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Week 4
Jambo!
As the forth week was to be our last we decided to spend as much time as we could at the school. As a result, as well as teaching we stayed after school most days and played with the boys. We even stayed until bed-time one night and watched the lion king with them! - So good! And set in Kenya so very fitting!! Hakuna Matata! Towards the end of the week we all started to feel aware that we would be leaving soon, I think the boys started to feel it too because I had the worst day ever with my class on the Wednesday and Kieran had an even worse one on the Thursday! On the Friday we were all very sad, I even cried in the morning! My class all wrote me individual letters saying good-bye and that they would never forget me and that they hoped I would come back to see them soon! I gave them a picture of us all that they backed and decorated and then stuck on the wall.
Kieran's class also all wrote him little sorry notes for their behaviour the previous day, which he was very grateful for. As we were leaving Mombasa that evening we could only stay for a short while after school to say our good-byes. We were all very upset to be going and a few of the boys were evidently very sad as well, which was hard to see because although its nice that they love you too, and your happy that you made a difference to them, you don't want your leaving to feel like another abandonment to them, because the more they feel this the harder it will be for them later in life to let people get close.
Before going to Kenya, Anna and I had discussed how sad it was going to be to leave the boys to whom we were inevitably going to grow very close, but we were not prepared for how much harder it would be because of the worry and concern we felt for the boys futures. Although many of the boys will complete their education at Grandsons and have a successful future, a significant amount of boys run away back to the streets every year, some come back and some don't and some fail their exams and then leave with nothing. You just feel so helpless to be leaving and you can only hope that all of the boys, but especially the ones that you have grown particularly close to, will stick it out and be some of the successes.
All in all Kenya really was a life changing experience for both of us, but particularly for Kieran. From his four weeks in standard 1, he found out he has a level of patience and persistence that neither of us thought was possible! :) and an evident talent for teaching - after lots of complements for his handling of the most difficult class he is even thinking he might consider a career change!
Kwaheri! xx
- comments
Annie A very moving account of your time with the boys.... such interesting reading. Thank you both.