Mti Mmoja tena

Those tanks at Mti Mmoja still haunt me! I have seen a comment made by nkonina on my original post. I am very glad someone from Mti Mmoja has read it. I don't know him, but he is my friend. I did not find a contact for him so through here - Salaam bwana, je labda wako watu wanatukumbuka - Misitu ni uhai - Mti Mmoja juu!
It is very difficult to find funds for projects these days - and I am still looking. Maybe someone will read this and start something - maybe.

Mti Mmoja was another school were we were able to bring the Primary School Assistance Project.
We had carried out our environmental project the success of which was tempered by the lack of water. This is why we did not supply very many trees to the school - we did not want to burden the kids with the extra task of finding water.
The school building was reasonably new, but there was a lack of resources so through the project were were able to supply desks, teachers tables and chairs, text books and cupboards to store them in.
I do not remember the name of the woman who was Headteacher (I see her still wearing her green woolen sweater) but I found her grateful on behalf of the students. I hope her students remember her with gratitude.
The area is proudly Maasai and I remember one teacher complaining that the students , especially boys, tended to be 'stubborn' and refused to learn. This seems to be one of those things that will occur. That person, I could tell, will not have been Maasai because I understood, each tribe has a certain opinion of another tribe. But I do think it is good that teachers serve outside their tribal areas because that's where understanding begins.

The special place I have in my heart for Mti Mmoja though is because I visited there with the General Secretary of DME and he saw me give a mixture of chili water to the school to help trees survive against termite attack. He saw the work we were doing there and asked if I would help his organization for a year. Well it ended up being five!
Mti Mmoja juu!

Meserani Chini

The events at Meserani Chini taught me a valuable lesson.
I was not really involved with the Primary School Assistance Project at Meserani Chini as it was a school allocated to another vol, Duck.

He was based at Monduli and had no transport, therefore could not supervise the project. Instead he handed the funds to the Monduli Regional Education Office for them to administer. Duck was fully in support of the project, he just lacked the tools manage it.

So I was asked to supervise the project from time to time, which was a task I did not mind, but could have done without.
The project went well and I had no real concerns except that part of the project in this case was to plaster the floor. Fair enough, it was in a really sorry state. My concern was that they were not 'plastering' the floor, rather, they were relaying a concrete floor about 100cm thick. I agreed that it was necessary but thought they would run out of cement, which they did. Duck's budget had been spent leaving the classroom floor half completed. I made a small application for more funds and was successful so the floor was eventually completed. There were minor concerns mainly over terminology - plastering vs concreting, but that sorted ok.

The other 'unusual' part of the project was rainwater harvesting.
There was indeed a need for rainwater harvesting but the project had not attempted it before and I was very interested in the concept.
Boards had been used for spouting and a small tank had been built and I thought the setup was very well done.
I found that there was no water source within the village and water was brought in by tractor and sold for Tsh100 per 20litre bucket. Very expensive for the local Maasai.
Naturally after the first rains, I made it my business to call there to see if the tank was holding the water. The Headteacher was very stressed and wanted the tank taken away.
Providing a small amount of free water had upset the internal balance of the village. It was never expressed who should benefit from the water. The teachers thought is for them, the parents thought it was for the students, who could take water home home. Then there were the thieves at night. So the Headteacher put a lock on the tap but that only caused extra bad feeling within the village.
I called in the Mtendaje - the village executive officer, and suggested that the situation be settle in one way or another. He immediately called a village meeting , chaired by the village chairman, and a few were able to come at short notice. Then he passed the buck on to me! It was not my fight!
So I simply told the meeting that the amount of water was small and if every household recieved one bucket, the tank would be empty in a day. They all agreed.
For the sake of keeping the tank in working order, there should be water in the tank for as long as possible with some remaining constantly. The water should therefore be for the use of the teachers - equally - as teachers need to be attracted to hard, rural areas and with no water, there may well be no teachers.
The meeting fully agreed with that and peace returned to the village.

The lesson: People need to understand the terms of aid/assistance fully before work begins or goods are supplied. By taking the power away from people it insults their intelligence and nobody can be expected to accept that.
Keep the consultation process going! Always.

