Children’s smiling faces and shouts of “Kathryn” and “Shelagh” greet us in Jeddah, a poor district of Brikama.

It’s Wednesday morning and we’re off to visit Jeddah Progress Nursery School in Brikama (for children 4 to 7 years old), a school Nyodema has been supporting since 2007. We’ve organised teacher training courses, distributed mosquito nets to every child and helped with the upkeep of the building which really is in a sorry state. As is typical of schools in The Gambia, it was built on a very low budget with mud bricks, no proper foundations and poor quality timbers supporting the corrugated steel roof. Luckily, Friends of the Gambia Association (FoTGA) have been able to step in and build a new school next door to the old one.

Driving through the outskirts of Brikama into Jeddah we hear some children calling out “Kathryn” and “Shelagh” which we find a welcome change from the usual shouts of  “toubab, toubab” or “minty, minty” which are calls any passing tourist or traveller would usual hear. (Toubab is a common term in West Africa referring to someone of European decent.)

When we arrive the children and teachers are all at the gate to meet us outside the Lower Basic school (for children 7 to 12 years old)  and lead us back to the nursery school in procession singing as they go. The new school building looks wonderful, very well built and beautifully painted in orange and red with bright blue doors and window frames. We are delighted as are the children and all the teachers. I was surprised and sorry to see that the new school building is not big enough to accommodate all the children and one class is still being taught in the old school building.

The youngest children haven’t met us before and look at us a little warily, however, the older children know us and greet us with smiles.

As well as seeing the new school we meet Ebrima,who has recently joined the teaching staff. He is not a qualified teacher but we are very impressed with him and we offer to fund the teacher training course he will need to become a qualified teacher. It runs in the school holidays over 3 years and costs around  D6,000  (£130) a year which is way beyond the means of most Gambians.

The teachers have organised lunch and we gather round a large bowl of domada, a popular Gambian dish of rice with vegetables and (sometimes fish or meat) in peanut sauce. It is traditional in The Gambia to all eat from the same bowl using your hands. our hosts kindly give us spoons knowing that we are not used to eating with our hands and would probably make quite a mess if we tried! Shelagh really doesn’t like domada and barely eats any so it is down to me to tuck in.

We then visit the home of Lamin the headmaster, and I’m pleased to see that he can finally afford for his wife and two children (who were living up country) to live with him here and I meet them all for the first time. Lamin’s little boy spends much of our visit playing with a deflated football with his friend. The ball may be broken but their enthusiasm is endless. We are offered another domada lunch, but explain that we ate at the school.

On to visit Lisa and her family. I’ve sponsored Lisa since 2005 through FoTGA. She was attending Jeddah nursery school the first time I visited which is how I become involved with helping that school. She is now at the lower basic school next door. I’ve brought some exercise books and coloured pencils for Lisa and we give Lisa’s mother a large bag of rice. We are offered lunch and a large bowl of domada appears. I eat what I can but don’t do it justice. There really is only so much domada a girl can eat. (This is beginning to feel like the episode of the comedy ‘The Vicar of Dibley’ in which the vicar feels she can’t refuse any invites for Christmas lunch and ends up eating 6 in a row.)

Back at our hotel the contrasts of how we live and life in The Gambia once again hit home. It’s easy to start thinking every time you spend any money… ‘but that would buy three mosquito nets’  or ‘that’s enough to buy a bag of rice to feed a large family for a month’ and so on, but you really have to try not to think like that most of the time.  Occasional thoughts like that, however, are no bad thing (and I probably should do it a little more often than I do).

More photos of Jeddah Progress Nursery School can be seen on Flickr

As co-founder of Nyodema I’m heavily involved with organising its annual festival held this year on Saturday 20th August in a lovely pub by the sea at Bognor Regis, West Sussex. I particular enjoy booking the artists and arranging the running order, however this is never with out it’s up and downs…

…so-and-so can only be there until such-and-such a time and thingyme can’t get there until after so-and-so o’clock but their display has to come before their workshop…

…on the day two artists get lost and one is going to be an hour late (oh heck! a quick re-jig of the line-up is needed).

It can get a bit tricky ensuring that the music ebbs and flows to create a vibrant day (without any long gaps between acts), ending in a crescendo of amazing music with everyone on their feet dancing and when the last act has played their final encore leaving the audience wanting just that little bit more.

Well that was the plan.. and thanks to everyone who played, sang, danced, sold raffle tickets, etc… this year’s festival went to plan (well, pretty much).

Slim Lightfoot's National guitar

It was,  in fact,  a really wonderful day starting on the verandah with rock n roll from Slim Jim and the Wildcards against a back drop of blue skies and the glistening sea. A variety of musical genres followed including Slim Lightfoot’s delta blues, an unplanned but very welcome guest appearance by two Gambian drummers, the beautiful voice of Daisy Mouatt, the outstanding medieval/Spanish guitar from Claude Bourbon,  the West African rhythms of the Nyodema Drummers and songs from around the world including traditional gospel from the Nyodema World Community Choir.  Morgana Villen Castro performed a stunning fusion of flamenco and belly dancing as well as holding a popular workshop. The children’s percussion workshop led by Chris Diallo from Hands on Skin brought out some fabulous young talent.

“Nyodema’s choir and drumming group are going from strength to strength. The weekly workshops held here in Bognor have proved a great success and both groups thoroughly enjoyed performing to such a receptive audience.” Said Geraldine Allchurch, the choir’s director.

The evening’s entertainment in the function room had everyone up and dancing. “What a great vibe – the whole day – then capped with Rattlin’ Bone’s feel from ‘The Big Easy’ ending perfectly with reggae from Planetman and the Internationalz!“ to quote Stewart Nicol, our fabulous compere for the day.

The raffle, stalls, workshops and donations collected throughout the day raised over £1,000. These funds will be used to provide children with insecticide treated mosquito nets and to continue developing the school in Dairuharu that Nyodema has built in one of Africa’s poorest countries.

“Nyodema would like to thank The Waverley and their staff, the ROX charity for the loan of equipment, all the artists, volunteers and sponsors including The Gambia Experience and everyone who contributed to making this a really wonderful day.” Nyodema treasurer, Shelagh Hamilton

And I’d like to add my personal thanks to everyone who made this such a special day. Thanks too for all the lovely comments on Facebook….”A great day of diverse and inspiring music – Thank You!” Seeing how much pleasure people get out of the day and, with the money raised, being able to continue with our work with schools in The Gambia, really does make all the hard work worth it. THANK YOU!

Now…  how can we make next year’s festival even better?

For more information please visit Nyodema‘s website. For photographs visit Nyodema on Flickr.