IMPORTANT *TRANSFER*

Hello Blog followers!
Please NOTE:
We are transferring TODAY to our next destination.
We will probably NOT HAVE INTERNET for some time.
Please know that we are safe and sound and will be posting as soon as we can get internet acess again :-)
Parents you will receive an email from Tom Flemma when we arrive this evening!

Many Thanks and Thanks for following!

-Allen & Diana

Rahul & Alex Bolhack - Day 11

TODAY we first went to visit the Ngwelele Basic School, a primary school in Lusaka. Three of the KF students who we taught had studied there in their early years. We split up in groups of 2 and 3 and taught different classes. Alex (Bolhack) and I taught Math to the 7^th graders, and although it was very frustrating at times, the kids tried their very best to pay attention and comprehend the material. Overall, I can honestly say that it was a very rewarding experience.

After lunch, we went to the Grass Root Soccer Centre to do an educational activity concerning HIV and AIDS awareness. Everyone participated and it was a lot of fun. We then went to buy some craft supplies (Mr. Babcock bought a walking stick, claiming it was “real silver on both ends”) and then went to arcades to buy some snacks for the next few days.

We had a great time at Chalo and the other two schools, and while we are sad about leaving we are extremely excited about the safari and the rest of the trip.

Peace out –

Rahul (and Alex Bolhack)

Lancy and Alex Bolhack- Day 10

Today, as it was Sunday, breakfast was served later so we were able to sleep in until 8. Soon after breakfast, we all hoped into the bus and picked up about 10 KF students from all three boarding schools. Then, one by one, we visited three homes before going to lunch. All KF students had their own touching story. One girl had been raised by her blind older sister who cared for 7 other children. In the early afternoon, we stopped for a quick lunch, and then headed off to see more families. We met the family of Merilyn, the student Hotchkiss sponsors. She has two sisters and was raised by her grandmother because her mother abandoned the family. Her story was emotional and very sad. Unfortunately, we were not able to visit all the KF families due to the fact that our bus broke down. We were fortunate enough to be able to pass the time in one of the KF student’s homes. Although this was a long, boring, and stressful time, we did get to know the KF students much better, the positive side of an otherwise bad situation. Finally, a new bus came (two and a half hours later) and brought us to the movies. We watched Night At The Museum 2 at the Arcades Mall. This was a great way to de-stress after the long day, and most people enjoyed the movie thoroughly.  Afterwards, we hung around Arcades for a while, buying some dinner, and then headed back to Chalo. It was late, so the girls went back to their rooms and soon after went to bed after a long and tiring day. 

a lot of people- day 9

Mr. B:
Today we awoke later! Yay!
After a delayed bus pickup we were off to visit 3 KF students at one of their homes.
We observed their community service project, which is to teach English and math to local children during their term breaks. Because the KF students are in session these lessons have not yet begun but they gathered some of their previous students for a refresher lesson to demonstrate to our group the nature of their service work. It was GREAT to see students giving back to thier communty in such a thoughtful and organized fashion! We took many pics and played the hokey pokey and head, shouldres knees and toes.

I realize that some following the posts do not know what "KF" is...
here is theoir website : www.kucetekelafoundation.org

the day continued...

Nan and Charlotte:

After we headed to the Super Spar (grocery store) and to Subway. When we arived at Manda Hill Mall we were a bit surprized because we do not know the grocery store well. This resulted it in being hard for Mrs. Flemma, Alex Bolhack and Bean to find everything. Every one else headed to Subway to get lunch. We all enjoyed the quick and easy meal.
Next we began our journey to the Crocodile Farm. We travled for 1/2 an hour on one of the bumpiest roads we have ever been on, especially for those of us on the back of the bus!
The first atraction we saw at the Crocodile Farm was the snakes. The Black Mamba, the most poisonous snake in the world was there, but don't worry; we are fine. Next we moved on to the crocodiles! We saw huge crocodiles and little baby ones too.
We then returned to the snake section. Some of us had the interest of holding snakes! First they gave us a little House Snake and a Camelion. Next the brought out the huge Python. Many people enjoyed holding it on their neck. Some of us were very scared but glad in the end that we held it.
The Crocodile Farm was very enjoyable.

Charlotte and Elizabeth:
we returned from the reptile adventure, with expections from the girls to play a soccer match. they dressed in cleats and uniforms, while we tried to pull together a team. mr. babcock ended up playing goalie, and rahul and neil cheered for us. unexpectaly, we won 3-1! we loved this experience.

