Challenge Yourself to Change Your World

For the second half of my placement in Africa, Charlie 2 focused their efforts on construction, teaching and a HIV/AIDS awareness campaign.

My team were hoping to make a lot of progress in the construction phase with the help of our project partner. Due to the horrific state and number of primary school toilets we planned to build three new latrine blocks for the children at Mgongo Primary. At the start we thought five weeks of hard graft and the assistance of local fundi (builders) would be enough to help us achieve our goal. However ‘This Is Africa’! The man delivering the water was ill for a few days, there wasn’t enough water for the next few days, then someone’s uncle died, our project partner never turned up, then the fundi were going to a wedding for the following two days, we had to wait for them to turn up each morning in ‘Tanzanian Time’, the fundi got too tired to work past 11 o’clock, and of course everyone celebrates the end of Ramadan for two more days… It seemed to never end and our goal went from completing three toilet blocks to finishing one, to just being able to get the bricks made!

So early each morning we lugged our tools, wheelbarrows, supply of drinking water and medical box to the school feeling motivated to do our best. We started by helping to dig the latrine pits, which were eventually around 10ft deep. Next we learnt how to make the simple mud bricks that the locals use for their houses. This involved hoeing up the ground into a pile, pouring water over, shovelling it into a wooden cast, punching out the trapped air, smoothing it over and then lifting off the cast whilst keeping it in shape! After a few days of drying in the sun we had to move and place the mud bricks into a complex stack ready to be burnt, which would increase their stability. The bricks were fairly large and heavy so it was harder work than we originally thought! But it was really good when we all got into it and worked together as a team. We danced and sang along to the radio which the locals loved, especially when we played a great Tanzanian tune ‘Dar es Salaam Stand Up’!

Due to the inconsistent schedule for the latrine construction we decided to go ahead with our secondary project instead.

Our secondary project in Charlie 2 was a HIV and AIDS awareness campaign. We were very lucky to have a HIV/AIDS volunteer working with our project partner, who helped us launch our campaign in the local area. Together we composed a presentation that included definitions, symptoms, stages, spread, prevention, stigma and discrimination. Over our last few weeks in Mgongo we held our awareness campaign at multiple community meetings, to secondary school students and teachers, then to teachers and elder students at four primary schools. I learnt a lot about HIV and AIDS from this project and it has inspired me to get involved with other similar projects in the future. By far the most interesting part of the campaign was the question time at the end – it really showed us how false or little knowledge most members of the community had on HIV/AIDS. We heard some weird and wonderful things, but the most important thing we realised about preventing HIV was that we couldn’t just tell people to wear condoms – They had no idea how or why. So after lots of persuading, Thabani and Catherine made use of our bananas and box of condoms to demonstrate this novel idea!

 

Black African magic, a.k.a. juju, seemed to be the biggest culprit for a negative attitude towards condoms and HIV. Many people believed that condoms themselves contain diseases and if you leave them out in the sun then you can see the viruses and also maggots start growing inside. We attempted to try this but they all burst after a few minutes in the heat! They also believed that AIDS is caused by someone cursing you; hence most people would seek advice from a witch doctor and not a medical professional. One teacher was even fiercely accusing condoms of shortening the distance that people can pee, as ‘back in the day they could pee for metres’…

All in all our awareness sessions were extremely successful and we received some great feedback from those who attended. It has certainly taught me a lot and I hope that it has made an impact on the community in Mgongo. 

We were hoping to do quite a bit of teaching in our second phase, but due to the messed up construction timetable and on-going success of our HIV campaigns we only managed to fit it in a couple of times. The classrooms are simple mud structures packed with rows of battered wooden benches and a painted on chalk board. When you walk into the classroom you can’t help but smile as the children stand up with a chorus of good mornings and giggles! It was a little daunting when I was presented with my first class, who were the youngest in the school. Where the hell was I going to start?! My Swahili was certainly put to the test, especially when my Tanzanian translator Kenny decided to disappear for half an hour! Luckily I managed to wangle my way through shapes, numbers, the alphabet and body parts, ready for heads shoulders knees and toes! My chalk animal drawings went down well too and they decided to teach me them all in Swahili before acting out the noises! I ended up teaching for three hours I was having so much fun! My other class was with Frank for Standard 7 doing maths in preparation for their upcoming exams, so a bit more serious! After some Pythagoras and division I decided to liven up the lesson in true Raleigh style - with an energiser! We selected some students to come up to the front to act as ninjas and try not to get karate chopped; it was highly amusing and hopefully brightened up their maths lesson! I really enjoyed teaching in Mgongo and it has given me the confidence and motivation to do more teaching in my future projects. I’m now considering doing a TEFL after university (teaching English as a foreign language qualification), so we’ll see what happens!

