Ethiopia Twenty-sixth day - 22/10/13 otherwise known as 12/02/2006 in Ethiopia!

Lots to report since my last post, Mike was here for a week to help out and he brought along his Ukulele expertise to wow the children with. They loved it and are looking forward to a ukulele club soon! We went up to Addis Ababa to drop him off for his night flight and took in some sights for the day. First stop was Camara, the people who we prepared the computer lab for to see if we could get hold of the elusive computers the Ceiran sponsored the school with. They said we could pick up twenty P.C.'s at 2.30pm so we rocked on for breakfast - mine was a very interesting pancake with melted cheese inside and chocolate and honey on top! Dawit had an eggy toast with jam and chocolate on top which he even recreated on Monday morning at home! and Mike had a local spicy chip dish which was lovely too! After all this eating we headed to the National Museum to see if Lucy (one of the oldest skeletons on Earth) was there amongst other things! After her world tour, she was back and looking great! So was all the other stuff in the museum and gardens! Can't believe I've actually seen a 3.2 million year old skeleton and other bones which date back 5 and a half million years! The emperor's throne and memorabilia as well as some amazing art work were also great to look at. After this we only had a short time before we had to get back to Camara so we headed into the biggest open market in Africa - Merkato (I think) - It was nothing like I expected - I was imagining the one I visited in Thailand. The best way to picture it (I didn't take any pictures, it's not safe to take anything of value out of your bag there) is a large village with all streets lined with shops and stalls and every now and again a larger building with many rows of stalls inside! I was nearly tempted to buy some ebony sculptures, but decided to wait until next time I visit. My foot was killing me as I fell down the drainage hole playing football with the children on Thursday, so I was glad it was time to leave. We picked up our twenty computers and headed to another restaurant for my first Ethiopian burger - nice stuff but not like any I've tasted before - must be the spices they use. After eating our fill - I even had cake for desert (thanks Mike!), we dropped Mike off at the airport and started the long journey back to Nazret, beginning with a trip to the petrol station!  Once back we offloaded the P.C.'s and headed to bed. Early Saturday morning we went into school to start installation and were finished by 2pm with just a few finishing touches to be done on Sunday. I had my first taste of Nile Trout for lunch at the Ras hotel and then slept all afternoon. Sunday was very similar and Monday I had the pleasure of watching all the children's faces as they realised that the computer room was not empty anymore and they were going to have a proper computer lesson! You should have seen their faces! Even better is that the main server has DVD capability so the DVD player and TV plus the five old computers can be taken over to the other school where the children will have never seen either before in their lives! Can't wait for that photo! I'm not feeling too great today i think all the lifting has strained my shoulder, so I've stayed home to rest it.

Ethiopia Twentieth day - 16/10/13 otherwise known as 06/02/2006 in Ethiopia!

Today I met a little girl (about 5 years old) having her first day at English Alive Academy. She was very nervous to do anything having never been in a classroom before. The boys were playing with the cars and the garage on the mat and she just picked up a car and looked at it - having never played with toys before, she was shown by the teacher how to roll it along the floor. The teacher then took her outside (before the rest of the kindergarten class arrived en mass) to show her how to go down the slide - which she did and ended up with her skirt and jumper over her head, sideways at the bottom, when she finally stood up, the smile on her face was priceless! Then when she went to wash her hands to eat and she used the taps for the first time, she had to be told to stop washing as she couldn't believe the water was still coming out. running water is a new concept at the far school because the water truck comes on a Monday and all of the people rush out of their houses with the biggest container possible to fill and use for the week. KLM sponsored a massive water tank for the school, so they will not run out! When Dawit fitted it, he saw a child standing with their hands under the tap (off!) making the washing motion in the air, but not knowing how to turn it on! It is truly amazing what we take for granted, I can't imagine not having held a pencil or played with a toy for the first five years of my life but these children don't get that opportunity until they come to English Alive Academy. They are also about to open an Autism unit so that children from the neighbourhood don't have to make the two hour journey each day to Addis Ababa to the only other Autism Centre in the country. 
Well done Stephanie and Dawit - your achievements astound me!

