Postcards from Africa

Imagine that we are sitting down with a bunch of post card sized photos and I am talking you through our whistle-stop trip to Uganda on our way back to Kenya from the UK. The UK was whistle-stop in itself, with Jane on a training course, family, friends, meetings, check ups, motorways. Then we were back on the plane to Uganda. Uganda is a place I love and has special memories. A lot of what we now teach was formulated into the current Leadership for Hope programme in Uganda; we piloted it from fishing villages, to slum savings groups, to remote islands and to bustling city.  But this was to be my first trip back there in two and a half years…..and only for two and a half days!

Postcard 1: The challenges of dealing with multiple disappointments.

We arrived in Uganda at midnight and straight to our hotel and up again at 6.30 to be ready to leave for the training at 8am.  We had gone to Uganda because over a year ago one of our team ran a small pilot programme specifically for teachers. The impact was clear and impressive so when they invited us to return to train 250 teachers, it seemed like an opportunity not to be missed. When we arrived there was no equipment working, a laptop projector that looked 30 years old, a screen on a stage that was torn and tattered and too small to be seen by many, apart from the first few rows….and hardly any people. By the end of the day we had got up to about 50 -60 people, with all kinds of reasons for what had gone wrong and many promises that on Day 2 they would all be there.  Lunch on day 1 arrived finally at about 2.30 and the day had to end just after 4pm. On Day two at 9am there were 11 people.  Need I say more?  The training was just such hard work from start to finish. By the way, what I failed to tell you about the teachers is that they haven’t been paid for the past four months!

Postcard 2: The reality of training in Africa

Sometimes people wonder, with all that they read in the paper, what is it like to deliver a training course in Africa. When I tell them that I train with an armed guard, they don’t believe me. So I persuaded our guards to pose for a photo to prove that I was telling the truth.

Postcard 3: Blessed are the children

One of the reasons to reach teachers with Leadership for Hope is so that they can start teaching leadership to children. I have long said that leadership principles are so simple and can be taught to a five year old. I said this to the group and told them what I would teach their class if I had 15 minutes with them. It was a Saturday and most schools still operate on Saturday morning. When we broke for lunch a great young teacher came up to me and said he would get his pupils together during lunch so I could talk to them! And he did! So I got my 15 minutes on the grass with 50 schoolchildren. A very special moment in the middle of a tough day.

Postcard 4: Meeting up with Rachel before she leaves Uganda and Cherish

I first went to Uganda 7 years ago to help with the start up of the most amazing project called Cherish Uganda that was building a whole village for children who had HIV/AIDs and were either orphaned or abandoned. At the start of that adventure I met the then 25 year old Rachel, the most outstanding young pioneering leader that I’d met, who was clearly going to be the one who led the whole Cherish adventure……and she has. A whole school for 230 children, 50 children with HIV all now living with mothers and families in houses, a farm, clinic-soon to be hospital, staff accommodation and an education resource centre for the whole community going to be built. After the two hectic days we got to meet up with Rachel, who is just about to leave Uganda for fresh adventures.

Postcard 5: The courage of Kenyans

A week ago we had specific information to not go to the coast so we changed our plans. As we flew back into Nairobi on Sunday afternoon we were greeted with the news of the first of two deadly attacks in the area we were due to go to in a few weeks time. We are well and safe and ensconced in our gorgeous little house in the woods.  But my final postcard is to celebrate amazing Kenyans and amazing people in any tough place in the world who still get up each morning, amidst their fears or the chaos, to get their kids to school, go to work, clean the house and live another resilient, courageous day.

As I tuck my postcards back into my bag I want to celebrate the courage of those who just get on and live each day without fuss or self-pity. “Gota” as they say in Swahili. Respect.

TW

Jambo Toto school

A social entrepreneur is someone who starts something from scratch to benefit others. They are motivated by compassion and fight to bring about lasting change. They own a deep conviction that they can bring about justice where there is none and plant hope into hopelessness places. 

Charles and Rose (Headteacher) - founders of Jambo Toto school, Nairobi

Meet this couple, Charles and Rose, they believe in the power of change and their own potential to affect the thoughts, feelings and actions of others. For the past 2 years they have invested their lives into a community around a Nairobi rock quarry (we've been blogging about it over the months). This is a quarry where dignity is a alien concept and compassion never gets a look in. Woman and men work for a poverty wage (£1 per day), and their children can't afford school shoes let alone what is needed to pay for uniforms and books. The 'quarry children' were facing a future without education until Charles and Rose saw the screaming need and decided they would not walk on by.

