An Adventure in Africa

16 July

Today’s rough plan is to walk up to Mwamba Field Study Centre and catch up with the Arocha gang this morning and then on to Silverstone this afternoon.

To get to Mwamba it’s best to walk up the beach and Turtle Bay always recommend that we take a rubbish bag with us to pick up any debris along the way. 

The beach is actually remarkably clean, in fact much more so than last year when it was a bit of a victim of plastics dumping at sea.  Nevertheless, accompanied by Dennis and Baker our beach boy mates, we manage to gather a couple of sacks which they kindly take back to Turtle Bay for a weigh in.  We are very pleased to hear that Dennis has just passed his driving test so is looking for driving work.  He has seen the futility of a life spent on the beach.

We arrive at Mwamba and bump into with Jonathan, our birding guide from last year, Tsofa, Liz and Dave and our friend Caro.  Another lovely surprise is that Sarah, a volunteer from last year, with whom we went on our first teaching expedition, is also here.  After chatting with them for a while we walk back to Turtle Bay for lunch.

Janet’s meeting us to accompany us to Silverstone.  It’s fun to experience a new mode of transport, our first ever ride in a Tuk Tuk, a little three-wheeled buggy. 

We’re outside the school and they now have a very smart sign and mission statement, proudly emblazoned along the main gates.

This is unbelievable.  In the short space of just over a year, the school has gone from 9 students and little more than a shack to 218 pupils and one, two, three, four, five classrooms, with another being built, a virtually equipped kitchen and office under construction. 

The kitchen is almost complete, some of the funds you donated will pay for an environmentally-friendly cooking stove, known as a jiko, so all the children can be fed.

Naturally, each class treats us to an impromptu concert.  The singing is almost deafening and the children so happy, their faces just shine.

You may have seen that Angie Cundale and friends recently raised a large amount of money for the school.  Her daughter, Sophie, together with friends Jo and Rachel have come out to stay with Janet for three weeks to help out.  They’re lovely girls and doing a marvellous job.  Sophie is responsible for the beautiful artwork on the classrooms and they’ve prepared colourful posters, played games and organised activities for the children.  We’ll leave them to it as they are going swimming and very excited at the prospect.

17 July

Nothing on the agenda this morning, so we join George in the pool for a water aerobics session.  As always, it’s great fun and we end with a maasai jumping competition otherwise known as “don’t lose your shorts”. Believe me it has happened - not that I’d mention any names (Agy).

Sarah from Arocha is here and we’re meeting up with her and Caro for lunch at our local bar, Bustani ya Eden (Garden of Eden) for lunch.  We go for the Swahili dish, chicken in coconut sauce, with chapattis.  It’s delicious and that sauce is great; perfect for dipping your chips in.

We enjoy a great fish curry, caught by the boys, sukuma wiki (spinach-like vegetable, meaning “see you through the week”) and chapattis.