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A visit to our campsite by Izzy the volunteer prompted our small group of overlanders to trek down to the Little Angels School for Needy Children and Orphans. A visit to a facility like this is considered to be a rite of passage for many first-timers to Africa, and for me at least was an opportunity to see how the schooling process differed between Australia and Uganda.
Little Angels was built and opened by a local named Duncan who had international sponsors willing to finance the school's development. Now servicing financially impoverished children from all over the region, the school is completely free and offers a daily lunch for the children (invariably the first and sometimes only meal the children get each day). This is likely to be the main reason attendance is consistently high in comparison to others in the country. Ages of the children vary from toddlers to 12 or 13 years old (very difficult to accurately track) and students are grouped loosely on developmental level - students only move up a year level when they pass the standardised national exams (equivalent of NAPLAN in Australia). The classrooms are sparse and resources are almost non-existent. A typical room will have a blackboard and some chalk, bench seats and desks, and a couple of worn numbers posters on the board. The floors are packed earth and the students rarely have paper, booklets, pens, pencils or anything along those lines. Instruction is old-school imperial system and incorporates huge amounts of singing and music: from celebration songs when a student answers correctly ("You're so good and precious") to rhymes when responding ("I can spell the word visitor: V I S...").
We were taken by surprise upon arrival when we walked past the window of each classroom and was blasted by 20-odd voices singing at the top of their lungs and welcoming us to their school. It happened again during free-time outside: a singing and dancing congregation would not be complete without dragging the mzungu (white people) into the middle of the circle for some choreographed dances.
Finally we had some down time to meet the children and get to know them a little better. Mostly this meant the girls were forcefully entered into an impromptu hairdressing studio for some plaiting practice and the guys became swings - I'm sure at one point I had 5 or 6 children on each arm inspecting my Garmin watch and LifeStraw water bottle with equal fervor. I got chatting to Pius, who wanted to know about my home life and introduced me to his little brother. He told me how he travels to and from school each day on a boat and how he spends his afternoons cooking dinner for the family - his favourites: green vegetables, rice and meat! On special occasions he sometimes even has all three in the one meal! How fortunate.
I checked in on Sjane to find her hair an utter mess. Half a dozen children had all imposed their own unique wills on her reddish locks - resulting in a bird's nest with an occasional tight plait thrown in for variety. We of course took some photos for the Bad Hair Day album.
Before leaving we discussed sponsorship and donation options and what they are used for. Sponsorship goes toward an individual child and is used to fund their education for a full school year (usually). Donations can be used to develop the school environment, to pay for lunches or sometimes to buy a mattress or the like for the most needy children's homes. Further information about the school and financial support options (if that interests you) can be found at http://www.littleangelsuganda.org/ .
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alison sparke Wow ! What an eye opener day you've had !! Might consider a donation one day soon