8th April
As it's the weekend, Romeo came to Bahay Susan and took us to Bennie's. It's a lovely park with a swimming pool and palm trees with loungers. We had a lovely relaxing Sunday. There's a restaurant on site where we had lunch. We watched a film and relaxed. It was a lovely day. We are looking forward to seeing Romeo tomorrow.
9th April
Romeo came to our accommodation at around 7am and told us he was leaving for a course in Windhoek for the whole week! We were hoping he would sort out our accommodation and take us to school. So we're all feeling a bit scared and lost now. Our accommodation has no running water or mattresses or fridge at the moment and we don't know where it is or how to get in! We don't know where the school is or how to get there and yet we are expected to go tomorrow. We're all very apprehensive now.
We tried to walk to Oshakati open market but went completely the wrong way! We walked for ages and couldn't find it so walked all the way back in scorching heat! We finally got back to our accommodation and it turned out that we'd walked in completely the opposite direction to the market. We planned our route by car and yet still went the wrong way! We drove all the way towards Bennie's and only saw Ongwediva market. We had a quick look but it was only selling dried fish and meat which didn't look very appetising as it was covered in flies! We were only there 5 minutes and got back in the car to find the main market. We drove back past our accommodation and continued the other way. It was very frustrating. We eventually found Omatala market and wandered around. People were saying 'Walelepo' to us which means 'hello, how are you?' The market was mainly selling dried fish and mopane worms plus some traditional dresses and baby carriers. The baby carriers were the nicest things there but since we don't have any babies with us or at home, we decided to save our money.
After the market, we went to Bennie's to meet Freda (Onamutai's deputy head) who was supposed to be helping us and showing us the accommodation and helping us get to school etc. She said she'd be at Bennie's at 4pm but by 6pm she still hadn't shown up. Definitely on African time! She was in the salon getting her hair done. She spent 2 minutes with us to say hello but we still have no accommodation sorted. She just told us to meet her by the roadside at 6.45am to go to the school. We were all really hoping that meeting her would put us at ease and make us feel better after an apprehensive day.
10th April
We were up at 4.50am getting packed and ready for our first day at the school. We were all so nervous. We had to negotiate a better price with Susan Bahay as it was expensive to stay there. We were all showered and ready for breakfast by 5.50am and eating breakfast by 6am. We checked out and drove to meet Freda. She called us because we were not there when she got there and when we arrived we couldn't see her. When she found us, her colleague Dina got in the car and directed us. The tarred road part of the journey was fine but the gravel road we had to turn down was very rough. We were being thrown around a lot and were worried about the car-it was like driving over rocks! When we arrived at the school, the headteacher came to greet us. His name is Mr Felix Tangeni. He is very friendly and helpful. We went straight into his office to introduce ourselves. He struggled with our names, especially 'Amy'! We went into the staff briefing and were introduced to the staff. There are only around 20 teachers here, teaching English, traditional languages, social sciences, science, maths and business studies. They all told us their names but it will be a struggle to remember and pronounce them all as they are very different to names in England. They find our names difficult too. When the Principal introduced us he got very stuck on Amy again and she had to introduce herself! Joyce gave a little speech. Then they did a clapping, slapping books and raining hands ritual to welcome us.
Then we went outside to the assembly. They have no assembly hall so students must stand in line and wait in the hot sun. One student collapsed in front of us. We think she'd had no food or water and fainted in the heat. None of the staff or students batted an eyelid like this was really common. Mr Tangeni introduced us to the students and they were all happy to see us. He then pulled out a boy who was laughing and made him stand in front of the whole school and share the joke then wait to be disciplined. He talked a lot about what a privilege it is to have us here and that if the students are very well behaved then some of them will get to meet with us but only if they are very good. He made it clear that if they are nice and respectful to us then we will be the same back to them.
We had a tour of the school with Freda along with a Nigerian volunteer teacher which was interesting. There are 433 children in the school from grade 8 (around 13 years old) to grade 12 at around 17-18 years old). We learnt that classes here have around 30-40 learners and although many have additional needs, the children with severe special needs do go to the only special school in the north of Namibia which is near where we are staying. We hope to visit there this week. Students here have to pay $150 per year to come to school up to grade 10 then to do grade 12 they have to pay $500 per year! They also have to take compulsory exams which cost $300 too. Some of the students don't live with their families, they rent accommodation on their own but then their family can't afford to pay the rent and for food so they go hungry. Many children don't bring food to school but the tuck shop lady bakes some cake in a small fire on the floor (a kind of porridge) and if they can afford it they pay 50c for that to keep them going all day. It's a very long day for the children. It starts at 7.30am and finishes at 3pm.
