Almost ready!

Almost ready!

Only a few days are left before school begins. Here in Central Africa the  official opening is September 16th.

We are also busy; cleaning the classrooms, painting, and other various repairs. Everything must be ready for more than 1,500 students who, between kindergarten, elementary, middle and high school, begin class Monday.

 In some classrooms, thanks to the help of the Czech government, we are preparing some educational frescos, which are used to invoke the students allowing them to converse, explain and count.

Meanwhile, parish activities are also approaching their start. For a couple of weeks we will have a seminarian from the diocese, who will stay with us for an internship lasting a year. I entrusted him with liturgical training, which about seventy people from the parish attend.

A bit about the roads ... I managed to get to Bouar, which is where I am writing from . By now, in full rainy season, it is becoming more difficult to move and travel.

 

Formazione sulla liturgia
Formation sur la liturgie

Teachers in formation.3

Teachers in formation.3

 The opening of the school year is quickly approaching, and so the work in preparing teachers with a better understanding of pedagogy has quickened.

Teachers who are in large (very large) a majority of "parents": volunteers who make themselves available to the village as teachers, even if they are not officially. Young people and adults with barely a high school level (about third level). Just a few days ago I prepared a statistic, and in the Bozoum Prefecture, out of 354 schools, the "maitres parents" teachers are over 85%. With an average of 100 students per teacher.

It is therefore essential to provide teachers with the pedagogical tools to teach to the best of their ability. After training with SIRIRI's friends, another 100 teachers are at work in Bozoum from Monday, thanks to funding from UNICEF.

Wednesday afternoon I left for Bouar. At the 14 km mark I stopped in the village of Bokongo, where we intend to build a small church. In 2011 we built the school, and now it's time to take a step forward. In the village there is a small chapel in earth and straw, and thanks to the help of a friend, an Italian priest, we will build a 15 meter chapel on 7.

After choosing the place and taking the measurements, the journey continues. But it's raining, raining and still raining. The roads, already very shabby, do not stand up to the rain and to the many trucks that pass in convoy. Once in Baoro (175 km from Bozoum) we have to stop: the road is blocked by bogged trucks. And we spent the night in our Mission, together with (many) other travellers: a Capuchin father and 2 nuns, we (there were 5 of us) and, late at night, other fathers from Bouar also arrived with the novices ... 'There is a bed and a bite to eat for everyone.’

Apertura della formazione degli insegnanti
Ouverture de la formation des enseignants

P.Matteo a Bokongo

Strade...
Routes...

Teachers in training.2

Teachers in training.2 

The two training sessions for elementary school teachers came to an end. Between here, Bozoum, and Bouar, more than 250 teachers worked for a week, morning and afternoon, together with 13 volunteers from the Prague NGO, SIRIRI.OPS. 

Six days of intense work, during which 24 Central African trainers helped teachers understand the "Learning by playing" method, and worked with them on reading, writing and arithmetic. 

It is interesting to see the passing of the baton among the trainers: 5 years ago, at the beginning, the trainers were all foreigners, while now they are all Central Africans. The volunteers of SIRIRI.OPS (from the Czech Republic and France) were able to motivate them, encourage them and support them during these days. 

The sessions ended on Saturday, and this allowed the 5 SIRIRI volunteers who had worked in Bouar to join us in Bozoum. 

On Sunday we prayed and thanked together during Mass, and in the afternoon we could not miss a visit to the rice fields. 

Sow, work, be patient, and hope for fruits ...

A spider web, a rainbow and orchids

.

..

A spider web, a rainbow and orchids 

Monday morning while on my way to school I saw a spider's web: a marvel of intelligence, a mixture of chemistry, physics and much more. 

I was going to visit the teachers training on the project "Learning by playing". A project conceived in the Czech Republic, which friends of the NGO SIRIRI have been carrying out for 5 years. It is a pedagogical method developed for elementary students to try to change a rather difficult situation: children learn what they can by heart, without much assistance of their teachers in terms of helping them actually understand, to develop reasoning that brings them to really learn. In addition to this, the program is done in French something that the students do not speak neither at school or at home it so the difficulties in actually learning this program are quite large.

There are benefits to the new program though; it tries to help children learn while having fun, and involves teaching in the national language (Sango). A simpler language, spoken and used every day. 

Thanks to this method, children are able to read and write in the first months of the first grade. A big difference with the traditional method, in which children take 2-3 years to stutter a little in French, without really understanding the rules and the mechanism. 

These days a group of volunteers from the Czech Republic and France are training more than 250 teachers (160 here in Bozoum and 90 in Bouar). Training is provided mainly by Central African teachers, with Czech volunteers providing safe support and guidance. 

That's why the spider web struck me: calm, method and patience, a small revolution is happening in Central African education. 

Low and behold the rainbow of yesterday (a double rainbow), calls for peace, of which school and teaching is one of the foundations. 

To top it all, these days orchids are blooming on the grounds of the Mission.

Work and festivities

Work and festivities

August, and it's raining! 

In Central Africa the month of August is the culmination of the rainy season. And even this year it is no different.

Last week, with Caritas, we distributed household goods (buckets, soap, etc.) for 400 Bozoum families. Within the same project, with the help of Misereor (German Caritas) and Cordaid (Dutch Caritas) we provided beds, mattresses and kitchen equipment for 38 families in situations of severe poverty. And with the help of the Lutheran World Federation we are building 11 homes for as many families. 

Sunday, after the celebration of 2 Masses, I left for Bangui. The purpose of this trip was mainly the participation in the meetings with our Provincial, Fr.Saverio, who was passing through Central Africa. We met with the other Carmelites who work in Central Africa in the communities of Baoro, Bouar (Yolé and St.Elie), Bozoum and Bangui. 

On Tuesday afternoon, 12 people from SIRIRI, the NGO of Prague, will arrive in Central Africa for 2 weeks, for teacher training on the method "Learning by playing": some come from the Czech Republic, others from France. 

We will leave with them on Wednesday morning to Bozoum. 

We arrived on August 15, the feast of the Assumption of Mary. 

As per tradition we celebrate the Mass in Doussa, a village 4 km from Bozoum, on the banks of the Ouham River, a few hundred meters from the yards of Chinese companies that extract gold. Some Christians from other nearby villages are also present.

Unfortunately, despite the publication of the river water analysis (which revealed the worrying presence of mercury) NO ONE moved, NO ONE took care to inform the population of the risk of contact and water use, NO ONE reacted . 

So at the end of the Mass, we made a small pilgrimage to the bridge over the river Ouham (built in 1943 by Italian soldiers taken prisoner by the British in Ethiopia!). We carried the statue of Our Lady: in our simple faith, we know that when NO ONE on earth listens to us, it is still her, the Mother, who does not forget about her weakest and most abandoned children. After having arrived on the bridge, we entrusted to her and to her Son the men who suffer and are at risk, the creation entrusted to us, the water that flows into the river.

Distribuzioni
Distributions

Concelebrazione della Messa al Carmel con p.Saverio
Concélébration au Carmel avec le p.Saverio

Messa a Doussa
Messe à Doussa

Benedizione del fiume Ouham
Bénédiction du fleuve Ouham

Formazione dei formatori
Formation des formmateurs