Mairowa visit

This week, the staff at LOOCIP and myself travelled to the village of Mairowa to check-in on the HIV/AIDS Program that LOOCIP runs in the area.

As usual this meant a good amount of time driving in the Land cruiser.

While I do sometimes get the odd headache while bouncing down the worn-out paths that pass for roads, it never ceases to amaze me how much wildlife there is in Tanzania. We weren’t even in a National park and yet we saw giraffe, zebra, impala, ostrich, and many other types of antelope and gazelle. In fact, we even saw a poisonous snake on this trip. (I probably shouldn’t say that, because my mother will read this.)

During our visit to Mairowa, one of my colleagues and I went to visit Sinonik Primary School. One of the projects that Sauti Moja, (a Canadian charitable organization and my volunteer agency) funds is the HIV/AIDS education program at this school.

Our main goal while we were at the school was to interview the students and find out about their experience with the HIV/AIDS education program. We wanted to determine what was effective and what we could improve upon because we are about to implement this program in another village.

We entered a classroom with a group of students and my colleague began to ask the students our prepared questions in Swahili. Then he translated what they said into English so that I could transcribe the data.

As I waited for the students to respond to the questions they were asked, I couldn’t help but notice the classroom. I had never seen a classroom like that before. With small wooden desks, a dirt floor, and a single chalkboard at the front of the room, it is a dark contrast to the colourful poster-filled walls found in a Canadian classroom. And the amazing thing is that this is one of Sinonik Primary Schools’ nicer classrooms.

Some of the other classrooms don’t even have a roof and children are forced to sit in the hot sun, or rain. There are three teachers at this school and one spoke fairly good English. He told me that because this school is in such a rural area of Tanzania, very few teachers are willing to come and teach there. As a result, classes are mixed with students from 2-3 grades. Likewise, because the region is so rural, the government is not as inclined to provide the necessary construction to fit the classrooms with roofs.

Growing up, I remember watching the World Vision commercials and seeing children in impoverished places, but I never really thought it was as bad as they made it out to sound. Being in such rural places as Mairowa and seeing real poverty is an eye-opening experience. It can be really difficult at times, because I wish I could do so much more!