 In between our busy project timetable we managed to fit in some cultural experiences and a little bit of chilled time! Faudhia taught the girls how to make sweet and savoury chapattis, which were amazing! Kenny was assigned as our language teacher, testing us on basic Swahili words and phrases. So in return we decided to challenge the Tanzanians with some old fashioned English tongue-twisters! I learnt  a hell of a lot about the African culture too, through observing behaviours and asking billions of questions! The most intriguing things revolved around juju, for instance the Tanzanians believed that certain people can fly on rice sieves as midnight. You have to be naked of course…

A great experience was visiting the travelling market that passed through Mgongo once a month. We haggled our way into some weird and wonderful souvenirs, including machetes, cow bells and arrow heads! Freya, Kitty and I were in awe of the hundreds of beautiful kitenge fabrics on offer, with every print, pattern and colour imaginable! The second market fell on Eid, which celebrates the end Ramadan. Faudhia from my team had been fasting so in honour we all dressed up and sacrificed a goat for a thoroughly enjoyable feast!

On our last weekend in Mgongo we decided to hike to the mountains in the distance (more of a long stretch of steep hill). We arranged for a local to be our guide, who insisted it would only take around six hours. But obviously this was in Tanzanian time… The walk there was really beautiful and the view from the top was worth every panting breath and aching muscle!  The moment we reached the peak I realised how far I had come and everything Team Majanga had achieved. We could see for miles across the flat plains and also a waterfall nearby, so we decided to head over for a swim! After lots of clambering and climbing we got to the base of the waterfall. The pool beneath was sacred to the local Pagan community, so we were only able to have a refreshing dip further downstream! After a long, sweaty day in the relentless heat we eventually hauled our feet back to camp… Ten hours later! It was definitely worth every second though and summed up our journey in Tanzania.

To celebrate our achievements we held an Awards Ceremony on our last night in Mgongo, complete with champagne! (Non-alcoholic unfortunately…) It was great to think about how far our team had come and everything we had done in the village. I had an incredible time living and working alongside such interesting people and have learnt so much from it. I knew it would be sad saying goodbye to Mgongo and I will really miss everyone I met, but I was glad to finally be leaving that bloody tent!

Our Projects in Tanzania

For the first four weeks at our village the main focuses of our project were integrating with the community, action research and awareness raising. 

To integrate with the local community we introduced ourselves in a number of ways. Firstly we visited the market every day to familiarise ourselves with the stall owners and explained our role with Raleigh ICS and SEMA. At first we got lots of unwelcoming looks as they thought we would just be there for the goldmine that was on the outskirts of the village. I don’t know if I was expecting them to welcome us with open arms, but I was a bit thrown off by this and couldn’t understand why they were being so unfriendly and would just stare or demand money. However when people started listening to our reasons for staying in the area and what we planned to do they gradually became more accepting, making us feel at ease. The villagers began to learn our names and faces and would try their best attempt at speaking basic English to please us. We met some very kind people in the village, especially the village leaders who welcomed us back to visit whenever possible!

As most of our projects would involve the schools we thought it was essential to get to know the students and teachers to build trust and respect. To do this my team held sports days at Mgongo Primary and Kibululu Primary Schools, with sack races, relays, three-legged and traditional running races. The children had never done anything like this before so were very excited yet nervous! The team were feeling a bit anxious about controlling hundreds of kids speaking a different language, especially as order and organisation doesn’t really exist in Africa! But with their co-operation and the help of the prefects we somehow managed to run it all smoothly and it was a really fun day. The highlight for me was being surrounded by all the children at the end of the day, fascinated by our hair and skin, then singing us a song in unison. It really was special to hear and is one of my favourite memories with the children in Mgongo.