After the morning spent at the Far School showing the little ones how to do jigsaw puzzles and spread glue for the first time, I went back to the guest house to work on a Volunteer Pack and the EAA Website and then went for dinner! Last night was a special treat, Dawit made pizza with tuna, cheese, tomato and mince meat - he put a little too much Worcester Sauce on for my liking but it was a great side dish to my injera and shiro. Azeb (Dawit's mum) has arrived from Addis, so all of the rest of the adults (myself, Mike, Dawit and Stephanie) went out into the town to look for hyenas. Dawit turned into some sort of Urban Hyena hunter - and by hunting I mean, driving around in the dark with the lights off and going quite fast when you see a hyena - and we saw lots of them. Then as we came back into the town, we came across a rubbish dumping spot and there were more on the side of the road eating the foul smelling meat leftovers. Unfortunately, my camera isn't made for night photography so they don't do it justice, but we had a great time and a mini adventure on a Wednesday night, off to bed now, got to catch up on my beauty sleep as me and Mike stayed up til midnight last night watching England beat Poland on his slingbox!

Ethiopia Eighteenth day - 14/10/13 otherwise known as 04/02/2006 in Ethiopia!

Lots to blog about since the last time I managed to get on here, I've been very busy in school and spent Friday with the little ones from 3-6yrs. They are cute! Especially when you start playing on the carpet alongside them.

After much fun with the little ones, I headed home to an empty house as everyone had gone up to Addis in preparation for Mike's arrival early Saturday morning. He came from the UK and is trying to help organise the fund raising side of things for Stephanie and Dawit. He's staying at the same place as me so I now have a neighbour I know! Upon his arrival, me and Dawit set to work on a new computer room which was to be inspected today by an organisation providing computers for the school. It's all ready now and the man came to see it so we should get IT going soon.

 On Sunday, me and Mike went on a mini adventure to a place called Sodere. A resort just outside of town. We got the bus (albeit the wrong one) and then saw the sign and got off, only to realise we had another 5km to walk. After an hour and a half walking in the hot sun, taking in the scenery and many photographs later, we arrived at the place! I enjoyed some fried chicken and chips and was faced with a very adept monkey who stole two bread rolls from right on the table in front of us! We then went for a dip in the Olympic size swimming pool and headed back to the guest house on the correct bus!
Ethiopia played Nigeria in the world cup qualifier at 4pm so everyone was in the colours with painted faces and shouting loudly in anticipation of the game. Unfortunately they lost 2:1 due to a penalty in the last few minutes - fortunately today we hear that they drew 2:2 as the referee should not have disallowed a goal in the first half. It is the first time I have ever known a score to be changed, so roll on the next game!

THINGS I LEARNT:
Some more Amharic - Neh = Come (f) Nah = Come (m) Ishi = OK, Salam = Hello, Autobus = Bus, Chow = Goodbye, getting there now!
Most Ethiopians don't know how to swim, they are not taught as children and many do not get into a swimming pool until they are adults - the ones that do stay in the shallow part and hang around at the side of the pool.

Ethiopia Thirteenth day - 09/10/13 otherwise known as 29/01/2006 in Ethiopia!

