Juan Sevilla en Angola

After four months since my last writing I am here again in Angola to let you know how is all going here and how the project is going too. For those who might not know, the reason why I have been absent was because I had some problem with my Visa when I came back to Spain in October. I won’t talk about the bureaucracy stuff because I will be boring, but I can sum up by saying that after doing my greatest efforts to sort all out, it seems as though my papers have disappear and nobody know where are them. Solution? I had to bring all my papers here to Angola and deal with the problem here. If within these three months I achieve my work license, all will be fine. If it does not occur, within three months I will be going back to home to renew my Visa. I just want to say that it seems extremely outrages the way that Embassy work and, believe me, I really know what I am talking about.

The 29th December I came back to Angola and I went directly to work on the project after spending one night in Luanda. I looked forward to coming back, just to see how things were working in the school after its inauguration (which I could not show up). I was looking forward to starting again with my work on the school, taking back the activities with children and thinking about on what I was going to spend the money from the sponsors etc. Ultimately, a lot of things to do but with plenty of joy.

The school was really nice; it was finished and with some furniture and materials in their place (there are some more to be installed soon). I went to my new home, which it is included in the same project. In the house there are six rooms and a kitchen which we use it as a living room to chat and watch the TV.

The house is fifty meters from the school. I have my own room and the other rooms are shared with four teachers in practice from the Future Professors School plus one more that was sent by the Ministry of Education. We are 6 professors (except that some others are sent to). We cook the meals together, as well as some sporty activities or watch some films … So far, living together is quite good and there have not been any problem at all. Since the first day we stipulated each one’s responsibilities and duties. Responsibilities stuff is quite complicated here in Africa. The majority of the people have not been taught to be responsible and all what it involves. There is no meaning for this word.

Sometimes we can mistake this word for apathy or indifference, but it is not as it should be. But like all the attitudes, they can be learnt and we are trying to teach them, although it may imply a really hard task.

Sometimes I have the impressions as though I am really hard with them, but if I behave like this, it is just because I want that they improve. Another problem which I face is the low self-esteem which they have. They do not trust in themselves and sometimes, they surrender before they start the work. There is a huge and important task to do to make them believe that things are not like this, that they are able to do much more. They have to understand that nearly all things can be learnt and understood and they are related to be positive, hard-working-, be responsible etc. We have to face life positively. The 90% of the problems can be solved depending on the attitude that we have towards them.

The Professional Polyvalent School in Lucala is beginning the classes on the 6th February. As you may know, it is a school of professional education and formation of three years. So far we have 45 pupils and the idea is to have more and more. We expect to teach 70 and have two classes of 35 pupils. Each group of 35 is going to have a group of three professors that they will be in charge of the education of that group. As I have said, we are six professors. Physical Education and English are the subjects that I will be teaching (maybe depending on the needs). During this year (seventh level), the instruction is going to be general so when we reach the eighth and ninth level we will be teaching the specialties: Energy Assistant, Cook or Agro-feeding Helper.

The next year we will have the three specialists for the three disciplines. This will be the moment when the groups will be working just and exclusively on their specialties. At the same time, they will be working on several companies around there and it will be their first contact with the working world.

Since my arrival, I have been doing several tasks, but I can sum it up within this sentences:

• Promotion of the school. Before going back to Spain in October, I already did some work of promotion to let everybody known about the school in Lucala and its facilities. When I came back, we had to repeat this since people did not know if the courses would go on because of my absence.
• Professors’ formation. I have been working with my group of teachers letting know them the program, how it should be implemented, the role of the teacher in the classes, materials etc. It is going of the hardest tasks.
• Class Schedule. It is really important that teachers show up in classes with an idea about what are they going to do, how many take it is going to take, how are they going to work and which materials they are going to need. Having a guide is really useful, although they can modify whatever they wish. Here, teachers are not used to preparing the classes and they are used to show up in the classes without having any schedule to do in class. So it is also my duty to teach them how to schedule the classes.
• Setting up the school furniture. We got all the furniture in boxes to set them up. So one of my duties is also to set them up; chairs tables and other stuff.
  Visiting institutions to introduce the new school, having meetings with the Director of the Provincial School, asking for new teachers to come, etc. I have to do this really patiently since the easiest task can take you a lot of time.
• I have been carrying on the Cinema Afternoons with activities with the littlest ones in the community. As you may have read in one of the news, we are carrying on a sport field which is going to be used with the Physical Education classes and for other events in Lucala. Other things are in process, but I am not going to tell anything yet.