 

To engage with the secondary school students we joined in with netball and football tournaments on a Friday afternoon for a few weeks. At secondary school they get taught all their lessons in English so it was slightly easier to attempt speaking to them, although they all got very shy! They loved that the British volunteers joined in with the sports too and liked to laugh at us getting tired in the heat!

As mentioned in my post ‘Welcome to Mgongo – Karibu Sana’ we conducted household surveys for our action research about water and sanitation. The results of this subsequently guided our awareness raising, infrastructure construction and secondary project.

For our awareness raising we decided to do a hand hygiene campaign with five schools in the area. In order to make it effective and sustainable we knew we had to plan it thoroughly. The team gathered for hours of meetings to discuss and plan everything we were to do in detail. As we were the first Raleigh ICS group in Tanzania there were no resources available from any previous teams or from the project partner either, so it took a while to prepare every campaign, session and meeting. This was still within our first few weeks so to begin with we had some slight language barrier difficulties, as the Tanzanian volunteers were having trouble keeping up with the fast incoherent discussions of the British. Hence part of our challenge was to continuously consider this and to make sure everyone understood every detail. After all, we were part of a team and each individual needed time to get involved. So after hours of discussions and decisions we had a plan of action to help the water, health and sanitation in Mgongo.

Once the planning and organising were complete we were finally able to begin the health awareness lessons. Our aim was to teach the schools about hand hygiene in order to help prevent diseases and illnesses. For the knowledge to be relevant we had to first provide the schools with hand washing facilities, i.e. a ‘Tippy-Tap’. A tippy-tap is a very basic but effective invention that has minimal surface contact and water wastage. It is simply three long wooden sticks, a jerry can with a hole cut in the side, string and a stick for the pedal. So to access the water you push your foot down on the pedal, which tips the jerry can via the attached string, and the water will come out like a tap – voila! We built two tippy-taps by the latrines at each school to encourage the children to use it after going to the toilet. We then conducted the health awareness sessions in four parts. First of all in introduction into why you should wash your hands, secondly a play about protecting your friends and family from illness, thirdly an explanation and demonstration of the tippy-tap and finally a germ game using flour to represent how thoroughly you must wash your hands! It was only basic information, but the children were completely unaware of why it is essential for them to wash their hands. It was such a great moment to first see a young boy running straight to the tippy tap after the toilet to try it out – I really hope we educated the teachers enough too for it to continue.

Another on-going project throughout our time in Mgongo was the Women’s Group. It was the first female social group to be set up in the area, so we found that it was a bit slow to get going and we began to doubt any success! However after a few meetings we all started to really enjoy it and have a really good time, despite the huge language barrier! We all spoke about our lives, families and ambitions, which helped us to understand each other a lot more. They also shared music and crafts that they had made and we showed them our photos and art work. Mama Musa showed us a bowl she had weaved using dried grass, and because we had said we loved it she presented all the girls with one as a leaving gift! With the whole women’s group we also made a doormat and netball bibs together; the netball bibs were an on-going project for the girls at the Secondary School to encourage them to be active and enjoy sports. In our last week in Mgongo Mama Musa invited us to her house for tea and to build her a Tippy-Tap outside her latrine. It was a simple mud house, yet she had made it feel very friendly and cosy! It was very sad to say goodbye to all the women from the group, but they generously welcomed us back to stay with them whenever we could J

So that’s what we got up to in our first five weeks in Tanzania. I will update you again on the second phase soon!

..x

A Day in The Life of Team Majanga

Charlie 2 Before a Hike

After three weeks at home I’ve finally started to get used to the reality of life away from Africa. I have found it quite difficult to adjust back to life in the UK, from attitudes to surroundings to our own issues. The bizarre lifestyle we had living in Tanzania became normal after ten weeks and it was difficult at first to see it from an outsider’s point of view. I learnt a lot from my time away with Raleigh ICS about the reality of life in rural villages such as Mgongo, how international development can benefit such communities but also challenging myself to live in basic conditions in the middle of Africa with a team of thirteen diverse people.

So to explain a little better here’s a day in the life of Team Majanga…

After a luxurious night on a thin roll matt under a suffocating mosquito net in a tent full of eight people with walls constantly flapping violently in the wind, it was time to wake up feeling fresh for the busy day ahead. Breakfast calls varied between 5am and 8am, depending on the plans for the day. This would be served by the pair on camp duty – one British and one Tanzanian. This was one of four daily duties, which involved cooking each meal and staying guard at the camp all day.

