It is perhaps rare to know what you want to do in life while still in your 20s. At 27, Ugandan Kaweesi Mark has a full plate and a life path already mapped out.
He is the founder and chairman of Break-Fast Jam, one of the largest breakdancing competitions in East Africa; is a teacher, student and founding member of Breakdance Project Uganda, an organisation that uses dance, music and various art forms to promote social change; founding member of Freshlane, an initiative working to empower youth; and founding member of Imagination Circle, a foundation geared towards youth.
Mark, an orphan, grew up in the slums of Kampala and is using his life experiences to empower people and uplift communities. Using a common medium like dance, Mark has built a community around East Africa with Break-Fast Jam.
"Our annual breakdancing event was created to spread the hip-hop scene in Uganda but has now spread to East Africa. We also get participants from Central Africa, like the Democratic Republic of Congo.
"We were inspired to form Break-Fast Jam seven years ago, because we had a lot of young people from the slums and communities around who were learning breakdance but had no avenue to showcase their skills. Break-Fast Jam was set up for them, so they could compete and come out of their shell."
Break-Fast Jam was initially called Breaking Ciphers for two years before changing its name. Mark realised that "ciphers" wasn't a word used in the daily vocabulary of Ugandans who speak English as one of their main languages. He decided to change it to make it simpler and to connect to the average person. "Break is for breakdance and then 'fast' is being fast and jam is an event a party," says Mark.
"I lost my dad at the age of four and my mum to cancer when I was 15, and then I had to leave school. Soon I became homeless. However, in Uganda if you hang around the slums someone will take you in and give you a place to sleep," says Mark. It was here in the slums, where Mark first got a taste of his breakdancing skills and talent.
"Breakdance has an element of flexibility and gymnastics to it. However, you need talent. You may learn the steps but if you don't have the talent it's not going to take you far if you cannot execute it.
"I learned the steps from a boy in the slums. When he realised I had the talent he took me under his wing. I soon realised not to show off my moves as people would often copy them. So, I kept them a secret until I was asked to join a dance centre by my co-founder Kibuuka Mukisa Oscar. I realised it was good to be out of the slums and I soon went from 'the kid who collects garbage to Mark the breakdancer or the kid who teaches breakdancing'."
Break-Fast Jam, which was set up as a platform for the youth, has now become a movement. It has begun working on creating opportunities for young hip-hop/breakdancers and building collaborations and partnerships with other events so to expose them to the world outside Uganda and Africa.
"It is important for them to see the world and to see that kind of art being done on a different scale," adds Mark.
"I believe everything needs to move to the next level -- 'Where will I go from here? This is where I want to go'. We also look at how our partners can support and expose our dancers. It also helps take kids off the street, move around in different communities and programmes and channel their energies in different ways," adds Mark.
In the first few years of Break-Fast Jam, people thought it was a food event and showed up with cups and plates, much to the amusement of the founding members. It was funny but it generated an interest with the public, so the name stuck.
When Mark started teaching dance, he began by visiting various slums and engaging the children. This also helped create a buzz around Break-Fast Jam and soon involved communities in and outside Kampala, Uganda's capital city. "I saw it as a process of bringing the youth together from all over," says Mark.
Along with the other founders of Break-Fast Jam, Oscar and Ssekitoleko Joram, Mark has created an initiative called Freshlane, which deals with event organising. Oscar is a photographer, Jerome does videography and Mark does the write-ups for events. All three being breakdancers help them relate to their jobs better.
In 2015, Break-Fast Jam received support from a US mission, who helped them bring a legend from the Bronx, Crazy Legs aka Richard Colon, to Uganda, who taught and jammed and gave talks to the youth for 10 days. They are also in talks with the British High Commission in Uganda to get a dance troupe from the UK to visit East Africa to hold workshops and seminars.
"We also work with corporate sponsors but we don't have a long-term partner. We finance ourselves and Break-Fast Jam by teaching hip-hop dance and other arts in international schools," says Mark.
"We are looking for sponsors for our trips, without interfering or changing our agenda and dynamics of Break-Fast Jam. The movement is vast and we keep away from politics and stick to being a social movement. We are also looking at doing more paid events, like music videos or advertisements where our dancers can perform," adds Mark.
Break-Fast Jam holds regular workshops and competitions in Rwanda, Kenya and Tanzania. In 2016, a dance crew from Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, joined their workshops. Winners of these competitions go on to represent themselves at other competitions abroad or in Africa.
"Though all this is costly, we look at the impact it makes. And when you compare the impact to cost, the impact is always higher. Of course, we also talk to individual sponsors and ask them to support and pay for bus tickets for two or three dancers. We also look for accommodation hosting in the countries that we visit.
"We have also partnered with the Goma dance festival in the DRC, where we had a team perform. We held workshops there, but the DRC is not East Africa and presents an entire set of challenges that make this difficult. So it was a one-off event," says Mark.
A 2016 recipient of the annual Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders, initiated by former US president Barack Obama, Mark attended university for a short while in New York where he studied community development and civil engagement.
"My life's purpose is to help the youth and be a youth leader; being behind the curtains and see change happening. I don't need to be in the limelight."
To know more about Kaweesi Mark and his efforts, visit http://kaweesimark.com or http://breakfastjam.org.
