Kencada and Anka's Birthday

I am pretty sure it is Wednesday today. When last I left you it was Sunday night and it had been raining all day.  We had hoped to go to Jipe Moyo on Monday but the rain was so heavy on Sunday we were worried the roads would be too difficult so we postposed to Tuesday.  So instead we went to Kencada on Monday morning.

As those of you who read my first post will remember, Kencada Academy is the second school that Anke started.  Once she got Jipe Moyo up and running, she realized there was a need in Mombasa proper for a school run on Kenyan curriculum but taught with Canadian/Montessori principles.  So she started a school for the first four grades.  It started last year and is just finishing up their first academic year this month.  This year she had about 35 students with at least 15 more signed up for the new school year in January. So, it is already getting a good reputation and building quickly. 

One of the benefits to Kencada is that a sponsor donated a school bus last year.  The bus means that Kencada can attract children who live further away.  Morris, the bus driver, starts his day by picking up the first kid at 6:30am and continues on until he drops off the bus full for 8am start.  I mention that bus because A. it is great for the school and B. because that is how we got to school on Monday morning. 

Kencada

The Kencada Schoolbus.  It is small so Anke is already wondering how to get a second one
because they now have too many kids to fit.

Once he drops off the kids, Morris stays around so he can run errands for the school.  He can also come and pick up Anke when she needs a ride.  Apparently this more than balances out when her car is not in the shop because they also use her car as a ‘second bus’ so that Hemed can pick up some of the kids too. 

We had planned to get to school around 9:30 but Monday was Anke’s birthday so she had lots of phone calls from Canada and Europe wishing her a Happy Birthday.  Morris picked us up and we arrived by 10:30.  My first introduction was to Miles, a little boy who greets everyone at the door with a hug, he will get up from any lesson or activity to hug new comers. 

Miles the hugger

Then I met Lydia who is a parent and runs the office.  She was the recipient of the very heavy laptop I had brought from Canada in my carry on.  She was very grateful.  Then I met Mona the head teacher and a slew of other teachers most of whom I have already lost their names.  Anke gave me a tour while the teachers and kids prepared a ‘surprise’ tea for Anke’s birthday. 

Lydia receiving her laptop from Anke

The playroom

One of the classrooms

The computer lab

The school used to be a big house.  The rooms have all been converted to classrooms.  It is indoor bathrooms and a little kitchen where the kids lunches are prepared each day.  There is a courtyard, a small play area and some storage rooms in a small separate building.  They also have a field down the street that they are raising money to convert to a bigger play area.

Breaking news:  A man just arrived on a motorbike and said he was with the power company and needs to read the meter.  So, I let him in.  As he is looking at the meter, he informs me we are late on our payment and he is here to cut off our power!  Nice deek to get into the house, buddy.  Anyway, I yelled for Alina who called Anke who is at school who called Freddie who called Alina who was instructed to bribe the man to make him go away.  Which she did.  How adorable, Alina’s first bribe.  I wish I had gotten a picture for the family newsletter.  I’m not sure how late our electricity bill is but not very based on Freddie’s reaction.  All’s well that ends well.  The bill will be settled tomorrow.

Back to Kencada.  We came back downstairs after looking at the classrooms to the birthday surprise.  The kids were all assembled in the courtyard and they sang happy birthday and a specially written one about Anke’s mother giving birth (with bonus pantomime!) on this wonderful day.  It was very cute.  And it was hard to get them to stop singing.  They liked that part almost as much as the cake and cookies that followed.

The singing assembly

Anke tries her cake

Hemed

Yay!  Cookies and cake for the kids

Then I visited a class in session for a few minutes and helped deliver lunch.  The kids ate and the little ones had a nap while we sat around the office and listened to business talk.  Then a half an hour later, a teacher, Sophie, told me the kids were ready.  For what?  Their recorder lesson!.  Oh uh.  So, upstairs I went with my bag of recorders to meet the fate I created for myself. 

There were 11 of the older kids. Older being, from what I could tell, five and up.  As predicted by everyone, it was chaos.  I started by handing them each a recorder in its special bag.  I had Sophia and Alina at the ready, and Anke for the first few minutes.  Each child removed his or her recorder.  That went ok.  Then I demonstrated how to hold it.  That is when things went awry. There was a lot of fist holding.  Trying to pry the recorder out of a tiny fist belonging to a small child who thinks you are trying to take his new toy away is surprisingly difficult. 

The one of the left was terrible, the one on the right was one of my stars.

Put your fingers like this.

Once we got everyone with fingers in place, or at least more in place than a fist, we tried blowing.  That was fun.  And noisy.  Too much fun though.  It was hard to make them stop.  Sophia went into full teacher mode.  If anyone didn’t listen to me, she would take their recorder away.  So, I would go around the circle, moving fingers and showing what to do, and then I would come across a kid with a very sad face and no recorder.  He or she (mostly he) was on recorder time out.  At one point, I think only four kids had recorders actually in hand, the rest were in lock down for blowing when they should have been listening. 

I don't think that is the right way to hold it

Yup, the not-star is holding it upside down. 

