The holidays have begun!

In Tanzania, the school year runs from January to December, and the month of June is always a holiday month. It is winter in Tanzania and, as you will see, some of our older children are wearing warm clothes. The temperature during the day can be as low as 24 degrees Celsius, ‘very cold’ several children have told us. We now have 28 – a record number – of our younger children attending the fee-paying, English-speaking Lifewaylight Primary School and a further 13 at Mkuranga Primary (mainly slightly older children who need to be taught in Kiswahili). At the secondary school level, we have 19 – another record number for us – children going to Ujenzi and St Matthews schools, where they board during the term. We also have 7 pre-school children and 4 doing special school/work experience. So June is a special time when the village is very busy with an overall total of 71 children as young as 2 and as old as 19 years.

The younger children are thoroughly enjoying the new playground equipment that your generous donations have enabled us to buy. The old equipment had lasted for ten years and was becoming very rickety.

They are also looking forward to a couple of outings with their mamas. A trip to the beach is always popular, and James, the Village Manager, is also planning a day at the zoo. Tanzania has a great deal of wildlife in its game reserves but many of our children have little idea of what an elephant or a zebra actually looks like.

The secondary children have each been busy writing us a short essay. ‘The year is 2025. Describe a day in your life.’ It has been fascinating to read how they see their lives developing. Some have very high expectations - seeking to become a doctor or a lawyer is popular. Generally, we would ask for a more ‘realistic’ objective, but the girl who wants to be a pilot is startlingly clever and we would not rule it out! Others have more modest ambitions, such as becoming a shopkeeper. In this case, we try to explain that a formal apprenticeship or college qualification after leaving school will always be useful. Many of these children tell us that they want to stay part of the Malaika Kids family when they eventually leave us; they would love to be ‘ambassadors’ for Malaika Kids and help us financially.

We have written short letters in response to each individual child, praising them where appropriate on their recent exam results and discussing their current aspirations for the future. We always advise that they have a challenging Plan A, but also think about a Plan B if things don’t go as well as they hope. It is great that they want to continue to help Malaika Kids, but their first task is to be able to support themselves economically when they are adults. We plan to discuss each of the secondary school children with James and Emanuel on Skype this week to ensure we are all on the same page and jointly doing whatever we feasibly can to help our children to become successful.

So far this year our fundraising is significantly less than last, yet the number of children we support continues to rise. If you would like to help fund our education budget, please click he re. It costs approximately £350 per annum to send a child to an excellent primary school and £900 to send a child to secondary school. We are always so very grateful for your support.

Alan Edwards Malaika Kids UK Chair

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