First Day of School

Everyone sort of remembers their first day at school and this one, for me, was no different. I was collected at 9am by Robert, a Projects Abroad employee, who took me via dala dala to just outside Mount Meru hotel. Robert is a nice intelligent guy who has a university degree in geographical and environmental science or something similar from Dar Es Salaam and was nice to talk to. Getting off the dala dala I was greeted with yet another dirt road leading north, indistinguishable from my own, or the other one I accidently walked down on Saturday. Turning right onto yet another muddy path led us past the usual mud houses but then became a trail through tall trees and greenery and on the right came Gohechi, a collection of classrooms fronted by a big...tent. The classrooms themselves were the usualy mud walls, corrogated sheet roof things but the dining area  was literally a tent. I arrived in time for lower school break. This consisted of two classes of nursery aged children running around a yard about half the size of Lonsdale quad. A bit of background about Gohechi. It is a mixed primary and nursery school generally for children from poor backgrounds or orphans. The classes are baby, nursery, class one, class two and class three; the classes are arranged according to ability rather than age. After being cautiously observed by the smaller children, the bolder ones ran to me and attached themselves to my legs. And refused to let go. Ever. When we had finally release me of their grip and taken them in for their lessons, it was the turn of the older children to have their break. These kids would range from around 5 to 8 I would say but Quirine told me that some don't even know their own age, or how to spell their names. The children were running about wildly, calling for the teachers to allow them to play with the football. Nothing was really different from any school in England, except some of the play was a little more violent than I remember but, then again, my memories of those days is hazy at best. After the break I was taken by the hand by two children in class two and really wasn't given an option: today I was going to observe class two's English lesson where the teacher was trying to explain when to use 'have' and when to use 'has'. As a native speaker, this is second nature and even when I tried to explain it to myself I was using concepts such as first, second and third person which these kids would not understand. First step on a steep learning curve, I imagine, as I am only at the school for a month.

As the day drew to a close, the heavens opened. It is entering the rainy season and the monsoon like rains battered down keeping the children who had been messing about in the classroom before going home trapped. It did give me a great chance to observe two of the children though, two girls called Doris (or Dorice, her name is spelled differently on all her books) and Rose who's giggling and liveliness would not have looked out of place in a British primary school. It was disturbing to imagine that if one were to transport them into a parellel universe, as two American or British children, they would have probably acted exactly the same, growing up together and becoming the classic best friends trope seen in many a high school drama. Both Quirine and I stayed later to do some tuition for some of the struggling children and I got the chance to do a bit of teaching on my first day. The children were working on subtraction, in particular subtration that required carrying over, and it was a good test of my ability to communicate a point across to the children who were understandably shy and reserved. As we left the school, the rain had stopped and we were treated to a magnificent view of Mount Meru rising up into a sky free of cloud.

Finally a message from Glory whose house I am staying in: I greeting everyone he or she sit. I am GLORY.  I am at kilimani primary  school  at  MANCHESTER place i am a girl i am 10 years old  I love my FAMILY ,teachers and my friends. [Spelling has been edited, full stops added]