We left Zanzibar for Kilimanjaro. It goes without saying that Kilimanjaro, which is highest mountain in Africa and 4th highest mountain in the world, is one of the main attractions in this region along with Safari. This is why there are so many tourist staying in Moshi and Arusha. Since these cities are positioned very high it gets very cold in the morning and it is very dry as well. This is in stark contrast to the climate in Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam where it is very humid and very hot.
On the first day, on arriving at the Kilimanjaro airport, we went to Mwika, a small town in the region, which is 2 hours drive from the airport. James, the guy who organized this trip, is based in this town, and his project for education is also based in Mwika.
On the first evening, we stayed at hostel that is run by local Christian community. Many of the local people belong to this community. Initially this community was established thanks to the contribution from German church. Since the electricity (outage?) takes place in the region frequently, it is common for each household has private electric generator, and this building was equipped with solar electric generator.
Having had a rest in the hostel, we headed for the 'mama’s place'. In Tanzania, ladies are affectionately called mama. We were invited by mamas to the dinner at their place. They served a wide range of Tanzanian local dieses including baked banana, roasted beans, and boiled pork. Also they served internationally famous Kilimajaro Coffee and this was pretty good. These ‘mama’ s produce custom-made Tanzanian traditional clothes which are made of textile like Boutique and Kanga. These clothes are designed for those who live in perpetual summer country like Tanzania, so it is very comfortable even under very humid and hot weather. Climate in Dar es Salaarm is quite similar to that of Tokyo in summer, so might actually be very suitable for Japanese people. While pattern of some cloths are elaborated, others are quite simple, so you can wear this clothes even after you go back from Africa. What differentiates this organization from others is that they engage in project to take care of orphans in that region. The profit they earn by selling their products is used for these orphans. They use the minimum amount of profits to sustain their life while the rest of profits is spent on the project. We found so many NPO project or social enterprise whose main purpose is to use the money they earned through business for charity in Tanzania. There were many entrepreneurs took up initiatives for these projects to address the problems they face in their community.
Having had a good dinner time, we visited a guy who is in charge of students union of the local University. He and his wife studied education at the university and we talked about situation of education in Tanzania with them. Here are brief summary of our dialog.
・ Jobs in the field of medicine and education are regarded as more promising in Tanzania where there is no major industry. Government subsidizes those who study medicine or education and according to their academic results, students get scholarship.
・ Since a few years ago, government made primary education free. (It is highly criticized because practically students need to pay for other stuff like school uniform) After that ratio of students to teachers increased so rapidly that there are not enough number of teachers in the school. Also, resources for education are limited to allow every student to use sufficiently. Internet is not available in the school either, so students don’t have sufficient access to the materials.
・ Although the use of the Internet is expanding genarally, it is not employed for the purpose of education. There are two main reasons. First of all, the cost of the Internet is still expensive though it is not unaffordable. Secondly, students need to acquire the literacy for the Internet.
・ In Tanzania, it is still difficult to go to graduate school. Generally students have to turn to loan to finance education fee for undergraduate level ($1000). Only after clearing off student loans, can they arrange new students loan for graduate school. Therefore, if one wants to go to graduate school, they have to work for several years before they apply for graduate school. Since this guy and his wife are fortunately both teachers, either of them can go to grad school while the other are working as a teacher.
Having talked for a couple of hours with guys we went back to our hostel to prepare for safari trip from following days.
After the trip to safari, we came back to Mwika. We stayed James’ s place this time. Along with his family, they live together with his relatives. It seems common for locals to have live together with relatives as a big family. We met his father, uncle, wife, child and his cousins. Speaking of his uncle, he used to be an engineer at Philips, the globally famous electronics company, in Nairobi, and he knows a wide range of things, so we talked about various topics including economy politics and other stuff. At night we discussed James’s education project. He is now running non-profit vocational school for local children who dropped out from the school mainly due to financial reasons. This vocational school serves as a good opportunity where students can learn practical skills that will be required to get the jobs or going to other school. In his school, he teaches carpentry, needlecraft and so on. There are other vocational schools where students acquire computer skills and English to prepare for the next school or getting jobs. Plus, he is now planning to launch a new kindergarten for pre-primary school children to prepare for coming primary education. This aims to educate children before they enter the primary school so as not to drop out from the school.
Basically, these are non-profit projects, which are mainly financed by charity organization in foreign countries. In the case of James, the church in the USA financed his project. They made contract 3 years ago that church would financially help his plan for five years. We, JEAN, are planning to help through advertising his project to those who are potentially able to finance his project.
The next day, we actually visited his vocational school. These girls are learning needlecraft at his vocational school. They welcomed us and they sang a song for us.
These are boys who are learning carpentry at his vocational school. The guy who is wearing red shirts is James.
In other vocational school, some students are learning typing skills, how to use MS words, PowerPoint and excel. Some were using typewriter because sometimes they can’t use computer because of the lack of the electricity.
Likewise, in rural areas there were quite a few projects that aimed at helping children to acquire practical skills that are needed to get job and go to the next level. Although these projects are mainly aided by charity groups from overseas, they did not have enough access to these charity organization. To address the lack of means of communication, we will launch the website in which we can offer information about the project and expand the ideas.
This is the cloth made by mamas in Muwika. This is made of Butique.
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