Even though we'd only been on our GIVE program for 8 days, we were blessed to be a part of a project that was over four years in the making!
As we were putting some final touches on the school, musicians and local community members began to arrive to celebrate the opening of Skuli Ya Kairo Give. The GIVE program had been working on the school for over four years, and it was the day that Nursery Schools Level 1 and 2 plus Primary Schools Levels 1 and 2 were set to open. The excitement in the air was electric, and the more that you looked around, you couldn't help but grin from ear to ear!
As the festivities commenced, the musicians began a dance circle. It was a small group of musicians with homemade instruments, from skins stretched over the drums to maracas made from cans filled with beans or stones. But, the lack of professional instruments didn't stop the music from being amazing. The energy filled the air as more young men and children began to dance around them.
After the community elders began to arrive, we all moved to watch the opening ceremony. From a picture, it looked simple enough. An old, red paint tarp stretched between the trees to provide shade, student desks moved outside to providing seating for the community elders, no microphones, and a few hundred people causally sitting around on the rock-coral ground. What a picture can't capture is the joy in everyone's hearts. It can't capture that some of these children had never been to school before. It can capture the fact that this moment is literally changing hundreds of lives.
Though most of the ceremony was in Swahili, the message didn't get lost in translation. The community is happy to have GIVE be a part of it. The community is getting better because we are all working as one. Tupo Pamoja. (We are together). A school provides an opportunity that will change generations to come. GIVE needs the community support to make an impact. And that together, we can help educate these children and be the roots of change. During the ceremony, both community elders and leaders of GIVE spoke. Each one pulled at your heartstrings, because it was evident how much everyone had joined together to reach this very moment.
And the last ceremonial moment, which could not have been more fitting was the "ribbon cutting ceremony". It was done by one of the children of the village who will attend the school. "Ribbon cutting ceremony" may be a loose description, as it wasn't truly a ribbon, but a piece of string which was tied around the front of the building to signify no one should go in the classrooms yet. It was cut by a little girl, with possibly the dullest scissors, but it proved that together, with hard work and a little patience, we can open a school!
This is just the beginning. One new primary school classroom will be opening each year, then upper levels classrooms next. GIVE and the community of Kairo are continuing to move forward and work together as one.
Tupo Pamoja!
Check out that packed "school bus" ... So many kids, so excited to go to school!!