The Female of the Species

I had a background in the Scouting movement, but here I do not refer to Kipling's poem - I never was into poetry. Silly rhymes? Well maybe.
Before Ian Flemming wrote about James Bond, I enjoyed Bulldog Drummond by Sapper and one of those works was titled, 'The Female of the Species'.

There are loads of myths and assumptions about life in Africa and sometimes I have been astounded how even locals or so called 'professionals' can fail to grasp the truth - if truth actually exists.

So many times I have heard it said that African men are lazy and spend all their time talking, while their women do all the work. This is a massive generalization and sure there is truth in the statement. But I have seen some really hard working men.

There is one agency I know about that deals in water projects but only when the administration is carried out by women or women's groups. I must say that I smile at such suggestions because it assumes that women somehow are not corrupt.
Such a suggestion is foolish because corruption rears it nasty little head wherever there is a perception that somehow there is an advantage to somebody - usually finanicial.

The water to our Makumira house and nursery was fed by a scheme that took water from a spring high on Mt Meru and ended at the Makumira Secondary School. The scheme was wrought with problems and we raised money to make extensive repair to ensure water for the school and the nursery. Why were there problems?
A local women's group was granted a very large amount of money by a US aid agency to carry out the project. The leadership of the group bought themselves Landrovers and other things before the village people had access to any water. The project was carried out as cheaply as possible using inferior materials. The scheme was barely working and part of the line supplied Nkoaranga Hospital!
The thing is temptation relates not to gender nor to the affluence of a person, it is only that the poor are tempted by less that than the rich - but even that doesn't always apply either.

I do not want to back away from 'The Female of the Species' theme.
I have seen that sometimes expats who volunteer, visit, live or work in Africa have somehow a hidden agenda. Perhaps not an agenda, maybe it is simply how they are. I really don't know, but I have seen some strange things.
Watch how some young women enjoy to be hassled by touts selling souvenirs and beating them down in price. Even boss them to about. Enjoying some euphoria.
But that's not what I'm on about here - my work in Tanzania was somewhat constrained by the actions of certain women. Without judgment, this is what happened, a history if you like - I give them all my Swahili names. I do not wish to unkind here, just report some of what actually happened and how it effected me.

Mama Malkia had been a Field Rep for the Agency during which time she developed a close friendship with Big E [now my boss]. She had taught him how to apply for donor aid and encouraged him to form his own NGO. Big E accompanied her on field trips, providing advice and, I guess, security. The need for security is real, but in reality, she had taken on a job that involved traveling and being alone.
Mama Baraka told me much more about what she had seen and it became well known what was happening.
Now the reason my job had been re-advertised was because the guy who had been appointed heard of the relationship between Mama Malkia and Big E judging there to be certain risks. Nobody told me of this.
There was a delay in Big E accepting my appointment and Mama Baraka told me that Big E had used all the funds supplied for my assignment and had not prepared our accommodation.
Once we were on site and into our assignment, I found there was indeed no money and I had to make application for funds to carry out our work.
Big E even told me that he had seen that volunteers caused a problems for NGO's and he only accepted us because he found that he couldn't get out of it.
Mama Malkia knew that Big E was spending donated funds inappropriately but accepted it like some accept a favorite puppy peeing on the carpet - a tut tut, nothing more.

The case of Mama Mwuguzi was more tragic and did not actually affect my assignment but it did indirectly affect the Agency relationship, therefore mine, with my employer, DME.
Mama Mwuguzi arrived with her husband who was unassigned. She was to take up a position at Nkoaranga Hospital and was accommodated in a house not too far away from where we lived.
What often happens is that people get a fixed idea of what things will be like, even though they are correctly briefed. This couple, I have no doubt were told that they would have no vehicle and that they would be close to amenities.
These people were 'older' and access out was a walk of perhaps 15 min and to them, they were remote. There was no phone, water was unreliable and of course there was some difficulty carrying stores. They needed to use public transport, meaning the daladala and they were not used to that at all. Sure transport was provided to the hospital, but that was all.
The husband quickly caught a stomach bug which he was unable to throw off and Mama Mwuguzi worried about him - rather, she fretted for him. Because I had a vehicle, I helped them out and regularly called on them as well as helping with the transport of food. But doing this made me late for my appointments.
Mama Mwuguzi confronted Jo in a hostile way and accused the Agency of not supporting them as well as not giving proper details about their living conditions. I could see her real stress.
In the end they pulled out of the assignment and returned home. Poor woman died of cancer within the year.