We ate a quick dinner, and then returned to the dorms to shower. charlotte and elizabeth returned to the main building while the others rested for the students' social hour. We talked and tried to learn to shake our hips (that's their way of dancing) . However, we are still trying to even figure out how their bodies move in that way! By going to social hour, we were able to socialize with not only the girls, but also the boys. In particular, we talked to Chris for a while, a guy who had lived in Texas for a year and hopes to travel back for college next year. Here, eveyone is so open and willing to share. We are both glad we decided to go- it was both a memorable and exciting experience.

alex bentley:
When we got back to the girl's dorms, we expected to play some board games with the girls or go to bed a little early. Luckily, the girls had a different plan for us. At around 8, all of the girls in the entire dorm got together to have a major dance party! Everyone danced and it was very exciting to see how good the other girls are at dancing. The girls stayed up and talked to us for a little after the dance party. It was a blast!

(Continuation: Nan, Elizabeth, Charlotte)

We left rhapsody with a satisfied appetite, and headed to our favorite soft serve shop before driving to Leopards Hill School. We arrived and immediately got to work. We planted numerous avocado and mango trees. We also planted a number of beds of spinach and Chinese (which looked like lettuce to us). It was fun gardening, especially because it gave us the opportunity to socialize with the KF kids involved I their agriculture club. Many of us recognized these students from our teaching experiences earlier in the week. It will be interesting to see how the garden has developed an grown by the time Hotchkiss visits again. The school hopes to sustain themselves on this garden. Personally, for Nan and Elizabeth, leopards had been our favorite school, and we were delighted to have been given the chance to reunite with them. Unfortunately this was the last time we would see the kids. We bonded over mud fights and having to replant a lot of the stuff, we had planted minutes before. A few of the kids joked about promising to send us some of the vegetables to America, so we could remember them and see the final results. Although we became quite dirty, and mud covered us, we left happy and with good memories.
We returned to chalo, and unfortunate had no time to shower before dinner, but they continued to embrace us nonetheless. There was the usual power outage which delayed dinner, but the French fries and chicken we were served made up for the brief wait. We returned to our dorms while the students studied, catching up on some rest and taking the much needed showers. We went to bed excited for the sleep in we would get the next morning.

Flemma’s First Post - Day 8 Part 1

We woke up early this morning to head to the Fountain of Hope Children’s Center, which is an outreach program for street kids who range in age from 7-19.  The children at the center were obviously well taken care of.  We took a tour of the facility first, visiting classrooms- their schooling ends at grade 7- and seeing their kitchen, library and medical clinic.  There was room for about 45 male boarders, but the majority of the program is for street children to come for food, a clean shower, safety and education. 

Our group brought a number of games, books, and coloring supplies to donate to the center.  We spent some time playing games with the kids- they especially like the game of Twister that we supplied!  They taught us some new card games of theirs, and of course, there were pickup games of soccer and basketball.  After the games, we went for a tour of the streets with a handful of the workers at the center.  They introduced us to a number of street children with whom they have been trying to make connections.  This was the most jarring part of our experience, as few of us have interacted with street kids before.  Upon our return to the center, we were surprised to hear that the leader of our group, Vasco, had grown up on the streets as well, but was one of Fountain of Hope’s first success stories.  Considering it was only half a day, we were remarkably drained from the experience.  We are currently recharging at “Rhapsody” the local favorite eatery among the Chalo kids, before we head off to do our community service project of planting a garden Leopards Hill Scholl this afternoon.  We will surely sleep well this evening!        

The Girls’ Post: Lancy, Charlotte, and Nan- Day 7

Today, Mr Babcock and Mrs Flemma gave us a sleep-in to 7, however, it seemed insufficient due to the activities of the girls in our dorms in the early morning. We hopped bus half and hour late, at 8:30, and headed to Ibex and Leopard’s Hill to drop off books for them and to say good-bye. Afterwards, we went to learn traditional dances. For us, it was very interesting to see (and participate in) the dances from different regions. We thoroughly enjoyed the booty-shaking. A highlight of this experience was going to the gorgeous bathrooms (this is a subjective term; they were much prettier than our current facilities) at the conference center we danced at. Then we headed to lunch at Arcades. We appreciated the relaxing, carb-free meal. After our lunch, we hung around the mall for a bit, getting an ice cream, then we headed back to Chalo to participate in their sports day.

 

Missing family, but having so much fun,

Lancy, Charlotte, and Nan

The Boy’s Post: Neil, Mr. B, & Rahul - Day 6

Neil:

Mrs. Flemma, Bean, Charlotte and I went to Leopards Hill School, where we taught BADFAT and theater. The classes started really early. I taught seniors and tenth grade how to analyze documents and I was little bit nervous at first because I am a senior too. Once the class started, however, I taught them about BADFAT as much as I know and I think that they understood most of them. Also, we made them do some exercises using documents and I think most of the students understood the material even though they didn’t really like it.

