A Week in Okahandja

When last we left you we had just returned from our fantastic weekend at Ngonye Falls. Unfortunately, the following week was not quite as much fun for me (Fearghal). I was due to travel the next day to a 3-day workshop at NIED (the National Institute for Educational Development) in Okahandja - a whopping 1140km from Katima.

Once I’d written the blog below I gave the transport officer a ring to find out what transport had been arranged. In the course of the conversation I discovered firstly that the name I’ve been calling him all year is wrong (cringe), and that he had managed to acquire a “combi” to transport us to Okahandja which he then promptly delivered to the house. A combi is a small minibus type thing, which is very common out here and will sit about 15 without luggage.

Unbelievably, I then had three stress inducing incidents on the Sunday night - not a good omen! Firstly, Katima had yet another power cut in the middle of me getting fuel at the filling station, which led to me sitting waiting for ages to finish refuelling. Secondly, when I got back to the house the plastic jerrycan I’d just filled with petrol for the journey cracked and I had to quickly find another to decant 20l of fuel into. And then worst of all, when trying to unlock the backdoor of the combi the only key disintegrated in my hand. Luckily the government garage people were able to find a spare and bring it round.

Despite arranging to meet at 6.30am on the Monday morning, it wasn’t until 8am that we actually pulled out of Katima. 13 people and their luggage plus a spare wheel and a jerrycan of fuel, crammed into a small tin can on wheels. Luckily, I was driving. And I decided there and then that unless I really couldn’t drive any longer, I was not relinquishing my precious drivers seat. About 12 hours later we arrived at NIED with me successfully still at the wheel.

On arrival I had expected that some sort of sustenance would be provided. At the time, I was a bit annoyed to have to drive to a service station to pick up some dinner, but during the course of the week I came to the conclusion that service station food is infinitely superior to NIED fayre. A particular low point was when I thought we’d been served up a piece of juicy steak. I tucked in with much enthusiasm only discover that it was in fact liver. I now remember why I gave up eating liver just as soon as my mother stopped trying to force me to eat it.

So apart from being badly fed, and frozen at night, what were we doing there? Well, all of the subjects in the Upper Primary (Grades 5-7) are having new syllabi introduced next year. I was invited as the Natural Science Advisory Teacher, along with 6 Natural Science teachers, to find out what the changes to the syllabus are and what information we need to pass onto the rest of the teachers in the Caprivi region.

The changes, on the whole, are good and the syllabus is definitely an improvement on the old system. The problem, as always, is its implementation. There wont be any money to train the rest of the teachers until early next year - after the syllabus as been officially introduced! So I’m going to carry out some training in September before we leave, with the remnants of my British High Commission fund, which I’ve been saving for this all year. After that who knows. But at least the teachers will have copies of the syllabus they’re supposed to be teaching and have been introduced to it. I shouldn’t complain too much though - the English Syllabus is changing also. It hasn’t yet been finalised and they won’t even have their NIED workshops ‘till April next year!

It was with great relief that we pulled out of Okahandja at 5am on the Friday morning to hit the long road home. And it was with even greater relief that we pulled into Katima at 5.30pm with me still stubbornly nestled in my drivers seat. I’ll never complain about having to attend a course in the UK again!