Here I am with two of the Form 4 students, Malek and Dut. Based on their character and academic excellence, they were chosen to give the farewell address and I worked with them on writing it. I am so proud of them!
Wow! So suddenly I find myself back in Kenya... Marial Bai? It is again worlds away, a seemingly figment of my imagination that has a strong hold on my mind and heart... Allow me to reminisce one last time on my experiences there... (Of course, the pictures I've uploaded on the "Photos" page have some of their own stories to tell...)
First I will tell you about "Halloween." It wasn't Oct 31st, but at some point in November I finally made a point of buying a pumpkin in the market ($1) in order to demonstrate to the staff and students exactly what it is that we do with them. The teachers watched the process from the beginning- cutting the top off, scooping out the gunk and seeds, designing a face on one side and carefully carving out each piece. They shook their heads in amazement explaining how, in their homes, they would have been scolded for playing with their food. (Here not only is the pumpkin eaten but also the pumpkin leaves). I had fun describing the face with my Dinka vocabulary- a head with two eyes, no nose and one mouth that was laughing a lot ("dal apei"). The highlight, of course, was after sunset when I stuck my headlamp inside the pumpkin to light it up... voila! Jack-o-lantern! I toured the school and everyone was intrigued... and asking if I could leave it behind for them to eat.
Yes, the pumpkins here can be sweet and I learned from the villagers that they taste delicious with sesame paste. I was blessed more than one weekend visiting the locals and getting treated to this. The staple food throughout November continued to be fish. Two popular dishes, "madesha" and "sumak" are made from dried, salted, fermented fish which produces a very pungent smell. I never did acquire a taste for it and had to position myself correctly in the wind while the local staff devoured it. I did try another traditional dish, "upulo," which is made from fermented sesame paste. Although I could stomach it better than the fish, I wasn't disappointed that it was only cooked once. As well as food preservation, I'm certain that all of these fermented foods are an important health component to the South Sudanese diet, but I just stuck to my probiotic vitamins and, every once in a while, enjoyed some sour milk.
If you're tired of my snake stories, I apologize in advance, but this one takes the cake. I had just gone to bed and was going through my regular routine of deciphering all of the night-noises- the drum (gathering of youth to dance and socialize), dogs barking, maybe a hyena howling, frogs banging against my door, lizards crawling on the window screens, mice scurrying overhead, an occasional palm fruit falling to the ground next to my tukul, the annoying mosquito buzz. Then I heard something a little different. I sat up in my bed, and shone my flashlight in the direction of the noise but couldn't see anything. So, I got out of bed to explore. To my shock, I discovered a black snake sticking at least a foot out of a hole in the wall of my room next to my desk. No way! I got dressed and ran to fetch the watchman to come and kill it. The watchman was at the school and so as I stood banging on the metal wall of their shelter, I woke up the policeman instead. He got a "jaray" (kind of like a spade) and came to my room. Of course, the snake had disappeared. I jumped up on my metal trunk and we searched every corner of the room looking for it. I apologized and he went back to bed. I stuck a couple of pieces of metal to block the hole and anxiously climbed back into bed inside the mosquito net and deep into the covers (no matter how hot that was going to make me). Two hours later when I had finally managed to drift off, I heard a noise again. I sat up and shone the light back at the hole... nothing. I had to explore again. Sure enough, two feet away from the first hole, there was another hole right behind my desk and the black snake was sticking out of it by 4 inches. I didn't want to appear crazy, so this time I decided to grab my camera and take a picture as my witness before running to get the policeman. By the time I turned around with the camera set to go, the snake was gone. What could I do? I put a glass jar in front of the hole so that if the snake came out again, it would knock the jar and make a noise. Then I sat in the middle of my bed and called my friend in Canada... "There's a black snake hiding in the wall of my room..." Needless to say, I didn't sleep much the rest of the night. The snake did knock the glass jar at one point, but I gave up and stayed huddled in my bed waiting for the morning to come. The Kenyan teacher graciously helped me fill the holes with cement the next afternoon, and to my knowledge, I didn't have any problems with snakes again. Honestly, the worst part of the whole experience was realizing that at least one of the times that I was staring down at the snake, it was staring back at me. I thought both times that I was looking at its tail, but it can't crawl backwards and there's no way it could have turned itself around inside the wall...
