Sponsorship- can you help?

Coming from a family living in extreme poverty is something that most of us can simply not truly understand because we have never experienced it.

Talking to my students I have heard many heart wrenching stories about what their backgrounds and lives outside of school are like. 

One of my brightest students explained to me that his parents simply do not have any money or employment and it is a struggle to find enough food to eat, he and his siblings often go hungry. His family will not be able to get enough money for his school fees.

Another student I often notice for her helpfulness and cheerful nature- she frequently mops the staffroom and helps out with odd jobs, recently I sat with her and she told me about her background- her father has died, her mother is remarried and she never sees her, she moved in with her grandmother but then her grandmother died so now she is with an uncle and his 12 children- needless to say money is a problem and any funds go straight to trying to provide food for the family, as she is not one of their children she often misses out.

Another lad is an orphan who lives with his 79 year old grandma and has been walking 18 km to school until he ended up moving in at the school- however he hasn't paid any fees and is worried about if he will be able to stay.

Unfortunately schools cannot run on no money. Fees are around equivalent to $240 per year or $400 for boarders. Compared to Australian prices this seems like nothing for full board, tuition, uniform and food, however it is still out of reach for many Kenyans. With the school Administrator I have discussed the situations of the most needy students and have identified 13 students for whom paying fees is an impossibility and the only way they can continue at school is if they receive sponsorship. 

For just $40 per month you could provide the necessary funds for these students to stay at school. I personally know all these needy students and some are the the cleverest and most helpful in my classes! Providing funds for their education will potentially help them to gain employment and break out of the vicious cycle of poverty. 

If you are in a position to be able to help any of these students then please send me an email (tabithaverity@gmail.com) and I can link you up- they are super excited at the thought of maybe getting sponsorship and being able to stay at school and I can testify that their need is very real!!!

Some of the 13 students urgently needing sponsorship:

Language!

Swahili and English are the official languages in Kenya, however each area also speaks their local dialect or 'mother tongue' here in Kamukuywa it is Kibukusu. So for many of the people (including my students) English is their third language. Considering the Kenyan national curriculum is in English this can cause lots of difficulty for learning!

I have been trying to pick up a bit of Swahili while I am here- early on in my trip I greeted the entire group of boarders (almost 200 students) at night time bible study by starting my talk with 'habari za asubuhi' I had thought this was 'good evening' but the uproar of laughter that followed didn't bode well...as it turns out it actually means 'good morning' it took a good few minutes to quieten everybody down! Once over the initial embarrassment I too found this hilarious and joked about it with the kids for a few days after.

I decided to make a pact with my year 9 class that they teach me a new word of their choice every lesson, my efforts at pronunciation cause them to explode in laughter. The other day I proudly said to them all what I thought was 'I don't speak much Swahili' but the resultant hilarity made me turn to the class prefect and ask what was wrong... Apparently I had just said 'I don't speak Swahili lakes!'
My novice struggles at Swahili have really showed me first-hand how difficult language is. I have a great deal of respect for all those multilinguals out there!

Walking down the streets many people call out 'how are you!' (pronounced howar) the appropriate answer to this is 'fine' and every child will call it out multiple times until you answer. Often this may be the only English they know and if you try to extend into a conversation it goes nowhere. Even when asking the same question back to the children they struggle to respond, I then try in Swahili which will sometimes get a response but more likely I'll need to say it in Kibukusu to get an answer. 'Fine' seems to be the appropriate response to just about any greeting  'good morning' ' how's it going', even 'hello' are all responded to with 'fine!'

In the street  it is a common occurrence for randoms to get excited at seeing a muzungu and run up and before I have a chance to really register their presence they loudly declare to me 'I am fine!!!'  I still find this hilarious and can't help but think ' I am SO glad to hear that!'

Funny Englishisms are everywhere, especially on menus- the local hotel has a lovely list of beaverages, and in a nearby town there is a lovely selection of 'bittings' including 'chicken naggats'.

Another one of my favourites I found when I was reading through an English teachers guide from the library and came across some helpful tips on how to deal with commonly 'missplet' words!

Half Term Break :)

Half term break has arrived- after week 10 of a 14 week term. Not exactly half way through the term but a welcome 5 day break all the same. 

A number of students ask if they can borrow my phone to ring their parents or guardians to organise money to go home. The Kenyans have an ingenious money management system called M-pesa which is basically money linked to your phone and through it you can pay bills, buy credit, send money to other peoples numbers, or withdraw cash (from a M-pesa agent). For some of the students living long distances away this works fantastic as they were able to get their parents to send money to my phone and I provided them with cash- who knew being an ATM would be amongst my roles here :) 

We have planned to see some of the surrounding region in the break and head south to Kakamega rainforest- the only tropical rainforest remaining in Kenya. Despite being unwell the previous few days I decide to go ahead with the trip-20 km hike included :)

Our accommodation is in a 'Banda' in the forest and we spend much of the time hiking through the forest. Our local guide Benjamin has loads of knowledge and keeps stopping us to stroke the leaf of a plant and inform us of its ability to cure anything from sore throats to malaria or else to get us to listen to a bird call and then replicate it exactly himself and tell us what bird it is. To me all the birds sound the same and the jungle is just a tangle of green, but I guess I havnt lived here most of my life. 

