June 8th

So, updates on everything. The past few days have been busy. On Friday, we had an amazing meeting with parents at the school BoH is running here. There are 100 students at the school, and, on notice of two days, we had over 60 parents turn out to talk with us about the challenges they have with school and education, and the solutions they see as most likely. We were astounted: two days notice, very high attendance (we anticipated about 10 or 15 parents), and amazing ideas. We’ve been incredibly impressed at the value placed on education here by so many people. It is unquestionably recognized as important (and after a solid debate on the subject, Emily and I have agreed that education is, for these people, not at all a luxury but a necessity). Also impressive is that school is not valued so much for hard skills, in learning to read and write and do some math, but rather that they see it as the way their children will learn to think critically, to challenge ideas, and learn to learn. I guess I’ve never been the parent of a 7-year-old, but I can’t help but wonder how many parents at home have that clarity of vision about the purpose of education. (Maybe I’m not giving enough credit, and that could just be because I wasn’t conscious enough at age 7 to understand why I was learning stuff at school, and to understand what I was actually learning at that time). Still, its an attitude that should certainly be encouraged.

The market here in Boura is every 6 days, so last week it was Saturday, and this week it is Friday. Clever that people can keep that straight.

Yesterday we were ‘taught’ some African dancing. Before they would teach us we had to share Canadian dance, so we (please remember that Kristina can’t dance) pulled off a terrible attempt at Irish dancing, with spinning and step-type feet movements. We tried to explain that people in Canada don’t actually dance like that, not sure if it was understood, but they all found it quite hilarious and did their best to dance with us too. I’m sure we looked much more ridiculous when we tried to imitate the African dances, but the effort was well appreciated, and having people fall to the ground laughing is rarely a bad thing, particularly when we are laughing too.

We’ve continued with the school interviews, having completed BoH’s school earlier this week, and today finished with Boura Public. We’ve got some interesting ideas, from people we’ve talked with, and are trying to see if we can make something work to apply some of what we are learning during our time here. Have to see how that works out, but we’re both pretty excited about that possibility, and also that it would mean spending more time in Boura, which truly seems like the best place for us, and the best use of our time. We were both nervous about the amount of time we were initially to spend travelling, hoping from place to place, and see this possibility as an interesting alternative.

We’ve decided we’re coming back some day. And we sing. And we feed babies (?). And we talk. Lots of talking. And, we baked, attempting to make banana bread, except it ended up as mango banana bread, and it was good.

I’m starting to feel distinctly less white (I’ve never felt white, except that people stare), in that either people are getting used to us and not staring so much, or that we are just getting better at ignoring the staring. We’ve had some interesting conversations about us and what we are actually able to do here, both amongst ourselves and with local people, and come to the conclusion that we aren’t useless, which is nice. Still having a hard time understanding realities here, and that is compounded by the fact that people here don’t seem to understand them either. We have little idea how many school aged children are actually in school, with estimates ranging from 20 to 70 percent. We have no idea how excluded from education girls are (and yes, I hate saying that, but I’m learning), if it is getting better or worse, and if it is primarily because of money or culture. Its tricky, much of the information presented seems to be from a long time ago, and current realities are not really known, making it hard to say if current initiatives are helping at all (if they should be continued) or if different approaches are needed… its tricky. I know that at home problems are frequently studied to death, but here a study could be very helpful to getting something done.

Well that sums up a lot, but doesn’t cover even the surface still. I need to get better at this, but it’s a start.