As we went around, some of the students were very excited to see us and asked us questions about England. Most children were very shy and nervous about asking questions in English but I pointed out that they speak our language much better than we speak theirs! They were very surprised to learn that England is very small and yet we have so many people. All the people in London is about 4 times how many people in the whole of Namibia! England as a whole is around 50,800 square miles and Namibia is 318,259 square miles so the population here is very sparse compared to England. It makes England seem very over populated!
Freda has asked if I can teach the staff IT skills. Lots of staff don't even know the basics so I said I'd be glad to help if they tell me what they need to know I can show them how to do it. It's nice to feel useful.
We have been working in the library today. It's an open plan room with 3 tables and some bookshelves around the edge. They don't have many books for a whole school. They don't have internet here either but have made a good link with millennium challenge and they have built the toilets and will be installing internet soon. The classrooms have very basic old desks and chairs which are often broken. The flooring is just cement or sand. They do not have data projectors or TVs in each class; only 1 projector the library for the whole school.
By lunchtime the librarian needed our help. She got us cutting up scrap book-covers, making them into library card holders for the reference books. When we came back to the library I worked on a presentation about the differences between the 2 schools and Joyce and Amy sorted out more library books.
After an hour or so we were kicked out the library and had to go to the staffroom for a meeting. Mr Tangeni told us the school is failing as the learners don't get high enough grades. This means we have to hold a stakeholder's conference. This involves the parents, students, teachers, directors, inspectors and ambassadors etc all going to the church and sharing ideas and learning about the school. Perception is that results are getting worse but in actual fact they are going up and down every year. Varying between around 23.1% pass rate to around 75%.
Mr Tangeni needs the staff to organise the stakeholder conference and so wrote a to do list with 15 items that people needed to volunteer for. One of the staff members quite vocally thought this was a bad idea and believed the head should take the lead and tell the staff what to do as letting people choose would take too long since staff would not be willing to help. It seemed very rude to be honest but as time went by we could see that Mr Tangeni was not being respected and staff were not willing to help. In the end I volunteered to help with posters, writing slides for the overhead projector and charts of results. When staff were not keen to volunteer, he went round the room asking each staff member what they would do. Whole groups of people were keen to join the smallest tasks but not the bigger ones. Joyce and Amy ended up getting signed up to purchasing the food and Amy also seemed to get put doing the room plan. When he read out the task list it seemed my name was by most of them! I was down to do the school profile involving taking pictures of students and turning all the information about the whole school over the last 20 years into a presentation. I was also down to operate the OHP (or HOP as they'd called it)! Then when he read out organising the church venue and decorations that was me too! He asked for group leaders for everything and when no one volunteered he said I was leading on all of these things! All the staff were looking and nervously laughing like 'she's new how can she do it all' but it seemed the decision had been made and I was in charge! I didn't quite know whether to laugh or cry-it's a huge task! Still it's better to be busy and useful.
After the meeting the Mr Tangeni came and said the accommodation was still not ready and we would be stuck until tomorrow. We called Susan Bahay and luckily she still had room. Then once we'd booked Susan's they said they would take us to see the house how it is now so we can see what is needed. We drove back to the Shell garage with Dina and met Freda at the garage. When she arrived she climbed in the back and we went to the Director of Education's office. We spoke to a guy who took us to the flat, Although it was old and needed a good clean it does now have beds and a fridge. It has no hot water but at least the water runs! The alarm was faulty and there are no pots, pans or plates etc but it will be OK. We just need hooks for our mosquito nets and to get crockery etc, bedding, pillows and make it liveable. We move in tomorrow.
11th April
We got up at 4.45am again and got ready, packed again and had breakfast. We got to the meeting point and Freda was not there so we called her and she said her car battery was flat so she'd be very late. Dina still come to meet us but was also on African time! We drove to school down the rough roads and arrived in time for briefing. Mr Tangeni was equally as unsure of himself when addressing the staff today.
