12. October 1, 1967

 Oct. 1

Dear Mom and Dad, (Line)

    Well, we finally didn't go to the Nairobi Show. The bus developed a faulty thermostat and heated up to a fare-thee-well. It took a day to take it apart and put it back together. Then it began missing again, all this while Frank was trying to go back and forth to observe students practice teaching. So he took things apart again and cleaned up the fuel pump, put it all back together, and so far it is running all right. But we felt pretty insecure about trying the trip to Nairobi when we hadn't tried out the car any more than from here to Embu and back.

    So Frank went down with the Young Farmers in the Land Rover and saw the sights. It was just like the fair at home minus the carnival plus about 40 times as many people! He came home around eight Saturday night pooped, sunburned, and so thirsty, I thought he'd never stop drinking! He claims now a Land Rover is the most uncomfortable thing to ride in the world, an opinion the rest of us have shared from our first trip up to here in one. I'm glad they were too expensive for us to own or we might have bought one!

    This week all the students are out practice teaching in about 15 schools 'round about. They get up about 5:30 am and the bus and land rover make several trips, the last of them leaving about 7:30 am. It is dark, so they run on the generator. It is a strange feeling to wake up with the light shining in your face. The night before we had read until the light went out and hadn't bothered to turn the switch. That only happened once though!

    About 8 o'clock the tutors here start out and go to the different schools. They sit through classes and observe and write comments and grade the students on the lesson they have seen. The students work in pairs, so that each has half the time. It is most interesting. I went out on Wednesday, and whether I did any good or not observing I don't know, but I enjoyed the trip and the experience. The school was Kanjuu which has Standards (grades) one through five with 30 students in each room or grade. The building is  a long structure about twenty feet wide and perhaps 100 feet long. The rooms are about twenty feet square. It is built with a stick frame with walls about a foot thick. The sticks are placed about six inches apart and mud packed in between to make the wall. Then more mud is plastered on the outside and inside to make a smooth wall and cover all the sticks. The roof sits up off the top of the wall about six inches and is gable type made of corrugated sheet metal. There is no ceiling. The windows are holes in the wall with a wooden shutter to cover them. The doors are wooden, much like the chicken house door, with a wood sill about 6 inches high to step over. There were three windows in the room I was in and that was where the light came from! The floor is dirt and most of the time pretty uneven. The desks are wooden tables and benches with about 14 kids at each one. The teacher had a table, and there was a black board sitting on a floor easel, and another table sitting in the corner with a sign which said "Our Nature Table". There were pictures and charts hanging on the walls, some of them pretty much the worse for wear, but there anyway!

    I never saw children so busy. They were having a class in skills in the first room I went into, in standard three. Most of the children are a little older than our grade three. Skills included Arithmetic and Reading. The teacher teaches in English and they all read in English. Some of them have a terrible time with some of the words. Sunshine and rain were the two hardest ones that day.  Sunshine came out "shun shine" or "sun sine" most of the time they cannot pronounce and "r"...it always sounds like and "l"...even the teacher's "r"s are funny! I think the trouble is that they try to make the whole 'r' sound without using their lips. I was tempted to say so, but decided I'd better keep quiet for a while longer. I guess the thing that struck me the most was the children. All of them were bare footed, hair cut as close as it could be. The boys wore the school uniform: khaki colored shirts and shorts, and the girls: blue jumpers and purple blouses. Most of the clothes were very worn and faded. Some of the girls had on different colored dresses and all of them faded and worn to the nth degree. Most of them looked fairly clean although I might have been surprised at what a wet wash cloth would wash off!

    The other classes in the school were English language (grammar), Science, Vernacular (Kikuyu or Swahili) and Religious Knowledge (R.K.). It is taught in vernacular and gives the  student teachers the most trouble from what Frank says, the worst trouble being that the Tutor who teaches Religious Knowledge is an English woman who has been here since "The Beginning". She thinks no one can know enough to teach the subject, so she hand makes all the students' lessons plans. You can imagine how hard it is to teach from someone else's plans, much less someone who thinks you are an idiot. This tutor is Miss Gass and she is a Miss Giesbrecht plus! ( my high school algebra teacher!) She talks of retiring and everyone wishes she would! I guess everyone here has his own way of ignoring her. Isn't it funny that there seems to be one in every school?

    Thursday I didn't go out. I had a bad stomach ache that left me sore yet today. It was just like pleurisy only right through the middle. We've all had various upsets. Milt had diarrhea yesterday and today a bad hemorrhoid, but he got to sleep all right tonight, so it will probably be better by morning. That's one advantage of being in charge of the dispensary. There was something for hemorrhoids, so I could help a bit.

    We are designing a big burlap picture to go over the fireplace. It's about 24 inches by 9 feet. So far it is just a bunch of lines here and there. Vicki came up with the best idea.  It is done in yarn in black, brown, yellow, orange and green. It is hard to describe, so I'll just send a picture later. Frank ran a contest so we all drew pictures to see who could come up with the best one. Most of us weren't inspired, but Vicki really fired up and so hers turned out best. It will add a lot to the room. The principal came by the other night and was quite enthused with the way our house looked. I'm not surprised. It looks nicer than his own, and that's the truth!

    Since this is the end of the page, lots of love till next letter!      Barb and everyone.