Mo & Jo were replaced by Baba & Mama Rubani.
This placement ended in tragedy also which caused an impact in my work again and in my relationship with the Agency and DME.
Mama Rubani was actually the Field Rep and Baba Rubani was 'an accompanying partner' so did not have real authority. But of course he did by influencing his wife. They did not welcome vols to their home the way Mo & Jo did and they were generally cool towards us all.
I have no really issue with this partnership but they had an entirely different view of providing donor funding to what we had developed - the ideas generally came from Baba Rubani. He did not believe that text books were necessary in schools. He believed that funds be given to the targeted beneficiaries in a lump sum 'to be used as they see fit - they get one bite of the cherry and if they blow it, it is their problem'. The theory of that is ok but in practice the funds are abused.
Ralph Naylor our old forestry mentor instilled into us that the money available to us as public servants was the taxpayers and our job was to spend it as effectively as possible - it was our duty. I adhere to that principle even today.
We were in the middle of the Primary Schools Assistance Project and this pair believed it to be a distraction from their work and wanted shot of it. Their way was to spend or distribute the funds as quickly as possible.
The good thing is the Rubani's employed a local woman as Administrator - Mama Tabasamu was to have a checkered career which ended well.
I was so embarrassed when I invited them to a function put on for us by Nkoaranga Primary School to thank us for the school decks etc that was provided. Baba Rubani was offered a soda, and took a bottle of Coke but quickly returned it stating out aloud that Coca Cola is no good unless it is cold! There was no fridge miles!
Out of the blue, at least to us, the Rubani's resigned. There had been tension with the Agency and I acknowledge that parties are not always compatible.
Tragedy struck when Baba Rubani was killed when the light plane he was flying ploughed into Monduli Mountain. This was a really difficult time complicated by the fact that flying aircraft was outside the terms of agreement of the Agency's insurers.

Enter Mama Mbembe.
We had stayed a night with Mama Mbembe in Zimbabwe when she told us of her wish to become a vol in Tanzania.
She was well connected and knew a few important people. She was married to a diplomat of sorts for a time living with him in Ethiopia. This may or may not have a bearing on what happened.
Anyway, it eventuated that she turned up at DME as a fish farm adviser by reputation rather than merit because she had no experience in fish farming.
She lived in the DME house where Mama Mwuguzi had lived and earlier the other troublesome Kiwi couple who had worked as fish farm advisers and left early under a cloud.
I was busy with my own assignment and coping with the Rubani's but took time to be friendly to and welcome Mama Mbembe.
The first I knew of trouble when my friend and the person I answered to, the General Secretary of DME told me of problems he was having with Mama Mbembe. She would not go out into the target villages with her co-worker Enoch and instead was 'flitting around the Northern outskirts of Arusha'. The General Secretary showed me a letter from Dr. Sudi stating that she was totally uncooperative in the fish farming project - a copy was sent to the Agency. At another meeting he told me that he had asked her for suggestions for a certain complex that DME were to build but her response was a Marae style (Maori meeting house), which is actually inappropriate in Tanzania as mixed sexes could not sleep in such a way - but Mama Mbembe was insistent. I was asked 'to sort her out as we come from the same country'.
Mama Mbembe complained about her accommodation being unsafe (but DME had two night guards posted there each night) and she came to me saying she had heard gun shots closeby. I sent Mbise down there to investigate and I joined him. Our conclusion was that the sound was whips boys used to scare birds from rice and maize crops.
Never the less this caused her to be allowed (by Mama Rubani) to move into rented accommodation in Arusha costing the DME Fish Farm Project USD 250.00 per month! Totally outside their budget.

