Kenya Summer Team Leapers Diaries

Rachel Brown

Just a quick email to let all know that I‚m all cool.
Hakuna matata, apart from I still haven‚t got much of a sun tan but let‚s be honest I don‚t really tan as it is!  Enjoyed this week in a local primary school, started off plastering the wall Kenyan style which literally means flicking the wall with plaster rather than smoothing it on! Fun but really messy. Last two days have taught class 6 English totally on my own cos the teachers out here don‚t turn up more often than not but I loved every minute of it!

Out here the classes are often taught like the teacher speaks, then the children copy and write ˆ there‚s little interaction.  First I taught them about Nelson Mandela and today I taught them about reflexive pronouns and the use of too‚ and to‚. It‚s been quite challenging cos in the class the age Ranges cos you can be put back a year so I‚ve got 11-18year olds in my class which is cool. Got them up writing on the board and talking which is really rewarding.

Got a chilled weekend ahead, decided to take it easy as we‚re all knackered! Probably just lounge about, might do some snorkelling. Saving ourselves for next weekend when we‚re going on a safari ˆ really cool. Anyway will love to hear from you all, please can someone pass this on to Steph as her address all the way in my room and I can‚t be bothered to trek there and back!Love to everyone xxxxxxxxx

Coral Burnell

Hi Guy,

Just thought I’d tell you a bit about how we’re getting on here. Our accommodation is really nice, and we are looked after very well.  We each get a chance to work in the kitchen when we do forestry which is good for me because I don't usually cook and I'm learning a lot.
As for my expectations, I didn't expect our house would be this nice, but I did expect all the insects though, they were not a suprise... Jo woke up with a massive millipede on the inside of her mosquito net this morning, they are so big, but we havn't seen any snakes yet which is disappointing.

We are getting all the support we need, Tom and Amelia are really nice, and always help us when we need it. The projects are great, I have been in the school all this week, and it was really fun.  The kids are always singing and dancing to us; they are so happy, and we have almost finished building  the classroom we started on at the beginning of the project.

I'm really enjoying myself and I'm so glad I picked Kenya as my placement. The village people are so friendly, and are starting to remember our names. Me and James went into Shimoni caves on the first week, and this man showed us around, and spoke like a robot because he had obviously been given an English presentation to memorise, so when we asked questions he got really baffled and repeated one of the paragraphs.  And he kept talking to our knees, it was so funny.  Amelia does a really good impression of him!! Today we all went to the school, and gave out all the things we had brought over for the kids as prizes and they were so happy and excited. Well, I'm off now because Alice is waiting for the internet.
Bye
Coral

Katy Madden and Nicola Braodbent

Hi Guy!

Everything here is great! It's what we expected but better.
Our accommodation is amazing because we're all together. The whole group has gelled brilliantly: we all get on really well. And Katy hasn't beaten me yet!

The guys looking after us are really cool; they're really good to us. We've been doing loads of different stuff, but tonnes of building work at the school. The local builders are the coolest, they even attempted to teach me Arabic (attempted being the key word!).

Katy is loving getting muddy, and I'm loving getting filthy in general. We did a big clean up day of Shimoni, which went really well, all the kids and teachers got really involved. Right now we're building desks for the deaf school and designing and painting a beach mural on environmental issues. We're kept really busy. Needless to say we're looking forward to a day off on Saturday!

We're diving loads now; we both got our padi open waters along with Kelby and Jo, and we're considering doing an advanced course we love it so much! It's so incredible here! We don't think we want to come home... all the locals are brilliant, though I think we just amuse them more than anything sometimes: I remember one saying it was "the first time they saw a Mzungu build".  We'll be really sad to go; it's just so chilled and friendly.

Bye!
Nicki and Katy :)

Lilly Hamnett

Hi Guy,

Having a really good time here and starting to get used to everything. We went to Tsavo East at the weekend which was loads of fun and are going to the marine park on Sunday snorkelling. The project work is really good, we saw a few humpback whales the other day and working in the schools is really cool. Time will fly by from now on..
Thankyou,
Lillie

Iona Symington

Dear Guy,

I am sorry it has taken so long to reply, I was actually using a different email address out in Kenya and I apologise for not getting in touch sooner. However I have had the most amazing 5 weeks and feel really privileged to have been involved in the projects.

To answer your the earlier questions I was very happy and the living conditions were excellent; much less basic than I had expected, the roofed communal area was extremely comfortable and the rooms very spacious. I tried not to come out to Kenya with too many expectations, but any I did have been exceeded, especially being able to interact with Shimoni village and get to know all the local people there.

