DAY 6: Many hands make ‘hope’ work
This morning we visited the ‘Hope Centre Nursery School’ in Sifoe. The school was founded with the financial help of an American organisation, but in 2015 the collaboration ended. Since then the headmaster has done his utmost to keep the school running. So far he has been successful thanks to his dedication, effort, feeling for structure, enthusiasm and will power. He had to pay the teachers with the fees the pupils pay. As most parents can’t pay the fees, times are hard and 6 teachers have had to leave. With them about half of the students left as well (government run schools are free). There are now only 4 teachers left and the headmaster is one of them. They continued to work for free. Due to the lack of money there is no electricity, no running water and no opportunity to provide school lunches. The headmaster has plans to generate income for the school (for example selling cooled water in a stand just outside the school, selling vegetables grown in the school,…) but he needs some help to get stated. We were so impressed by this man and the school that we decided to include him in our project.
Then we left for the health centre in Sifoe to supply it with the medicine we bought. The waiting room was packed. Two women were about the give birth and the medicine cabinet was almost empty. The male midwife was really happy to see us. We made arrangements to see him on Thursday to give him additional information about the supplies we brought.
We spent the afternoon in Madina Salam. After a short presentation of the local project by the village chief and his collaborators we toured the health centre. The nurse keeps on top of everything with the help of a trainee nurse and a lady who keeps everything tidy. We filled her cupboards with much needed supplies.
Before going back to the hotel, Karamo brought us to a mosque by the sea. It was a relaxing close to a very emotional day.