Well now, there came an Agency conference and the Africa Programme Manager, Mama Mhindi came out to take part. The General Secretary of DME told Mama Mhindi exactly the problems he faced with Mama Mbembe and it turned out that Mama Mbembe had done nothing toward her assignment in the six months she had been there. This meant a directive from Mama Mhindi that both Mama Mbembe and I were to meet monthly with the General Secretary to discuss what had been done and what was to be done. Well Mama Mbembe did not like the General Secretary so did not meet him - I did but that was usual anyway and he just preferred me to get on with my work.
When the Rubani's decided to resign, (and I suspect this was talked about at conference) Mama Mhindi was going to appoint Mama Mbembe as Field Rep. The grapevine whispered the news of this intention to me and I was horrified to think of the result - for the sake of vols, the partner organizations and the Agency.
My response was to throw my hat into the ring and apply for the job. I did not actually want the job as I preferred what I was doing, but I thought that I would force an open selection.
It did and many very good people applied. The Agency telephone was down so we had to go to Mama Mbembe's house for a telephone interview. With her in the next room!
It was down to the pair of us and Mama Mhindi and a sidekick came to interview us for the second time. Mama Mbembe was selected - what a process to go through for that outcome!
After the death of Baba Rubani and the takeover the Agency's error of judgment came to fruition fully. Mama Mbembe became offside to all the vols, the partner organizations and was discrediting the Agency by her actions. I don't need to go into the gory details but the effect on my reputation was that she told the Agency that I was unhappy with my Toyota truck so sold it cheaply to the Tanzanian fellow she had taken up with this left me with a dunger of a Landrover. He arranged for Agency vehicle repairs and she grossly overpaid him - even he was embarrassed! I caught them once and then after the next repair, as I drove down our road, the tie-rod end popped off leaving me with no steering! A different result if I had been going 100kph!
There was an accusation that Mama Tabasamu had stolen Tsh 400 000 /- in fact Mama Mbembe loaned it to her boyfriend to retrieve a vehicle from one of the National Parks! It was repaid. But poor old Mama Tabasamu was treated somewhat as the colonialist would have treated her.
Just one other: Of course Mama Mbembe was somewhat antagonistic to DME and particularly the General Secretary. I had written up a funding proposal so that DME could continue the environmental project after I had returned to NZ. I ran it past Mama Mbembe, as was protocol, but I could see that she was not going to support it.
Well a short time after, A Big Noise (my term for someone in authority) was to pay us a visit and a function was arranged to meet him. I managed to corner him and discuss the proposal to him. Mama Mbembe was livid!
That night in her words 'He and I drank and danced until the wee small hours'. And the funding was never approved.
Generally though I was very busy - I had my assignment, the Primary Schools Assistance Project, building Valeska Primary School (a special project), building Mama Upendo's house and building Mbise's house - oh there was the food assistance as well. I still had a lot to do with Mama Mbembe and bits will emerge as we go.
There is much more but I have to say in my last days of those assignments, she helped us with our departure. However the Agency finally realised the problem/damage she cause and paid her to walk away. What a disaster!

