EXTRACTS FROM A VOLUNTEER'S DIARY - 16th Feb 2012

Thursday 16 February 2012
Having gained an understanding of local food customs and realising that we would be invited to eat many times during the day, we had convinced Sainey that we did not require a huge breakfast.  We requested simply bread with peanut butter which she delivered to our door along with a large round tupperware pot filled with weak coffee with lots of condensed milk.  

This was the day when we were to observe some of the teachers at work.  Mr Mahmoud arranged for the Deputy Head, Mr Bah, to take us into each of the classrooms in turn to get an impression of a typical day in a Gambian Lower Basic School.

We saw the youngest classes chanting Jolly Phonics, a lesson on hygiene precautions to avoid diarrhoea, a class learning about how Gambia is governed, maths classes etc.  

The lessons were teacher-led with little input from the students and often involved the children copying questions or maths problems from the board and working alone to answer them.  We were surprised to see the teachers did not check on the children's understanding or progress while they were working, and the teachers seemed a little taken aback to see us sitting with the children at their tables, prompting them and questioning their knowledge.

After morning break we spent more time teaching maths and English before a lunch of cassava and fried onions with rice.  The cassava was my request, having seen it served in the school kitchen before - it was delicious and probably my favourite Gambian food.
                                           

Isatu brews ata - Gambian tea

Mr Bah invited us to visit his home after lunch - he lived only a couple of minutes walk from the school.  At his compound, we met his wife Isatu who made us ata - Gambian tea - brewed in a tiny metal teapot on a small charcoal stove.  We sat together outside his house while she brewed the leaves three times, the tea poured into a small glass from a height, then from glass to glass to dissolve the sugar and create a foamy head.  Tradition dictates it should be slurped noisily! 

Isatu brought her husband's dinner outside - rice and fish - which we were once again invited to share.  The local fish comes from the river rather than the sea and has lots of tiny bones which the Gambian's are expert at separating from the flesh!  The flavour was much stronger than we were used to.  

Mr Bah in his compound with his wife Isatu and two of their four children

I joined Isatu and the children, shelling peanuts until Mr Bah offered to show us round the compound.  He had lots of cassava plants, plus tomatoes and other foods I didn't recognise.  

 His house was quite typical of the 
local style with mud brick walls and a roof thatched with palm fronds.  He explained that such a roof needs replacing each year after the rains.  The house had a separate building for the kitchen and a toilet surrounded by a fence of reeds.  Within the compound stood the walls of a new house he had begun building six years before.  More concrete bricks stood waiting to be used and Mr Bah explained that he was saving up to buy the expensive corrugated metal roof panels before the house could be completed.

As we left his home, Mr Bah presented us with a carved wooden owl as a gift.  We felt embarrassed that we had nothing to give in return, although we had come to realise that the plastic bottles containing our water supplies were highly valued in the village, and made a mental note to save some for Mr Bah.  

That evening, Mr Mahmoud took us on a walk around Pakau.  It is considered good manners to pay visits to the important figures in the village at their homes.  We paid our respects to many of the people who had come to welcome us when we arrived at the school.  We called to see the Alkalo, who was not the same man we had met at school but his elderly father, now blinded by cataracts.  It was explained that he was still officially the Alkalo (chief), although his son carried out the duties of the office.   

The elderly Alkalo at home

Despite the dark, the village was buzzing with many people sitting outside, making ata on small stoves or wood fires, or simply sitting, eating and chatting with their neighbours.  The village shop was open too - a real Aladdin's cave containing everything from bread to scissors to batteries.

Returning to school around 9.30, Mr Mahmoud and I sat outside together and talked about schools and teaching, with me trying to answer his many questions.