“Marial Bai”... it became my answer to all the unexpected events of life while I was there. I'm laughing right now as I remember a set of lab demonstrations I did for my students including one which was supposed to turn a green leaf blue/black to confirm the presence of starch in it. I had both classes together in the dining hall- 84 students staring intently at my every move. This particular demo required heat and it was taking longer than normal because I was relying on burning coal and I probably should have gathered more. It failed the first time and so I tried it again and to my dismay, it failed again. Of course there's always someone who wants to know why and so I responded, “Marial Bai.” The best part was that only a few of the students got the joke and they leaned over and explained it to their friends in Dinka so that the laughter slowly spread in pockets across the room. Yes, I will miss these students.
There wasn't much time for fun and games in November. Everyone was in exam mode. We made a point this term to type and print all of the exams... 27 different exams for 174 students (the grade 12 students were not included and we lost some others due to lack of funds for the feeding program). As the computer "expert" on campus, I edited and formatted all of them to try to take up as little space as possible. We had two printers with one set of ink cartridges for each which we had to make last since we didn't have a budget for more ink or for printing elsewhere. It took over 10 hours and four trips to the market to get it done. If you can imagine, we made use of the generator that runs the "movie theatre” in town- a grass hut with two, large-screen TVs and a set of speakers. We lugged the printer to the front of the “theatre” next to the plug-ins to get everything set up. It was loud, smoky, stuffy, dark and some of the programs that were being shown were definitely not up my alley. But it was worth it. With the exams printed, the students did not have to depend on the blackboards which enabled us to space them out more which helped eliminate the “wandering eyes” and skewed results. The students had some other tricks up their sleeves (literally), but we took the time to inspect every student and I'm satisfied to say that I believe their results on my exams truly reflect their understanding of the material. Whether or not they will pass depends on the overall average of their top 8 classes including math and English. The female students continue to struggle the most although I am happy to say that there were at least two Form 1 students who finished above average in their classes. I would definitely be willing to come back in three years to see them graduate- I pray they make it.
When the exam week was finished (Th - Wed), the very next day we had our Form 4 (grade 12) farewell celebration. For the boarding students who lived far away, waiting one more day was too long and most left immediately following their last exam. The celebration was kicked off by a team of traditional Dinka dancers. Costumed mostly in black and white with brightly coloured hats, socks and beads, they sang and danced in a circle surrounding a drum and some kind of horn. They also had noise-makers on their ankles, some of these made from empty tomato sauce cans! Following the dancing, we moved into the dining hall for speeches and other dance performances by nearby primary schools. The first few speeches including the farewell address by one of the graduates were done in English. But as the time passed, more and more community members filled and surrounded the dining hall so that the majority present only understood Dinka and the language of address switched. I didn't understand what was said, but the Form 4 students told me later that the words of the presenters were humorous, wise and supportive. It was interesting to me to note that none of the presenters themselves had ever had an opportunity to finish high school- this graduation truly was a remarkable achievement.
A party isn't a party without food and music. Three goats were slaughtered and enjoyed by all. Just like Independence Day, after the meal we transformed the teacher's compound into a dance floor open to the whole community. People danced until the generator ran out of fuel at exactly midnight. The Form 4 students were particularly pleased with the day- Marial Bai Secondary's first farewell party for the first set of grade 12 graduates. I chose this year to go to Marial Bai for this reason and I'm so grateful I could be a part of it all.
It wasn't quite the time for the Form 4 students to say farewell though. In fact, it is me who left them behind. As I write, they are now sitting their national exams. They started last Monday (Dec 3rd) and will go until next Monday (Dec 17th). It is quite a big ordeal. The exams had to be escorted by police from Juba to Marial Bai. They came right at the last minute, the Sunday night before the exams were scheduled to start (African style!). They are stored at the police station and escorted to the school every morning. The school compound was completely blocked off from non-staff members. A policeman/watchman with a gun was positioned at each of the school's main entrances to prevent outsiders from entering. I had to laugh when a group of women complained when they were stopped because they said, “but we're not girls, we're women” thinking they were being kept away from the male students. It was a new experience for the whole community. The students seemed to be handling the pressure well- geography was good, math was tough, CRE- somehow. It could be months before the students get the results. In the meantime, the government has passed a legislation that all Form 4 graduates must serve as primary school teachers in the country for 2 years before being permitted to attend university. I think it's a great idea for capacity building in the country, but it seems like it will put the students in a tough position because they will be neither paid for their work nor given any compensation towards their university costs. How will they be able to save up for university for themselves?