Our Home for Ten Weeks

 

The daily food at the camp was carbs, carbs, and some more carbs. For breakfast we had porridge every single morning, which I thought was really nice to start with. But after weeks and weeks of the stuff and when the sugar, chocolate and milk powder rations ran out, it wasn’t quite so appetising. But still, eating out of a mess-tin watching the sun rise over the mountains is something quite amazing!

Depending on our schedule, the team would have to be promptly ready after breakfast to begin surveys, hold meetings all morning, head to the schools or practice their campaign role. We tried to throw in some Raleigh energisers to liven us all up a bit too! One of my favourites was Last Man Standing… everyone had to fill their mouths up with as much water as possible, with the aim to make everyone else laugh. The trick was to avoid them spitting it out over you!

Those on camp duty would then have the opportunity to use their ration of water to wash their clothes for the week in a bucket, which would usually be taken over by the Tanzanians tutting at our inability to clean them by hand! I took full advantage of my camp duties to be my ‘pamper day’ of fresh laundry, clean hair and scrubbed feet! All with less than just one bucket of water.

It’s shocking to think how much water we use a day back in the UK. Old style toilets use around 15 litres just for one flush, but newer ones still use 4-6 litres. A washing machine uses up approximately 50 litres for one spin and a dishwasher can use 20 litres of water. Obviously this is better than a few decades ago due to advanced technology and design, yet I find it shocking to realise how much we water we waste and completely take it for granted. In the UK we use 150 litres of water on average per day. For one person. In the scorching heat of Mgongo where we were constantly sweating and drinking a great deal more than at home we used 200 litres per day. For thirteen people. That’s only 15 litres each per day for cooking, cleaning, drinking, washing clothes hands and showering. It has made me think a lot about the water usage in my household and I would definitely encourage others to consider their own habits to try and save water.

The Village Water Source

The people of Mgongo begged us for a water tap in their village. A tap would mean they have many more hours spare each day to focus on the important things – farming their crops, looking after their livestock and educating their children. Every morning the students would have to leave school for a couple of hours to fill their jerry cans up from the bore holes in the dry river bed to have some more unclean water to drink. For them, it affects so much more than just their water though. It’s their education, livelihood and health. Unfortunately we did not have the time or resources to begin construction of a pump for them, but we informed our project partner SEMA and hopefully the next Raleigh ICS group will be able to build one for the village, which is great news!

So back to life at camp… After a busy morning the heat tends to exceed 40 degrees to make the rest of the day even more tiring! We attempted to get a decent tan for ten weeks in Africa, but simply gave up due to the unbearable heat. “Sunbathing? Too busy saving the world!”

The afternoon would be a continuation of one of our many projects, with the fantastic translations from our Swahili speaking volunteers. We would not have been able to achieve half of what we did without a mixed team of British and Tanzanians, which is such a great and unique aspect of Raleigh. The Tanzanians helped us to integrate into our new community but also learn how much they were connected to the Western World. For instance we were quite surprised in our minibus journeys to Kizonzo School to have the delights of Westlife and Celine Dion tracks repeated each time! Our Tanzanian Frank was also very upset to hear that Westlife had split up and would no longer be releasing new songs… It’s odd what parts of British life they have taken on board!

For camp duty most of the day would consist of sitting on the floor chopping, peeling and cooking in true African style. Our gas stove decided to break one week too so we got used to tackling the wind and balancing the pan on rocks for hours on a camp fire! Lunch and dinners would revolve around even more carbs (rice, potatoes or spaghetti) with a sauce based on just onions and tomatoes. Now I honestly never want to see another potato in my life!

The basic food provoked the whole camp to crave certain luxuries, with a good old McDonald’s being the British favourite! The prospect of chocolate always excited the British girls too, so when our Deputy Project Leader visited on ‘the loop’ it was all we could think about for days! We also looked forward to the rare treat of fried chicken and chips, although the preparation time of slaughtering the chicken and peeling 10kg of potatoes deterred us from doing it often!

