Celebrating Somali Style

Some of the ladies preparing steamy Somali Chai for Friday's celebration with our ESL classes in Eastleigh.

Some of the ladies waiting for the tea to brew and for the party to start.

On Friday, we enjoyed a wonderful party with about sixty women from our ESL classes and Self-Help group at the Eastleigh Community Centre. It was a great chance for the ladies to quite literally "let their hair down" and have some fun together. Many of the ladies dressed to the nines with scarves, flowing dresses, and jewelry.

We've discovered that Somali women love to dance. They played both traditional and contemporary Somalli music, and performed several individual and group dances, tying scarves around their waists as they danced.

They also like to create a tight circle and call one another into the centre where one or two women will show their moves. With great cheering, Erica and Zahra (above) answered the students calls to dance in the circle. It was a lot of fun!!

What's a Somali party without henna? One of our students, Bisharo, brought her henna supplies and decorated several of the women and girls at the party. She uses both black and red henna to create incredibly detailed designs over hands, feet, arms and legs. Some of the women even had henna painted on their necks like a necklace. The dye ussually lasts for several months.

Erica joined our students and had both

of her hands decorated with henna.