My exit from Marial Bai was timed perfectly. The day before the Form 4 students had a day-off from their exams and so I had one last chance to sit and chat with them all, encouraging them and accepting their appreciation of my commitment to the school. After supper I popped a huge bucket of popcorn in oil over the fire for them to taste as they had never had it before- one last cross-cultural experience which they thoroughly enjoyed.
And then, the next day, 6:30 am we were off to Aweil to catch our flight to Juba. This was the same flight we had missed back in August and we didn't want to make the same mistake twice. Most NGO workers in the state were heading home for Christmas meaning that all the flights were fully booked and there would be no way for us to get on any other plane if we missed this one. Pulling into the airport, we see a crashed plane (F50) to our right. When did that get there? We learn that it crash-landed a few weeks ago; "57 S.Sudanese returnees from the North were on board but none of them were seriously injured." I'm not sure that the last part of the statement made me feel any better.
We arrived at the airport at 8:30 am, enjoyed one last spiced coffee, and waited... and waited... 10:30 am, 11:30 am... we find out that the plane was delayed from Juba and wouldn't arrive until 2 pm. There wasn't much to do but watch the young boys soliciting customers to have their shoes shined, 25 cents a pair. I talked to a few of them and they said they were trying to save money for school. Other students from Marial Bai told me they were going to be fisherman over the holidays to save up money. I also ran into a couple of students in the market in Marial Bai running shops selling basic necessities like soap, tea and sugar to save up some money. I asked them what the best seller was and they said cigarettes. Go figure.
The plane came in close to 2 pm and we took off for Juba around 2:45 pm. While waiting I wasn't thinking about the sun and by the time we boarded the aircraft, my face was badly burned. Because the plane was so late I had to spend a night in Juba before managing to get a flight into Nairobi the next afternoon. It was another long day in one of the most chaotic airports I have every experienced. From 8:30 am until 1:30 pm I was jostled from one line to the next in an overly crowded and stifling hot place. But that's all a part of the journey and I don't regret any bit of it. Marial Bai, this seemingly figment of my imagination, has helped to put me back into touch with reality.
“Do not fret because of evil men or be envious of those who do wrong; for like the grass they will soon wither, like green plants they will soon die away. Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun” (Psalm 37:1-6).
Thank you for joining me along the way!
Most sincerely, Jen
Wow! So suddenly I find myself back in Kenya... Marial Bai? It is again worlds away, a seemingly figment of my imagination that has a strong hold on my mind and heart... Allow me to reminisce one last time on my experiences there... (Of course, the pictures I've uploaded on the "Photos" page have some of their own stories to tell...)
First I will tell you about "Halloween." It wasn't Oct 31st, but at some point in November I finally made a point of buying a pumpkin in the market ($1) in order to demonstrate to the staff and students exactly what it is that we do with them. The teachers watched the process from the beginning- cutting the top off, scooping out the gunk and seeds, designing a face on one side and carefully carving out each piece. They shook their heads in amazement explaining how, in their homes, they would have been scolded for playing with their food. (Here not only is the pumpkin eaten but also the pumpkin leaves). I had fun describing the face with my Dinka vocabulary- a head with two eyes, no nose and one mouth that was laughing a lot ("dal apei"). The highlight, of course, was after sunset when I stuck my headlamp inside the pumpkin to light it up... voila! Jack-o-lantern! I toured the school and everyone was intrigued... and asking if I could leave it behind for them to eat.
Yes, the pumpkins here can be sweet and I learned from the villagers that they taste delicious with sesame paste. I was blessed more than one weekend visiting the locals and getting treated to this. The staple food throughout November continued to be fish. Two popular dishes, "madesha" and "sumak" are made from dried, salted, fermented fish which produces a very pungent smell. I never did acquire a taste for it and had to position myself correctly in the wind while the local staff devoured it. I did try another traditional dish, "upulo," which is made from fermented sesame paste. Although I could stomach it better than the fish, I wasn't disappointed that it was only cooked once. As well as food preservation, I'm certain that all of these fermented foods are an important health component to the South Sudanese diet, but I just stuck to my probiotic vitamins and, every once in a while, enjoyed some sour milk.
