Christmas in Senegal

It's not too long since I last wrote but the last few days are of course significant to document in British culture (a culture of which I am more aware of my heritage in now that I am living in a multinational, multicultural, Christian community).

My Christmas was actually very British in many ways. On Christmas Eve I played cards and cherades with the Moltons (a British family, the school coordinators) and afterwards led our midnight carol service on the theme of Immanuel (the name given to Jesus, meaning 'God with us').

On Christmas morning the single Britons met for a full(ish) English breakfast after which we went to the school Christmas morning service in the chapel and then I retired home to a lunch of bread and cheese (our traditional family Christmas lunch when we're not at a Granny's house for Christmas). I met with the other Brits again at 3 to listen to the queen's speech on BBC Worldservice (not as good as last year's but still alright), some insisted in joining in the national anthem afterwards too and Bob Molton stood up throughout the whole speech. After the speech I went home to cook roast potatoes for our staff Christmas meal that evening.

The meal was fantastic. Everyone signed up to cook part of it and there was far more food than we needed. Starters included home made spring rolls, garlic bread and olives, the main course had BIG portions of roast chicken, various potatoes and assorted roasted and boiled veg along with stuffing, gravy and home made bread. Pudding was fruit salad and chocolate mousse (very rich) followed by hot drinks and gingerbread houses in Eagle lounge where we opened our presents to one-another. Afterwards we watched 'Cars' on the projector in Falcon dorm lounge.

On Boxing day I decided to start working again as I don't have much to keep me entertained when I'm not working so I finished my training to become a qualified Cambridge IGCSE Computer Studies coursework moderator and started work on the internal phone system which isn't working in places.

On Christmas Eve we went down to the village as a school and sang carols in French and presented a short gospel message through an interpretor. It was fun and all the village kids were enjoying messing around with my guitar and drum before we started.

I should cook up my left over potatoes now as I'm going to the sports hall at 8 and it's 7:31.

Laptop's back!

I'm writing this from my laptop!!! This is the first time I've used it since it died back in September and I've only just got it working again; in fact I haven't even screwed it back together yet!

I've spent this morning working on my laptop and simultaneously reorganising the store room in my classroom, the rest of the day will probably be spent fiddling on my laptop now, although I can't do too much customisation right now as I need an ADSL connection to download my favourite software and desktop environment.

The Embassy on Sunday was great fun. The Ambassador and his wife live in a very nice victorian/georgian style house which is set in its own grounds overlooking the sea (Dakar is on a peninsula). They have lots of grass (and I'd imagine a very hard working gardener and high water bill) which was of particular novelty value to the children in attendance who spent a large part of the evening chasing each other around on the Ambassador's lawn (very surreal). We were provided with a free bar serving mulled wine, various soft drinks and Flag (Senegalese lager) and there were two Africans serving freshly prepared Chawarma which is a cross between Doner kebab and Fahitas. Later on in the evening some ladies came round with mince pies (something I've been rather short on this year) and we sang carols around the piano. Keith, the WEC Senegal field leader was invited to pray for us (and apparently instructed not to "take advantage") and did a very good job.

In the end I was wishing I'd booked into the WEC guesthouse for a longer stay in Dakar as it was great to get away from the school and have a break. There were quite a few from BCS at the guesthouse while I was there which made it fun.
Unfortunately I tend to miss out on some holiday activities as there are only two single men at the school, myself and Adam, and Adam's been everywhere already and so doesn't really go off site much so while all the girls are going of in groups to visit Dakar, Saint-Louis or the Gambia, I end up staying at the school working because they don't think to invite me. I think I'll have to do something about that.

Christmas break begins

Sorry it's been so long. We've had internet problems at the school. I'm now sat in the WEC guesthouse in Dakar using their ADSL with a colleague's laptop. I put my new hard disk in my laptop yesterday but it still doesn't work; gives a very confusing message.

It's now the school Christmas holidays and the kids have left. I'm in Dakar today for the British embassy Christmas carols and mulled wine tonight, should be fun. There's quite a few of us brits going from the WEC community.

