Ready to Read Project Update – Nkora Nursery School, Rwanda
From: Jill Fenton Date: 3/23/2013
Subject: How to load a cow into a boat!
It's pouring with rain as we wake up at five this morning and we are so fortunate that we went to Nkora yesterday! Vincent drove. Neil was not at all happy to just ride but it's a 12 hour day on hard roads. We also drove The Beast, not without some trepidation, but we did it!
Friday is market day at Nkora and we watched a group of men load cows from the bank of the lake into a wooden, handmade boat. We had heard that cows came by boat but always wondered how. Well, they had the front legs tied and lifted the front in then pushed in the back end after while avoiding the huge horns some of them have. The cows were going to Bukavu in Congo, way down the lake! I hope they stay in one place and don't move around because the boat didn't have much draught! A creek running down to the lake was full of pigs, heaps and heaps of them, like big boulders, keeping cool. Busy, busy place!
The teachers weren't expecting us but things were going well and I was really pleased to see the children working with the wooden puzzles which Harold had made for the school. When the afternoon class arrived we watched them line up and sing the national anthem. Roy would have loved to see the flags flying overhead. David wants to learn O Canada! Perhaps that's a step too far?
We never stay long because as it's the rainy season we don't want to be on that coast road in the rain and so were back in Kigali before dark.
Backing up. .On Thursday we had a meeting with Faustin (Caferwa) to strongly suggest that they give us the house next door for another classroom. Faustin now has partners so it's not so easy for him to agree. We still have another 60 children waiting to go to school!
Saudah and I also took the plunge and hired David, who we had helping us to get the nursery school going. He was being reassigned, by the mission he worked for, to a secondary school and we needed him. David will start adult literacy and English classes of parents as well as running the school. His next step will be computer literacy, but one thing at a time. He will live with Peter Claver, the manager of the coffee washing station. They have become good friends and Peter loves the school.
David had already set up the PTA, reported to the local education authorities, is planning a feeding program with the parents, got the school report card designed for me to run off. . .Nkora has become his mission!
Just in case you wondered what we did on the Sunday of our famous week. We were invited to Paul and Didi Farmer's for lunch. It started at 1 and we got home at 7pm! Paul started Partners in Health which builds and runs hospitals in Rwanda, Haiti, Lesotho . Google him because he is an amazing man. There is a book written about him called Mountains beyond Mountains. We got to know them because their children go to Green Hills. Since I went back to Green Hills our social life has certainly picked up but tennis has suffered!
Today we plan to go the market.
As always. . Jill and Neil
Photos from the Nkora Nursery School
