Christmas Greetings

Dear all, 

 I hope you have a lovely and restful Christmas and a Happy New Year. Looking at the news, I can see that this year in the UK has been a second year of great difficulties with Covid. I do hope this improves in 2022. As far as Covid is concerned South Sudan has been probably one of the least affected countries in the world, so we have really been very fortunate. Of course, objective figures have been masked by lack of testing and general problems of poor infrastructure and logistics. However, it is still remarkable that a country with such poor health infrastructure can be so little affected compared with countries such as Britain or America which have plenty of medical resources. There are always a lot of funerals here, but this hasn’t noticeably increased. Most people are not complying with the Covid regulations, largely because of the far more pressing problems faced by South Sudanese on a daily basis – such as where to find the next meal. If people are living from hand-to-mouth, there is no way they can self-isolate. They simply must cultivate and sell their crops or starve. It is extremely rare for anyone to have the luxury of a room of their own, so isolation at home is not physically possible in any case. Another major reason for lack of compliance is that many people view Covid as ‘Satanic’. Anything to do with it is shunned – Covid testing, facemasks, handwashing, social distancing and vaccines. Some even propagate the myth that the sign of Satan (666) will appear on a person’s arm after receiving the vaccine, or that they will die soon afterwards. This is having a very serious effect on vaccine take-up in Uganda too, which will unavoidably lead to many teachers leaving the profession and stop many older pupils from finishing their education. I have personally seen young people who were mid-course, unable or unwilling to complete their courses because of the mandatory vaccine requirement. Enough about Covid! 

Private maths lesson for Alice

For me, a great highlight of the last few months has been the teaching of a few of our deaf children by the eldest, Alau, who is the only one at secondary level. The picture shows Alau teaching Alice. He has decided that he wants to become a teacher for the deaf when he leaves school. This will involve doing a teacher training course at a specialist training college. He particularly wants to teach in South Sudan because there is no help for deaf children here. I am hoping that once he is qualified we can open a deaf unit in our school and stop sending primary level deaf children to Uganda. We would be able to help more children at a smaller cost and without the long journeys and school fees. We have been paying him out of what should have been school fees for the deaf children if their schools had been open. Thankfully Alau has been vaccinated so he will be able to move ahead with his plans.

 

Foundations for a block of 4 classrooms

Another achievement was the building of foundations for a new block of classrooms. This is just a large slab of concrete right now, but hopefully we will be able to raise funds so that classrooms can be built in the not too distant future. 

Our contribution to the anti-Covid effort has been to have school in two shifts. This has had the added benefit of making the school less crowded and quieter. However, some parents of ‘afternoon’ pupils complain that their children are not attending because they dislike coming in the afternoons. Once we have more classrooms, we will be able to rethink our school day. 

Schools in South Sudan have just broken up for a two week Christmas break. On our last day, the lower school (who operate in the mornings) all did Christmas story related activities. I was teaching Primary 2. We told each other the story of the nativity and then improvised a Christmas play. There were a lot of applicants to be Mary, Joseph and the Angel Gabriel. The smallest boy in the class was the baby Jesus. The sight of some of our boys who are almost street urchins being angels with flapping wings was very funny. In the afternoon, the upper school was very poorly attended and so we played board games together. I had very recently taught some of the oldest pupils to play Scrabble. This is a huge success and very educational for them too, helping with vocabulary, spelling, spelling rules, strategic planning etc. We have three sets of Scrabble and also several of Lotto. They were donated by UNICEF. 

We go back to school straight after the New Year. However, I will be in Uganda for the first week as our school opening coincides with the post-Covid reopening in Uganda. I will need to take all the deaf children back to school. Thank you all for your support for the school during 2021. I am really so grateful, particularly at such a difficult time for all of you. 

Once again wishing you a lovely Christmas.