fixing up a classroom

One day Mama Lynn mentioned that a school outside of Boma wondered if we would be interested in fixing up a classroom. Grace, Flo, Ulli and myself said we would. We then thought it was funny that they expected us to supply the paint also but we decided to do this as part of community outreach.

Kids start school around 7 years old and we would be painting the 1st graders room. We arrive at the school and find a classroom full of old desks and benches. At the back and along the sides of the building are metal barrels and bags of grain. Moving most of the contents out of the room we find a nest of baby rats. Isn't it comforting to know that these small children have to share the room with rats since they also use the room to store food. The cement floor is full of holes and in some spots the walls need to be patched up also. Grace and Flo mention that they will use some of their donation dollars towards getting the floor fixed. We spend the day painting the room a cream colour on top and a light blue around the bottom. There is also black paint for a skirting strip along the bottom. While painting this I spot a small scorpion along the floor and even though I don't like to kill spiders, I definitely didn't want to have this crawling on me when I sat on the floor so it saw the bottom of my shoe. As we paint, the mother rat keeps squeaking from the ceiling rafters so she is probably pissed at us for moving out her babies. Since some of the walls need to be patched and dried, we have to go back a few days later to finish the job. Some old metal corregated sheets that were sitting in the rafters has been removed and the floor is now covered in rats poop. I guess there were rat nest up in the rafters also. I sure hope that disease that is found in mice droppings doesn't occur with rat droppings. We get the painting finished and I'm sure once the new floor is in the classroom will be in much better shape. Mama Lynn has told the principal that no food should be kept in classrooms but I wonder if in a few days they will once again be storing the food in classrooms.

Most of the day while we are painting kids are hanging out at the door and windows. It doesn't appear that they make the kids go into the classroom. I felt that the teacher that was using the room we were painting figured she didn't have to teach those days and let the kids just amuse themselves outside all day. While waiting for a ride home the 1st afternoon, I sat outside under a tree to cool off. Gradually more and more children were coming closer to me and I ended up having about 50 kids surrounding me and I could barely breath. I few of them could speak a few words of english and I could only speak a few words of swahili. I felt like I had too heads and couldn't see why they seemed to be facinated with me. It's not like I was in an area that doesn't have white people. A few of the kids wanted to touch me I guess to say they had touched a white person. I finally had to go back into the classroom for some peace and quiet.

Tanzania is a very corrupt country and there is even corruption in the school system. Along with school fees, uniform, black shoes, food fees, every child must pay a security fee. There was probably about 1000 kids at that school and with the amount of money they collect for one askari guard, they could probably hire 10-20 guards so that means the corrupt teachers are pocketing the extra cash. Teachers also carry long sticks with them to beat the children. Boy am I glad my nieces and newphews don't have to go to a school like that. Private school is probably better and international school is the best choice but many families in Tanzania cannot afford the private schools. A few of LIA kids have sponsors that pay for private schooling which I think is about $1000.00 a year.