production of the European Film Festival trailer in Dar es Salaam in 2009. Get Real Training, together with a trainer from the media company Real2Reel gave training to Tanzanian underprivileged youth.

Get Real Training continues to work with the center where the children live now, to provide six of the youth long term training and thereby providing them with skills that will hopefully get them a job in visual media in the future!

You can see the trailer here: http://www.youtube.com/user/GetRealTraining#p/u/3/XmYMEkiR9TU

Did you know  that you can also find us on Facebook and YouTube?

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Dar-es-Salaam-Tanzania/Get-Real-Training/417593903272?sk=wall

YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/GetRealTraining

And of course there is the Get Real Training website: www.getrealtraining.org 

I am so exited to have our project for the computer screens online at 1% Club, for us it is a great opportunity to try to finish the classroom for visual media training here in Dar es Salaam, while also getting more visibility for what we are doing.

I will post regular updates on how things are going on with Get Real Training here, please give me a few days to find out about all the different ways in how we can spread the word (any suggestions are welcome of course!).

Irene from Get Real Training will be going to Bunju, a small village north of Dar es Salaam, tomorrow to give editing training to former street children at the Dogodogo center. I have asked her to make a video so we can share it with you. More about that later this week.