Another Year in Africa: Visitors

Last week was a week of visitors.

On Monday friends from Warrnambool and Ballarat came to see Steve’s workplace and mine. Martin and Anthony were Agriculture Victoria colleagues of Steve’s. Martin and his wife Kaz are volunteering on the Bandari Project at Mto wa Mbu (Mosquito River) west of Arusha. Anthony is on the board of a children’s home at Moshi, east of Arusha, and is also volunteering on an AVP assignment in Kenya. Together Steve, Martin and Anthony can boast 100 years of doing no harm to agriculture in western Victoria!

Anthony, Martin and Steve

It was a quick visit - they had dallied at Echo which was fair enough as the men were all agriculturally inclined - but we walked quickly and I talked quickly so they were able to see all of the Olkokola Vocational Training Centre and hear all about it. There was even time for questions. (Steve and I were able to do a reciprocal visit to the Bandari Project school on Tuesday on our way back from Lake Natron - it is an excellent project.)

On Wednesday we had a visit at OVTC from four young Dutch people (including an Australian/ Dutch woman originally from Perth). Two of the young men had visited Tanzania as secondary school students and the poverty they had seen had a lasting impact, particularly the lack of underwear possessed by boys. They started the '4allfoundation' which aims to provide undies, currently just for boys but with the prospect of undies and washable/reusable menstrual pads for girls in the future. They were impressed with OVTC and what it provides and I did a video interview - unexpected so unprepared! - which I’m debating whether I’d really want to see! They also are keen for our tailoring students to start producing the menstrual pads, a sewing project that would be excellent from a social, ecological and economic point of view.

On Friday the children and staff from Step by Step Learning Centre, a school for mentally handicapped children, came to visit. They were a lot of fun! The children enjoyed seeing our students hard at work in their class rooms and also seeing our farm animals. The accompanying adults were very impressed with the centre and the wonderful vegetable garden. We have made Step by Step a present of a bull calf as they are establishing their own farm. There is also the prospect of future links with our tailoring students making the fabric bags the Step by Step children require and our carpentry students making some furniture - shelves and cupboards. We had a reciprocal visit to Step by Step Learning Centre today. Our students and teachers had a very enjoyable time. It is a very impressive school, a credit to the woman who started the centre when she realised there was no learning centre in Arusha where her mentally disabled daughter could gain skills and some independence. A fellow AVP volunteer is working there on fund raising and I wish her all the success in the world - this centre (and many more like it) is sorely needed.

On Tuesday last week I was also a visitor. I went out to see Holy Ghost Vocational Training Centre run by the Spiritans at Tengeru, just east of Arusha. It is part of an impressive complex that includes a boys secondary school and a deaf education unit. The Head Teacher showed me around and answered my many questions. I am starting to get a better understanding of the vocational training sector and ways we might add value to what we do at OVTC. I was also able to get a look at the official Vocational Education Training Authority (VETA) syllabuses for Carpentry and for Masonry - something which up to now had eluded me. My next step is to get copies of the syllabuses for myself.

My maths classes are continuing. Each student has one hour a week in a streamed class that has a maximum of 12 learners so all can get individual attention. The lowest ability groups have only 5 students. We are concentrating on money and measurement. For some students the aim is for them to be able to count and to recognise the currency of Tanzania; others are working on keeping simple financial records and doing tax calculations. My challenge is to produce appropriate resources so that students will be able to be use them in a self-teaching situation after I leave. Below is an example of the work left for our students by the local primary school teachers - with no feedback given!

Look at Steve’s blog for the story of our trip to Ngare Sero, Lake Natron and Engaruka with pictures. Just a couple here as incentive to go and see more!