Settling In and a Slight Delay

Hello again!

I have spent the last few days settling into a nice routine at the hostel and trying to get the details of my placement figured out. Secondary schools here do not normally take volunteers, as most of the volunteers have no teaching experience or background in the subjects. My placement was arranged specially for me by the former volunteer coordinater who has since left Tanzania. It also happpens that it was arranged when the owners of the program were back in Germany having their baby, so neither they nor the currrent volunteer coordinater really knew much about my placement. I was told Sunday night that the school I was supposed to be at was no longer accepting volunteers. Oh ok. So they said I could go to a different project with some other volunteers on Monday while they worked on finding an alternative placement for me, likely in a primary school. 

On Monday, I went with two other volunteers, Jamie and Liselot, to Pippi House - a shelter

The entrance to Pippi House

for women fleeing trafficking and domestic abuse. There we played with some of the children and taught them some card games. Jamie had raised money to send one of the women to college, so she left to help Glory pay the fees and register for classes. Liselot and I stayed with the kids. When we returned home, Tini and Tizia, the couple that runs Viva-Tanzania, told me that I could start Tuesday at St. Pius Primary school, which was a 5 minute walk from the hostel.

Tuesday morning Tini, Rosie (the volunteer corrdinater) and I departed for the short walk to St. Pius. The school was much smaller than I imagined, with the upper grades (6 and 7) only having about 5 students each. While the teachers were kind and welcoming, I wasn’t sure what my role would be there given the small class size and the fact that this was not the level or content I am used to teaching. Apparently on their walk home, Rosie was thinking the same thing and asked if there was at least a larger primary school I could go to and Tini confirmed that there was. He would spend the next day coordinating it, so Wednesday I stayed at the hostel. Jamie and Liselot were also there in the morning, as they were going to Pippi House later in the evening. We were going to check out a pool in town but the weather was cool and cloudy, so we decided against it. They worked on their presentation for the evening and I managed to get some school work done, which was nice. In the afternoon Tini and Tizia came to talk to me again and said that they had made the arrangements for me to go to the original secondary school that I was supposed to be at! 

This morning I left with Didi (another Tanzanian who works at the hostel) and we walked

Walking to the school

about a half hour to the school. I met with the headmistress and explained who I was and what I wanted to do at the school. She introduced me to some of the teachers and each of the classes. It’s a pretty small private school, so there was only one class of each grade. Not all of the students had returned from holidays yet, but it seems that there will be between 20-30 students in each class. They didn’t have a syllabus with them to give me so they told me to come back tomorrow and they would arrange a schedule for me and I could start working with some of the students. Though I am not entirely clear yet on what my role will be there, it seems that I might be working with students to help them prepare for their National Examinations. I guess I’ll find out more tomorrow. Even though things didn’t get entirely sorted today, I feel much more comfortable at this school and I am confident I will be able to carve out a niche for myself while I am here. When we entered one of the classrooms, I saw a big algebraic expression on the board for the students to simplify and I couldn’t help but smile—this I knew. (Yes, I know I’m a huge nerd). 

On the walk back (were were only there for less than an hour), Didi asked if we could stop to see his family. We took a short detour and he took me to his house where his wife and infant son were. He introduced me to them and showed me the bigger house that he was

Didi’s house in the process of being built

 in the process of building. Houses here get built very slowly, one step at a time as they can afford it. He had been working on his house for three years and the brick walls were all up inside and out. He walked me through the layout and I could tell he was proud of his work (and he should have been-the house looked great!) He said the next step would be the roof, and then the windows and doors, followed by the floor. After showing me where his mother and brother lived (in houses very close by to his) we continued back to the hostel.

I am excited to go back to the school tomorrow and figure out the details of what I will be doing there on a daily basis. The students and teachers seem very excited to have me there as well, so I hope that I will be able to do some good and help them in any way that I can. 

That’s all the updates I have for now. I’ll end with some pictures of the hostel in case any of you are curious as to my current living situation. Also, if you want to look it up on Google Maps, it’s Nyumbani Hostel in Mianzini, Arusha, Tanzania.

The dinning room/card table

Kitchen

My bunk

The shower even has (a little bit of) hot water!

Nala and Kimba (two of Rosie’s dogs who stay at the hostel)
Aren’t they the cutest? I’m also convinced Nala is an Australian Shepard like our old dog.
I had always wondered what Gretchen would look like as a puppy and I think I found out!