Within 10 minutes of arriving we were given the job of assembling exam papers between the three of us and Ukeme, the Nigerian volunteer teacher. Then 5 minutes later we were told we were invigilating an the exam! We were all split up and had 1 class each. I went into a rowdy class of students and quietened them down, got them to put their books at the front and gave them a five minute warning to use the loo etc. I then had to check the exam papers all had the right number of pages and then gave them out papers down. I told them they had 1.5 hours and had to concentrate and not talk. They began and were all passing the few rulers and calculators they had between them. It started at 8.30am then the majority were finished within 20 minutes to half an hour and were all looking around distracted and bored. I then had another hour watching them so they didn't cheat! An hour staring at a new white stranger is a long time fopr a class of students when when they have nothing to do! After 1 hour I told them to check their papers as they still had 30 minutes left. They all groaned as they'd finished and been hanging around for ages. They were getting restless and trying to communicate with each other. With 15 minutes to go, I told them they had 15 minutes left and they all laughed. They couldn't believe they weren't allowed to go yet. After the test a girl wanted to speak to me. She waited until her class had gone then asked me for $5 for food as she was so hungry. I said we weren't allowed. Then she asked for my phone number! I said this wasn't allowed either!
After the exam, we wandered over to the local clinic and Joyce has arranged to visit on Friday. A child was diagnosed with TB while we were in there. It's so sad. We came back to school and had some food. Mr Tangeni came in and gave me all the information to make the presentation for the stakeholder's conference. When we came over to the library to work on it, another teacher asked for our help to produce the logo for the stakeholder's conference. We took a picture of 3 hands linking to represent the student, parent and teacher. I then uploaded it to the computer and designed the logo to have the words 'education is everyone's responsibility' in English and Oshiwambo. It actually looks really good considering we don't have great facilities. They were really pleased with it. I emailed it to a member of staff so it can be used on all the marketing for the conference.
After school we met with the director to discuss accommodation. They were supposed to fix the alarm, the mosquito nets and the hot water. None of this had been done. We took the keys and went to get bedding, cookware and crockery etc. When we arrived at the house it was full of spiders. Amy has been busy naming them all!
12th April
We went to Eluwa special school today as it's more similar to Milestone. It's a very good school for children who are blind or deaf. We waited for an hour for the principal. She was very friendly and clearly in charge of the school. She watched our powerpoint about Milestone with great interest. We then went to Romeo's sister's (Julia's) class to meet the learners there. Her class are all hearing impaired students and some have developmental difficulties too. They were all excited to see us and signing hello (a flick from the head and a thumbs up). They use Namibia sign here which is very different from signalong. In the picture below they are signing our names!
They have 342 students and all are either blind or deaf. Most of the deaf children cannot speak a word either so rely completely on Namibia sign. Some children have autism too. They study a national curriculum and also learn computing and hairdressing. Students are aged 4-adults. Some students cannot write their own name so there is debate over whether a national curriculum is appropriate when what they really need are life skills. Many of the children are orphans and all but 1 child lives at the school in the on-site hostel. Some parents do not pick up their children for weekends or holidays and so they may have to look after themselves. When parents come to collect the other children, the teachers see those who remain, crying. There are no physically disabled students at Eluwa special school but they can go to Otapi special school or may be sent to special school in Windhoek. Often, children who are physically disabled are kept at home because the parents cannot afford wheelchairs.
We talked to Julia about PECS and it seemed like a system that would really benefit students here. However, although the classrooms are lovingly decorated with hand drawn posters about numbers, letters, weights, quantity, food, the body, families and much more; this is the extent of their resources. They do not have any communication aids, other than a function for the computers in the computer room to talk to the blind students. Other than that, the deaf students rely on sign language and the blind children rely on Braille.
We went on a tour of the school-it's very large with massive grounds. The students are well cared for here. They have a free on-site clinic and dining room so the student's health and nutrition is catered for more so than at Onamutai. We saw classes of deaf learners all keen to say hello in Namibia sign. We got very good at this sign after doing it every few seconds for the whole day! Classes were all very excited to see us! We went to one deaf class and they were watching a film. It wasn't signed though so they were just trying to follow the pictures. We told them about Mr Tumble and promised to send them some links to videos that will support their learning.
