Have you ever driven a car in a country where they drive on the left side of the road? It is not just that they drive on the left side of the road, you shift gears with the left hand, the steering wheel is on the right side of the car, and the turn signal lever is on the right side of the steering wheel. To make a left turn you push up on the right-hand side lever. Until I got used to thinking upside down and backwards, whenever I wanted to make a left turn, the windshield wipers would come on.

In Tanzania one drives on dusty, rocky, dirt roads while occasionally dodging donkeys, goats, cows, bicyclists, and children. The countryside is SO beautiful. I love these drives into the country.

Yesterday, Happy and I drove one hour from town to visit two secondary schools. We are looking at other schools and meeting headmasters to determine the sites of our installations in 2012. Of course every school is eager to have computers. We are warmly welcomed wherever we go.

Our five-month Technology Tent training session begins June 6. We have 18 computers and 28 applicants. How do we choose? Albin, our Country Director; Justine, the Banjika headmaster; Mr. Tonde, the Welwel headmaster; and Peter, the computer teacher decided to conduct interviews. I sat in the background and kept silent.

Twenty applicants showed up for the interview. Each applicant stood in front of the panel and was questioned about their commitment, ambition, desire to teach technology to others, and computer experience. A few were so fearful they could hardly speak. It was too heartbreaking to me to reject two applicants so we decided to accept all 20. Some computers will be shared. We will see how many participants show up on Monday morning, June 6 with their $25 contribution to begin the program.

Today I am visiting other secondary schools in the Karatu district. We are installing a solar energy system and computers at two more schools in October 2011. One school will be Welwel and the other is still to be determined. I met with Mr. Mbwambo, the Karatu District Education Officer and we compiled a list of 10 secondary schools in the district which he thought would be good candidates for installations in 2012.

Stay tuned.
  

I wonder why some computers are working and some are not 🙂

Powering Potential has a very dedicated group of people working with it. The computer guys are striving diligently to solve our software problems. It is such a relief to me to have such knowledgeable, committed people involved with Powering Potential. I also hired Happy Mashinga, a former Banjika graduate, to help us. On Saturday she helped set up student accounts on the computers, test all the mouses (is it mouses or mice?), accurately set the date and time, and we taught her the proper way to turn on and off the solar energy system. When Albin is in Dar es Salaam and I am in New York, she will be on-site to help. She lives a short distance from the school.

Happy has a lot of potential to power.
  

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can;
And wisdom to know the difference.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can;
And wisdom to know the difference.

That has been my mantra the past few days 🙂
 

I left my Manhattan home at 2:30pm Thursday, May 19, and 24 hours later was checking into a hotel in Arusha, Tanzania (9:30pm Tanzania time).

This morning I am meeting with Albin, Powering Potential’s Country Director and Rogers, our vendor in Tanzania who is helping with the computer installation. We will work out the final details of the installation plan. The computers have already arrived and the monitors are arriving tonight.

Our long evolving plans are finally coming to fruition….I wonder what wonders await us.

JRO – Kilimanjaro airport in Arusha, Tanzania.

Am waiting to check in at the airport and then off I go….home on Dec. 20.

I feel like I’ve been here for 10 months not 10 days 🙂

I had several meetings with Tanzanian government officials and they are paving the way forward for us. Also Hamisi, the head of Ensol which is the solar company we use, came to Banjika to see the solar system. We worked out a design that will serve the school’s needs and be very efficient.

Also met with these people to discuss our future projects:

• Mason – our solar-aid.org consultant
• Mtituh – a tech guy from Dar who has been very helpful
• Mercy, Noel, Tina, Wantay, and Dr. Taylor – representatives from NGOs (non-government organizations) working in Tanzania. I’m learning from their experiences.
• Sirili, Emanuel and Happy – former Banjika students who I am considering as future Technology Tent trainers.

Justine, the headmaster, and I worked out a design for the computer lab….where to place all the new computers that are coming. And Rogers, our tech guy here, was at Banjika yesterday and today to fix a few problems.

I had a chance to observe Meshack teaching The Technology Tent. I’m amazed at how much the students have learned. I took some videos of the class and will get them up online to share.

The counter clerk just arrived….I better go and check in.

Stay tuned…

This is the certificate which the U.S. Ambassador to Tanzania presented to me and Justin Joseph, the headmaster at Banjika, at the Embassy’s Check Presentation Ceremony yesterday.

It says:

“U.S. Embassy Dar es Salaam 
U.S. Ambassador’s
Self Help Grant Award
The United States Embassy has awarded
Tsh 8,600,000 to Powering Potential
to upgrade the solar power system at Banjika Secondary
School. Congratulations and thank you for helping to bring electronic information technology to rural schools.“

It is also signed by Ambassador Alfonso E. Lenhardt.

Justine and I had an official photo taken with the Ambassador and there was a group photo of the grantees. We will get those photos in March.

l to r: Albin, Janice, Justin

The Embassy forbids guests from bringing cameras on the grounds so we had this photos taken after we got back to the hotel. A very exciting day and an historic one for Powering Potential!

The excitement is starting early.

I’ve been invited to a party tonight. A friend’s mother is a Tanzanian politician who was recently appointed Deputy Minister for one of the Ministries. The family is celebrating her new status with the government and also her birthday. This party will be a taste of Tanzanian high society. I need to get home early though because:

Tomorrow at 9am the Check Presentation Ceremony with the Ambassador begins at the U.S. Embassy. I got a call on Friday from a Tanzanian journalist who wants to interview me 🙂 He told me, “This ceremony is a BIG deal.”

The Karatu District Education Officer called. We are meeting next Friday to work out details for future projects. He is very eager to continue supporting our work. He assured me that the computer teacher for Banjika will begin work in January at the start of the new school year. He is honored that the U.S. Embassy is giving money for a project at a school in his district and he is covering the costs for the headmaster to attend the ceremony.

I also spoke with Mr. Kalinga from the Ministry of Education and had a long meeting with Albin, Powering Potential’s representative in Tanzania.

Stay tuned….

I’m back

home

in Manhattan….

paved roads
flush toilets
reliable electricity
hot showers with heavy water pressure
English as a native language
people who “go with time” rushing around….

I miss Tanzania  🙂

In Swahili there is: mji (town), kijiji (village), and porini (bush).

The Monduli school was definitely in the porini. I’m now in Dar es Salaam – mji mkubwa (big town). I arrived yesterday – back from the bush – and am leaving for the airport in 1/2 hour to return to New York.

I had two meetings in Dar today, one with our new-found solar expert and one at the US Embassy again.

It’s been a most fruitful time here in Tanzania and I’m returning home eager to raise money and add 15 computers at Banjika. In my meeting with the Karatu District Education Officer he agreed to assign a computer teacher to the school, which is a huge step forward, and if they get more computers they can apply to the Ministry of Education to offer Computer Studies as part of their curriculum. We would like to give the headmaster his own computer, put one computer in the teachers’ staff room, and have 20 computers for the students.

I spoke to Sirili today, a Banjika Form Four student, and he was SO excited because he had been using the Internet at school yesterday. We also found some fantastic educational material which includes the Khan Academy learning videos – Bill Gates uses them to teach his children – the material is stored locally on the server at the school so it will be easy for them to access.

Time to leave for the airport…..I’ll be home the afternoon of Oct. 6. Thank you all for your interest in the story of Powering Potential  🙂