MIS Tanzania Projects 2013 - Days 5 - 8 - Work Project

I've finally just gone through all of my photos and videos of the trip...I feel at ease knowing that I've had time to review it and reflect on everything through photos. Phew. Now onto it...

MIS started doing the work project at Muungano Primary school in 2011. Money to support the work project (and all projects) is raised through drink and snack bars for school events like plays, musicals, etc.; a stall that sells purchased items/souvenirs from Tanzania; specific fundraisers set up by the students and general donations made by people associated with the MIS community. The money raised then goes towards purchasing materials needed to do the work and a 'fundi' (a foreman) who overseas all of the work we do, mixes the paint and helps the students get organized and on track.

Day 5 - Muungano Primary School: Day 1 of Work Project

So we had visited the school yesterday and learned about what we'd be doing. Today, we rocked up and had a bit of downtime to start while a few last minute things were being purchased for our work. In this downtime, a few curious students approached us and introduced themselves. At about 10:30am, we got into the school and started doing some sanding on the walls of the staffroom, hallways and director's office. Sadly, I forgot my camera on this day and wasn't able to get any before photos of the place but will try and add some later. To sand, we used straight up sandpaper without sanding blocks, and it wasn't the easiest of tasks...especially since I thought I'd be the tough guy and not buy work gloves for the trip. I'm that hardcore. As there were 28 of us, some students also had the opportunity to teach a couple of lessons in the classrooms - I really enjoyed watching these! We stopped for lunch around 1pm and it was another delicious ISM treat - who knew a take-away lunch could still be that tasty? A student ended up being sent back to ISM because he wasn't feeling well so at 2pm, I headed back to campus to accompany him. The rest of the students carried on with sanding and putting some base coat on the walls and then interacting with the students outside for a game of soccer to wrap up the day.

Day 6 - Muungano Primary School: Day 2 of Work Project

We were straight back into work again on day 2 - finishing up base coat painting and then beginning the first layers of oil based paint - yellow - on top of the old light blue and white walls. The fumes got to be a lot for some students to handle at times so they were warranted a number of breaks to get some fresh air outside. Along with these breaks came engaging with the students which included anything from getting our hair played with, to slapsies and games of tag. I loved this bit. Interacting with the kids was just such a heartwarming experience and my favourite bit of every project we worked on...I guess it's a good thing I'm a teacher so I have lots of these opportunities! :P After a hard day's work, most of us participated in a soccer game against the Muungano students on the big dirt field behind the school. It was awesome.

First layers of crisp, new yellow paint going on the walls in the staff room!

Getting every nook and cranny!

On the stairwell walls...

Mr. Munissi's office...

The hallway's looking brighter already!

Bart was a hit with the boys!

The soccer pitch

Love this guy...George!

Day 7 - Muungano Primary School: Day 3 of Work Project

Today we found out that we wouldn't actually be building a gate for the school - the money we raised wasn't quite enough. I think we were all a bit bummed by this as we had seen the number of random people that would pass through the school grounds (including a number of motorbikes) and could see how helpful the gate would be. The good news, however, is that we know they need one and we can work on getting the materials and funds together to build one next year. Work continued as normal and a couple of other students taught classes today and I taught "Skinamarinky Dinky Dink" to the kids...a very random song choice but it was the first to pop into my head! They all loved it though and it followed me around for the rest of the day and the next one.

We finished up the bulk of our painting today and started doing some details with some brown paint on the doors and floor borders. Because of the leaky ceiling, a lot of moisture seeps into the walls and has destroyed the bulletin boards...as I mentioned in my last post, this school would no doubt be shut down if it was anywhere in the Western world because of mold. With some of the money we had left for the project (but not enough for a gate), we were able to buy some cork board to install in the rooms which really increased the aesthetics (and probably health) of the rooms! A separate fundi would come in tomorrow to help install this for us and we'd finish up the painting along with wrapping up the project. I walked to a tree and plant area (it was literally on the side of the road...a bunch of trees and plants together) with three students and Mr. Huber to look at trees to green up the playground a bit. After a long and busy day, we were ready to get back to ISM for showers and chill time so our daily soccer match (sadly) didn't happen.

Teaching a class about body parts...

He loved slapsies!