The end of term was very busy what with cleaning and closing down the dorms for the holidays and the school end of term production. I made a TV camera and boom microphone props which I must take a photo of before they get stored away. I've not got much planned for the holidays. Most people are going away somewhere like the Gambia or somewhere up north but I'm not planning anything big. There's plenty to keep me entertained at school though, there are always jobs to be done. Thanks to those who prayed about the amplifiers I've been working on; I found the cause of the problem on one of them the other day and it now works on one channel, I need to get a replacement component to fix it fully.

I hope to get the laptop working in the next week so I'd appreciate prayers for that too. If I do that'll rapidly increase my blogging and emailing rates. That's all for now, I hope to get out to the supermarket soon and buy some Christmas food treats for over the holidays.

Christmas comes early

Christmas comes early here at BCS. I don't know how much Christmas stuff is going on back home right now but it certainly seems early here. Our dorm kids started decorating their rooms two or three weeks back and Chris and Brianna started playing Christmas CDs in the lounge the weekend before last.

On Friday we took all the junior kids out to Thies to go Christmas shopping; the school has a 'secret santa' type of thing where each person buys a present for another person (student or staff) according to names drawn from a stocking and the kids are given 1000 cfa each towards their gift (~£1). We all piled in a car rapide (local public transport which we'd hired for the morning) and spent an hour or two in Thies' biggest supermarket (a large corner shop by UK standards) and 'New York 1000', a small shop which is a sort of pound shop but not everything is 1000 cfa. After a hard morning's shopping we all went to Les Delices for lunch and the kids were given 2500 each from the treat fund to buy lunch (the BCS treat fund is a fund set up to pay for special treats for the students, in particular weekend activities for those who are full time borders and don't see their parents for months at a time, donations are always welcome, enquire through the school office (see website) for details). The restaurant owners were very kind to us and put cartoon network on the TVs for us (in French of course). I was responsible for two 8 year old boys for the morning, Chan-Hwi, a Korean full border, and Daniel, an English day pupil whose parents live in Popenguine and work in Bible translation.

The journey home was filled with carol singing and trying to remember the words to 'the 12 days of Christmas'.

I need to try and write this month's update today so that I have a chance of getting it out vaguely on time this month.

Hope you're well and it's not too cold where you are.

BCS Olympics

It's been a long but very fun weekend here at BCS. This weekend saw the first ever BCS Olympics, a three day event comprising such varied sports as dodgeball, cycling, hopping, weight lifting, frisbee golf, pillow fighting, skipping, sumo wrestling, crab football and sheet volleyball. It all started on Friday with the opening ceremony. All the teams were assembled between the dining hall and the chapel/school block in their team colours with their flags holding up placards with their country's name. Each of the teams then paraded around the arena to their chosen national anthem, ranging from the theme from Knightrider to the theme from Pirates of The Carribean, and made their opening remarks expressing their thanks for their invitation and their best wishes for the other competitors. Once all the teams had done their thing one we lit the olympic flame. David, one of the boys from my dorm, ran in with a flaming torch (a wooden sword dipped in diesel) which was then passed from team to team before being used to light a small bonfire in a steel barrel (all this accompanied by suitably cheesy music of course). Each team competed galantly throughout the weekend with some very impressive individual efforts, particularly in the weightlifting. I spent most of the weekend behind the screen of my digital camera, having found a tripod in a cupboard a few days earlier. I will try and put the best photos on a CD and send them home so they can be put up on my Flickr page.

Today's my day off again, I'll probably have a lazy day on site I think although I'd like to go to the beach (the girls left without me last week, they couldn't find me :o( the phone wasn't working properly in the workshop where I was tinkering).

School Cook for a day

Well, it's my day off again and I'm back in my classroom, but only to change the songs on my mp3 player and put last week's blog entry on my memory stick. This afternoon I'm going down to Sindia to pick up my new clothes I mentioned last time. I'd like to cycle down to the beach later for a swim but I'll have to see what the others want to do because it's no fun on my own. My plans for the rest of the day include making some hooks for the ICT store room and a small lantern. I've taken to using our new school treehouse in the evenings after I put the kids to bed as a place to relax so I'd like to make a little lantern so I can take my book up there with me.

