Today, Sam rode with the driver who was taking breakfast out to the students. Ruth, the WEH workers, and I followed later, driving directly to a small school at Kotto Up. It’s an English-speaking community, made up of refugees from English-speaking parts of Africa. It was good that the students could try their wings in English. Fortunately we had a translator who could speak pidjin, a West-African adaptation of English. It really helped some of the kids’ comprehension. One group of students conducted health assessments of the WEH orphans, one group taught about malaria, including a lesson on how to reduce the mosquito population and protect yourself from the malarial mosquito. Then they would play a form of freeze tag where the persons who were “it” were the mosquitoes and the others had to escape from them. If you ran to the “net” you were safe. The kids enjoyed that.
The amazing thing was the apparent quality of teaching at this little country school. The information on the broken and ragged blackboards was quite sophisticated. I hope I can post pictures of this little four room school with no windows or doors. It is appalling that education must go on in such dilapidated buildings. I understand that there is a single donor somewhere who pays the teachers’ salaries.
It was really hot and there was little shade, so I was glad it was a half-day of work. We rode with the students in their bus back to Mangamba, shared dinner with them, and returned home to Douala. Several students expressed what a fulfilling day it was for them. They enjoyed working with the children tremendously.
We have pieced together more information about the shooting in Arizona. It was at a Safeway in Oro Valley where we frequently drive. And we understand that one of the dead was a member of a Methodist church there. I still can't find a coherent motive. Was it a response to hate rhetoric? Why Giffords?
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