Mr. B:

Today the team of Babcock, Downs, Rich & Phillip went on the road again. Yesterday we were at Leopards Hill School; today we traveled to Ibex Hill School. Upon arrival we went into the 5^th grade class as a team that I had taught theatre games on Monday. They were energetic and willing as ever! In the middle of the class I got called out and sent to the 9^th grade English classes because their teacher was out with a toothache. Some quick thinking ended in the class writing short character descriptions and then crafting dialogues between the two created characters. In the first English class we did not get completely through the exercise but when the girls joined the second things went much quicker and all the students were able to have their works read aloud by a combination of ‘kiss students and Ibex students! There was extra time at the end and the girls had a nice “no adults” chat with the class for the last 15 min… this actually degenerated into a photo taking session with every 8^th grade boy taking a picture with Elizabeth. WE next went into the 11^th grade. What followed in the 3-hour marathon class was Geography of the US, Regionalism, Dialects, “what is America really like?”, the sex talk, the drugs talk, and finally a rousing discussion about gay marriage… it was a VERY long class but we emerged with much to think about! We wrapped the day in the Primary. I went back to my 5^th graders and did a simplified version of the lecture I taught to the grade 8’s in the morning. After a long day a teaching we boarded the bus for grassroots soccer. At grassroots soccer we played modified handball. I was THE ONLY white person to SCORE A GOAL!!!! It was an awesome day.

Rahul:

Alex Bolhack, Alex Bentley and I stayed in Chalo today while the rest of the group went to the other two schools. We planned to teach as many classes about relationships and gender issues at the school. I was pretty disappointed when we were only allowed to teach two classes (the first period and the last period) Between that time we just walked around campus and took some photos. After that we had lunch and went to pick up the other guys. Together we all went to the Grass Root Soccer Centre. I was really looking forward to playing some soccer, but the activities we did were fun too. Then we had some dinner (French fries and chicken) and are now just enjoying some free time in our rooms… again with no power! 

Nan & Elizabeth Day 5

As we write we are being served lunch at leopards hill school. This morning was wonderful, with us teaching from 930 and we will continue after lunch. So far our favorite is the senior class who is open and willing to interact. We were surprised when we arrived and were told we were teaching public speaking, but took this opportunity with pleasure.

We are now sitting in the local internet café…

Today was a great day in which we both thoroughly enjoyed. It was so much fun to personally get to know the students. We are excited to see them later this week as well. The children were open to asking us multiple questions about almost every aspect of our life, an although we were there for lessons, we spent a good portion of the afternoon discussing Hotchkiss/ American culture.

 

Today was worthwhile and exhilarating, and as an ice-cream shop is next door, we will head off there next.

 

 

Alex & Alex Day 4

HELLO ALL!!

Today was our first day experiencing school in Zambia.  We split up into three different groups and sat in on classes and Chalo Trust School where we are staying, Leopards Hill, and Ibex Hill.  Alex Bentley, Alex Bolhack, and Rahul all visited Leopards Hill to experience first hand, the type of material kids are learning in Zambian schools!  After sitting for 3 hours in the staff room, we got to experience and 80 minute 9^th grade biology class.  It was just as exciting as any biology class… Afterwards, we went to a Religion class, which was very interesting.  The teacher talked about suffering and pain and students would share past experiences with deaths in the family.  It was a very touching and sad moment in the class.  Afterwards, we hopped off to lunch with the rest of the students, and got to eat some nshima, a traditional food… the chicken was good though!  After lunch, we visited a 10^th grade IT class where the students were learning how to make charts on Microsoft Excel.

 

After a day of school, the three of us joined the rest of the Hotchkiss students at Ibex Hills where we sat in on a social club.  The students were talking about relationships, and when the teacher asked if anyone would volunteer to share information about their relationship, Alex Bolhack was very brave and told the class information about her and her boyfriend.  The class was pleasantly surprised!

 

Once we returned to Chalo, we had dinner and talked to some of the Zambian students.  We very much enjoyed sharing our different cultures.  After a very long day of fun, we crawled into our mosquito nets and hit the hay!