This weekend was a little more relaxed than the last. I spent Saturday morning hanging out in the dorm and then after a long siesta I played cricket in the sports hall. In the evening we played a game called Catacombs (sp?) where a small group of people are selected to be roman soldiers and the rest of us are 1st century Christians and the Christians have to make their way to a secret meeting place somewhere on the compound without the soldiers finding out where they're meeting. It was great fun, we turned off all the security lights so the only light we had was from the stars and everyone scattered across the compound trying to throw the soldiers of the scent before converging on a very small space in some remote corner of the school site.
On Sunday I was cooking lunch for the whole school which was a challenge. I made paprika chicken with the help of Franziska but it was a little harder than at home. Firstly we were cooking for over 50 people. Secondly I would normally use tinned mushroom soup as a sauce but you can't get it here so we made a strange mix between bechamel sauce and mushroom gloop. Time consuming and not quite right but edible at least. after cleaning and washing up I was a little late starting my siesta so I had an extended one again until 4 when I went to the sports hall to play basketball. In the evening the German contingent celebrated St. Martin's day and I joined them in marching around with paper lanterns singing "Ich gehe mit meine laterne und meine laterne mit mir", "St. Martin, St. Martin, St. Martin war ein gute mann" and "Laterne, laterne, sonne, mun und scherne" (I only caught the first lines of the songs, forgive any spelling mistakes too as I never saw them written). After putting the Eagle kids to bed I went to Falcon (the oldest dorm) to fix a computer and ended up staying there and having hot chocolate which was great.

Bonfire Night

It's Tuesday and I'm in the middle of 'teaching' the IGCSE class; I use inverted commas as the year 11s are all happily plodding along with their projects and the one year 10, Christoph, is embarking on a new active learning assignment I gave him this morning to try and liven up our somewhat dull one to one teaching sessions that are now necessary (the year 11s having finished the taught syllabus).

I'm currently enjoying my teaching a bit more as I've been able to plan ahead more this term and some of the units we're studying are quite interesting. I'm also finding it a great blessing to be able to reuse material I did with the year 9s at the start of term with the year 8s as they are now studying the same unit.
This weekend was busy. We had a bike repair day on Saturday in which I was involved which meant being up at the workshop most of the day try to ressurect dying bicycles which probably would have been scrapped by now in the UK. On Sunday I was able to play bass in our chruch meeting for the first time since I arrived. I enjoyed it very much, despite having to share an amplifier with a guitar and microphone and playing on a neck that needed a fair bit of adjustment.

Sunday was bonfire night, but of course you're well aware of that. I, on the other hand, was taken a little by surprise as it's hot and sunny here and not at all like November should be. The Brits got together and we built an impressive bonfire and we'd sent some of the teachers on a mission to find fireworks on their day off in Dakar on Saturday. They had got some pretty impressive rockets from the Korean shop on Pompidou (the main shopping street). Unfortunately they didn't find any brown sugar so we couldn't make bonfire toffee but we made flapjack instead to my old housemate Jonathan's trusty recipe which is now lodged in my brain.

On Monday I got up extra early and cycled to Popenguine with Franziska and Jacqui to see the sunrise and eat breakfast at a cafe on the beach. It was lovely. The tide was quite high and the waves were very big which was great fun for paddling. Unfortunately we had some problems with the bikes on the way home and had to be picked up by Sue, the school secretary (the cost of which will go 'through the books' as everything does here, it's almost like a cashless society here at BCS). We also made a trip down to Sindia (the village at the crossroads of the main road to Dakar, 2km away) to see the tailor. I'm now having some trousers and a shirt made which I'll be able to pick up next Monday afternoon. It will be good to get a few more clothes as you go through them much quicker in this climate.

It's now siesta time, I had to stop writing for lunch and came back at the words "On Monday". I'm now going to go and enjoy what little free time I get during the day (particularly Tuesdays) by a short snooze and perhaps a spot of reading. Goodbye.

Fleeced?

The end of a busy day and a busy weekend. This weekend was what's known here as 'the long weekend', that is the weekend which marks the divide between one half of a term and the other. This is the one time during the term when most parents will get to see their kids. Parents came from all over Senegal, the Gambia, Mauritania and other countries just to spend the weekend with their children. For the single staff this usually means a chance to get away for a few days and relax on a beach. I went with a group of 10 others to nearby Saly where we spent a refreshing two days in a small tourist resort, occasionally brushing shoulders with one or other of the five BCS families who had also chosen Saly as the venue for their long weekend. It was actually very nice to play in the pool with the kids without the responsibility of having to look after them.

