Sports Days!!

Saturday and Sunday, (June 7 & 8 ) we held our first ever sports competitions. They were incredibly fun and fabulous two days filled with screaming kids, soccer, volleyball, and tennis table competitions. Each of the sites had at least one team in each type of competition– with Zeway having a few more. Kids came out of the woodwork to watch these competitions– with the smaller towns cheering with their cohorts against the big bad teams of Zeway. Jiddo and Bulbulu had their own competitions in Bulbula where Bulbula took all five trophies– but graciously gave a trophy to Jiddo for good sportsmanship. In the Zeway competitions, Tilahun’s soccer team took the cup in a final against Geleta’s team. Abossa women’s volleyball took the cup in the final against Zeway and Adami Tulu’s mens volleyball took the cup against Hanna’s girls (Zeway). After each team won their event all of the kids from that site took off running all over the fields chanting about being the winners and how the loosers only eat spinach. I don’t think I have ever seen such an exciting event in my entire life.

These events are great for these children as it builds up their self-esteem, teaches them about team work, communication and competition. For the children who competed in Zeway, for those coming from other sites, it was some children’s first time to visit Zeway or to take a trip with a bunch of other kids. Just the fact that these children were there and competing was a once and a lifetime opportunity.

 

Twister!!!

No I’m not talking about a tornado but the game: Twister. My parents brought it with them to give to the project. We introduced it during the Saturday Program at the office. During the Saturday Program, children come to play and socialize with one another. They play soccer, jump rope, sing, and play other local games. Well, the kids knew that we brought something with us because our plastic bags were bulging—we pumped up new soccer balls & volleyballs then broke out the new game. It was great as no one (including the social workers) had seen a game like this before—in fact manufactured games have almost never been seen. So I explained in my crude Amharic and stretched myself across the dotted playing map. Then we drew a big circle in the dirt around the mat and chose 6 kids to enter the circle and play the first round. It was loud and crazy and nearly impossible to choose children to play. But we did and they played and it was great.

Explaining the new game

We’ve also got some new games at the projects that some previous groups brought. Just last week I had the opportunity to distribute the games with the social workers. We talked about the importance of play for development and socialization then we played each of the new games ourselves. It was fun to have the social workers acting like kids as we played twister, uno, and memory. Now all the games have been divided up between our 5 sites but we still don’t have enough—as we’ve got 5 sites and 2,000 kids in the program.

This is where you come in!!! Please send us more games. My number one request is for Memory—it’s a great game that needs little explanation or supervision but is good for all ages. Here’s the list:

• Memory
• Uno
• Twister
• Cards
• Crayons
• Connect 4

You can send them to:

Kristen Damron

PO Box 470

Ziway, Ethiopia

*you can take memory & twister out of the box & put them in a plastic bag to save on shipping weight.

Thanks…. From the Project Kids!!!

 

Bulbula Elementary School

One of the half completed classrooms in Bulbula slated to be completed in the comming year. The community began construction and ran out of funds to complete the buildings. There is a 1/2 foot layer of dust on the ground. The school officials have been keeping the doors locked because the children have been using these unfinished classrooms as toilets. Currently there are around 130 children in each class.

This is a latrine which is currently being dug at the school. The old latrine is falling apart and at least 25 years old.

 

Most recent guests

I thought I’d share a few pictures of some visits that we’ve had recently. Morris, has been out to visit our project at least 5 times. This time around he brought a good friend, Rick, and his friend’s two daughters. Much of Morris’s heart is here and he has a great passion for the children in the area- it is beautiful to see. One of our major areas of focus is building up the capacity and quality of the schools in our project sites. Many don’t have latrines, enough desks and have few classrooms, many of which are poorly constructed.