That’s how all is going here. As always, I feel like I am missing a lot of things to tell, so I hope that the selection of what I have written is nice to you. As you know, any question, doubt or consideration is accepted.

Greetings

Before writing, I usually write down a list about the facts which I think that may be interesting to you or, from my point of view, facts that can make us think about them.

If you stay thoughtful or questions come up to your mind after reading this post, I think that I have achieved my aim which is to show a different world that we are not used to live in. I hope that these posts make us realise how lucky we are, because of the place we were born. In our developed world it does not matter how many problems you have because you will always have somebody to help and when this “somebody” is millions of men, women and kids I think that it is imprudent, foolish and hypocritical complaining about certain unimportant things.

During the month of August, some positive events have occurred to our project and also to the Multipurpose Professional Schools performance in all Angola. These are the following positive events one by one:

• In the ADPP headquarters in Luanda we welcomed Mr. Alexandre Nascimiento, who is the National Director of Technical and Professional Education in Luanda. In that meeting, he showed his commitment and also the global commitment to assist our schools (professors, equipments, workers etcetera) We hope that these commitments come true and are not just words in the air.
• Facilities in Luanda are finished. We are just waiting to purchase the material for the classes and also to equip the outside zones. We hope that by the day of the Inauguration on the 11th November all will be ready. But, as I have mentioned before, when things do not depend on you, the only thing that you are supposed to do is to wait and pray!
• From 8/29 to 9/4 we had a formation in all the Multipurpose Professional Schools in Angola. There are 5 schools altogether which implement the programme. I expect to learn a lot from them. I also wish to learn what are the hardest facts, present new ideas and different performance ways of the activities, errors, success etcetera. All in all, share and take advantage from all their experiences as advice for the future. (Because of that formation and other meetings that I had lately, I was delayed in writing the essay of this month. I do really apologize.
• ADPP celebrate 25 years in Angola. Many different activities n all over the country were carried out in order to celebrate these 25 years since ADPP began in 1986 with a project in Caxito. In the north of Kwanza we did a “Race for development” over 5km, in which people from both ADPP and from Lucala participated in.

But today what I really wish to talk about is a visit that I did two weeks ago in a zone in the north of Kwanza called High Golungo. I was there to give clothes for disadvantage people and was there for the whole day. After visiting that, I can confirm that I have never been in such a disadvantaged place. The population live in the most critical poverty. Their faces, their eyes, their bodies show their pain, their weakness and, in some cases, the agony for not having anything and the 100% dependence on the help from outside.

It’s said that there are sights that speak, but the bodies do not talk, they tell you stories-The stories of someone who waits for his death with his pain. Because it is their only aim in life, the death; they await for the death all the time. There are things that we see many times on TV or we read in magazines, but we do not actually understand them until we live them.

After having lived them and tried to comprehend them you still feel more impotence and you understand them less. Sometimes I feel like I have lost my humanity somewhere because of staying in Angola and Mozambique. Each time I consider myself a colder person. I try to give more importance to things that really deserve it and I tend to leave the unimportant facts which people in the developed world tend to worry about. I try to solve all which do not depend on me, and I try to omit all which is not in my reach. I could not be working here if I had not thought this in my mind. I will explain: If I let my heart and my feelings act as they wanted and I established emotional relationships with everybody, I think that it would be impossible for me to go on, because I would not act rationally. I tend to know the communities, I try to comprehend their problems but in an objective way.

I won’t deny that sometimes it is hard for me, but with the time, I have learnt to sort it out. I have no other option. Infant mortality, poverty, hunger, diseases etcetera are already a part of my daily life. It is no longer hard to look at somebody with a disease, someone maimed, kids near to death, people begging etcetera. I have to be emotionally detached from them all. Now I understand how doctors can continue with their work, because they see people dying every day.

I can say that my scale of values ​​and priorities have changed completely and sometimes I bang my head against the wall when I see people in my country arguing over crap that have no rhyme or reason (from my point of view).  Wasting time and money on trivialities and not going anywhere. Whoever wants to know about problems, I invite you to spend some time with me. I assure you will rethink many things. We make life more complicated than it really is.

Think not that easy for me to say all this, I just want to convey how I feel at times.Sometimes I pinch myself incase even  I’m dreaming or not, because I have difficulty in imagining situations  only 2 years ago … .. This experience is b a life lesson for me, which I receive much  more than I give, I can assure you.