 

Another thing that was a million miles away from us in camp life was communication. It was slightly odd but very refreshing not to think about checking your phone or Facebook constantly and be brainwashed by all the mass crap that many people revolve their lives around. I lived without any phone or internet completely for ten weeks, until my last day when I called my mum to let her know I was still alive and checking for a lift home from the airport! Our only form of communication therefore was letters. This was really cool to start with, but after finding time to write what felt like a million letters it became a bit of a chore to repeat everything over and over! I would have very much appreciated a desk instead of the floor too! Living in camp made me miss having clean feet and a carpet too, especially when you’re showering standing in mud and can only expect your wet feet to collect the sand in the tent! As for wildlife, apart from hyenas and a few baboons we didn’t get to see much unfortunately. Well unless you count cows, goats, chickens, ants, flies, beetles, mosquitoes…

So after finishing our project work for the day it would be time to visit the local market, play with the children hanging around camp or join the queue for a showering with a bucket and jug. Despite the barren landscape and sand, the village was certainly full of colour. From the bright bold kitenges worn by the local women to the rows of fresh fruits and vegetables, it was what I’d always pictured African life to be like! Around our camp there were endless fields of dried sunflowers and maize, waiting for the first drop of rain from the wet season in November. At first we found it really odd to see a bunch of young children attending the fields or herding the cows and goats to graze. They couldn’t have been older than eight years old, yet they were left alone to help the family to maintain their land. This is Africa.

Raheli in the middle with her sisters and I

For me a really great thing about living in Mgongo for so long was hearing a little voice shouting ‘Emma!’ when walking around even the remotest part of the village! The children were always so inquisitive and excited to see people from outside their area, let alone country! Whether we were at the school, market or just walking we would hear our names being called, so we also got them shouting “Chapattis!” and “Sausages!” Another thing they absolutely loved was photographs. Normally they wouldn’t be able to recognise themselves but would always point out their friends and giggle a lot! One little girl in particular stole my heart, her name was Raheli. She was only in Standard 4 at school, but was really eager to learn. Raheli taught me Swahili with my phrase book by correcting my pronunciation and wanted to be able to read in English so borrowed my book to practice. It is really sad to know that opportunities in rural communities like Mgongo are limited, with so few children making it to secondary school. However with organisations like Raleigh and ICS it is possible to change that and I have been inspired to carry on helping children like Raheli to have more opportunities in life.

 

So at the end of a busy day when the sun had gone down and the stars were filling the sky, it was time for bed again. It did take a while to get used to sleeping on the hard floor, especially with someone else's feet kicking your head, the tent going mental in the wind and still around 28 degree heat! One night we even got the treat of a surprise visit from some hyenas. Their distinctive call was suddenly heard around our campsite, alarming quite a few of our team members! It was also a bit unnerving that our tent door was ripped down the seam and none of the zips worked so it was just a gaping hole… But in true Majanga fashion we worked as a team to make the most noise possible at 3am to scare the hyenas away from the camp, with cow bells, clanging mess tins and peculiar vocals – it appeared to work! Another eventful day at Camp Majanga done, the next exciting one about to begin J

Welcome to Mgongo - Karibu Sana

10th July


Camp Neighbours

When Charlie 2 arrived in the rural village of Mgongo our title of 'Team Majanga' was fully earned - we had the wrong tent poles, a missing tent, an hour walk to water, broken water filters, no shower and a collapsing long drop! For those of you who aren't aware of what a long drop is, we had to dig a hole in the ground for our toilet for ten weeks... It was certainly an interesting experience and a few team members admitted to dropping some items down to the depths! We were all very hot and tired after our day of finding an appropriate site and setting up camp, but battled through the majangas and kept smiling :) When the sun set over the barren landscape we thought the amazing view made it all worth the effort. The night sky was incredible too - I've never seen so many stars in my life!



The Sunset

Our Shower

Putting Up Our Tent

Now our camp feels like home, even though we are all squashed up into one tent! The water situation became a huge problem, so luckily now we have Emanuel who delivers it on a bike twice a day from a pump in a nearby village. We have also built a tarpaulin shower, looking out into the middle of Africa, pretty amazing! Unfortunately there's not much positive to say about the long drop....

