15 November 2016
Day 13 Monday
After saying
goodbye to Regina and David at breakfast, Pippa and I set off to visit some
schools in the south west of The Gambia. The purpose of the visits was mainly to take
photos of our sponsored children, but in some cases to pay sponsorship monies.
It took just under an hour to get to the first school, St Francis. That school
has a Lower Basic and Upper Basic on the same site and a Senior Secondary a
short distance away. We had just brief visits to each and then on to Banyaka LBS
where we were met by Jerreh Manneh, the Principal.
Pageant has one
sponsored student at that school whom we met and then the discussion turned to
some funding we had received to spend at the school. Chestnut Grove Academy in
Balham, South London had raised the equivalent of 40,000 Dalasi and wanted it
to be spent directly on helping the children there, rather than on, say,
buildings. After discussion it was agreed to spend a small amount in marker
pens for teachers and the rest on exercise books for the students. There are
about 900 children at the school and this will be sufficient to buy about 3 for
each.
That school has
a large garden and we were pleased to donate some of the seeds donated by the
parents of Manor Green School.
On then to
Jambanjelly school. We are familiar with this school as we carried out science
workshops there in February this year and last. A quick visit and discussion
with the new Headteacher and on to Sifoe
school for our only disappointment of the day because the students who we
wanted to see were not there.
Next was St
Marks LBS in Sandali. This was a quite astonishing drive. We swung off the
highway onto what looked like a fairly narrow footpath. It was in face a narrow
drive. With bushes scraping the sides of the car Abdoulie drove superbly for
about 3 miles on very sandy tracks. Although we had to have the windows shut
because of the bushes, the car was filled with the most magnificent scent from
the shrubs – a bit like lemon balm.
A final visit
to Tujering Senior Secondary then the longish drive back to the hotel.
In the evening
we met Mr Drammeh, who was the Headteacher at SOS Senior Secondary until he
retired earlier this year. We have been trying to trace two of our most able
students who left that school in July. He was able to give us some information
that should enable us to re-establish contact.