On the Friday afternoon we visited the art market in the village where there were lots of little stalls selling souvenirs from carvings to jewellry to paintings. Shortly after entering this densely packed maze of little shops we were set upon by hordes of Africans inviting us to 'come look my shop!'. I was with a group of four girls and so was naturally asked which one was my wife which caused some amusement. The funniest part was what happened next though. I suddenly felt a strong hand grabbing my wrist and before I knew it I was being dragged away by a big black woman saying 'looky my shop'.

Ten metres away and down a passage I found myself in a cramped little stall faced with hundreds of tourist trinkets, none of which I had any desire to purchase. Next she reached over to part of her display and produced a necklace which she proceded to fasten around my neck with the words 'un petit cadeau'. Before I could refuse it (I don't even like necklaces) she had pulled out a little bench and sat down, pulling on my wrist, still firmly grasped, to join her. At this point I knew I was in the hands of a professional and would leave her humble shop poorer than I entered it. After I had joined her on the bench she got out her fan and started fanning me and encouraging me yet again to view her wares, probably accompanied by some reference to her good prices, I don't remember exactly. I sat in silence, not knowing what to say or do and definitely not wanting to buy anything and so she started showing me individual items.

When she ran out of things within her reach she got a friend to bring down higher items but I continued in my attempt to resist her. At some point I realised I had lost and decided that if I was to spend money I would get something I could use so I pointed at a shaker hanging beside me and asked her what one does with such a thing. She took it down and promptly demonstrated the technique before placing it in my hand so I could have a go. At which point I was assured that this instrument was in fact always played in pairs and I needed two. I sat there with two strange looking shakey things and decided it was time to go for it so I asked how much for just one of them.

She started at 15000 cfa (~£15), I made my fist move, 500 cfa (~50p), she laughed at me (I like to think I drive a hard bargain). She came down to 10000 and placed the second shaker in my lap assuring me that I really needed two. I went up by a few hundred cfa, I think she knew at this point I wasn't going to rise to where she wanted so she changed her method and got her friend to get down another instrument, a type of rattle, this was added to my pile. '5000' she says for the lot, I'm not having it. She starts throwing in bracelets, 'pour ta famile' she claims. I'm getting fed up by this point and want to get out of her shop. So we eventually settle on 3000 cfa, much more than I wanted to pay but I couldn't be bothered any more. I reach in my money belt to find the cash but unfortunately the smallest note I have is a 5000. She readily accepts this and closes her fist tightly on the crumpled note.

'Where's the 2000 change?' I ask. 'My friend will get it for you' she assures me. I look at her friend in the entrance, a slimmer woman but equally capable of fleecing me. My heart sinks. I dutifully follow her out of the shop to the stall next door where again a bench is pulled out and I'm made to join her on it. 'Look my shop' I'm instructed again. I had suspected upon pulling out my 5000 note I would never see my 2000 change and now I knew. This second woman intended to give it to me in the form of goods from her shop. She starts by getting down a small wooden model of a 'car rapide', a very Senegalese mode of transport that all the tourists love because they're so colourfully painted and un-western.

I didn't want a car rapide but this didn't matter by this stage, it would make a good gift back in England and by this point I was aware that the story that would accompany it was going to be a long one. I tried my best to argue in French that this model was not worth my 2000 cfa and so she reached over for a bracelet, this time a thick one that looked like it was made of leather stuffed with something and she fastened it around my wrist. This alone, apparently, was worth more than 2000 cfa; 'Yeah right!' I thought, being the sarcastic Englishman that I am (you realise how much of a cultural stereotype you are when in such an international community).

It seemed like my ordeal was finally over, she wasn't going to give me anything else and I wasn't in the mood for collecting more souvenirs I didn't want so I thanked her, in my polite tourist way, for ripping me off and left her shop, having a close shave with one of her neighbours who also saw me as rich pickings.
The rest of the staff were wondering where I'd got too and I was sad to find that Ruth, who'd also been dragged away by the arm, had come off far better than me, escaping with her free gift and all her money.
Nevertheless, the story amused us all on the journey back to the hotel and hopefully has amused you too. All sarcastic English comments are welcome and appreciated as the sign of affection as which we (culturally) use them.