 

With love,

Alex Bentley and Alex Bolhack

Elizabeth & Bean's Day 3

After a brief power outage, we ate breakfast at 830. once again the bus was late, but this allowed us to catch up on missed journals and pick up some playing cards for the orphanage. by 1030 we were on our way to the local mall to exchange our money for kwache(1$ for 5000). we then spent a fair amount of time at the Kabwata cultural center. we used our bargaining skills to buy small village made trinkets. each vender had their crafts set up in traditional wooden/straw huts. they were desperate even for the few dollars, and a few of us traded basic supplies such as tissues and chapstick. bean gave up a box of cookies, and elizabeth traded a pair of clean old socks.
by now it was lunch and we ate burgers at a local fastfood chain. we sighted zambia's most famous heavy weight boxer, while the kf co-founder, florence, went to buy fruit for the orphans at Mother Theresa Orphange.
we then headed of in the bus. we arrived to singing children of all ages. most of kids have lost their parents to hiv/ aids. the complex was nicer than expected with several well kept building, and full vegtable and flower gardens. there was a cute soccer pitch and playground out front. we visted the baby ward first, where each infant was eager for any connection. they were all dressed in donated clothes, sitting peacefully in matching metal cribs. We held numerous babies; many of the babies cried as we set them down. as we passed they would reach up their hands. we were surpreised by the high amount of flys. we continued our tour to the terminallt ill wards. here we visted both the female and male sections, in which they both the healthy sung and danced for us. we returned to the cildren were the groups split between playing with the toddlers while some of us tended to the babies. all of this was a touching experince.
We are now off after a short stop at the internet cafe back to Chalo Trust For dinner... more soon

Elizabeth & Bean

Charlotte & Nan's Day 2

June 20, 2009

Today we planned to leave the hotel at 10am. But due to Zambian time (Island Time) we left at 10:30am. We drove for about 30 minutes to the Chalo Trust School. We arrived and met the Chileshe’s, the heads of school. After a short meeting we headed to our dorms, called hostels, to unpack. Due to a fire last year, the girls dorm that was on the center of campus, burnt down. This resulted in a change of housing for the students. The boys hostel is down the street, a 2-3 minute walk. The new hostel for the girls is down the street as well, a 5 minute walk. The girls hostel is very nice because it is the Chileshe’s old house.
At the hostels we began to unpack and set up our beds. We were provided sheets, blankets, pillows, and mosquito nets. After we were settled, we headed to back to the main campus for the Cultural Ceremony. We first were served lunch, today the meal was traditional. One of the big hits were the caterpillars! Rahul, Alex Bolhack, Lancy, Mrs. Flemma, Charlotte, Nan all ate full Caterpillars! After lunch and a small amount of socializing, the Cultural Ceremony began. The Chalo Trust School chorus sang the American National Anthem, the Zambian National Anthem and the Chalo School song. There was also traditional dancing by the students. There was a skit by two boys from Chalo. There were also speeches by representatives from the 3 schools and from the KF Foundation. Afterword, we preformed Fair Hotchkiss. Our singing did not match the skill of the fabulous singers from the other schools. The Cultural Ceremony was great!
Afterword the boys returned to their hostel. The girls went on the bus to go to the grocery store, students from the Leopards Hill School joined us on the bus. It was great to spend time talking to them. At the grocery store we bought water, toilet paper, and snacks. We headed back to the school for dinner. When we arrived we learned that we had missed dinner.
The cook at the Chalo School nicely made us dinner. Afterword we headed back to our hostels. We enjoyed talking to the girls that night before bed. It was a great first day at the school.

Lancy Breakfast Day 2

This morning we met for a wonderful breakfast at 9. We are currently waiting for the Chalo School to come pick us up, so that we can go to their campus. Today is Culture Day, meaning that the students will performs traditional songs and dances for us. Hopefully we can pull something together that represents Hotchkiss culture before we embarrass ourselves in front of the Chalo students...
So far, we have had no major setbacks and everyone has been safe about food and water. It was refreshing to get a good night's sleep after the long, sleepless time on the plane.

Lancy

Rahul's first day

Today, after a total of 17.5 hours in the air, we finally reached Lusaka, the capital of Zambia. To most of our surprise, we were interviewed by a local Lusaka television station. They asked us what we were looking to get out of our Zambian experience. After that we were driven to our hotel which was 30 minutes away from the airport. After checking in, we had some time to relax and freshen up after all the traveling. Then we went for a short walk around the area. The weather was pleasant all day and got a little chilly in the night. Finally, we all got back to the hotel and had a really nice dinner. I tried to go with some traditional African food, so I ate a burger with fries.
Now we're all looking forward to some sleep and an active day tomorrow.

-Rahul

The first one :-)

This is the First Blog Post for this blog.
We will post as frequently as possible....
when we have internet access!