Sierra Leone Trip Inspires Father and Son

My name is Tom Eastell.  My family funded the building of a basketball court for Port Loko Girls School in Sierra Leone.  Once the basketball court was completed, Children in Crisis invited us to visit them in Sierra Leone to meet the children whose lives have benefited from our support. 

DAY 1

On arrival at the airport, my initial reaction was of how friendly the people of Sierra Leone are.  Within 15 minutes of passing through immigration, I had 5 locals calling out “Tom, Tom!”  Although I was initially overwhelmed with the whole experience, my treatment of celebrity status was just their attempt to be friendly and welcome me to their country. 

The short trip across the estuary to Freetown was uneventful although I was very nervous when I first saw the helicopter we were to travel in, and soon our driver (Ansu) was walking us towards his car.  I could not help but smile to myself.  As I stepped into the car however, I had a stark reminder of where I was.  The sticker on the dashboard read, “ONLY YOU CAN STOP AIDS” in large bold letters. 

DAY 2

In the morning we went to visit a school in Goderich.  The location of the school was incredible.  The permanent school building has been built right next to the almond tree where lessons used to take place before Children in Crisis and FAWE got involved.  It is so good to see how the two charities worked together to transform a makeshift school into a proper place of learning.  The headmistress was a wonderful woman called Betty, and you can see how proud she is of her school.

It was then such an incredible contrast to go to Kroo Bay, which is one of the worst slums in Sierra Leone.  As we got out of the car, the smell was unbearable.  We then had to follow a path, alongside a river piled with rubbish and home to a group of pigs.  I could not believe the living conditions of these people, but as we arrived at the school, the sight of the bright blue uniform and the chorus of the children shouting ‘white man’ in one of the many tribal languages could only make me smile.  It was brilliant to see the spirit and energy that these children have even though I was told that the majority of them had not eaten anything all day.  

After what I can only describe as a shocking experience in Kroo Bay, we went back to FAWE’s office and sat in on some HIV training for teachers and selected parents.  One of the two charities’ initiatives is to train two teachers or parents from each school on the subject of HIV who can then go out into their local community and teach not only the children about HIV and AIDS but also fellow parents.  What I found staggering was that many people in Sierra Leone simply reject the idea of HIV.  Some believe it is an imaginary infection made up by white people and others think it is carried by mosquitoes. 

Today really was an insight into how hard day to day life is in Sierra Leone, and how complicated and difficult the work of NGO’s such as Children in Crisis is.  There are so many problems that need fixing, and with limited resources it is so hard to determine which is a priority and which will benefit the community the most.

DAY 3

After a 5 hour journey down a dirt track for over 80 kilometres to Kambia, we had the opportunity to visit a local school, which was hosting an HIV training course for teachers in Kambia.  The school only had 5 classrooms, one of which was used as storage for the unusable desks and chairs.  This meant that classes 1 and 2, and classes 3 and 4 had to share a classroom.  150 children had to fit into one classroom with one teacher that was not fit for anything more than 30 children (at a push) in my view.  We also learnt that the water well was not working because it needed to be drilled deeper.  The sad thing is that this is the condition of 90% of the schools in Sierra Leone.  They have had no funding since before the war. Schools are overcrowded and their resources are over stretched, as many schools were burnt down during the war. There is also a lack of trained teachers to add to the many problems.

DAY 4

Today was the best day of my visit by far.  We travelled to Port Loko to attend the opening ceremony of the basketball and volley court that my family had funded at the FAWE/Children in Crisis school there.  We arrived to girls singing “welcome, welcome” and we indeed were made welcome.  Words cannot express how I felt when I saw how happy the children were to have the new facilities, and they were described as the best in the province. It is so good to see the results of the funding which we were able to give as a family.  One student came up to my dad and said, “I have tears in my eyes at the idea that a man from London would come and do this to our school”.  That really sums up how it is possible to help these girls by providing not overly large amounts of money from the UK.  The new facilities will also benefit the entire community because other schools will be allowed to use it during after school hours.

On the journey back to Freetown, I felt amazing.  The happiness and strong spirits of the kids kept a smile on my face all the way home.

DAY 5

I have so many memories, so many experiences to take home.  The people I have met, the stories I have heard, the places I have seen.  On my first day I met Cisay.  A young boy whose father and two brothers were killed by rebels in the war.  His mother was driven crazy with grief and could not look after him.  Luckily a couple adopted him, but sadly his adopted father died and the woman was left to look after him on her own.  What I find extraordinary, is that even after all of these terrible events, he is one of the lucky ones.  His new foster mother has managed to find work by drying fish to provide money and food for Cisay so that he can he attend one of the best schools in the country. 

One of the things I have said many times during my stay is, “this is unfair”, and its true.  The unequal divide of wealth in the world is too great to explain, too great to believe; and that is one of the facts which I will find hard to take in once I am back in England, knowing how different life is in Sierra Leone.  I just wish everyone in the world had the opportunity to go to Sierra Leone and see for themselves how important it is that these imbalances are corrected.