Been a bit busy again

Hello again. J and I have been pottering round clinics and hospitals for a little maintenance and we are restored now to working order. We haven't been too idle - I've been conducting the usual struggle with TalkTalk, a firm which seems dedicated to making me spend more time calling the computer rude names than allowing me to complete GOES work without crashing (the computer, that is): if I get to spend 15 minutes without the machine crashing I'm having a good day!
Still, the days of TalkTalk are numbered - I'll let you all have the new address when everything is sorted out ... I need biscuits!
Our friend S has offered the Clinic a supply of medical goodies - I don't know exactly what but should find out soon.
The latest book - 'Jodie's Wheels'* is coming along at a steady pace, inspired by the coming Paralympics - hope Gambia can field a team again this year. I believe that it's more important to have the participation of teams from the smallest nations to make the Olympic spirit truly fulfilled.
P, a friend of J's, has made a very kind donation to GOES funds. We would love to be able to take on some new projects but money is a little tight at the moment.
*I think I posted a short extract here a while ago?

Best wishes to all of you,
Tom

2016 Olympics and Paralympics

Congratulations to the GB Olympic Team who will bring home a well deserved basket full of medals and personal bests.
Let us also salute the efforts of tiny teams from less advantaged countries: I'm thinking of the Gambian team: Pap Jonga, aged 19, a swimmer, and Judoka N'Jie, aged 22, who competes in Judo. No medals, but they gave it their best.

GAMBIA OLYMPICS AND PARALYMPICS QUALIFIERS WERE RECEIVED BY THE SPORT AUTHORITIES EARLY TODAY 12 July 2016
Gambian Paralympian Demba Jarju was among the athletes received by the deputy permanent secretary for sports after deputizing for the Youth and Sports Minister Alieu K Jammeh earlier today at the National Sports Council office at the Independence Stadium in Bakau. Demba secured Olympic qualification standard for the second time after representing the country for the first in London 2012. The courtesy call is the first by the Ministry of Youth and Sports since the athlete achieved the qualification standard earlier in May in the 200mtrs T54. Demba was accompanied by the other two athletes Adama Jammeh and Gina Bass who earned the qualification standard for the Rio 2016 Games in the male and female categories of the 200mtrs

GOES does not work alone - we co-operate with other charities and NGOs

From: Sanyang Musa Sent: 01 August 2016 23:21
To: Stuart
Subject: greetings

hi stuart how are you and the rest of the family friends and all wishes .hope you are al fine there the school annual report on the development of the school and is achievements ,stuart, the nursery is 3

-4 yrs old the school was founded by mr momodou  and mr musa, and your effort s are complimented by mr stuart, tom and joyce and the members of the white church .the school started with only 7 children with no proper furniture and learning resources .but today it is a different history .the school is developing at a alarming rate a school of 7 children before ,now counting up to 85 children .stuart’s nursery has five staff two teachers are on pay roll while the heads and two others are doing voluntary .the school has good furniture for both children and teachers .the staff monitoring tools, visitors book registers for children daily attendance are of paramount importance. the introduction of the school bell and the school official stamp are steps for the well being of a develop institute ..the school is now  recognised as a learning institute ,because children dress smartly in their school uniform with the school badges bearing the name of the school .the provision of break fast for the children pay a great dividend for the development of the school ,thanks to the white church ,for their immense contribution achievement .in no exception the school achieved a lot the community has a school at their door steps ,the risk of their young children travelling a kilometre or so is now a think of the past .another great achievement are children can now read and write very well .they can display teaching and learning materials on their own ,and can identify both letters and numbers from one to hundred .in 2015 three children from stuart’s  memorial are moved to the primary school  namely 1 kadijatou, 2 cherno and 3, bubacarr.have done well in their final third term exams .the f=llowing children are going to be transit to grade one .coming  september .2016they are as follows 1 kaddy,  2 nyima,  3 amadou, 4 pa,  5 samba and finally 6 mam. we started enrolling children into nursery one ,all are issued with report school ,and school close on the 22 july and open on the 3rd of september 2016 i want to thank you all once again may god blessed you all .