This guy's English was great...such a lovely kid...but then again, they all were! :)

Waving goodbye on our second last day!

Day 8 - Muungano Primary School: Day 4 of Work Project

The past three days have been fantastic! The students have worked so hard and it's been so rewarding to watch them interact with the kids and see how invested they were in everything they did at Muungano Primary School. We finished up the brown trim today and fixed up some spots we missed with yellow paint. After lunch, the students paired up, named and planted trees in the school yard...with the help of some eager student helpers! We hung out with the kids a bit, some other members of the school board/district arrived and we had a presentation from them to thank us for our efforts. MIS also donated some textbooks to the school so we saw a sample of what these books. Three of our students gave a presentation (as they do at all projects) and said some words of thanks for the hospitality we had from the school and for the great experience the project offered us. We said our goodbyes to the Muungano students, which was a challenge, as many of them had grown some good friendships with the MIS students over the four days.

Lovely young ladies :)

Kid in the front...what a hoot! A cheeky lil guy!

James and Max with their tree!

All smiles!

Our farewell photo...sad to go!

MIS Tanzania Projects 2013 - Day 3 & 4

Day 3 - HIV Affected Teens Fun Day

Today, we spent the entire day on campus at ISM. The campus is beautiful so it was actually a treat to be able to hang out here for the day! We had breakfast at 8:00 and then waited for groups of people to trickle in. By 10am, a number of teens and their families and/or friends began to populate the ISM campus. We met them and organized a couple of games of pick-up basketball and soccer. Some just stood by and watched (despite my efforts to try to get them involved) and others did their own thing. At about 11ish, we gathered as a big group (I bet close to 100 people) on the ISM field and were listening to music and heard a number of introductions from the people who work at the clinic that helps these students - while not all of those in attendance had HIV, all of them have been affected by it in some way, shape or form.

The MIS students were all active in participating in the activities planned for the day, such as dancing (an African version of the electric slide), chugging cola, tug of war, a rap, a bboy performance, sack races and the most unique activity - chasing a chicken...a live chicken...well four live chickens. There were four 'heats' of chasing the four different chickens around the field until each one was caught: the Tanzanian boys, the Tanzanian girls, the MIS boys and the MIS girls. It was entertaining to watch, to say the least, although you couldn't help but feel a little bad for the chicken when it got caught...what is the best way to hold a live chicken anyway? The students who had caught the MIS chickens donated them to two students who would have really appreciated the eventual dinner treat for their families. And guess what was for lunch...chicken! :P

After lunch, we had a chance to sit down with an American lady named Annie who spoke to the group about HIV/AIDS and answered any questions that the MIS students had about the illness. She works at the clinic from where all those in attendance came from and/or families/friends came from. She shed some light on some myths that may be associated with the illness and the treatment options that are available for patients in Tanzania. I learned that the medication for the disease is provided free to patients but also that the medication is not as advanced and are hand-me-downs (so to say) from the western world. She was an optimistic lady, though, and I know the clinic must appreciate her and her efforts to promote HIV awareness and to provide assistance to those suffering from this illness.

To wrap up the day, some kids jumped in the pool, myself included. There were three girls that didn't know how to swim and were adamant that I teach them - what a workout! One of them had a death grip on my arm the whole time and my shoulders felt the effects of that the next day. After an hour in the cold water (yes, the water was quite chilly because it is 'winter' there), I had to retire from my role as a swim instructor but was proud of what I had accomplished in even getting one of the girls into the water. At about 5, most of the visiting crew had left and we had yet another delicious dinner at the ISM cafeteria to celebrate a successful day.

Day 4 - KCMC Occupational Therapy Department & Hospital

After another delicious breakfast with good company from Afzal, we headed off to the Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center Hospital. This project was one that I was looking forward to because the Junior School at MIS raised a lot of money towards this. In February, students from EC to Grade 4 participated in a Sit-Up-A-Thon which was organized and run by my colleague, Dan, and myself. Students took home pledge sheets and then spent some time at the beginning of a PE class doing as many sit-ups as they could in one minute. Then, they recorded how many they did (a partner should be holding their feet and counting for them), took this paper home and brought it back with a monetary donation. This year, the students were successful in raising just over 4,000Euros which is pretty incredible! The top five earners then got to choose some medical equipment to be purchased and brought with us to donate at the hospital while 3,000Euros of the raised money went towards helping the students with their tuition fees to study at the hospital's campus.