I'm more interested when he starts talking about the cobras, baboons and leopards but we only see the baboons- perhaps that's a good thing. 

After hiking for hours we reach a river which considering the hot day I don't need to be told twice is safe to swim in- first time in over 2 months to be immersed in water, such a good feeling, and having wet clothes for the rest of the hike was nice and refreshing!  

A 4:30 am start the next day proves to be worthwhile as we hike to a hill overlooking the forest and region for sunrise. I am greatly amused by a fellow tourist from Nicaragua who is an avid bird watcher and has a long list of birds to sight. He sits near us at the top of the hill glued to a laptop which his guide has carried for him, complaining about internet speeds and completely ignoring the amazing sunrise and beautiful scenery! 

3 days in the forest is a lovely break and we return with a couple of days to finish marking exams and get motivated for the second half (final 4 weeks) of term :)

Sports Carnival

The much awaited sports carnival finally arrived!
The week prior was a hectic rush of organising the teams as I was required to make student IDs for every student, these had to be stamped and signed by the principal then laminated. Another copy of their IDs with all the players shown on one page also had to be made and stamped. Each player had to have their birth certificate (matching the date on their ID) and primary school results certificate stamped, signed and attached.
Sounds simple enough but in reality it was a nightmare.
Many students don't know their birthdates, have multiple names they use interchangeably and couldn't produce a birth certificate.
Combine this with frequent power blackouts and ink shortages and the result was a couple of 12 & 13 hour days at school getting it done. The whittling down of the team to the required number was more determined by who had the necessary paperwork rather than skill. A shame from a coaches perspective, but the principal informed me that if we don't obey the rules we are likely to get kicked out as they are stricter on private schools.

Our transport lorry.

The actual morning was a flurry of organising shoes and uniforms, strapping ankles and checking names and then our transport arrived and the energy and excitement levels increased astronomically! 
Over 50 girls in the back of a lorry all super excited about sports, clapping and stamping and singing at the top of their voices-no wonder we attracted attention as we drove to the venue!

The sports competition was pretty interesting to be part of. There were over 2000 people there from various schools in the region, the street lined with stalls selling bananas and snacks, music pumping from large speaker setup, games being played left right and center with everyone seeming to know where they had to be despite no schedules, scoreboards or timepieces anywhere. 

Rough fields resulted in many injuries.

My duties were to be coach of girls football and also first aider to all our school teams- although it didn't appear that any other schools had first aiders so I ended up assisting quite a few other students as well.

Being the only white person caused a stir again, as I walked past the row of spectators watching a football match they all stopped, turned and stared, laughing and waving.  I am fairly used to this under normal circumstances but found it unusual that they were turning from their beloved football to look at me, until I realised there amongst the  noise of music and cheering there were two guys just behind me yelling out in Swahili 'have u seen the muzungu!? Look look!!'
Once again I was given preferential treatment, people kept giving me chairs to sit on which was a bit of a problem as I preferred to stand and cheer, but it was rude to refuse so I would sit for a bit and then thank the person and come up with some excuse as to why I had to suddenly leave.

Crowds watching the football.

I discovered that it is very difficult to coach a team when the officials, spectators and other players are all speaking another language. My girls were fantastic, sticking by me and translating when they realised I had no idea what is happening, but even so I found that in our first game some Kenyan men were cheering super loudly for my team and then made a couple of substitutes on my behalf- I assumed they must have been associated with our school somehow but afterwards I found out they were just over enthusiastic spectators that has convinced the officials they were part of staff- something that had slipped past me amongst the language confusion- often they speak Swahili and also a local dialect, sometimes even both together-makes it very difficult to know what's happening.

After the first game I was a little more savvy and didn't allow randoms to take over anymore. I continued to cause a stir, being a white, female coach, and running around with a backpack bandaging, massaging and strapping my players. Especially in the first game when one of my players realised she didn't have sports shoes, and so I pulled mine off and gave them to her to wear for the game, a barefoot muzungu is a very rare occurance!
Often people asked me for money or if they could work for my school or come and be my student, or get contact details. I would mostly answer 'hapana pole' (no sorry), pretend I didn't understand or leave it to one of my students to answer them in Swahili.

On the second day the school hosting the games ran out of water and I had students asking me for drinks all day. I ended up purchasing 28 bottles of water throughout the day- until there were none left even for sale around the grounds!! The games went late into the day, not finishing until almost 7 pm, but it was worth all the efforts, our school came off with a few wins and we qualifies for regionals in girls volleyball, netball annnnnnnd yep... My girls football team :) :)

Kids climbing the trees in order to see properly.

Lunchtime for football girls.

  

Our boys volleyball