The road to Jambo Toto and the rock quarry at Kiserian

And so they stepped out onto the high-wire of life and committed themselves to finding a way to bring a small school into the heart of the quarry community and provide, as best they could, basic education for the children who were destined to have no schooling.

Some of you will remember that Trevor and I visited the patch of scrubby- ground back in Dec '13, that Charles had ear-marked for the little school. His plan (stage 1), was to build a 3 class-roomed building and some outhouses... and just get going!

Then, in the new year a 'wee small voice' became 'an audible yell' in my ear with the words, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?...DO SOMETHING!!...GET ON AND RAISE THE MONEY....the voice could not be ignored. So we did fundraise, and many of you darling friends and family helped us raise a stunning £4,000 which we sent in stages to Charles, who was ready and waiting, and he completed the 3 class-roomed building in a staggering 4 weeks.  It's truly an amazing story and we're thrilled to be a part of it, with you too.

So, where are we now? 

From Left: Peter from Dandora, Jane, Rose and Charles

A few weeks ago we visited the school and sat with Rose and Charles and our friend Peter from the Dandora slum and discussed the way ahead. The truth is they have achieved so much, but the reality is...they have no toilets for the children, no books or education materials, no fuel efficient cooker, no mats for the babies to sleep on or toys for them to play with, or chairs for the 57 children to sit on (they have 6 makeshift desks which seat 18 bottoms). They have no play equipment of any kind and only the most basic way of washing the children. That's the reality....

The kitchen and the fire where they cook for the 57 children

When the needs around us are so great it's easy to hear the call to give up and let our dreams crash and burn. It's easy to believe that the challenges are simply too great and too impossible to overcome. 

Here in her classroom Rose teaches 24 children, 8-11 yr olds, below she holds the only teaching books she has. 

During our Leadership for Hope training we hang a banner which says, 'We can do more together than we can on our own'....and it's totally true in my experience. Alone we can feel like a thin voice in a hurricane, but together we can make a mighty roar. 

A few days ago we returned from the UK and whilst there we were generously given 4 laptops for free and over 50 childrens books - all of which we managed to get safely here (a sweet miracle). But, the point is, together we can make things happen, together we can right wrongs and fight to bring justice to the hopeless and the oppressed and the fatherless and the widow.....together, we can.

JB

The school compound - I wonder who could build them a playground?

The difference a hand makes & why we should sing more....

Sunrise on Malindi beach, Kenya

 Of course, I know that the sun is doing its breathtaking 'sunrise show' every second of every day somewhere on the planet and will do so until the curtains close on life itself. But when you wake and see this from your bedroom window, the awesome-drama and the dazzling splendour of the rise of the queen-of-the-heavens, you see it as if for the first time.

Yesterday, when we woke to this dawn view we were stunned into silence and simply reverted to involuntary responses like 'gosh' and 'amazing'  - which were totally pathetic and excruciatingly inadequate in every way.

Then I remembered the time when I had been in a similar state of bewitched wonderment and adoration. It was back in 2009 when I travelled to India with my dear friends Caroline, Colin and Helen. Our travels brought us to the southern-most tip of the great country, at the sacred city of Kanyakumari. Here I was been hit by sun-stroke and Helen had nursed me through a grim night. I still felt rough and ragged when my intrepid pals rose to greet the dawn the next day but I decided to drag my limp body to the roof top of the hotel for this city morning ritual. When we arrived in the shallow light we looked around and saw many hundreds of human silhouettes on every available roof space and down on the beach....waiting....waiting for the birth of a new day. And, as the glory began to rise in the east we watched in sublime wonder and intense humility, not really understanding what we felt or what it meant for us.

I felt many emotions that day, as the sun rose to greet us, and one thought has stuck with me - in celebrating the dawn we are in effect celebrate the chance to start over anew each day. And that morning we blessed the dawn, we blessed each other and somehow felt fresh and clean and restored deep within.

Eddie shows me how to hold a sea urchin while it wriggles

So now, meet Eddie...