“Our friend Stuart forwarded this message from the head teacher of a school in the Gambia. Stuart has been instrumental in setting up this school in a small village a long way off the tourist track. GOES has from time to time been able to co-operate with Stuart and the villagers. I enclose the message with the permission of the school staff and Stuart. Names of children have been modified.

Stuart also does great humanitarian work in other areas of Africa. The 'White Church' is in the town of Lytham St Annes in UK and the support from them is provided through their Outreach Group which raises funds for International and Local charities.”

Every penny counts!

Hi Tom,   You and your supporters have raised £4.07 for Gambian Occasional Emergency Support (GOES) so far.   Your funds are safe in your easyfundraising account and will be paid to you once you've raised £15 or more. Donations are sent out to our good causes every three months.   Keep shopping the easyfundraising way so we can pay you next time!     Your Statement Summary Date: April - June 2016 Payment method: Cheque Amount raised: £4.07 View your statement »

On the road with GOES ...

Where does your money go with GOES? Fair question. Let's imagine we're going to find out as we travel to some of the villages together.
We're staying at a small hotel on the Atlantic coast near Kotu village. Turn left out of the hotel and a ten minute walk takes you to the centre of the village. There are a few shops, a market, several hotels and that's it! Back to the hotel, keep going to the crossroads and we'll pick a taxi to Bakau, the next village along the coast. It's a good 20 minute jog but it's a hot day ... Bakau is a much larger fishing village with a fish market, a craft market, several hotels, large shops and banks and a crocodile pool! We've helped one of the large families here with housing, education, and health care. We might as well drop in for a brew of attaya (green tea). The children are anxious to show us their school reports and parents smile proudly ... while we're nearby we'll pop along to the Capital city, Banjul, and visit the hospital. We need to drop off supplies you've donated - medicines, bandages, catheters  and a ream of computer paper.
Where next? Another taxi ride to see one of the schools we help in a suburb of Serrekunda. We drive across Denton Bridge which carries us across Oyster Creek, a wonderful place for bird watching, and eventually turn off the blacktop road onto a series of sand tracks which lead us to Bundung, where the school is. Here we have contributed to the running costs, bought paint, supplied school gates - numerous items which you've contributed to. The children greet us and sing! We tell a story but refrain from song!
 Back in the taxi - one of the yellow Mercedes which transport everything from people to goats and chickens and sheets of corrugated iron and ... everything that requires transporting, and mostly at the same time! Off again, back on the main road, past Abuko nature reserve on the right - must find time to visit one day - and Lamin Lodge Hotel on the left, on the bank of the mighty River Gambia, through Lamin village and turn left by the Taxi Centre on the road to Mandinari. We pass the Lower Basic School which has received a couple of dozen dictionaries given by you and carried free by Thomas Cook, plus a locally purchased sack of rice which the head teacher cooks so the children start the day with happy tummies - and stop outside the village clinic. We've had a long and happy relationship with this place. You'll remember helping to provide a clean water supply? See, there's the tap! This time we're bringing supplies for the medicine cupboard - stacks of paracetamol (for treatment of malaria) and rolls of bandages and a blood-pressure monitor.
 We also pay a quick visit to the nursery school next to the clinic and check that funds we donated last trip have been put to good use. More attaya, then a quick round of visits to friends GOES has helped over the years - school fees paid for children and adults (mainly women who missed out on formal education, house repairs funded - if cement is added to the home-made building blocks it can resist water damage for a much longer time.  So many people here want us to stay and chat and drink attaya and share a meal that we promise to return in a couple of days and stay longer.
 Time to head back to the hotel in Kotu. Our driver, a long-time friend, mentions that his wife is preparing the evening meal and perhaps ... and the children would like to read to us? Of course - you don't mind, do you? You'll be welcome!
 It's much later when we return to the hotel and sit by the pool watching the bats chasing mosquitoes across the night sky. Hope you enjoyed the journey? What's that? Mandinari seems very like Malinding in the story books? I couldn't possibly comment!

Happy Koriteh!