We had two years back in New Zealand and responding to a call from DME I again accepted another assignment with them.
The Field Rep by then was one, Mama Viazi and she was pushing hard for me to change my assignment from DME to an outfit in Mbulu. I had 'unfinished business' at DME and so refused the Mbulu invitation.
I could tell from Mama Viazi's emails that she was not too pleased about that outcome.
Being an old hand at the 'game' I wrote up a funding proposal for DME to send off to the new NZ funding body, and I spoke to them by phone. They intimated they were happy to continue support of DME and thought the project worthwhile. My reason for doing this was to make sure there were funds available when we arrived - remember Hifadhi?
When I arrived at DME the new General Secretary - who I already knew to be a fine fellow - told me of a huge argument they had with Mama Viazi. She had tried to have them accept another vol instead of me, but the DME told her that if they could not have me, then they don't want anyone! Mama Viazi tried for them to have nobody!
Don't blame DME - and I am not big headed about this. They had had the fish farmers - they were big trouble to DME and to the Agency; they had Mama Mwuguzi and her husband; who had left early; they had the Tongans - who complained about the night guards, the lack of water and had received complaints about walking around the village without a shirt and carrying a huge knife (plus other issues) and then they had Mama Mbembe who had treated them so poorly. We were the only NZers who had not caused trouble! Any wonder that they did not want to experiment with others!
Mama Viazi was none too happy when she found out that we had already applied for project funding! The thing was: if I had applied, it should have gone through her. But in fact, DME had the right to apply independently and after the argument, they were not going to tell her anything! All I had done was write up the proposal for them to present.
Mama Tabasamu manned the Arusha office and Mama Viazi's office was in Pretoria, so she popped down to the funding agency and 'threw a spanner in the works' for our funding!
With no funding, we could not operate so I had two choices - sit and do nothing or return to NZ. I took the third option which was to fund the project myself, from personal resources in the hope that funding would come through. There was a high risk and I had to be prepared for the funding not to come through.
I had the Landrover to fuel, I employed Upendo (but did not pay her until the funds eventually came through), I bought the nursery materials and managed to run the environmental project.
The Agency Africa Programme manager had been replaced and he was more realistic in his approach. He made changes that saw Mama Tabasamu become Tanzania Field Rep and after a full year the funding was granted to DME and they repaid me in full.

Ngarash Primary School, Monduli

Ngarash Primary School is situated just a little outside what I would call the Monduli town boundary. The school was obviously under resourced and had a growing roll.

We visited the school early in our assignment so we had not yet formalised just how we would go about our environmental programme. Simply we called on the school and Joshia offered trees for the school to plant. The Headteacher thought there was indeed a need for trees around the school, so he agreed to plant and care for any trees we might bring to the school.

By the time of our next visit, we were more prepared with our 'system' in place, but because I was not yet confident with my Kiswahili, Joshia took most of the seminar and read 'Ndoto ya Grace'. As usual, we were not able to address just the senior part of the school, all of the kids wanted to participate. He instructed the kids to prepare planting holes and we would bring trees in four weeks time.
On the appointed day we took the Maruti loaded with trees to the school - a selection of mixed species and spent the day planting them with the students.

As the Primary Schools Assistance Project was now in gear, we arranged to meet the Monduli Village Executive Officer (Mtendaje) so the village government/leaders were in the picture as to what we were proposing to do.
The school head teacher had heard we were coming and was waiting for us - expecting a handful of money. He particularly wanted a new office built for himself.
Here we were again; I found using the Assistance Project to be a good lever for the Environment Project and it proved so again.

We were to supply 100 school desks, 5 teachers tables & chairs, 2 cupboards to house the text books - enough for the senior part of the school and some junior books as well, teachers (instruction) copies, slates and chalk for new entrants, and blackboard paint.

I had on board some 174 Guava trees to be planted out because of a request from the deputy headteacher to provide vitamin C for the whole village population.
Our followup revealed that the trees were not thriving too well because of the fierce sun and lack of water. We certainly understood about the lack of water but called the school together and allocated one tree to each pupil to care for. We announced there would be a competition for the best tree shelter - to provide shade as well as protection from livestock. I would give a prize for the best shelter and later another for the best tree.

On our next visit (Sept 10) all the Assistance Project Material had arrived and was stored - the teachers and students were happy and grateful.
I could see that work was going on in the Guava orchard, but this day we were inspecting the plantings behind the school. There were, as expected, varying results but overall I was pleased. I had bought some pencils and exercise books for the best three trees. There were as always some kids who's trees were dead so they put a green twig in the planting hole to fool me - it didn't, but I was well aware that not all trees handed out were equal and failure could not always be put down to poor care. However the best ten trees could not be separated so Joshia called what he thought was fair to represent the best five and we gave them a pencil and exercise book each.
'This is not enough!' I muttered to Joshia, and he, in agreement said the next lot of prizewinners could 'feel the hand of an mzungu' - white man. That is, shake my hand. But I remembered I had bought some avocados at the market, so distributed those until we ran out. But the kids did in fact enjoy shaking my hand.