Its been a few days since I last blogged as here the weather and power are yo-yoing somewhat. The power usually goes off at least once a day for an hour or less. I have been told it has gone off for three days in a row before - who knows why! As a result I always have my torch at the ready and my kindle charged. I'm on my second book since being here, currently reading Lord of the Flies and just finished Flash Forward - both I highly recommend. The weather seems to change quite suddenly from 30 degrees sunshine to 15-20 degrees and rain and because of this, most people (including me) are suffering with sinus problems, coughs and colds! I'm sure it will pass, Ethiopia is quite a dusty place and I'm getting used to shuffling along between the goats, cows (with extremely looong horns) and dogs on the dirty street. Some have been paved with the Ethiopian version of cobblestones and are much better, but most are dirt tracks.
I haven't eaten any meat since my first day and the raw meat fest! so this is officially the longest time I've gone without it. Can't say my body is disapproving much and the flabby belly I gained over the summer is disappearing slowly - for those of you on the book, it's looking good for the lower end of the after Ethiopia weight!
I've taught all of the grades apart from nursery now and they will be my treat on Friday. All of the grade school have had at least one computer lesson with me and know all the major parts of a PC in English and Amharic. My Amharic is not going so well, I can't remember any of the children's names and the only words I know are a few random numbers, ok, phone and that's about it! It doesn't stop everyone speaking to me in it though, especially the little ones who were practising the robotics of "Good Morning, how are you, I'm fine thank you and my name is..." today!
THINGS I'VE LEARNT
No-one eats on the street in Ethiopia as it is customary to share/offer to share all food and therefore would be a nightmare walking down the road having to offer to everyone going past.
Cold, flu etc. are known as allergies to the weather here.

Ethiopia Ninth day - 05/10/13 otherwise known as 25/01/2006 in Ethiopia!

I lay in until 8.30am today, the latest I've been up all week! I went for breakfast and then we headed off to the Grade School so that Stephanie could do some photocopying. I set the children up on a computer game and then walked into town for the first time alone! It was very busy and noisy but I didn't get too much hassle, mostly from little children wanting me to buy their packets of tissues and chewing gum. After an hours wander around of seeing the same kind of shops I headed back with a backpack full of exciting new things - such as:

• Washing powder
• Fabric Softener
• Teddy Bear Biscuits
• Strawberry Jam
• A tin of tuna

I played with the children and LEGO for a bit while Stephanie finished off and then we headed to the Ras hotel where we enjoyed a fizzy drink around the pool. It then proceeded to throw it down so we waited for the worse to pass and then headed home. After a quick bite, I went back to the guest house for a chat with mum and dad and checked my emails. The power went out for about an hour so I headed to Stephanie and Dawits in the dark and brushed many Barbies hair whilst waiting for dinner. I'm back at the guest house now and the power has returned. Roll on tomorrow to see what exciting Sunday fun is to be had in Nazret!
Oh and in case you are wondering what my room in the guest house looks like, it's very nice:

Ethiopia Eighth day - 04/10/13 otherwise known as 24/01/2006 in Ethiopia!

This morning we dashed over to the far school to help out with lessons there as the two new teachers are just getting used to the English plans. They are great and really enthusiastic so I team taught maths and English in the grade 3/4 and grade 1/2 classes. As the children are not used to playing with toys (they don't have them at home and can't afford them), we had great fun driving the cars around on the carpet and floor and when I showed them that the garage had a moving lift, they were very impressed. Then followed a race, from the door to the carpet where they all ran along with their cars. We tried a push race after that but they preferred to move along with the car to make it go faster.

 During this, the classroom was invaded by the Grade 3/4 class to conduct scientific measurements on bone growth - all very interesting and fun - they didn't want to stop for break time!!

After this we headed back to the grade school and I sorted out more resources for the teachers and children. We all walked home for lunch after sorting out some food for those children who forgot it was not half day today (Friday's is usually teacher training day) and transport/help for a little boy who had not got lunch, did not have breakfast and who walked to school alone as his mum is very sick and his dad took her to the clinic in the night and left him alone (I estimate him to be about 5 or 6 years old and the furthest the bus went was only halfway to his house). This afternoon I did some resource work on the computer until the power and Internet went down. Then went off to see Stephanie and the children for dinner and a spot of Noddy, Saturday lie in tomorrow - yippee!

 
THINGS I LEARNT TODAY:
Most people in Ethiopia don't celebrate birthdays or even know when they were born or how old they are and since no-one goes to school at a set age, you can't even work it out like that!
As well as the Ethiopian calender being different, so are their day times. Most people rise with the sun at 6am so each hour is called one after that e.g. 7am would be 1 o'clock - one hour after sunrise. So we finish school at 3.30pm or 9.30p.m. depending on who is saying the time!

Ethiopia Seventh day - 03/10/13 otherwise known as 23/01/2006 in Ethiopia!