We sat with some of the aspiring Occupational Therapy students and learned a bit about why they've chosen to study OT and what they hope to do with it. It was very inspirational to hear what they felt and, despite the challenges they face with OT and it not being well-recognized in Tanzania just yet, they're determined to make a difference in the lives of those who struggle with simple physical activities of daily living. After the chat, we had a tour of the clinic and the MIS students gave a quick thank you speech and donated some other equipment that their personal fundraising had afforded them. Although there wasn't a lot involved and we were sitting around quite a bit, I enjoyed this project and felt a great sense of pride for my Junior School students and in seeing where their hard-earned money went.

We headed back to ISM for lunch and in the afternoon we headed to Muungano Primary School where we'd be starting our work project the next day. We met Mr. Munissi, the director of the school, and he showed us around the school and what we'd be working on in the next four days. If this school had been located in a western country, it wouldn't be a school. Mold was visible in all corners of every room and you could tell the roof had a leak because of the amount of water damage (and mold) that was located on the walls. This school was in bad shape. We'd be doing some painting (to cover up the mold) and we were also told we'd be building a gate to help limit the amount of traffic crossing through the school grounds; sadly, a lot of stuff gets stolen because of the lack of locks and security on the school grounds! We knew straight away that the painting bit was a bit of a waste of time seeing as how the leaking roof would ruin the paint in a matter of months but as we aren't construction workers and had no idea how to fix the roof (and we also had a limited amount of money to work with), it was going to have to do.

After our visit, I headed into Moshi with a handful of students who wanted to buy some souvenirs - the most popular being a Tanzania soccer jersey. We shopped a bit then sat down for a Coke before heading back to ISM for dinner and an evening of chilling out before our labour-intensive four days began!

Goooooo CHICKEN!

Poor bugger didn't have a chance...but, Bart didn't escape unscathed! In his epic chicken grab, he scraped his rear end and knee pretty badly!

Sarah's bringing whole new meaning (and reward) to the favourite PE Game "Capture the Chicken"!

And they're off...

This chicken wasn't too happy...and I can't imagine his wings felt too great in that hold!

Rap star Max and beat box king Flo with special guest bboys, Mike and Roland! :P

The Electric Slide...Tanzania style!

A beautiful flower with the KCMC College building behind

On the bumpy road back from the hospital...can't imagine an ambulance cruising too fast down here!

An incredible view of the roof of Africa!

MIS Tanzania Projects 2013 - Day 1 & 2

Sitting down and looking through 20some photos on Picasa, I realize I have to verbalize (in reader-friendly format) some of my reflections. “Whoa!” is a good starting place.

I arrived in Tanzania 15 days ago and it’s been a non-stop 15 days since touch-down. It has been an incredible experience. It has taught me much about myself. It has changed the way I look at the world, as most of my travel experiences do, but this time in a much more extravagant way. It has put me in contact with a loving, passionate and influential group of students and adults who, in some way, became my temporary family for 15 days.

I’ll recap my experiences as individual blogs for each day…I know I can write too much so I’ll go day by blog!

Day 1 and 2 – Arrival and First Full Day in Africa!

I left Starnberg at an early hour (very early…3:30am) on Friday, June 28th to meet the students, their parents and other teachers…chaperone/projects coordinator/trip leader. We then arrive at Kilimanjaro International Airport around 7:30pm to be greeted by one of eight Maasai leaders in Tanzania, Dr. Ole Kunney. I met him before at MIS when he came to visit and this man seems like a pretty big deal…probably because he is! He greets all of us with a giant bear hug and then we wait to pass through immigration for an hour, collect bags and begin our journey to International School of Moshi (ISM) on this big open-air converted dump truck. Upon arrival, we’re again greeted but this time with pizza and orange juice…and room assignments for the next 10ish days. Bed was also high on my priority list and even though springs dug into me, I slept like a champ that night. Holy cow…I’m in Africa…!