Since our team of thirteen have been in Mgongo we have been really involved with the community in order to launch our water and sanitation project. First of all we conducted baseline surveys about water access, health issues and sanitation with our local project partner SEMA. This involved interviewing houesholds within the local community and looking at their latrines (if they even have one). It has been quite shocking, as most toilets are a dirty tiny pit or a slit between two planks of wood, with only a metre high wall to protect it. No door, no roof and no hand washing facilities. We also asked about access to water, finding that most households spend over four hours each day collecting water from the boreholes in the dry river bed, usally with the assistance of a cattle-drawn cart. It has definitely made us appreciate a lot here and realise how much Raleigh and ICS have the potential to help.


Mgongo Primary School Toilets

I am really excited about seeing some visible progress in Mgongo now. After we have compiled our survey results we are going to discuss which area in the community needs the most help, which will probably be latrines in the local primary school. Currently they have 8 drop holes for 600 students, which are poorly built and already falling down. They don't have enough water to drink so washing hands is not a priority for them currently. The school children seem to be amazed by seeing 'mzungu' (white people) for the first time! They often come to the camp and just watch what we are doing or play football with the guys. Our team have are currently planning activities such as sports days with the schools to meet all the children properly before we do health and hygiene workshops with them. We also have plans to set up a women's group which will be the first one of its kind in this area.

It is only early days but I feel like we are already making progress and cannot wait to get fully stuck in with the community. So for now,  kwa heri!

Emma ..x

Settling in to Life in Africa

Mambo!

Morogoro

It is the start of our third week in Tanzania and time has definitely flown by! We all got here safe and sound after a not so pleasant flight - I barely slept and couldn't eat or even watch a film as I had reacted badly to the cholera vaccination. But everyone on my flight was really nice and made sure I was alright. We stayed in a small 'hotel' in Dar Es Salaam for the first night due to the different arrival times, which I was really grateful for and seemed like luxury when I was ill!

The next day we had an early start with a four hour bus journey to the training centre in Morogoro. This is where we completed our training week alongside the Tanzanian volunteers too. Along the way it was good to finally see true African life - mud huts, fruit stalls, and bold printed clothing!

The Training Centre, Woko

When we arrived at the training center (Woko) we were greeted with a big African welcome - dancing and singing "we are one - one big family!" in  a circle, where we joined in to integrate with our new Tanzanian friends! We stayed at Woko for a week, so there was lots of training on cultural awareness, interviewing techniques, camp life, first aid and team building. We had to start practicing some Raleigh traditions - firstly the three bowl system for washing dishes to avoid illness, also "longs o'clock"  where you must wear long trousers and shirt to protect from malaria after 6pm and tucking a mosquito net around your mattress at night. The Tanzanians enjoyed laughing at Alicia and I trying to wash our clothes in buckets outside, which was an interesting experience! We also had to get used to cold bucket showers, purifying drinking water and the African wildlife appearing in our rooms.

Our New Washing Machine

For my training team I was in Tango 4 with the team leaders Andy and Elisha. They were going to be running the Charlie 4 project in the North of Tanzania, working with the last remaining hunter gatherer tribe in Africa. We were all so excited about the prospect of living amongst this community, hence I was really sad to leave Tango 4. It would have been a unique experience and our team had grown so much throughout training. However on our fifth day at Woko we were allocated into our Charlie teams, which would be our project groups for the next ten weeks. I was moved into Charlie 2, aka Team Majanga (disaster!) with team leaders Mary and TJ. I settled really well into camp life with my new team and have been so happy to be able to work with so many schools and children for our project.

Charlie 2

After our training week I felt like I had started to get used to African life. We met so many new people, both from the UK and Tanzania, so it was really interesting hearing about such diverse lifestyles, cultures and stories. I learnt a lot by sharing a room with Happy, a Tanzanian girl who studies Law at University. It definitely helped me to adjust to living in Tanzania, especially for communication and cultural expectations. Most of the Tanzanians were a bit shy with their English to start with too, but couldn't stop chatting and asking us questions by the end of the week! The British volunteers were taught the basics to surviving in Tanzania: Speaking Swahili, making the best chappattis and how to dance like Africans!


African Life

Africa is Just Around the Corner

I knew these last few days would probably come around too quickly, but I still can’t believe that in 14 hours I will be boarding a plane to Africa! It is 1:15am and I have literally just finished the long task of packing, squeezing and bounding all my belongings! I have had to reject so many things from my original pile and just about squished the necessities in.

