Cathy’s story

The choir grew out of Cathy Groenendijk’s moving encounters with young girls who were living on the streets in abject poverty, the fallout of the war.

Groenendijk, born in Uganda, came to Sudan in 1999 with her Dutch missionary husband to run a health program. The country was caught up in a civil war between the north and the south. She was struck by how people talked about the “lost boys” of Sudan more than 20,000 boys who were displaced by the violence and either died or ended up in refugee camps in Kenya - but no one talked about the “lost girls,” who stayed on, living a traumatic and vulnerable life.

“They were living on the street, in markets, and even in cemeteries,” Groenendijk said. “At first I would just talk with them and offer them one meal a day.”

In 2007, she founded CCC in Sudan, which currently runs a shelter for children, mostly girls, educating them and teaching them social skills. She initially rented a place to shelter the girls but has since received funding from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency for the building where they are currently housed.

“We are taking in children who have no other option. These are street children, many of whom have been severely abused. This is a male-dominated society and the war has eroded tradition,” Groenendijk said. “We had 60 girls but with the recent violence, the number has gone up to 89 children.” After South