Happy Koriteh to all my Muslim friends! I hope that's the right way to spell it! I believe that it's the celebration held at the end of the holy month of Ramadan, when there is a fast during daylight hours.
I have the greatest respect for those people who can observe it. Years ago, while I was staying with friends in the village I tried to follow the rule of no food or drink. I think I managed 3 days and then my friends ordered me to stop! I was, they said, exempt because of my age and they didn't want me to come to any harm. They said that they respected my attempt, but it wasn't a good idea to make myself ill. They provided food for me at lunch time and checked that I was drinking water regularly. I was more than happy to contribute to the feast at the end of the month!
May I take this chance to wish all my friends Good Health, Long Life, and Happiness.
Tom

A preview page from one of the Malinding Village books

10)

Rachel's smiling at me. I've done something right. Or something write? This book seems to be a book about a book. How not to write a book? Do all writers agonise about what they're trying to say? Or do they just sit down in their studies, smile at the beautiful bunch of flowers their fan club sent, gaze out at their swimming pools, sip at a G & T and then write perfect prose at the rate of a thousand words an hour? What is a G & T? Must be something to drink if you sip at it. I've got this old laptop with windows 98 and a battery that lasts all of half an hour if I don't play games. Couple of hundred words a day? If I'm lucky. I once did five hundred but when I read it I was so ashamed. I shouldn't have thoughts like that. Rachel** said I should have kept them in, they were what this book is really about. But what if one of my teachers - what if Miss Ellesmere - read it? Not that it's likely that anyone will ever read it, but what if?  I wish I could keep this book in order, day-by-day, month-by-month. It keeps leaping about from year to year then back to another year. That last bit I wrote, about love and lovers. That was before I went to Uni.

I need a time line. BW and AW. Before wheels and after wheels.

Sorry, I came to a grinding halt after that last thought. Why do halts grind?  Teeth grind. Mills grind. How do halts grind? Halt! Who goes there? An old lame lady, sir. She goes haltingly. I'm rabbiting on and on. Haltingly. It's a good job I've got Rachel to talk to. I'd be talking to myself otherwise. Going quietly mad. Stark raving starkers mad - like I did at school after those prefects assaulted me. I wonder what happened to them? I could make something up about them, I'm a liar: all writers are liars, well, the fictional ones are. I'm fictional, you know. I am. So's Rachel and everybody else I know. We're all a pack of liars.

It's a bit like being a god, being a writer. What would I do to the prefects?* You want to know? O.K. How's this: on their way home, after the head teacher had sacked them, they rescued a kitten that had fallen into the canal. They took turns to give it mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and wrapped it up in my skirt (which they'd stolen as a souvenir). They took it to the R.S.P.C.A. and it later found a good home with an old lady who lived a long, long way from any dangerous water. Sadly, on their way home they were trampled by a Mastodon which had escaped from a secret research centre and had to be shot before it trampled the whole population of Weaverham. It took years to breed another Mastodon from DNA and stem cells. I've just re-read that last bit and realised what a nasty piece of work I am. Still, I'm not going to change it. I hope it's not true …

Rachel's vanished. Maybe the last bit of the story was too far-fetched even for her? Maybe. She's pretty far-fetched herself; maybe that's why we get on so well together. If I had a real friend I'd like her to be like Rach. I know she's not gone far because she never does. She once stayed away for nearly a whole week. She thought I was becoming too dependent on her. But she did come back. She doesn't find fault with me so much nowadays. She used to be on my case all the time, day and night, but now we're best mates. She does give me that look at times and I stop and think what I've said or what I've done that wasn't quite right. Not appropriate kind of thing. I worry a bit about my state of mind. I was unconscious for a couple of days after the accident. I wonder if a few of my brain-cells opted out and didn't grow back. I never had that many to start with.  know I'm not normal. Normal people have legs and walk and run and dance and swim. I can swim, actually. Sort of doggy-paddle a lobster might do. My instructor thought it was a variety of butterfly-stroke, so that's it then: the halting-moth crawl. It works, gets me from one end of the pool to the other.

*Three racist senior students had attacked Jodie on her first day at school.

** Rachel is Jodie's imaginary friend.