wednesday AfriDACA By Nathan, Jaden and Joe

We’re half way through the teaching experience within the Acholi community and it still doesn’t fail to shock you and make you appreciate the smallest things within our lives.

The tea didn’t disappoint last night, our hosts made us a nice traditional English meal; fish and chips. It made those who were missing the comforts of home feel much better. Whilst in debrief last night in triplets we was sharing what amazed us about the previous day and when it got to our triplet of Jaden, Joe and Nathan it seemed that Joe got a little nervous when speaking and let out a trump which were rather amusing.

When we turned up to the Acholi community this morning we were greeted by the children with another rockstar welcome, it still feels surreal and incredibly overwhelming. In the larger church we had another fun filled day packed with activities including clay model making of vehicles which we were all surprised to see how creative they were, the only challenging part was making sure that they didn’t eat the clay. The most satisfying part for Joe and Jack today was teaching a little Acholi boy named Daniel how to write his name. As it was half way through the week we all have started to feel the long days catching up to us, the realisation of what some of the kids must go through everyday makes it minute in comparison and spares us on.     

Meanwhile in the small church, we were again fascinated with how creative and quick the children learned. The most notable things within the day were when the children wrote their own stories and drew their own pictures. One child drew and incredibly amazing picture of a car which really had us amazed, we was starting to realize how talented they are but they just aren’t in the right environment to really excel with their talent. In the crafts lessons with both groups we sang songs again which we learned from church on the first day! They really love the singing and dancing due to their faith in god as he is the reason they remain so happy and hopeful that things will change within their lives. In the second half of the crafts lesson we let the kids do some finger painting and we had never seen them so quiet, they really got into it and enjoyed it, it was brilliant. In the small church there were two older children who were significantly more talented than the others in maths so the teachers chose two students (Joseph and Victoria) from the big church to help them in a one to two session as the big church had more staff to teach.

After both finished teaching in the big and small church half of the group went to visit the houses of the Acholi citizens in their triplets. The other half went to a free area where loads of children gathered to greet and play with the mzungu’s, it was absolutely wild! At one point I think I had at least 10 kids on each arm. John had a group in the corner which he was teaching dance moves which were rather amusing to view whilst the others played football, catch and other sports.

Just demolished the best meal of the week so far. Pasta, veggie curry and japatis went down a treat with the whole team.

Lots of love from the lads on the comfy couch… and the rest of the Afridaca  team. XXXXXX

P.s Jack and Joe say that Cadbury’s chocolate fingers taste exactly the same.