Once everyone had mastered (hahahahahaha, not!) B, A & G, and they all had their recorders back,  I went around the circle, one at a time to ‘assess’ their progress.  I had three star pupils who understood at least that the finger position was supposed to change.  As we went around the circle, I had one kid blowing into the recorder sideways like a flute.  Many of them had managed to twist the mouthpiece around so they were backwards.  But one, Hemed, son of Mona the head teacher, actually created three distinct noises with his three finger positions.  They weren’t B, A, G, I don’t know what they were but I took it as an accomplishment. Then I played Mary had a Little Lamb while they sang along.

Hemed, my superstar

And just in case you missed how cute is he, here he is looking even cuter (and tinier)

Joe, if you are reading this, I commend you on doing this every day.  You deserve a raise.

After about 20 minutes that seemed like 2 hours, we had all had enough.  I’m not sure if this is true of Canadian kids, but these kids are kind of poker faced.  I could not tell what they were thinking as we played.  They all looked so serious. They all dutifully put their recorders back in their little bags and handed them back to me.  They said ‘thank you’ at Sophia’s command.  Then I asked if they had had fun.  That is when they broke into smiles and said yes.  Alina assured me that they had.  I think they are supposed to be serious when they are ‘in class’.  Anyway, I had fun, they had fun and people think I am good (sorry Joe, I promise I didn’t tell them you had anything to do with my skills) because compared to the kids, I am a virtuoso.

Star pupil happy, not-star sad

As we were getting close to going home, Anke asked Alina and I to find something in one of the store rooms.  We couldn’t find it.  We didn’t want to dig through the bags and boxes because there was some gecko poop around.  A few minutes after we abandoned our search, one of the groundsmen found a snake in the storage area.  They killed it.  Depending on who you asked, it could have killed us instantly or not at all.  The former makes a better story, the latter a bit more comforting for my time in Africa.

Dead snake, killing potential unknown

It was getting late in the day so Morris had to use the bus for the kids so we took Romano’s tuktuk home.  When we got back, we went for a refreshing swim on the beach.  Then got ready for Anke’s birthday dinner at Tamarind Restaurant. 

(oh my.  I have managed to stay up until 10pm.  While writing this, I have taken a dinner break to go to Yul’s with Anke and Alina, researched and booked a hotel room for one of my excursions (details later) so this isn’t going too quickly.  I will resume in the morning…  Next day, it is 7 and I just got up.  I guess I am on Kenya time now. I will try to get this posted before everyone else stirs).

We started our evening on the deck of Tamarind to have a drink and watch the sunset. I had a Dawa which is Vodka, cut limes and a blob of honey served with ice and a stick to mash it all together.  It is so simple, yet delicious.  Why do we not have this in Canada?  We also had some sushi.  I was skeptical but it was good.

Enjoying the sunset and drinks on the deck

Sunset

A Dawa.  

Mombasa across the harbour

Eventually we got a table.  We each had a cup of soup and shared one meal between the three of us, a seared tuna with some sort of sauce.  The tuna was good but the soup was amazing.  Then we finished by sharing the Kenyan version of crepes suzette. 

20 or so minutes after we finished desert, as we were discussing leaving, the waiters arrived with a second ‘birthday’ desert for Anke.  They all sang Happy Birthday.  So we ate that even though we were all so full.  And then we called Ramono for him to come and get us.

You can see why it took so long, that is some pretty
elaborate plate writing.

We all piled into the tuktuk but Alina sat up front with Ramona.  This involved sharing one seat.  And then he taught her how to drive as we drove home.  I haven’t said too much about Mombasa traffic yet but take my word, it is much like Delhi or Bangkok or any of those other big cities where it is difficult to figure out the lanes let alone the rules.  But Alina managed to lurch us home (she had never driven a stick before) without ending up in a head on collision.  I am pretty sure Ramono took the wheel during the round-abouts which are particularly scary.

Anyway.  That was Monday.  I will have to write a separate Jipe Moyo post or this will never get posted.  Sorry to make you wait, Rhonda.  

As it turns out I can’t post yet. (I am writing this bit as a word doc to cut and paste into Blogspot. The pictures are what take so much downloading time).  Let me tell you about the internet.  Anke has great internet service.  But the modum is a little white box, the size of a cell phone, that can move around.  It can also be taken elsewhere and needs to be charged.  

This tiny modum is one of the reasons why I am having trouble posting, and it is the only reason this morning.  Sometimes I can’t find the modum to turn it on.  Yesterday Anke had taken it to Kencada.  Today, I can find the modum but it is dead and I can’t find the cord to plug it in.  Add to that my computer is not being nice to me and Frankie took it away on Monday evening to try to fix it (he couldn’t but I removed some pictures onto a zip and it is better, not good but better). But Anke just got up and plugged it in (the cord was in her room) so here we go…

A couple of updates.  First, my bedroom is finished.  First Freddie built my bed on the day I arrived and then he and Anke put up my mosquito net the next day. 

A bonus picture of Simba, the neighbour's cat.

And, I have booked my tickets to Uganda, Zanzibar and Lamu.  Alina will be joining me for the Zanzibar and Lamu weekends.  I will give more detail in a future post. 

Now to add the pictures, post and get ready for my day (Thursday).