The next morning we wake up, head to breakfast at a much earlier hour than I’d ever even consider on a Saturday…the first Saturday at the end of the school year…but hey! We saw Afzal there, who I quickly met at the airport when he greeted us, and enjoyed a nice meal…the cafeteria at ISM was one of the best continuous food experiences I’ve ever had in my life…and headed off to the first “project” of the trip.

So, I feel I need to back up a bit and here’s a good place to do it. I’m chaperoning a school-related (though not completely ‘school’) trip to Tanzania. I knew I wanted to do at/with MIS before I even started working here. How it works is that there’s a yearly trip to Tanzania planned by a trip leader, projects that are ‘seen to’ and planned by a trip coordinator and chaperoned by two other members of staff. Students write letters of application, have interviews and are selected to join a group of like-minded students. They then spend the school year raising funds, collecting donations and preparing for this end-of-year trip to help out those in need, experience some pretty amazing volunteer work and exude some awesome humanitarian skills. Fortunately, I was chosen as a trip chaperone!

We rolled into Neema Orphanage between 9 and 9:30 in the morning. We were welcomed by a couple of sisters (the Catholic kind) and a number of children mostly under the age of 3. There was also a group of four girls there from the States who had connections to the orphanage through their their church and who were doing a nice thing in helping out at the orphanage for 3 or 4 weeks of their summer break. It took about 1 minute (no joke), for a kid to make a move to someone from our group’s legs. These kids were SUCH a delight. They would ask your name, say hello, smile with you, want to be picked up, cuddled, still smile with you, play with your camera…just be kids! Despite not having parents, these kids has an amazing lady (Sister Hazel) and a group of staff there to help take care of all (25) of these children. What we did for this project was donate clothes and toys; the students had gathered baby clothes donations during the school year. I was very familiar with this project as I spent quite some time folding, packing, and labeling these clothes before the trip had started. Also, in a discussion with my department colleague, I learned that the idea of donating clothes in Africa is starting to be frowned upon; we should be giving them the education and tools they need to resource the making of their own clothes. Nonetheless, the clothes were very welcomed – there were a lot of them! – and you could see that these clothes would go to good use. A group of three MIS students gave a little thank you speech and officially donated the clothes, we did some handshaking but the best part of it all was the children. It was the interactions I saw the students having with the little ones, the interaction I was having with the little ones and the smiles on their faces all the while. We stayed around until 1 or 1:30, had some difficult goodbyes and headed back to ISM for lunch. First project: done! I thought it was pretty easy and would have enjoyed staying longer, but after our longish flight the day before, we were tired. After lunch, we head into the city of Moshi to exchange money and just look around. From what we see, it's a friendly little place but then again, we only see a couple of streets of it...we find out later it's not like that everywhere in the city. After an hour or so exploring around, we head back to ISM for a little down time. 

At 6ish, we sat down to dinner, with Afzal, and we realized now that we were going to be completely spoiled with delicious food for the duration of our stay at ISM...this is very good news! It didn’t matter what was going to be there, it would be delicious and the students were realizing this too. The evening was given to the students to mingle and chill out and I bonded with Mr. Joshi, Mr. Arnoldt, Mr. Huber and Afzal in his apartment. Afzal - This man is a legend at ISM and with anyone who's ever met him through the MIS Tanzania Projects. He organizes everything for the Moshi leg of the trip (which is 12 days total), he’ll do anything to accommodate you and he’s just known to be such a nice guy. He organizes many other excursions for visiting schools programs as well so someone reading this, may know him if they've ever been on a school trip to Tanzania.  

...The group of us gets to chat, share stories about past experiences in Tanzania (and elsewhere) and it was a nice wrap to the day.

First impressions of Tanzania in daylight - plants for sale in Moshi

Some of our students still not sure what to do with all these kids...

This was this guy's pose...I have a few photos of him doing it...very original! :)

Try and tell me this doesn't melt your heart!

The boy walking away had a serious connection with a couple of kids...including this one...who cried when he realized Titus was going away from him!

Instant love :)

The donations all laid out...proud moment for me of these MIS students!

Sister Hazel and two of her darlings.

Downtown Moshi...that's a big beer can!

Meat stall in Moshi Market

Hustle and bustle of the market

Our first glimpse of Mt. Kilimanjaro...amazing right?