We saw the blind section of the school and talked to the blind staff who Braille the work for the students. The staff are all keen to come to England to learn. One is keen to get into Cambridge university!
13th April
We arrived at school early and saw there were hardly any learners in assembly. They were all skipping school. Slowly as assembly started, more learners turned up but Mr Tangeni made them wait outside. We then had a staff meeting and Mr Tangeni said all the VIPs that were expected to come to the stakeholder's conference are unavailable due to catching planes to England and France and also in meetings. Mr Tangeni asked if we should go ahead and all the staff said to cancel it! Then he tried to tackle the issue of the latecomers and asked for suggestions of punishment. I said in the UK latecomers would be given detention which could be as long as the time they were late by. I also suggested report cards that teachers sign each lesson to say the student has arrived on time. In the end they decided they would do some work in the grounds. Mr Tangeni wanted students to be punished as soon as they came in but the staff were dead against it. Many were shouting and saying the exams should be written first as it was illegal to delay the exam and the inspector would be angry but Mr Tangeni persisted that punishment must come before the exam so learners could not escape early. Dina was shouting that this was a bad idea and that they would just let the students who were on time go and everyone else stay behind to clean. Then Ukeme gave a speech saying that in the name of God staff should respect and obey the principal as it's his decision, he is the leader and he is trying to put things right. Staff reluctantly agreed and got their rakes etc and got their learners to clean up. I think even the learners who were on time must be being punished now too because the exam will start so late. It seems mad that there's so little authority or respect in the school between the learners and teachers or the teachers and headteacher.
I spent the morning working on the stakeholder's presentation. Then we were making exam papers for the learners. The copies they gave us to put together were all upside down and back to front but they didn't have the money (or inclination) to fix it so that will be a hard exam for the students to sit as question 17 is upside down next to question 1 etc. It's clear that the students are disaffected due to the staff feeling this way too. There seems to be little motivation to improve. Everyone sadly seems resigned to the fact that it's failing. It's heartbreaking to see a hardworking man like Mr Tangeni being so disrespected by the staff and students. Apparently this is because he is from a different tribe to the staff and students so people don't think he should be in this school. Staff seem to almost want the school to continue failing so that Mr Tangeni will be removed. It's a very disheartening situation.
14th April
Thank goodness it's the weekend. We got up at 6am to drive to Etosha. It was about 4 hour's drive to the Von Lindquest gate in the East of the park. We came in and they said we'd get in free as we are volunteers. We drove inside and within 2 minutes we saw 2 giraffes! We were so excited.
The people in the car behind us were out of their car taking pictures of the giraffe-it's so dangerous. They are wild animals with no cages. 20 metres further up the road there were 2 lions! It definitely wasn't safe to get out! A bit further in we saw 2 more giraffes up closer which we watched for ages. Then as we drove further into the park we saw some zebras in the distance and some wildebeast. We decided to drive north out of the park so we'd be heading in the right direction. You must leave the park 1.5 hours before sunset because it's very dangerous to be driving in the dark with wild animals roaming. Further into the park we saw a zebra crossing...literally! Followed by a few others crossing the road behind-up really close to the car. We also saw some warthogs and a herd of springbok jumping around. As we moved further into the park we saw more giraffes and more zebras- almost 10 of each in total. We also saw 2 tortoises and an oryx strutting along by stinkwater on the Etosha pan (like a huge lake).
We passed someone who said there was an elephant by the next waterhole and got really excited. When we got there though it was nowhere to be seen. We were really disappointed. We then drove quite a way through the park just seeing beautiful birds and butterflies. As we were coming out of the park we noticed a detour and decided to take it as we still had some time. I noticed something on the horizon. Joyce thought it was trees but I said 'they are swishing their tails so it must be animals...maybe it's elephants!' When we got further down the detour, sure enough a whole herd of elephants came into view! We watched them for ages. They were snorting and squirting the dust over themselves and flapping their ears to keep cool. There were a few baby elephants too. They were so cute. The longer we stayed the closer they came. At one point we were surrounded and thought they were going to trample the car as we had nowhere to move to. That was a bit scary! We were really lucky in our visit today. To see so much wildlife roaming free in just a few hours was amazing! We were really glad we saw the elephants at the end of the day too as it was a really positive thing to finish on. What an fantastic day!