Bedspring improv

Monday again. Not much happened today to tell you about, just some guitar some football and some bed springs, so I'll tell you about the weekend instead. We had a great day on Saturday. The morning was the date of the much hyped staff vs. inter's football match. I was in goal for the staff and we gave the intermediates a good lesson in how to win a match, we won 7 - 3. It was my first time playing in the hotter part of the day (not that it's ever cool during daylight hours), I think, had I been in a more active position, I would have run out of energy quite quickly but playing in goal is relatively effort free when your defence is of any quality. The match ended up in a bit of a water fight as the water cooler we'd brought up to the field for team refreshment became the focal point of quite a chaotic episode of splashings and soakings, quite nice if you were hot and sweaty. In the afternoon we had a whole school trip to the beach which was great fun. I cycled there and back which was good (although the bike I was on was horrible). I spent most of my time with Josephine, the youngest girl in our dorm, a Nigerian, who had never swam in the sea before and was quite afraid of it. We spent most of the time sat on the edge of the sea getting pushed around by the heavier of the incoming waves but ocasionally I carried her into the deeper water where we enjoyed the bigger waves until she got too scared and asked me to take her back out. On Sunday morning I took the senior kids for the teaching part of our Sunday meeting. We did a bible study on different old testament prophecies which reveal things about the coming Messiah (Jesus). It was really encouraging for me to prepare it just seeing the sheer volume of prophecies undeniably fulfilled by Jesus and I think those who made the effort to participate properly were encouraged too (although it was hard work sometimes having such a wide age group and so many of them). In case you were wondering about the bed spring reference earlier that was one of the pieces I found today for the drum kit Chris and I are making, it should work very well in my bass drum pedal design. Bye4now...

Volleyball Match

It's a while since I last wrote so apologies if that distressed you although I doubt anyone looks at this regularly enough to care. It's Monday again, my usual blog writing day (my day off!). It's been a great weekend. On Saturday morning we had a visit from the Dakar Academy (DA) senior volleyball team (our main rivals) and we played a friendly match against them in our sports hall. DA is a much bigger school than BCS and some ex-BCS-pupils go there for post-GCSE studies; as a result, their senior team is made up of year 12 and 13 boys who are quite tall. In contrast, our senior volleyball team usually has two year 11s, a boy and a girl (one of which is currently ill), two year 10s (one currently recovering form illness) and a bunch of younger kids some as young as year 8. DA practice daily for several hours, BCS practice weekly and play very little outside of that. Despite this obvious disparity we put up a good fight and in the first game we went several points ahead early on. Unfortunately this didn't last and we were quite well beaten by the end, although we put up a good fight. Most of the school was in the hall to support our side. There are some crude stands on one side of the hall which were well packed with spectators of all ages and we made a lot of noise (I took a drum in with me which was fun!).

The afternoon's activities were meant to take place at the beach in Popenguine (including the birthday of Immanuella, a Nigerian girl in my dorm), however the weather was pretty dismal which meant we spent the afternoon in the dorms playing games which was great fun. In the evening we played hide and seek in the dark which the kids really enjoyed. The boys from the Korean dorm joined us and the youngest attached himself to me whilst searching for the other kids as he was afraid of the dark. On Sunday we had our usual whole school meeting in the chapel for which I was able to play the Djembe and then my team was on Sunday lunch prep and Lesley and Franziska made stew and mashed potato (very tasty) whilst Margrith made a delicious yoghurt and stewed apple flan/pie/cake thing for pudding. After siesta we had the first adult intermediate level French lesson which was fun (although rather basic, being the first lesson), after which we had a big football game outside, Aunties and boys vs. Uncles and girls (school staff are referred to as Auntie or Uncle, so I'm Uncle Andrew). We won 4-3 even though Uncle Adam became an Auntie half way through to even things up a little. In the evening we had FIX which is a monthly-ish worship event which this time was based around the opening of the new prayer room which was set up over the summer. The kids had spent most of the afternoon decorating it and it looks really cool. Hopefully they'll take ownership of it and it will be a really great focal point for prayer for many of the kids (and staff too). I've probably written enough I think, off to the beach later hopefully...

