imagine a tellytubby singing about Satan: Last night's DVD speciale

Jessie:

factfile of our three weeks in Freetown:

number of deepfried sauasages eaten: 2

number of times we have been
reminded of our racial origin in a way
which would make Nick Griffin blush: 3740 (approx)

number of sewers fallen down: 1

number of people in our house who have had Malaria in the past week: 4

number of taxi drivers Christophan has told to 'fok ohf' on the way to school: 6

number of children I have considered doing a Madonna on and abducting: 76
 (all the students at Planting Promise, minus one toddler who screamed like a cold turkey crack fiend when I tried to stop him playing with a huge saw and a staple gun. The teachers gave me a look which read 'let the poor child be')

number of times we have been asked 'you like to soak?' after getting unexpectedly caught in the rain: 54

number of screaming domestics in our house at 2am: 1 (perhaps they've got used to us?)

Our time in the school is now over. The rains are drenching people on the streets of Freetown with fever, Class one now know the whole alphabet (up to e), and the amount of rice I ingest on a daily basis has now probably reached critical mass. A little girl followed us from the school the whole way across town after we said goodbye this morning to ask for our address. This caused some jealousy in the crowds around the atm as several middleaged men asked if they could also be our students.

Though we are sad to leave the school, the last few days have felt like an ending: summer school finishes today, and the students have two weeks holiday before term begins, Rocco is arriving tomorrow to continue his work developing Plantig Promise, and next week a group of girls from the London Business school will be starting work with the Adult Education Project.
I would love more than anything to be able to follow one our students through the next few years of his life, to see how he navigates the wheel of fortune that is life in Freetown: disease, the smart uniforms of Brass Bands proclaiming funerals, success, the raise nod of praise from a teacher, or smile of recognition from an older brother or sister, scrubbing up for church on sunday, playing football with a plastic bottle on the street, the battle to eat twice a day, get into secondary school and stay out of trouble...

We have a few ideas of ways we can continue to work with Planting Promise from the UK, so we'll keep you posted. We are off on a quest for the beach where they filmed the Bounty bar advert on monday!

Lots of love xxxxx