I went to see the Centre in full flow today - the children were clearly loving the space. They played games and even danced. The special needs session was happening too, Three teachers from RCCI, the special needs school we support a few miles away, helped to run an inclusive session, where all the children sang and performed together, before leading activities with the six children with learning difficulties. When the two groups separated, the main group went upstairs to the first floor, which is still a building site – years of health and safety consciousness made me rather anxious at this point. Sister sat them down in what will be an office, on mats and benches constructed of planks and buckets... and they had their “life education” class. This only happens twice a month, when the special needs group needs the main space.

I’ve also had a meeting with the team from the hotel school, who are delivering our employment training programme. Our trainees have now completed their classroom phase, and are on their placements at hotels. Things are going well, most of the young people have settled into their placements and within two weeks, one young woman was offered a permanent job by her hotel. Anuja, Hiran and Harpo who are running the programme were confident that all who complete will be offered jobs. Unfortunately there are a few, mostly girls, whose attendance has been sporadic since the group separated and they were placed in separate hotels. We did know the level of commitment required on this programme would be challenging for these young people, who have little experience of regular work in their families. Many of their parents and neighbours have casual work – they earn by the day, which must engender a different mindset. I have the names of the poor attenders, and will be visiting these young people with Sister or Mrs V in the next day or two. Stern words will be spoken. Sister will express her disappointment – she is confident we can get them back on track.

We have realised that our training programme for employment in the hotel and restaurant business is not always appealing to young women. One of the suggestions for addressing this problem is to explore another industry, perhaps hair and beauty. We are a little hesitant to embrace a stereotype, I know that many schools and colleges in the UK have found that hair and beauty courses enthuse some of the most disengaged young women . Yesterday I was introduced to the woman who runs one of the most successful hair and beauty schools in the country. The wife of a relative, she trains about 75 young women a year, and every one has secured a good job with one of the large, reputable salons in Colombo. She tells me that there is a real shortage of well-trained staff for the industry, and that she is regularly asked by the salons for trained staff. She told me she has been looking for a way to “give back”, to do something meaningful with her business. Having achieved commercial success, she said she longs to make a real difference. She has been trying to take her course into prisons, as a way of giving young women an employment skill on release. She is keen to take on a cohort of our young women. We’ll discuss this with Sister and the team, and talk to the young women in Athidiya – its early days, but very exciting.