Day of the African Child

The origin of the International Day of the African Child come from 1976 when in Soweto, South Africa, thousands of black school children took to the streets on 16th June, in a march more than half a mile long, to protest about the inferior quality of their education and to demand the right to be taught in their own language. On that day hundreds of young students were shot and in the protests that followed over the next two weeks more than a hundred people were killed and over a thousand were injured. The day was first initiated by the Organisation of African Unity in 1991 to honour the memory of those killed and the courage of all those who marched.

In Mazabuka, as is now the case elsewhere, the day is meant to raise awareness of the continuing need for improvement in the education provided to African children. The theme this year was ‘Planning and budgeting for the wellbeing of the Child . . . a collective responsibility’. The day was in many ways no different to the others that I have experienced with dance, drama, music and speeches; though the hundreds of school children from around the area did make plenty of noise. The most interesting part was in the run-up to the day. A debating competition was held pitting local schools against each other at junior and senior levels with prizes including a computer, printer, television and DVD player. I attended the finals which was a raucous, noisy affair, more speeches by each school team of four students rather than debate. It was all very passionate, especially when the audience joined in to shout support for or against the speakers’ points.

And here are some people photos from the trip too!

Namibia

And then we moved on to Namibia ... When we first entered Windhoek we could have been mistaken for thinking that we were somewhere in Europe with its modern looking apartments, office blocks, shopping malls and restaurants. As a capital city it felt very organised, clean and developed in contrast to the chaos of Lusaka. However, on the other side of the city, sweeping along the hills were the shanty areas filled with tiny houses made of wood, tin, iron or any other available materials. The gap between the richest and the poorest is reportedly the greatest in Namibia compared to anywhere else in the world.

We left the city for the sand dunes of the south, something that I had been looking forward and I was not disappointed. In Sesriem we climbed up and up some huge dunes but the hard work was worth it for the views and the fun of running, almost falling, down the sand. It got even better when we went sandboarding. Lying flat on a thin piece of board – smooth underneath to improve the speed – we threw ourselves down various different runs – long, curvy, steep and even had even went tandem. In the process I got covered in far too much sand, and ate some, when things went slightly wrong but still managed to clock up speeds of over 70kph. The trip ended as it started with more animals. Along the coast we visited a colony of seals (thousands of them) who ignoring us tourists were quite happy to fight with and yelp at each other, whilst giving off a pretty disgusting smell. The last national park was Etosha in northern Namibia where around a number of natural and man-made waterholes it was transfixing to watch elephants and particularly rhinos coming into drink as the sun went down.