There is support and careand Staurt looked after everyone very well and I felt really safe during my time, without anyone feeling mothered and I think it was good that problems could be sorted out within the group which taught me a lot.

The project tasks were very interesting, I was not entirely sure exactly what they would be like before my arrival, however after being briefed on the aims of each project I knew what to expect. there was enough to do during the mornings, I found the forestry and school projects involved more direct work, and loved spotting whales and dolphins. One of my best days was coming so close to a humpback whale. I even managed to spot one of the whales in the background on my last day on the boat which was really exciting!

I think that the community work in the school was the most satisfying as you really felt you were making a difference, having built a classroom in 6 weeks, and interacting with the children, it was lovely to see how happy and welcoming they were and I feel I learnt as much from them as they did from me and my appalling attempts at teaching them English songs compared to their little songs, the entire group were humming them all throughout the trip!

As far as improvements go, there is nothing major I would add, I would say that all three projects are worthwhile, in the afternoons the optional mural and desk making projects allowed the group to become involved, I think that more projects like this would greatly benefit the group and perhaps getting the community of Shimoni involved may help build the relationship between them.

I completely agree that you get out what you put in to an experience like this and I think everyone should be encouraged as much as possible to get involved with everything they can in the community. I managed to build some special bonds with the local people and will miss them greatly.

Considering this was the first group on this particular project I think that things ran really smoothly and it was a great success, I would definitely recommend doing this to anyone and my enthusiasm will certainly be reflected in the article I will be writing.On another note I wish to say that I really enjoyed the company of the Tubbs family and personally I think their presence added something to the group and gave a different perspective.Anyway I hope this feedback had been of help, and again sorry for the delay. I feel very lucky to have had this opportunity and look forward to hearing from you soon. Iona

Aled Thomas

Jambo!
 
Thanks for the e-mail. Flight to kenya was ok. Everyone got here okay, Hakuna matata.
 
Staying in a pretty remote village about an hour from the nearest town so can't get a sim card till the weekend. Weirdly the village has an internet  cafe (in a wooden hut) and they all have facebook :S!
 
Spent last night and today doing construction work laying the floor for the local nursery, about 20 people in total working for 6hours and dad could probably do more than we did in an hour by himself, v.very slow when doing everything by hand, but well worth it.

Played football with the local boys last night, they are all really cool and nice. Got one more shift in the nursery tomorrow morning but we get the evenings plus weekend off to go to Diani Beach and watch the football.

Next week we have a lot more options from teaching English and computing in schools to working in the local Health Centre.
 
Gotta do my washing tomorrow night... by hand :'(, Washing machines are sooo underated.

Everything out here is rediculously cheap, just bought 3 large cokes and an hour internet time for less than a pound.
 
Wildlife is crazy, we have tons of monkey's running around our camp and the girls found a bush baby in their gazibo, everyone wants to do a safari trip soon so that could be pretty sweet.

Day and Nights are boiling, especially when your doing pretty physical
work, so surprised I haven't been burnt yet.

 
Gotta be quick cus we got a Swahili lessons soon that i have to get back
to.
 
Hope everything is good back home,
 
-Aled

Aled Thomas

Jambo Jambo, 

Lol washing clothes by hand is soo hard, i've given up on getting the stains out and just concentrating on keeping it smelling fresh.

Spent this morning building stoves for the local houses so that they don't have to use as much firewood, really tricky work!, and than spent this afternoon teaching English to a class of about 50 8year olds, was really realy hard but they are all sooo happy and enthusiastic and constantly break into a song while your trying to explain things, makes you wander where western civilisation went wrong :L we're going to be doing work like this all week so that should be fun :)

Most of our evenings are spent playing random games, planning events (fancy dress party, sports day etc) or swahili lessons and the funniest game of ring of fire there has ever been.

Next weekend we're going snorkeling and scuba diving during the day and then Forty Thieves at night, which is just amazing fun when you can hop down the beach and walk in a warm sea at 1am. Got to make the most of this weekend tho couse next week we're going inland so we'll be really far from.. well anywhere really.

Yeah the Leap is defo one of the best companies, we've met sooo many people like us who just have nothing to do all day except sit by the beach and drink. Sounds good but they are all soo bored of it and want more work to do which makes us feel really lucky!

The camp we're staying at is really sweet but we have no Hot water but we get used to cold showers so meh, the next camp apparently has no running water so bucket and a rope me thinks =/

Should be fun fun, everyone is super cool and theirs no one here that doesn't really fit in and yeah chris is nice and yeah mr green found it quite funny that i was the only guy doing A level biolgy.

havn't got my number on me but i'll send it to you 2morrow

kwaheri  x