Day 3: Hardcore work begins...

After another night of terrential rain we had the usual morning ritual for showers...I say showers, we each have a large bucket of hot water (or moshi moto) where we can wash our selves down with in the shower room - basically a toilet cubical size room with hole in the ground which acts as the drain...these are only different from the toilets in that the "toilets" have squat pans embedded in the floor and the "sewage" pipes run deep in to the ground rather than just letting it all flood into the ground...seriously - they are quite hygenic..for squat toilets.... On that note, many of us have still not been to the toilet (as in a number 2)...some of the boys have given in and used the squats but the girls seem to be holding off until Saturday night when we get to spend a night in a hotel in the town of Arusha for the dream of a normal sit-down toilet.


I was last to have a shower today but even so the feeling of being "clean" or "cleaner" has never felt so good...it really perks you up for the day in a way that I never thought I would appreciate to much when at home a hot shower is never more than the turn of a dial away.

We had a nother amazingly prepared breakfast of porridge (that was a bit of a like/hate moment - with me being on the hate side) followed by lovely fresh fruit and then eggy bread and sausages...just what we need to get the day started.

By the the time we started work at 9:00am, the sun had burned most of the cloud away and it was already in the 30Cs.

We had another amazingly sucessful day today managing to get the first 2 classrooms that we started yesterday competely finished (apart from the blackboard and the paint around the borders which we'll do tomorrow). We also managed to get what was the breakfast room, stripped, dusted, 2 coats of primer, 2 coats of gloss and most of the windows painted...a really successful acheivement - we are already way ahead of where Child Reach thought we'd be.

Late afternoon once work was finished for the day was very eventful. Whilst waiting for the shower room to be free we spent a large part of the afternoon playing with the kids. We tought them the hokey cokey which they absolutely loved (around 300 kids and us volunteers all hokey cokeying!! Fantasic!! The kids were fighhting over who gets to stand next to us in the circle). This was second to head, sholders, knees and toes which was a very popular request. Harry and Katie took centre stage and ttok pride in teaching the children the macarana to which they picked up extremely quickely and continue to hum the tune throughout the evening!! Freddie and Katie also tought the children the game of "What's the time Mr Wolf, again very popular!!

After all the fun and games (we were exhausted) but were then taken on a trek by one of our guides (Raymond) to see what I believe must be one of the nicest sights tanzania has to offer...so far. We set off around 17:30 grabbing some beers on the way from the local pub (a half fallen down wooden shack, manned by the locals). Beer has to be brought up by motorbike from the nearsest town which is about 10km away and you'd be amazed how they make it in one piece with the beers literally strapped onto these pizzahut like bikes with string..Anyway, we trekked high up into the hills for around 30mins to the most amazing viweing point. You could see for miles right over into kenya!! It was absoltuely stunning, words cannot describe!! Our guide (Raymond) suprised us with choclate (what a luxury!!) and buscuits and we cracked open our beers and took in the view!! Incredible!!

As sun set we went back to base collecting a few more beers on the way ans sat round the campfire to enjoy a strange concocktion of cucumber soup (yummy) followed by pancakes and mincemeat (which was not quite the shrove tuesday experience!!). Elvis one of our chlreach reps on asite then began some campfire games which evoked many others oin the group to share their campfire games, brainteasers and childhood once past before hitting the hay. Most of us disapearing off to bed by around 21:00 as we were so worn out from the hard days work (a few people including me were also feeling a little poorly! Too much campfire smoke maybe?!)