First 2 days of our Feb/March trip to Gambia

Gloz and I took off from Gatwick South at 8.20am on Friday, 26th Feb 2010. We arrived 7 hours later in Banjul.
We first of all made a visit to Busumbala after leaving the airport. This is where the compound is going to be built. There is water now in a standpipe available in the new compound we are building for a family, and students who are going to the coastal area to further their education.
6.50pm: We arrived at Sunshine Coast B&B – a great place to stay at Cape Point, Bakau. We discussed our immediate requirements to organise, made a list for Sankung of meetings to organise, in particular Soma Hosp, Red Cross, Mr Touray, Toniataba School, Women of Sikunda, PTA, and VDC, Pakalinding School to discuss internet access, and also the youths of Si-Kunda as a follow up from the meeting we had in November, a lot to sort out, but I am sure Sankung will manage! we need to sort out transport for tomorrow, supplies to buy, change our money to dalasi, and go to the bank, Gloz and I had a very enjoyable meal in the restaurant in the evening, the staff are lovely here, as is the owner, Liz, she will do anything to help and always make you so welcome.


Saturday, 27th Feb, 9.30am. Sitting in a little roadside stall having a drink, because the market isn’t open (found out later that it is a public holiday). There is no sign of Sankung, cannot call him as he has his mobile switched off, supermarket not open so cannot get our supplies either to go up country this morning, Oh well, I am sure it will all happen eventually, the sun is shining, we are looking forward to the week ahead, what more could you want!! Maybe Sankung has decided we have given him too much to do! I am sure he will turn up soon.

We decided we had just enough time to visit the Botanical gardens in Bakau, it is beautiful, we have a guide showing us round, so many varieties, dutchmans pipe being one of them, it is cool in the gardens so it made the walk very pleasant. We will visit again when we have more time as we did have to rush it a bit, but at 50 Dalasi each it was still well worth the visit. It is situated near the market on the opposite side of the road just as you start walking up towards Cape Point. Of course it was one of the only times I didn’t have my camera!! There were lots of varieties of birds, lots of paths and seating areas, we really enjoyed the visit.

We did some shopping eventually once the supermarket opened, but we didn’t have enough money, so left it there to collect later. Back at the guest house, we sit and wait for Sankung.

We set off about 12pm, and pass the University of Gambia where Lamin Njie attends. The students don’t all go to the same building, it isn’t big enough, so lectures are shared in about 3 locations down that street, one of them being the Gambian Development Institute, I took a photograph of that to send to Lamin's sponsors.

Its 12.35pm, we are in Serrukunda, there are no geli geli’s available because of the public holiday. So we make our way to Banjul to the port in the hope we can get a ferry to cross the estuary to the North Bank to find transport to take us to Farafenni.

Gloz originally said we would arrive at 6pm, I said 7pm and Sankung optimistically said 4pm! So I think we may all have underestimated our ETA!

In Banjul at 1pm, Gloz and I still in the taxi, Sankung has walked off somewhere, the luggage has all been transferred to a handcart, G and I are just cooking in the back seat while all this is going on, wondering what is going to happen next. Not the usual amount of transport about, the noise is usually deafening with so many people pushing and shoving, shame Gloz couldn’t have seen it like that, but there was a Muslim celebration last night with praying going on all night, hence the public holiday today.

Its 1.25pm and we are sitting on the ferry on the ‘top deck’ waiting for it to leave. It’s a beautiful sunny day, we are sitting overlooking the estuary, some of the passengers on the bow of the lower deck are playing djembes, we are eating our packed cheese and tomato rolls, and enjoying ourselves.

We set sail, a nice cool breeze, very uneventful enjoyable 45 minutes spent on the crossing to Barra on the North Bank. How they work out the loads on these ferrys I have no idea, there are some huge lorries on it, and goodness knows how many people.

I brought a Dictaphone at the airport to record everything instead of writing it all down, how much quicker it is, and it’s brilliant!! (…Its taking some time to type up now I am home though!!!) Our ferry will be docking soon, these ferry’s are quicker than they used to be and there are now 3 instead of 2 ferries, so at least you don’t have to wait for so long now.

After unloading at Barra and pushing our way through the crowds we hire a cart to carry the luggage, including 3 sacks of netting for the women’s garden. We get to the geli geli park, and wait, and wait. Eventually at 3.35pm we get in an 8 seater taxi, well at least there are 8 of us squashed in it., luggage piled on top

One hour and 25 minutes later we are in Farafenni!!!! The road was amazing, best I have seen on either north or south bank, road markings, occasional road sign, even one bus stop sign miles from anywhere, so it was a very good journey. 5.05pm we are looking for transport to take us to the ferry. Sankung finds us a horse and cart, so we all climb on, and off we trot and quite a speed, The horse does his job well, and we were deposited at a taxi park. I shall use the term ‘taxi’ very loosely, it was devoid of almost any interior, and was in as bad a state (almost) as the vehicle we used in Georgetown a few years ago, hot wire start and off we go towards the ferry port on the river. We arrived safely enough and then got another cart to take our luggage onto the ferry. We have to wait a while for it to fill up, then arrive once more on the south bank, another cart to take luggage to a taxi, we met a lovely young lady from Fonkoi Kunda who is in her 3rd year of teacher training, she managed to get a sponsor, and seems very grateful for it. We all pile in the taxi and go via Soma to Si-Kunda. Eventually arriving about 7pm, which is exactly the time I forecast! So seven hours and several modes of transport later we finally arrive! Hurrah!