After the sun got settled yesterday, a head popped over the wall near where we were sitting meditating on the morning sky and a chirpy chap called Eddie offered to take us out through the shallows, using his local knowledge, to the reef (about half a mile out).

We agreed, for a small fee and headed off.
But it wasn't long before I started to feel anxious and thought, 'Heck, this isn't my thing at all. How do I get out of this excursion?'


My feet felt uber-sensitive and winced at every tiny piece of sharp coral and was alert to every tickle of foot-eating weed. Panic gently rose (my Cortisol button got activated).

Scary, pokey-thing!!!!!!!

Then suddenly I heard Eddie's voice saying, ''Give me your hand. I know the way. Put on your flip-flops. Trust me". So I took his hand and followed at his side and leaned into him when the water got chest deep and trusted him. And along the way he showed me how to focus on the path ahead and find sea treasures like urchins and sea-cucumbers. And when he felt me gripping his hand hard, he sang....and I sang... and joy flooded my heart and I knew I was overcoming my fear.



And as I relaxed I lifted up my head and I saw that we were with the fishermen, who knew the oceans like no one else.... and one even found me the most unbelievable starfish....and I was in awe...again.

I realised, as we begun the long wade back to the shore, that my fear could so easily have denied me the joy of the trip to the reef and the opportunity to overcome my cortisol-rush... that was not needed. And I was reminded of the importance to stay Daring Greatly, in the little things and in the larger challenges of life.  

'Courage is being scared to death and saddling up anyway' - John Wayne



'I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but triumph over it. The brave man/woman is not the one who doesn't feel fear, but he who conquers that fear' - Mandela


'Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go' - T.S Eliot


Namaste 

-JB

Out on the reef with the fishermen - Malindi, Kenya

Inhabiting three worlds

Young people attending the Leadership for Hope in Dandora

Yesterday I had a surreal moment. I sat on our veranda with Jane & two friends from the UK, drinking tea and eating cake, looking out across our little valley, cocooned by a tapestry of trees,  mellow greens and a silky canopy of acacia trees above it all. All I could hear was the sounds from so many beautiful birds, from those the size of eagles to those the size of a teaspoon. This was the world I sat in yesterday - deliciously hot, friendly, beautiful, harmonious, creative, peaceful, luscious, relaxing, restorative.
It felt like the Garden of Eden.

 

It felt surreal because the previous four days had been the opposite of most of these words. Our new Head of Kenya Operations for Emerging Leaders was mugged at gunpoint and thankfully escaped with her life; one of our associates house was violently burgled and his wife escaped to the bathroom just in time but the guard dogs were all killed.  

One of the director’s wives of Vegpro Ltd, our first Kenyan partner, was shot dead. On Friday we were on the adjoining district to two more terrorist bombs in Nairobi and the evacuation of British tourists out of the country from the coast.  

Each day for four days we spent four hours a day driving past the chaos of humanity fighting for survival and existence in some of the toughest areas of the city – hustling for a bit of money, ditches full of garbage, desperate individuals picking through the rubbish for food, roads so bad that your body feels beaten to a pulp by the end of it, training in the Dandora slum, the city rubbish dump, swarming with foraging pigs and cranes and people eking out their living from the garbage jungle, armed guards outside the training room.

And then there was the third world. The cross-over world.... 

We delivered Leadership for Hope this past week to 350 youth in the Dandora slum. The cross-over between these scary realities and the reality of hope and the human spirit. 350 slum youth who have had very varying degrees of education sat for three whole days. I’m told that has never ever happened before. The cross-over between donors who give money to help these places but who never actually come here, to our wonderful team who embraced the world of Dandora.  The cross-over between youth crime and youth hopelessness to working alongside the most amazing young people of the Dandora Uprising, who I trained last year, seeing them running the event like a well oiled machine; a now mature, servant hearted group of young people who I wanted to adopt for life. The cross-over from a world of nothing, to seeing where Peter (leader of the Dandora Uprising and one of our new trainers), is going to build Dandora’s first ever library for youth because he now sees himself as a leader.  The cross-over of 350 youth who live in a violent, often desperate slum, where no one dares to visit, to a place where 96% of the 350 youth said the three days have greatly changed their lives.

 

We lived in the three worlds this week.

Meet Joseph from the Dandora Uprising team - washing 350 chai mugs

- TW