Blogs from Basse Santa Su, Upper River, Gambia, Africa

I think I was on the telly last night! On Saturday we had the Region 6 Teachers awards and the event was featured in the evening news. I had to attend to present the award for best ECD teacher of the year. Over the last few weeks I and many of the other staff in the office have been verifying teacher’s nominations as I trekked around the schools. However, the actual oraginsation of the day happened in typical Gambian fashion i.e. there’s plenty of time to get things done... don’t worry about it... oh god it’s tomorrow, we’d better get something orgainsed. I’d been out of the office all week trekking with FIOH so I managed to pretty much stay out of the way of things but poor old Eleanor was stressed to death with it. ... read more

Work has been busy lately. I’ve done my workshops. I think they were moderately successful if not slightly frustrating.Most of the teachers responses were to complain that they had never had training in early years followed directly by requests to finish early or ‘I need to go out to drink water/answer this phone call/go for a wander around’. I thought the activities I did were relatively simple but they really struggled with some of them. The idea of planning an activity to do every day but making it a little bit harder towards the end of the week totally baffled them and you should have seen their faces when I said big sticks shouldn’t even be in the classroom even if they were to only threaten children with a beating rather than actually using them. I ... read more

So I’m back in Basse again after a long stay in Kombos and a two week holiday back at home. I was really keen to get back to get on with my work and see my compound family again though dreading the infamous heat. I was lucky enough to get a lift up along with Lilli and Kebba in one of the Tostan vehicles (the organisation that Lilli works for). The landscape along the way is looking incredibly dry after 6 months without rain. The land is very bare with all the crops apart from the trees either dieing back naturally or burnt in bush fires. The poor cows look starved. We took the south road meaning we avoided the dreaded Banjul ferry and we also got to experience the beautiful new road that is fully ... read more

Today I had my first Gambian cookery lesson. I’m a bit ashamed how long this has taken me. We made choo with fish. No, it’s got nothing to do with a nasty sneeze, ha ha! It’s a spicy onion stew type thing that is served with either meat or fish or sometimes fish balls which is pounded fish, bones and all, made into meatball type things (they’re nicer than they sound). I think choo has become my favourite dish or ‘my choice’ as the Gambians would say, overtaking domada even. Hopefully I was actually a little bit of a help and didn’t get in the way too much. I did manage to get covered in soot which everyone found very amusing. I would probably be more help if I stopped taking photos while I’m doing it ... read more

Things are plodding along nicely here. I don’t feel like I have that much to write about these days as life has seemed to settle down and I’m feeling more at home here. Work is picking up and I finally feel like I have things to do which is great. I stopped counting how many weeks I’ve been here which is surely a good sign. It must be because last week I told VSO that I’d like to extend my placement for another six months. Crikey! What am I letting myself in for! I would be due to come home in July but if all goes well I’ll be staying until at least Christmas. It’s all a bit up in the air at the moment though. There are lots of changes happening within VSO and they ... read more