If you're tired of my snake stories, I apologize in advance, but this one takes the cake. I had just gone to bed and was going through my regular routine of deciphering all of the night-noises- the drum (gathering of youth to dance and socialize), dogs barking, maybe a hyena howling, frogs banging against my door, lizards crawling on the window screens, mice scurrying overhead, an occasional palm fruit falling to the ground next to my tukul, the annoying mosquito buzz. Then I heard something a little different. I sat up in my bed, and shone my flashlight in the direction of the noise but couldn't see anything. So, I got out of bed to explore. To my shock, I discovered a black snake sticking at least a foot out of a hole in the wall of my room next to my desk. No way! I got dressed and ran to fetch the watchman to come and kill it. The watchman was at the school and so as I stood banging on the metal wall of their shelter, I woke up the policeman instead. He got a "jaray" (kind of like a spade) and came to my room. Of course, the snake had disappeared. I jumped up on my metal trunk and we searched every corner of the room looking for it. I apologized and he went back to bed. I stuck a couple of pieces of metal to block the hole and anxiously climbed back into bed inside the mosquito net and deep into the covers (no matter how hot that was going to make me). Two hours later when I had finally managed to drift off, I heard a noise again. I sat up and shone the light back at the hole... nothing. I had to explore again. Sure enough, two feet away from the first hole, there was another hole right behind my desk and the black snake was sticking out of it by 4 inches. I didn't want to appear crazy, so this time I decided to grab my camera and take a picture as my witness before running to get the policeman. By the time I turned around with the camera set to go, the snake was gone. What could I do? I put a glass jar in front of the hole so that if the snake came out again, it would knock the jar and make a noise. Then I sat in the middle of my bed and called my friend in Canada... "There's a black snake hiding in the wall of my room..." Needless to say, I didn't sleep much the rest of the night. The snake did knock the glass jar at one point, but I gave up and stayed huddled in my bed waiting for the morning to come. The Kenyan teacher graciously helped me fill the holes with cement the next afternoon, and to my knowledge, I didn't have any problems with snakes again. Honestly, the worst part of the whole experience was realizing that at least one of the times that I was staring down at the snake, it was staring back at me. I thought both times that I was looking at its tail, but it can't crawl backwards and there's no way it could have turned itself around inside the wall...
“Marial Bai”... it became my answer to all the unexpected events of life while I was there. I'm laughing right now as I remember a set of lab demonstrations I did for my students including one which was supposed to turn a green leaf blue/black to confirm the presence of starch in it. I had both classes together in the dining hall- 84 students staring intently at my every move. This particular demo required heat and it was taking longer than normal because I was relying on burning coal and I probably should have gathered more. It failed the first time and so I tried it again and to my dismay, it failed again. Of course there's always someone who wants to know why and so I responded, “Marial Bai.” The best part was that only a few of the students got the joke and they leaned over and explained it to their friends in Dinka so that the laughter slowly spread in pockets across the room. Yes, I will miss these students.
There wasn't much time for fun and games in November. Everyone was in exam mode. We made a point this term to type and print all of the exams... 27 different exams for 174 students (the grade 12 students were not included and we lost some others due to lack of funds for the feeding program). As the computer "expert" on campus, I edited and formatted all of them to try to take up as little space as possible. We had two printers with one set of ink cartridges for each which we had to make last since we didn't have a budget for more ink or for printing elsewhere. It took over 10 hours and four trips to the market to get it done. If you can imagine, we made use of the generator that runs the "movie theatre” in town- a grass hut with two, large-screen TVs and a set of speakers. We lugged the printer to the front of the “theatre” next to the plug-ins to get everything set up. It was loud, smoky, stuffy, dark and some of the programs that were being shown were definitely not up my alley. But it was worth it. With the exams printed, the students did not have to depend on the blackboards which enabled us to space them out more which helped eliminate the “wandering eyes” and skewed results. The students had some other tricks up their sleeves (literally), but we took the time to inspect every student and I'm satisfied to say that I believe their results on my exams truly reflect their understanding of the material. Whether or not they will pass depends on the overall average of their top 8 classes including math and English. The female students continue to struggle the most although I am happy to say that there were at least two Form 1 students who finished above average in their classes. I would definitely be willing to come back in three years to see them graduate- I pray they make it.
