Dr Duveskog

Found my name in the paper after last weeks certificate ceremony and the quotes are at least not to far of :-)

OLPC certificate ceremony Ukombozi

After two very intensive weeks with daily sessions at the school, technical challanges to overcome and a lot of material to put together we yesterday had a certificate ceremony where parents, officials, press and all kids at school were invited. Parents were amazed of what the kids had achieved and the headmaster took the chance to market his school as a very unique school in Tanzania. The participant were happy about the certificates and proud to present their work to all the visitors. The material which contains quite big video files is stored on the school server and can be accessed by the kids from there. The material is also avaible at http://cs.joensuu.fi/games/ukombozi so please have a look but might not work that well with poor connection. There is still a lot of improvements that needs to be done on the SwaEnglish composition but at least it should give you an idea :-)

Invited for engagement party

Was a surprisingly big party, almost like a wedding with 3 layer cake and fancy arrangement of the venue. Realized it had to be fancy as the guy is from influential family with an uncle who was the former minister of education. One of the highlights of the evening was the entertainment guy dancing with a beer bottle on his head.

Erkki visiting Ukombozi

Erkki and Paul visiting our workshop. Workshop is going well so far. Will try to upload some of the materials shortly.

The Pajero is crying

Yesterday got a call from the professor renting my car as it was having a problem. It turned out to be the timing belt that snapped causing damage of engine. Now trying to sort that out in between everything else. Feel for my precious car that is now bleeding.

OLPC video challange 1

Challenge 1: You are failing your studies, what will you do to make sure can still reach your goals?
Kids solution was to pray to God to find a sponsor and video is showing
1) Frustrated kid
2) Kid praying for a sponsor
3) Kid trying to find a sponsor on Internet
4) Announcing in church for a sponsor
5) Announcing for a sponsor on radio
6) Kid asking parents for help to find a sponsor
7) A famous media guy recieves the e-mail and decide to sponsor the kid
8) Kid is very happy and thanks God
9) The media guy helps to select a good school
10) The kid promisses to study very hard not to fail again.

Workshop day 1

First day of workshop was scheduled for wednesday but once arriving at school I was informed that the kids had been sent home because standard 4 students had an examination. But yesterday we could start and it went quite well. Students have allready gained the foundation and know how to operate their laptops. On tuesday kids were interviewed abouth their interests and dreams. Yesterday they were asked to write a few sentences about being themself in Iringa and thereafter they recorded the sentences with their web cams. They were given the first challange on how to face the challange of failing in their studies. Carolina had brought a map from Germany which was loved by the kids.

Concert in Iringa

Some artist were performing at some event sponsored by USAID for bringing awareness of HIV. I noticed quite a few persons visiting the tents for testing their status.

Heavy rains

Raining like crazy. Power went of for a while and rain is coming in on my bed, luckily not on my precious computer that was on the bed. Guess rains are welcome after 5 months without rain but these 'african' rains are almost scary. Good at least i have access to a car that can manage though roads. Now time to unplug electronics.

Tumaini University/Ukombozi primary school

Arriving at Tumaini I could notice some changes since I was last there for instance that the extension of the library is almost finished. Also there is a big ad saying "Graduate with A's not with AIDS". I also heard that according to latest statistics the HIV prevalence in Iringa region is now as high as 15.7%. According to some unconfirmed source one of the reasons is all the Universities in Iringa... Today again I visited Ukombozi primary school and met the head teacher. He was very positive to the workshop we are starting next week and is very flexible to adjust other teaching activities to accommodate us. Ilkka was challenged to figure out how to configure the server to work with the XO's and Internet and managed after some hours of hard work. Ukombozi has a total of 364 students from standard 1 to 7 and they have 16 teachers. The XO laptops provided to the school is not in the possession of the kids but taken care of by school and shared between several students. So far it is mostly standard 5 and six that has had training with the laptops and in the group I will work with it will be mainly standard six students. The title of the workshop is "Working for my Dreams" and feel inspired and hope it will go well.

Tanzania

Back in Tanzania and I must say it feels quite good. Was travelling together with Ilkka from Zambia. Arriving in Dar we had to wait a bit for Christian who was picking us up from airport. Traffic situation is really bad in Dar these days. Spent a lot of time in traffic jams. It was great to meet with Christian again and nowadays he has a big house in Dar and managed to accommodate me and Ilkka. He also proudly showed the car he had imported from Japan. In evening we went for kiti moto(my favorite pork dish), think even Ilkka enjoyed it. Victor also joined us before exploring night life a bit and meeting up with my Swedish friend Anders. Saturday we took the bus to Iringa and before Iringa there is a lot of road construction going on so took extra long time, think we spen at least 9 hours on the bus before arriving. Sunday I met up with one of the university students I am gonna work with at the One Laptop per Child School. Also met up with my friends Mike and Walid and they have been very helpful in helping to get me organized. Mike who spend most of his time in Mbeya invited us to stay in his house and from Wednesday I will probably get access to one of his cars, meanwhile Walid has offered me to use his car during daytime. Today visited the school were we gonna hold the workshop and they were very welcoming so I hope things will go well. Had lunch at the finnsih family Kemppainens and got a bit updated on what is new in Iringa. Now time to find somewhere to have dinner...