.... continued - health

Feeding the children before school every morning

Preparing the porridge

The health aspect of the project started with giving children food every day.

Our next two aims for health improvements are the provision of a clean water supply and a health worker to visit the village regularly.

A community base

 The Executive Secretary of the Sector has agreed to provide a health worker for one day every week!! This is brilliant news and more than we were expecting. The Sector will also provide some basic health materials.
The health worker will be able to use a room in this house when she visits. 

The water supply

Whilst we were visiting,the Executive Secretary came to visit the village and brought an engineer with him to assess the possibility of bringing water to the village. He assured us that this could happen very soon. we hope so because this is the priority for the people. Clean water is the basis of good health.

Having fun under the grass mat

Learning early to use the tools of his trade

Paul chatting to friends

Further developments in Gasundwe

The view from Gasundwe Village

I just want to remind you of the location of Gasundwe Village. It is situated on the mountains around Lake Kivu in the west of Rwanda.It is stunningly beautiful as you can see. 

As I have said before on this blog,pictures can tell lies. However the lies are not about the scenery but about what the scenery doesn't tell us. So it is a lie by omission really.


I don't want to emphasise the poverty because the villagers are working so hard to improve their lives and the lives of their children. The project is involved in three main areas - education, health and prospects for the future.

Here they are - the school!

The school for children of Pre Primary age was started last August and has been going for one year now.You can see how happy and proud the children are to have their own uniforms and their own teacher. The parents provided the uniforms and we provide the teacher.

Jack is not the teacher but he does teach!!!And he makes new resources for the teacher to use in class.

Jack is teaching the children to add up. 

A new floor for the school at Gasundwe

The church and school in the village

Before- the earth floor which breeds worms which get into the childrens feet.

Everyone helps to gather rocks

the lads carry the rocks into the school

Sand is brought up from the lakeside

Jack helps to break up the old floor

You can imagine the dust this creates

The rocks are laid on the earth floor

The lads mix the concrete

The previous day these boys carried 40 bags of cement up the mountainside on their shoulders. Each sack contained 40 Kg!! Everyone helped to carry water from the lake. 

The cement is carried indoors and lain over the rocks

A smooth finish in the doorway

Wow! Look at that! No more worms in the kids feet in this school!

'nuff said!

Giving thanks to God for friends across the world

The children try out the new floor. Please notice their lovely uniforms!

Now we just need  grass mats for them to sit on.

A BIG THANKYOU to all those people who go to the Coffee Kitchen in Cockermouth, Cumbria - with your money and the hard physical work of the villagers the school now has a wonderful new floor and this means better health and more possibilities for exploratory play for children in the Early Years.

Everyone sends their love and thanks.
Tricia xxxxx