One of the first people to greet us was Njie… and she called me Marje… Marje would have loved that! She was so pleased to see Gloz was with me, they always get on particularly well. The call to prayer started almost as soon as we arrived so Sankung disappeared for a while. Gloz and I started getting ourselves organised by unpacking all our luggage, and checking out the storeroom.. Sankung certainly had got a surprise for us, as it was now resplendent with lots of deep metal shelving, absolutely perfect! All our plastic boxes of supplies were put away, and it all looks so tidy, covered in orange dust of course, but very tidy. It makes a lot of difference, and we can now be so much better organised. Our whiteboard proved to be as useful this time as it was last.

Gloz and I decide an early night is on order. Well it was about 10pm eventually.

Feb 26th - March 5th - trip to Si-Kunda

Gloz and I returned early hours of Saturday 6th after a very enjoyable trip. We only managed a week this time, but still managed to achieve all we wanted to, so it meant early mornings and late evenings! first update below, with more to follow ...
Si-Kunda School has had a 'makeover' - The teachers have painted the entire school, including the kitchen and the surrounding school walls and gates; A wall has been built to define the school garden from the playground; The storeroom has been cleared; Furniture has been made for the two teachers offices; Metal shelving; The roof and ceiling have been repaired in one corner of the school; Seedling beds have been prepared in the garden; A new metal lid has been fitted to cover the well; Paths made in the school grounds; and generally all the school is looking very tidy, spic and span! We attended the school's first PTA meeting, with a lot of good suggestions being made and it was agreed which actions should be first priority. School attendance is rising, and school dinners are now being supplied Monday to Thursday, with Tombolu being the school cook, we joined in one lunchtime and the rice was extremely tasty. She cooks it with some peppers and onion, and when there are vegetables harvested in the school garden the produce supplements the rice. To add to the rice we provide, we have been allocated some ground in the rice fields, with the promise by the elders of the village that groundnuts will be grown for the school also. Any surplus will be sold to go towards the school fund. The schools needs new classroom blackboards, but apart from that it has quite a lot of supplies to keep it going at the moment. The childrens desks and benches soon need to be replaced, but we are hoping that these will be done soon by another organisation, so we will wait to see it this happens, if not, then we will have to try to do something about it. The school is progressing, the teachers and pupils seem happy, there are improvements still to be made but with hard work and determination this school will continue to improve.

Next Trip to Gambia

Gloz and Sue are going to The Gambia on 26th February... we will travel to the village the following day for a week. The Si-Kunda Village School and the sponsored children are our priority this time, though we will of course be catching up with our other projects, including the build of a compound on the piece of land recently purchased in Busumbala.

Our next shipment is being packed, and supplies still being collected, this will arrive in Gambia in March, and will be distributed by Sankung our project manager.

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January 2010 Newsletter

Newsletter No.13 is now ready for posting this week to our sponsors.
If there is anyone else who would like a copy, or would like to be put on our mailing list, please contact one of us listed on the website either by email or phone.

Website updates

The website Projects page for 2009 has now been completed, with a few recent photographs.....

Trip to Gambia November 18th 2009

Well we returned very late on Friday, 4th December after a very enjoyable trip. The Tabaski celebrations took place in the middle of our stay in the village of Si-Kunda which we all enjoyed, though it meant we had to try to fit everything we needed to do around it which was a bit of a challenge! But we did achieve most of the things we really needed to do. This time there were four of us, Marje, Anne, Richard and myself. I will be writing more later, but just a few highlights.... Richard worked in the Computer Lab which we installed about 3 years ago in Pakalinding Upper Basic School, rebuilding the server and a few pc's that needed attention, also some work was needed on the pc's previously installed in the local hospital - Soma Medical Centre. The headmaster of the school and the medical staff at the hospital were very pleased and happy when Richard had finished his work there. We went to inspect the doors we have had replaced in the hospital, the old wooden ones were in a bad way, so we have replaced them with stong metal doors, and they are fitted with locks to make the hospital more secure.

We have made some changes at Si-Kunda Village School regarding staff, along with the support of the Akilo and elders of the village. We are also starting a PTA at the school which we hope will increase further interest from the parents by involving them more in the school's future. We have been given some land in the rice fields which will be cultivated by the women in the village to supplement the rice we are providing for the children at lunch time and hopefully help the school fund which has been started by the headmaster and our project manager.

We are going to create a library for the village in the Skills Centre we built last year. It will take up half of one of the large storerooms and be completely isolated from the rest of the building. It is in the centre of the village, and we believe it will be well used. The library in the school can then be just used by the school pupils themselves.

The building is going to start very soon on the land purchased earlier this year near the coast. This will be a compound for Sankung and his family (they have no permanent home at the moment), and included in this will be 3 rooms for students who are going to the coast for further education. Sankung is our project manager, so therefore needs to travel very frequently between the coast and Si-Kunda to enable him to do the work he does for the charity.

One of the students who will be staying there is Lamin Njie. We are so proud of him, he is our first sponsored student to be accepted at the University of Gambia. He will be doing Economics and Management. We have quite a few students now in higher education, so we are very grateful to our sponsors!

We will be posting our next newsletter to our sponsors in January, and will also be updating the website with more news of what has been done in 2009. But if you would like to know more, then please just ask, I am always happy to talk about the charity!

Sue