Roller disco?

It's Monday again and my day off which means I have more time than usual to do emails and stuff. This week I've stayed on the compound for my day off. I was planning to cycle to Popenguine (the beach!) with a couple of friends but decided that it was stupidity to attempt to cycle several kilometres in the midday sun and tried to persuade them we should go at 4pm instead. Unfortunately they wanted to go into the village (our nieghbours Kinniabour) at 5pm so they decided to go ahead and cycle. They're not back yet so I hope they're still alive and well! A new school timetable came into effect this morning as there were several problems with the old one so this week's teaching schedule is looking quite different. Hopefully I'll find it better in terms of the lesson prep load but it doesn't look too friendly on paper!

The weekend was fun. Chris (our dorm 'dad') and I set up a roller-disco in the sports hall; we carted the school PA system across and I turned up the amp full (still wasn't load enough though - only 200W RMS I think). The playlist was a mixture of child friendly metal and 80s nostalgia (Chris used to be a professional metal drummer and spent some of his formative years in the 1980s) and the kids loved skating round and round the hall in their roller-blades. Chris also enjoyed being a very cheesy and very bad (and therefore perfect for the atmosphere) DJ.

Trip to Dakar

Today was my second day off and this week we went to Dakar! This was my second visit to the capital (excluding my initial arrival) and it was great fun. The Senegalese are a very friendly people (although often in the towns it's because they want your money). We got a ride in with the father of two of our weekly boarders on his way home from dropping off his sons. Unfortunately his car was having problems and he had to stop in Keur Massar (spelling??) on the outskirts of Dakar to see a mechanic so we got a bus from there to the town centre. Buses are one of the more normal forms of transport from a western point of view but they are still very African. After quite a wait to get on it we couldn't find any seats and had to stand up for what should have been maybe a half an hour journey on a good day. This was ok at first as the bus was no more full than your average English service bus on a busy school route, however as time went on more and more people quickly joined us and soon I was literally cheek to cheek (of the lower variety) with my fellow passengers. The sweat was dripping from my elbow onto the poor guy sat below me and I was growing steadily weaker and more tired as I had to refrain from drinking the ice cold water in my bag I so sorely needed out of care and respect for the bus full of Muslims around me who are now fasting for Ramadan. The journey took nearly two hours and after an hour and I half I seriously thought I could faint but I found my strength renewed as I contemplated the free gift of salvation I have in Jesus and the fact that he has paid the ultimate price so that I don't need to fast for a month and pray four times a day to earn salvation because it cannot be earnt. I spent the rest of the journey singing to myself and proclaiming this truth to myself in song (I couldn't muster the courage to proclaim it to a bus full of fasting Muslims and they wouldn't have understood the words anyway!). It's been a long but great day, one which has refreshed me, if not physically, at least spiritually, for the week ahead.

Not Autumn

Friday week 2, term 1. I nearly wrote Autumn term there but of course there's no such thing as Autumn here. We're curently in the wet season and in a few weeks it'll get less wet and cool off a bit for what we would call the Winter months. I've just come from the dorm where I had to put David to bed; there's only one boy in our dorm at the weekends (at least for now). The power went out at the exact moment I tried to turn his ceiling fan on (I thought I'd done something for a second), I had to make my way allong the corridor walls back to the lounge where I managed to knock my tourch of the table and ended up scrabbling around on the floor in the pitch black trying to find it. Quite fun really. I'm still enjoying the teaching although sometimes a little more prep wouldn't go amiss and I feel a little bad at making the older kids write so much; the IGCSE Computer Studies course is really theoretical, they never get to use the computers, it's all talking and writing. I'm really enjoying the younger years ICT classes, we're just getting into some fairly interesting projects which is more fun for the kids and less lesson prep for me which is great all round! It's been a tough week in some ways. There are a lot of staff ill and many of the kids in our dorm have been having trouble sleeping and some pretty nasty nightmares. As a staff we feel there may be a spiritual element to all this (which has been going on since the leadership change over last month) and we've been spending a lot of time praying with and comforting the kids. We can be confident that when we call on God he will help us as Christ defeated evil once and for all by his death and ressurrection therefore evil powers must flee when we call on His name. That is a great comfort to the kids and we've been looking together at encouraging passages from the bible which the kids can use when they're afraid. I had a great day off on Monday. I went to Thies with Franziska and Jacqui, two other general helpers, and we went shopping and generally wandered around town before eating lunch at Les Delices, a local restaurant with nice food that's dirt cheap compared to eating out at home. We travelled back in an old Peugot 7 seater which was falling apart, inside and out, the three of us squished on the back seat (made for two) with three africans in front of us and the driver and another passenger in front of them. It was great to get off the school compound and relax and to experience some more authentic transportation too.

