Volunteering & Cultural Exchange:

March 19th, 2007 - March 23rd, 2007

Hamjambo!

I have fully recovered from my sickness and I was able to attend my placement at Akeri Primary School this week. The first day was interesting, seeing the school and the students and how everything operates.

I was taken around the school to each classroom and introduced to the kids. In the younger grades, en masse, the kids would stand up and state, "Education is the key to life. Good morning sir." In the older classes the same thing would happen but the kids would start with, "AIDS is dangerous, be aware. Good morning sir."

I was asked where I would like to teach so I said I would be glad to help at any level, but I would prefer to work with the older kids. So, I was assigned to work with Veronica, who is the Standard VII (Grade 7) teacher. The timetable for the school is fairly confusing, but I discovered that we taught Standard VII-A English in period 2 and Standard VII-B in period 3. The "A" class is the smarter kids and the "B" class is for the less "smart" kids.

I helped Veronica teach various English words in the passive. She found it helpful for me to say the words like a native English person would say them. The kids were very receptive. The hardest part, I have discovered, about teaching is the lack of resources. As many as nine kids will share one workbook, plus there is no heat or electricity in the classroom so when it is dark outside and cold it is hard for the kids to accomplish any real work.

Seeing the children having to share text books in such big groups was hard to take so I went to the bookstore in Arusha and purchased 10 new books (for only $40 CDN) and now the kids are able to work in groups no larger than three. They thanked me for the books and were extremely happy to have received them – as were the teachers.

On Tuesday, the Standard VII students were writing national exams so I helped out Elizabeth, the Standard VI teacher. She had me teach adverbs to two Grade 6 classes. Prior to the class she told me that she was scared to teach this unit because she didn't understand it herself. So, after a few minutes she left the room and told me she had to go to a meeting. I was left alone to teach the class after having only 5 minutes to review the lesson! It actually turned out OK and the kids appeared to have a lot of fun. On Thursday, when I passed by the class again, the kids were all calling to me from the window shouting "Jimy"... they can't pronounce "Jaime" yet!

On Thursday, following the two English classes for Standard VII, Veronica too me on a short walk to her village, which is close to the school. All of the villagers seemed shocked to see a foreigner, but they were very friendly and welcoming. We walked to her house and I met her son and saw some of their animals. Her and her late husband both had good jobs so they have a nice home. She also showed me some of the other land that she owns which they used to use for growing crops. However, since her husband passed away the land sits vacant.

The teachers at the school have been giving me the royal treatment. I think it is partly because I am a foreigner, but also partly because I am male. Of the 16 teachers at the school, only three are male. During the morning break, we hang out in the staff room and they always provide me with copious amounts of piping hot chai tea. On Tuesday they even gave me warm chapattis, which the students bring into the staff room for the teachers.

In fact, the students treat the teachers with a lot of respect. While waiting to go into a classroom to teach, a student always comes out and takes my books from me and places them on my desk inside the classroom. And, the chalk they use to write on the board always breaks, so after a few pieces break, a student is always up next to me picking up the pieces and putting them back on my desk.

The final interesting point is that the teachers will bring their own kids to school. One of the teachers has an infant baby who gets passed around the staff room and looked after by the teachers who are not teaching a class during the time that she is teaching. It is amazing how Tanzanians will all look out for each other. I tried to play with the baby, but she is scared of me. I think she hasn't seen very many foreigners!

Speaking of being fearful of foreigners, they have word in Swahili "Mazunga" which basically means "White Man." One afternoon, Veronica, another volunteer, Lauren, and I were walking down the road from the school back to our village. Along the way all sorts of children were coming out of their yards and yelling "Mazunga" and pointing at us. Veronica had not seen a display like this before and kept laughing and explaining to the villagers that we were teachers at the school.

Outside of teaching, it has been a busy week. On Monday a few of us went into town and booked flights to Zanzibar for next weekend. We also had a chance to go to a market street and pick up some fabric to be made into local clothes. We all got some nice African patterns and took them to some local women who will then make us pants, shirts, and bags.

On Tuesday afternoon, some volunteers arranged a soccer game between our team from CCS – the CCS Zebras – and a local team called TUPO. The TUPO team is a group of locals who have AIDS and they play soccer games around town and use it is an opportunity to distribute flyers to the people watching. The flyers help provide information about AIDS. This is one of the best ways to spread the message to the people about the dangers of AIDS, because for some people it is still a taboo subject.

I was elected captain of our team - as you can see from one of the attached photos - and I also was our goalkeeper. The game was a lot of fun and we won 4-1. It was the first time the CCS team had beat the TUPO team! We did have a ringer on our team, a guy named Sebastian, who plays in the Tanzanian premier league. All in all, both teams had a great time and we were able to distribute all the flyers that we had printed up.

Tuesday night was my first chance to head out to Arusha for dinner and not eat at our home base. We went to this place called Khan's, which is an auto body shop by day and a street-side BBQ by night (as seen in the attached photos). They had a few choices of meat, but really it was all about the chicken. They had between 25-50 chickens roasting over an open flame grill. They had a great variety of spicy food as well. We were such a big group that they put us at a table across the street under an awning. It was interesting crossing the street to get our plates of chicken and then crossing back to the other side. I guess it gives new meaning to why the chicken crossed the road...

On Wednesday we had a chance to leave our village and we got to go to another main town, Moshi. Moshi is the gateway to hiking Mt. Kilimanjaro. We were able to catch a few glimpses of Africa's tallest peak as the clouds passed, but we never did get an unobstructed view.

Near Moshi we visited a traditional house of the Chagga Tribe. The Chagga, like the Masai, are two of the most populous tribes in Tanzania. The Chagga are stationary unlike the Masai who are nomadic and will move their houses to find greener pastures for their cattle. We hiked to a beautiful waterfall near the traditional Chagga house that we visited. In the afternoon we saw a local artists who makes batik paintings as well as local craftsmen who carve various items out of ebony wood.

On Thursday, we were supposed to visit the International Tribunal for War Crimes in Rwanda. They are holding the UN-run trials here in Arusha. However, after clearing security we were informed that all the hearings that were going on were closed hearings because the witnesses didn't want to be seen. So, we were unable to view any of the proceedings. Apparently, there are several Canadian lawyers from Quebec participating in the hearings.

At night our whole group of 30+ people went into Arusha to a restaurant and outdoor concert venue to celebrate three birthdays and also take in a local concert. The guys performing sang mostly reggae songs, but they were not very good. Our taxi on the way home from the dinner ran out of gas on the highway so me and three others were left to walk about 1.5 km home down the dark highway at 1 o'clock in the morning using only the light of one girl's mobile phone to guide our way.

This past week has been a bit sad, as four of the volunteers in the program have seen their time come to an end. We celebrated on Friday night at a great Indian restaurant in town.

As I write this, we have just returned home from one of the most amazing experiences I have ever encountered. We spent Saturday and today in a Maasai Village on a Maasai cultural safari (in Swahili "Safari" means "trip" or "journey"). There are so many photos and stories to share that I will send that in a separate e-mail later this week.

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