 

We only received the flight details on Friday, so after eagerly awaiting for weeks we were eventually able to plan last our goodbyes. Unfortunately due to issues with availability our group has been split into three, with separate flights. So there are 10 in my group, which is the first flight from Heathrow. It’s going to be good to get to know everyone better and share our excitement!

I have no idea what to expect for my next ten weeks, which is a little daunting, but also a huge adventure. Now that I have finally done everything I am beginning to feel a little nervous and slightly wish I had a few more hours tomorrow to relax and catch up on sleep before I go. For those of you who don’t know, I will be living in tents without running water and electricity throughout my stay in the rural community, which is going to be challenging! So it would have been nice to enjoy one last bubble bath too! We’ve also been told we have to dig our own long drop…

 We will be living, working and sleeping in a team of 12 with 2 team leaders. Half of these will be UK volunteers and the other half will be Tanzanian, so I am excited to get stuck in with the locals and learn some Swahili! We will also be writing a blog as a team, which will be typed up at base camp every week or so. If you would like to hear about what we are doing then please follow my team on http://www.raleighinternational.org/ri-blogs/raleigh-tanzania-ics

 

They should also post some pictures of us in action, so look out for my dashing hat and elegant rafting sandals…!

 If you would like to surprise me with a good old fashioned letter then that would be amazing! This will be our only form of contact and it would be nice to hear about the outside world J The address is:

Emma Gover
Raleigh Tanzania

PO Box 729

Morogoro

Tanzania

You’ll have to send it via airmail at the post office and it could take up to three weeks so please send it before the middle of August!

So here’s where it all begins. Thank you again for all the support from friends and family, particularly my Mum, Dad, Stu and Katy who have done a lot to help and encourage me throughout my adventures! I will see you all on 2^nd September J

Hakuna Matata!

 

Emma ..x

The First Stepping Stones

Last summer whilst exploring the streets of Chiang Mai I was inspired to do something extraordinary. As part of my Psychology degree we have the chance to spend a year on a work placement, so I felt this was the perfect opportunity to explore the world and challenge myself! After countless hours of research, persuasion and determination I began to organise my next big adventure. This was certainly not a simple process - the University have specific rules and regulations to follow, plus it’s rare for psychology students to go abroad unless they’re doing academic research (a tad too dull for me!). I decided to push the boundaries and go one step further, ignoring others doubts and never giving up my hopes.

So in just seventeen days now I will be on my way to Tanzania to begin 10 weeks of my first project with Raleigh International. Their programme is part of an on-going mission to make a long lasting difference on deprived communities around the world. I will be working alongside volunteers from Tanzania on a project that tackles issues around education, health, livelihoods, strengthening civil society and protecting the local environment. When I applied in January it seemed like light-years away, however June has definitely crept up fast! Now that my exams have finished I thought it was finally time to begin writing a blog.

As part of the programme I had to fundraise £800 for the Raleigh International Trust, to allow them to continue bringing about positive change in developing communities. I was involved with various events and with everyone’s assistance I have raised a grand total of £821.63! This was mainly through sponsorship, as somehow Lorna and Becky persuaded me to run the Plymouth Half Marathon… After training through the wind and rain I managed to complete the 13.1 miles in a comfortable 2h38m, before hobbling to the library to prepare for my exam the next day!

 

 

 

To boost the sponsorships I also skydived 15,000ft from a plane, freefalling at 120mph before catching my breath again for a great view of Devon- it was incredible!

 

I raised the rest of the money through cake sales, bucket raids in the Student Union, visiting a local primary school, car washing and a ten week chocolate ban. I couldn’t have achieved this without the help of all my friends and family, so thank you all for your support! A special thank you as well to Becky for encouraging me to apply and for fundraising with me :)

 

I’m getting pretty excited now as the 24th June creeps round the corner, but also quite scared! In Tanzania we will work in teams of twelve within a community, have no running water or electricity, with letters as our only form of contact. I’ve already chopped off half my hair and stocked up on wet wipes! It’s quite frightening listening to the nurse list off the endless diseases I might catch and remembering how to possibly prevent them, but I know that I’m in a very fortunate position and people have to live with those risks every day of their lives. This project is certainly going to be a challenge - but I cannot wait to get started!

Now it’s time to sort out the final details and the part I love - packing! I’m sure it’ll be time to leave before I know it.

Emma ..x