A tough first week

I've just come to the end of my first week of school. It's been tough. It was great on Tuesday to see all the kids arrive; the whole site atmosphere completely changed and I started to realise more fully what I'm doing here. I'm helping in the youngest dorm, Eagle, which has been great so far. The kids there are really lovely and the house parents, Chris and Brianna, are great. There are only two boys in the dorm (and eight girls) which makes life easier for Chris and I at bed time because the two boys share one room so there's much less chasing to do than in most dorms. Being the youngest they go to bed fairly early which is a help too. I'm usually back in my house by 8:30 in the evening. The teaching is going fairly well (after a slightly dissatisfactory first lesson) and I'm enjoying it. I am finding the prep hard though and have found that I've been flat out this week trying to squeeze in time to prepare for lessons at the last minute. I had four periods first thing this morning and was up 'til 2am last night preparing them. I hope that's a one off and I can do things a little more in advance from now on (hopefully I'll get quicker as time goes on too). What I'd love to do now is crash out for the weekend but unfortunately, being a general helper, I'm in the dorm all weekend with the kids so I'll have to wait 'til my day off on Monday but I'm not planning any more super late nights in the meantime.

Computer died today...

Computer died today, luckily this was all on USB stick. There was another entry ready to roll but it'll have to be rewritten. In the meantime enjoy what you'll find below (this is my first time of internet access since arrival!)

Beginning to settle in

I've been here nearly four days now and I feel like I'm starting to settle in. The last of our staff arrived this morning but we're still not a complete team as one girl has been in hospital in Thies since I arrived; the doctors have decided it's definitely not Malaria which is good and they think it's probably an infection of some kind. Yesterday a native came in to teach some of the new staff some basic Wolof which is the native language used for communication among nationals of different tribes (French is the national language but Wolof seems to be preferred by the Africans). I can now ask you how you slept, how your day was, what you are doing, how your family is and what your name is in Wolof.

Last night we had a team building evening of fun and games run by Jens and Conni, the Heads of House (responsible for the dorms) which involved pulling the school minibus up a slope, hitting each other with newspaper and traversing the sports hall without touching the floor. It was an enjoyable evening, if a little bizzarre at times.

This afternoon we're going to the beach at Popenguine for the first time. At the moment it's dull and it just rained briefly so hopefully it'll brighten up for the beach (although rain is good, it brings the temperature down).

The heat is not so bad anymore as long as you stay indoors. I'm not sure if the temperature is changing or if I'm just getting used to it. I had four showers on my first day here! Now I'm just getting used to being a bit sweaty ocasionally, it soon dries off so as long as I don't smell then it doesn't bother me too much, I'm not the only one anyway.

The phone line has been down for a few days so now that it's back I can upload all I've written so far and finally let my parents know I've arrived safely.

It's Hot!

It's nearing the end of my first full day at the school and the main thing I've learn't so far is that it's HOT! At least it's hot by British summer-time standards, but here it's the rainy season (although dry today) and things will get hotter early next year. The worst thing is the humidity rather than the heat; I seem to be permanently wet with sweat and if you wash it off it comes back within 5 minutes. Unfortunately I made the embarassing mistake of having a cup of tea at our first meeting this morning and, as someone who sweats easily usually, the hot tea wasn't a wise move. I could feel sweat dripping off my legs onto my toes and my arms were covered in rather large droplets. I had to change my t-shirt before our first introductory session (much to the dissapointment of Jens, one of the long term staff, who was rather keen on the VW camper on the front of it).