When the exam week was finished (Th - Wed), the very next day we had our Form 4 (grade 12) farewell celebration. For the boarding students who lived far away, waiting one more day was too long and most left immediately following their last exam. The celebration was kicked off by a team of traditional Dinka dancers. Costumed mostly in black and white with brightly coloured hats, socks and beads, they sang and danced in a circle surrounding a drum and some kind of horn. They also had noise-makers on their ankles, some of these made from empty tomato sauce cans! Following the dancing, we moved into the dining hall for speeches and other dance performances by nearby primary schools. The first few speeches including the farewell address by one of the graduates were done in English. But as the time passed, more and more community members filled and surrounded the dining hall so that the majority present only understood Dinka and the language of address switched. I didn't understand what was said, but the Form 4 students told me later that the words of the presenters were humorous, wise and supportive. It was interesting to me to note that none of the presenters themselves had ever had an opportunity to finish high school- this graduation truly was a remarkable achievement.
A party isn't a party without food and music. Three goats were slaughtered and enjoyed by all. Just like Independence Day, after the meal we transformed the teacher's compound into a dance floor open to the whole community. People danced until the generator ran out of fuel at exactly midnight. The Form 4 students were particularly pleased with the day- Marial Bai Secondary's first farewell party for the first set of grade 12 graduates. I chose this year to go to Marial Bai for this reason and I'm so grateful I could be a part of it all.
It wasn't quite the time for the Form 4 students to say farewell though. In fact, it is me who left them behind. As I write, they are now sitting their national exams. They started last Monday (Dec 3rd) and will go until next Monday (Dec 17th). It is quite a big ordeal. The exams had to be escorted by police from Juba to Marial Bai. They came right at the last minute, the Sunday night before the exams were scheduled to start (African style!). They are stored at the police station and escorted to the school every morning. The school compound was completely blocked off from non-staff members. A policeman/watchman with a gun was positioned at each of the school's main entrances to prevent outsiders from entering. I had to laugh when a group of women complained when they were stopped because they said, “but we're not girls, we're women” thinking they were being kept away from the male students. It was a new experience for the whole community. The students seemed to be handling the pressure well- geography was good, math was tough, CRE- somehow. It could be months before the students get the results. In the meantime, the government has passed a legislation that all Form 4 graduates must serve as primary school teachers in the country for 2 years before being permitted to attend university. I think it's a great idea for capacity building in the country, but it seems like it will put the students in a tough position because they will be neither paid for their work nor given any compensation towards their university costs. How will they be able to save up for university for themselves?
My exit from Marial Bai was timed perfectly. The day before the Form 4 students had a day-off from their exams and so I had one last chance to sit and chat with them all, encouraging them and accepting their appreciation of my commitment to the school. After supper I popped a huge bucket of popcorn in oil over the fire for them to taste as they had never had it before- one last cross-cultural experience which they thoroughly enjoyed.
And then, the next day, 6:30 am we were off to Aweil to catch our flight to Juba. This was the same flight we had missed back in August and we didn't want to make the same mistake twice. Most NGO workers in the state were heading home for Christmas meaning that all the flights were fully booked and there would be no way for us to get on any other plane if we missed this one. Pulling into the airport, we see a crashed plane (F50) to our right. When did that get there? We learn that it crash-landed a few weeks ago; "57 S.Sudanese returnees from the North were on board but none of them were seriously injured." I'm not sure that the last part of the statement made me feel any better.
We arrived at the airport at 8:30 am, enjoyed one last spiced coffee, and waited... and waited... 10:30 am, 11:30 am... we find out that the plane was delayed from Juba and wouldn't arrive until 2 pm. There wasn't much to do but watch the young boys soliciting customers to have their shoes shined, 25 cents a pair. I talked to a few of them and they said they were trying to save money for school. Other students from Marial Bai told me they were going to be fisherman over the holidays to save up money. I also ran into a couple of students in the market in Marial Bai running shops selling basic necessities like soap, tea and sugar to save up some money. I asked them what the best seller was and they said cigarettes. Go figure.
The plane came in close to 2 pm and we took off for Juba around 2:45 pm. While waiting I wasn't thinking about the sun and by the time we boarded the aircraft, my face was badly burned. Because the plane was so late I had to spend a night in Juba before managing to get a flight into Nairobi the next afternoon. It was another long day in one of the most chaotic airports I have every experienced. From 8:30 am until 1:30 pm I was jostled from one line to the next in an overly crowded and stifling hot place. But that's all a part of the journey and I don't regret any bit of it. Marial Bai, this seemingly figment of my imagination, has helped to put me back into touch with reality.
“Do not fret because of evil men or be envious of those who do wrong; for like the grass they will soon wither, like green plants they will soon die away. Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun” (Psalm 37:1-6).
Thank you for joining me along the way!
Most sincerely, Jen