The following is the report I received from Lorna, teacher at the Bukura tailoring school.  First term started on January 5^th, 2009 and ended on April 3^rd, 2009.  The school closed for the month of April and reopens on May 4^th, 2009.   I was able to spend a lot of time with students and parents this year and it was exciting to see the new students and the second year students getting started on learning.   Student attendance – second year students responded well on the opening of the term.  We had eleven students in the second year class, one boy and ten girls, then three other students joined the class as new students, so in total we closed the term with fourteen students in the second year, thirteen girls and one boy.  The new intake in January was good, of which we admitted twenty one students, one boy and twenty girls. It was a good start and we hope it will be successful in the future. In total we closed school with thirty seven students.  School academic - Students are really working very hard to acquire their future skills, we hope it continues that way.  It is very positive as seen by the way last year candidates performed in their external exams, they all passed.  I hope this year we will send a good number to external exams. The community is very pleased with the issue of taking student for external exams.   Respond of parents - They are positive to the progress of the school.  This was shown by the good respond of bringing their kids to school on time, they attended meetings when called for, we concluded by saying that they have motive towards the progress of the school and their children.  Fees payments - The fees payments was good specially the new parents. Most of the students have finished the payments of the first term fees and registration.  This has enabled us to have the license for this year 2009, open the school account and also to meet some of the problems we had at the start of the term for example the construction of four benches to create sitting materials for students.  Due to the poor economy we have in our country, we agreed and managed to raise the school fees of the school from 1100 Kenyan shillings per year to 1700 Kenyan shillings per year starting this year for every student.  Project for the parents - For the good progress of the school, parents have agreed to start a good lunch program for their kids when they are at school for five days a week.  This has been a success in this last term. Production unit - The project has been started at school but due to poor economy it’s going on slowly by slowly because most of the money from items remains in debts.  I hope as we are marketing the project in the future it will be a success  Problems of the school - Thanks a lot for the machines heads you bought for us.  We haven’t got the tables for them therefore there is a shortage of machines in the workshop.  Hence students are sharing one machine which makes the work to be slow. Future plan - To have more machines to do better work and to have an embroidery machine to start embroidery work in the school.  To have a big workshop to accommodate more students.    Mrs. Lornah Mitungu    School instructor

Up early on Wednesday to head out to Bukura to meet parents and students.  I am joined by Terry, Tanya and their son Cody, from Vancouver Island who are here for 7 weeks looking for some type of project to get involved in.  They had been in contact with me over the previous months and I was happy to have them join us for the trip.  They have not been anywhere yet so this was an adventure.   Headed down to the matatu stand where we catch the public vehicles into the rural areas.  Most of the drivers and conductors know me now; some actually phone me to see if I am going somewhere that day.  So I get the typical question when I arrive; where are you going today, Bukura or Khwisero?  Today it’s Bukura so we pile onto the vehicle and head out.  We are stopped only once by police, but this bus is not overloaded so we continue on.  It takes about an hour an a half to get there and we are greeted by all the students and parents at the school.   There are songs, speeches and laughter.  It was nice to see the parents as I have not had much time to spend at the school.  I met with the two young students, Evans and Bedhinah and their parents to tell them about the sewing machines that have been bought and waiting for them in Kakamega.  The other young girl Bilha did not attend but does connect with me later and gets her machine.  She is an orphan and living with her aunt in Bukura so this will be a big help for her life.  They each give me 1000 Kenya shillings to go towards the cost.  Each machine costs 17,000 Kenya shillings or $275 Canadian.  I bought 3 nice singer machines for them so they last longer than the other cheaper ones.  I will return the 1000 shillings to them so they can use it towards purchasing other items.   So we enjoyed the day with everyone and head off to the matatu stand to try and get back to town.  Michael is driving so we hop into his matatu and make the slow, yes slow drive back to town.  Usually we drive at breakneck speed back to town but this matatu has no clutch and the brakes are bad.  Ok its hard to wonder which is worse but at least if we do crash the impact will be softer.  We get stopped by the police again, but this time the officer recognizes me, laughs and sends us on our way.   

I asked the Fisheries Officer if we can get a vehicle to visit farmers, but no luck, its busy doing other stuff.  So the option is matatu, motorcycle and bicycle.  The fishery officer declines to come, he wanted the luxury of having a vehicle so I guess when he says he likes the office its true.  Hussein and I head off to catch the death machine to Makunga and luckily we arrive alive….its true they must loose 20 people a day in this country from these reckless drivers. 

Hesbon and Abraham are waiting for us and we hop on the back of their bikes and head off down the road to yells and questioning from all the people wondering what I am doing.  Some of the young men who are sitting there remember me from last year…off we go and we arrive at James’s place and start the visits.  We do look at fish ponds but it seems we spend more time eating and talking.  So it takes three days to complete the visit of all the farmers in Bukura.  It is an amazing time and I laughed so hard and enjoyed myself so much.  We visited each farmer and I gave suggestions on improving their ponds and people are starting to follow through. 

On Saturday Hesbon and Abel come in to town and we buy 60 pipes, 5 wheelbarrows and 14 shovels.  We get a vehicle and stuff everything in the back and squish into the vehicle and head to Hesbon’s home.  We are stopped by the police and the driver takes 50 shillings from Abel for a bribe.  5 minutes later he comes back and says if we add another 50 shillings we can go.  We dig deep and make the payment and off we go.  We arrive to a crowd of kids who are waiting for us.  Most of them wearing Whitehorse Minor Soccer School t-shirts that I had brought.  They looked great and the kids were looking so smart, as Hesbon says.  We headed down to the fish ponds and see most of the farmers standing around a half dug pond.  We say lets finish this expansion before we eat and meet and they say it’s too hard without shovels.  So Hesbon goes back up to the house and gets all the shovels and we finish the expansion.  I sunk in the mud up to my knees but we all had a great time.  We expanded Hesbon’s pond and with everyone working together we got it done in one day.  So we have a great meeting and people are really thankful for all the new items that will assist them with their ponds. 

We eat and then Hussein and I climb on the back of a motorcycle and make our way to the tarmac road to catch a vehicle to town.  Sunday we spend the day in town doing some things and sit and plan for the following week. 

Tuesday morning my friend Abraham offered to take me out to the tailoring school so I could meet with Lorna and all the students.  Perfect!  We arrive to see the school open and 11 students, 1 first year and the remaining 10 are in their second year.  Also waiting patiently were Evans, Bedhinah and Bilha who have now graduated and are waiting too discuss what the options are for them.  Lorna was able to get them permission to write the National Tailoring Exam where they had 7 hours to sew a dress and write an exam.  They did great and showed me the dresses they each made.  They were perfect and all three had brought their parents to discuss the next steps.  I gave them 2 options, continue into a better technical college or cost share a new singer sewing machine.  I gave them all a couple of days to discuss it and I gave them my phone number so they could contact me when they decided what they wanted.  Evans phoned me that night and wanted to come into Kakamega on Wednesday morning to try and find a boarding college and continue with school.  Unfortunately there are no boarding schools as they are all day schools and he lives too far away to commute.  So we have decided to buy him a good sewing machine and he can continue to study at Bukura tailoring school and Lorna will help him when she has time.  He is a nice young man and was so timid while we were wandering around Kakamega.  Of course he tells me he has only been to town 3 times in his life so everything was so new and exciting.  We found a couple of different machines and I will do a bit more shopping before getting him the machine and materials so he can continue.  We escort him back to the matatu stand and get him on a vehicle to take him back home.  He phones me to tell me he safely arrives and thanks me for helping.