We had a good session together talking about some of the basics of school life and spending some time singing to God. This afternoon we had a guided tour of most of the school, learning more about some of the daily routine as we did.

Arriving in Dakar yesterday was fun. As I had predicted, my French fell over at the first hurdle. Having felt rather pleased with myself, ordering my lunch on the plane in French (the hostess assumed I was a French speaker), I then was confronted with Africans who insisted on talking to me about the fact I had a guitar with me and wanting to help me with getting through the airport. Whilst I understood the jist of what they were saying, my mind went blank about how to respond. I was met at the airport by Adam, another short-term worker who stayed on from last year, with whom I am sharing a chalet. I then found out that I should have in fact been travelling with Ruth as suspected but her travel agent had told her the flight was from Heathrow when in fact it was the one I was on from Gatwick. She's now arriving on Friday which is a shame as she'll miss out on quite a bit.

The most memorable part of yesterday would have to be the drive back to the school from Dakar. Adam and I stayed in Dakar until 8:30 to pick up Tracey who was travelling with Air France. Upon leaving the airport at 8:45 we were expecting a 1 and a half hour ride back to Kiniabour, where the school is. We actually arrived here just after 2am. The road out of Dakar was absolutely rammed with traffic. Traffic which doesn't pay heed to traffic lights and expands into arbitrary numbers of lanes to fill all available road space, darting between those lanes according to which seems to be moving regardless of whether there's actually any space to move into or not. Senegalese driving is very different to the UK. They use the horn less to display anger and more as a reminder to other traffic that they are there and would like to move/would not like to be crushed/shunted. They also wave their hands out of the window pleading to be let in or allowing each other in with special signals. The ride home was tough. Some times we'd move 200m in half an hour and for 4 hours we hadn't a clue why. Finally we asked a guy wandering between the traffic what was wrong and he said there was wate ron the road. I should have mentioned that it was raining when I arrived in Dakar. In a country like Senegal where it doesn't usually rain much the infrastructure is not ready for it and the ground does not seem to absorb it so just a short period of rain can produce standing water quite deep. This was what had happened further up the road and combining that with the inevitable prangs and breakdowns created by the combination of a traffic jam, the senegalese driving style and the seeming lack of enforcement regarding MOTs etc, this made for a rather long and frustrating journey, not least for Adam who'd got back from the airport at 2am the previous night as well. When we got to the water it was not as bad as we'd expected. Being Bitish we decided to show the locals a thing or two about how to cope with rain and drove past the queue and straight through the main patch of water. From there onwards there was more water around causing problems for the next mile or so but after that things got back to normal and we were flying.

That's all I've got time for now (it's more than enough to read anyway) as we're playing volleyball in the sports hall in 2 minutes (I'm preparing to wring my clothes out afterwards!).

Brussels Airport

I'm sat in Brussels airport having succuesfully completed the first leg of my journey out to Bourofaye Christian School, Senegal. It's been a long day so far. I set my alarm for 2:40am, allowing enough time for a shower, some bible study and a quick breakfast. The first problem was that I didn't actually get to sleep, even after going to bed at 9, the second problem was that I couldn't get any hot water in my shower and hence emerged from it shivering. My parents and I stayed last night at the mission's headquarters in Gerrard's Cross, Buckinghamshire. Having done so meant that Gatwick was just an hour away so we arrived in plenty of time for check-in, having set off at ten to 4. Having got rid of my luggage we sat down for a farewell cuppa and prayed together before my parents left me to get on with the fun of August 2006 UK airport security. As I joined the queue I was confronted by a sign informing me that I could buy 'anything' in the departure lounge, I couldn't help imagining a shop selling wild Elephants. Whilst still pondering this I was asked to put my pockets into a plastic bag, another interesting thought. Now /i'm watching the last few people drift through the departure gate and wondering if I should think about moving too; the plane doesn't leave for twenty minutes! I was half expecting to bump into Ruth here who is supposedly arriving at the same time via the same airline but there's been no sign of her so far. Maybe I should get up now, I'm the only person left sat here. If I miss the plane it's my dad's fault, he told me not to rush in departure lounges...