A week later I was astounded when we returned to find 174 tree shelters covering the Guava trees - all immaculate and well built, each with the name of the student; remembering there were few materials and no money for resources. I had no idea how we were going to choose the best - I had brought prizes for ten this time - bits I had gathered up while at the market - enamel mugs, combs, toothbrushes.
We made our choice after much deliberation (making a show of it for them to see) and presented the prizes.

After our project was completed and we moved to Makumira and the Lutheran Diocese, but I went back to Monduli to deliver Upendo to secondary school, so I took the opportunity to return to Ngarash.
The woman who had been the deputy Headteacher was now Headteacher and she immediately recognised me and slow hand-clapped chanting 'Babu, Babu, Babu!' (Grandfather) - until the whole school had come outside to join her in her chant. I more than was a little overwhelmed at this and even though my Kiswahili was good now - I was lost for words.

Some of the Guava trees had been removed to make way for the expansion of the school - a new classroom, but the kids were eating the fruit, I saw some of them! Now that's a good outcome!

Monduli - a small scale nursery.

I have previously mentioned Mama Furahi, who we met through one of the Agency vols who lived close by her and was friends with her.

Mama Furahi had the sharpness of her clan and she soon became aware that we had some resources at our disposal and that we assisted with various projects. It did not take her long to ask us to help her 'group' with a tree nursery project. It is/was common that assistance for small project meant that the funds would be handed over and the project generally fizzled out because the funds were somehow 'eaten'. Another Swahili term.
Mama Furahi did not know then that she would never be given cash money for her project, but if we were to assist - then materials only would be donated. This was general policy for our projects, though I had developed a cynic button in my brain that self activated - and it had clicked into gear on its own.

I asked to meet this group of women and to lure them, I told Mama Furahi that perhaps I could provide some help. I had the feeling that the 'group' was hastily thrown together, but I considered that did not really matter. They were made up mainly of women from the College compound, with one or two exceptions. While I had my suspicions about the motives of the group, what made me decide to help was Mama Sudi. She lived with her children and cared for her father who was a frail centurion on their small subsistence farm. They were very poor and I judged that she would probably carry out the bulk of the work, but her needs and enthusiasm would keep the other members honest.
I had planned that I would give a notebook to Mama Sudito record the hours each member put into the project, then when the young trees were allocated (or sold) the divvy would be based on the proportion each had put into the project. At a meeting I drew up an agreement and all members understood and signed it. I worked out well.

A friend in New Zealand belonged to to an altruistic club which wanted to donate a small amount of money to a worthwhile project and with these funds we donated the nursery equipment to the group and I supplies the tree seed - the chairperson signed for materials on behalf of the group.

I gave the group a seminar on how to operate a small tree nursery and I warned them that they would face problems because of the summer water shortage - therefore, grow only the number that can be properly cared for. I saw that most were at least interested but I guessed a couple of the women would drop out fairly quickly once the work began. And that did happen!

To her credit Mama Furahi did her fair share of the work and together with Mama Sudi, a good number of seedlings was produced they did not really thrive well within the walled yard of Mama Furahi's house, but I suspect that was because she had enlisted her daughters to do most of the watering.
Once her new house was built, Mama Furahi assured me that the trees would thrive much better, but as I saw the house slowly growing, I was sure that her time would be concentrated on her house rather than the group project. There was another problem in the back of my mind - security. What was to stop the trees being stolen from her new, unfenced yard. Oh yes of course she asked for assistance to erect an enclosure - I declined.

So when Mama Faraja changed houses, I advised the group that the trees should be divvied up and that was agreed to. Mama Furahi and the members from the College compound used all their trees around their properties but Mama Sudi sold her share 'to buy soap and sugar'. The term for household needs.

Once the house was finished, Mama Furahi did manage to surround it with a post and barbed wire fence and for two further seasons the group, now a trio carried on with the tree nursery. I donated further polythene tubing and seed - it would have been nice had the group set aside funds for this, but hey, I was there to help. I was assured the nursery would keep going, but I never returned there. I hope it is - I will ask one of my friends. Was the project worthwhile? In my opinion, it sure was!