15th April
We were up early for Romeo to take us to church. We all put on our best clothes and met him to drive to the church by Onamutai school. We all nearly had a heart attack when we found out it was 3 hours! The whole service was in Oshiwambo too so we didn't understand a word! We tried our best to sing along to the hymns. Then everyone had to go up to the front to donate money for the church renovation and for the general fund. After a few more prayers and hymns it was time for confirmation. Joyce is confirmed but Amy and I aren't so were not allowed to join in. Joyce knelt down to receive her bread and wine and said she was praying for her not to fall over when she stood up as her knees were trembling with nerves being in front of a 300 strong congregation!
Following church we went to see Romeo's friend at his cucca shop. (Like a little shop or bar) and had a drink. He is quite the entreprenuer and has had electricity installed so he can run the fridges to keep the drinks cold that he sells. Then we went to Romeo's homestead. We learnt about how the wheat flour is made. The mahangu wheat looks a bit like sweetcorn and it dries in the sun. Then the grains are rubbed off and put into a hole in the earth. Then they are pounded with a stick until they turn into flour. Then the flour is added to water to make a mahangu pap. It was really interesting. We learnt about all the buildings on his land. He has several brick and mud huts with straw roofs. His cousin lives there with his daughter and his nephews. There are several trees growing on the land; paw paw, mangoes and marula trees.
Once we'd seen his home we went to a cucca shop run by his auntie which was overflowing with people having lunch. We didn't try the food but it looked like people were enjoying it; apart from all the flies! It was a long and hot but fascinating day. We are really grateful to Romeo for sharing this slice of traditional life and culture with us.
16th April
Today we had to get up at 4.30am to go to Romeo's school in Oshikango near the Angolan border. It was 3 hours return trip in the car. It's a combined school with children aged 6-16. Lots of the older classes have low percentages of girls because lots of them fall pregnant under-age. Only a few return to school. It's a small school but has 340 pupils. They have no electricity in the school-only an office 3 km away that has a photocopier and 1 computer but that serves all 23 schools in the cluster. It also has no flushing toilets. They have pit latrines which absolutely stink instead. They don't have any support like Onamutai. The learners pay N$30 in the lower school and N$90 for the upper school students which is needed to pay for books and resources. We looked around the school and met the staff. One in particular was very excited to meet us-she shook my hand first then shook Joyce's and Amy's but still hadn't let go of mine! We went to assembly which was conducted in Oshiwambo and English where we were introduced to the learners. They didn't know what to say to us! After assembly Romeo took us to a class where he was telling the students they should be studying before their exam instead of playing outside. They all took their seats and he told them about today's and tomorrow's exams. The students did not want to ask us anything as they we're too shy or embarrassed. Romeo was asking them if they knew it all already. One boy was wearing an arsenal shirt so I said we live near Arsenal football club's ground. He still only understood when Romeo repeated what I said. Even when we speak very slowly they find it hard to understand our English and vice versa.
We helped Romeo prepare exam papers. He started organising them and we had some students looking into the room. We went outside to take a picture and before we knew it we were engulfed with 300 students wanting their pictures taken! I was practising English with them and getting them to say 'hello' and 'how are you?' and hello in signalong on video for our students at Milestone. It was an amazing experience-they were suddenly so excited to see us. It was lovely.
Then we went to the cluster copying office to help Romeo prepare his papers for the next day. The copies came out wrong and with bits missing about 10 times! A 20 minute job took 2 hours. When we'd finished for the day we drove to the Angolan border to see another country and get another stamp in our passports. We were told we'd probably have to bribe them and it was best to take Romeo's Portuguese friend as that's what language they speak; having been colonised by the Portuguese. We queued for ages and were refused entry because we didn't have a visa, unfortunately. It seems a shame since we were right on the border at the most northern point in Namibia right by the next country. We drove round the Oshikango open market instead and saw the dried fish and mopane worms again. Then we drove the nearly 2 hour drive back. We went to the resources shop to get materials to make the posters for the school and the International boards for Onumatai. It cost £43 for what would have cost £15 in Wilkos. It's far more expensive here than at home! Tomorrow we're back at Onamutai and we're going back to the special school on Wednesday and Thursday which we're looking forward to.
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