Too tired to blog much today, it was jam packed. After breakfast headed over to the grade school to give out water on the street to show everyone the school has clean water (you can't drink the tap water here).

After this I helped out with some reading, maths in grade four and three, then taught a basic computer lesson to grade four. Soon it was off to lunch - twenty minutes walk back in the midday sun along the busy dusty road. After that I headed to the other school to enjoy the company of the nursery and KG students, who were all sleeping when I arrived. They soon woke up when I got my camera out though!

We did a bit of number line maths in the KG class and then it was home time! So I set off for the guest house and had a relaxing shower before nipping down to Stephanie and Dawit's house to watch Shrek the Third with the children.
THINGS I LEARNT TODAY:
Children of any age can enter any class in Ethiopia (for example a ten year old in first grade), but if they are between 16-18, they tend to go to night class.
Pretty much anyone will stop for free, clean water!

Ethiopia Sixth day - 02/10/13 otherwise known as 22/01/2006 in Ethiopia!

Today I woke up and began to get myself ready for the day when the power went out. Never mind, washing and brushing teeth by torchlight is always fun! Injera and something for breakfast, washed down with nice hot black tea boiled on the gas cooker of course.

We walked to the grade school and I began the day doing circle time activities with grade 3. Lots of fun, I think they have the children with the most English in that class. My mission today was to sort out the library a little to make it easier to gather resources in the morning. The ministry did a spot check and many rooms had to be swapped around so the resources are in a bit of disarray. Afterwards I went over to Grade 1 to help out with their maths lesson - simple addition, again lots of fun, they love getting red ticks from me! Shortly after this it began to rain and did not stop until lunch time which meant that the playground was one big muddy puddle - not that it stopped the children playing - I watch a little girl splash right from one end of the playground to the other and then stamp off the wet (her feet must have been soaking), I suppose there is nothing better than a muddy puddle! We didn't go home for lunch and so I enjoyed my date jam sandwich and went into the Eating Room to see what the children were having. I was very surprised to see lots of pasta being consumed and of course... injera!

I dipped in on grade two this afternoon and helped out with a lesson on number ordering, they were very good at it - especially when I started writing excellent on their work and the teacher got the stickers out! After school there was a tiny chick at the bottom of the tree in the playground so we all spent some time watching it and discussing it's fate.
Me and the children went back to KG on the school service and then I walked them home, after which I ducked into the guest house to have a shower and unfortunately again the power went out, so it was cold :-( I went down for a lovely dinner of rice, pasta and sauce with a fork!!! and ate so much that my belly hurts.

THINGS I LEARNT TODAY:
Rain does NOT stop play in Africa
There are a few nasty spiders here I should look out for and kill if I see.

Ethiopia Fifth day - 01/10/13 otherwise known as 21/01/2006 in Ethiopia!

Last night was a bit noisy as my next door neighbours seemed to have a bit of a get together - odd for a Tuesday! I awoke to a power cut and opened the door to light rain as I headed off to Stephanie and Dawit's for my habitual morning cup of tea and a bit of date jam on bread.
We all headed to the KG school to set up the water cooler and give out some freebies on the street outside school as the children arrived. I was on a mission today to get the specs. of all the old computers so that I can make them the best that they can be, so, I hopped on the school service bus with the children to the Grade 1-4 School and headed in to get techy! As there was no power, I looked in on all the classes and did a few circle-time activities with grade four as well as quizzing grade three on their knowledge of colours in English - turns out they have never heard of purple!
After snack time (10.30am), the power was back on so I went ahead and played with the PC's. Then after lunch at home with the family, I stayed to do some resource work on  my laptop, after which we all walked back to school to get some sorting out done. Shortly after dinner, the power went out for almost an hour so I walked back to the guest house (with Dawit escort) and headed off to bed.

THINGS I LEARNT TODAY:
It's great being in a guest house with TV, hot water heater, internet and lights - when there is power!
When the temperature changes from 30 degrees to 25 degrees here, it feels like a cold day!