It has already been more than three months since the kindergarten opened in Niaguis. In the first two weeks, the number of children kept increasing, but now the classes are staying stable with about 35 children per class. It didn't take long for us to see, that our worries concerning the quality of the teaching, as well as the well-being of the children (we thought it might suffer because of the large classes), was unnecessary. And just like that, our spontaneous idea to run the kindergarten with parallel classes wasn't needed anymore. In the worst case we will have to do it like that next year though, so no children will have to be rejected because of the lack of space.

The whole situation has calmed down, even though we far exceeded the planned limit of 25 students per class. Thanks to the guidance of our teachers, the lessons have quieted down in a very short time and are well-rehearsed. Also the central room in the tower allows teachers to divide their classes and work on different subjects alternately with the children. I am really surprised and more than happy, with the variety of ideas and expertise that this education is being handled with. But the most important thing is the dedication of our four teachers to their job and the highly motivated and smiling children.

Finally our furniture is here! The commissioning of the furniture was followed by a long delay, because the first offers our local "Parténère", Federation Dimbaya, obtained were not what we had in mind. The offers included furniture made of plywood with metal frames. I had seen similar furniture in other kindergartens and had noticed, that almost all of it was broken. It was a struggle and it took me a couple of weeks to get my ideas regarding the furniture accepted. But now, everybody is very pleased with the beautiful and very robust furniture made of solid Teak. The furniture was finished on 5. February and got delivered the next day. Over 120 chairs, 24 tables, 10 large shelfs and some other pieces of furniture had to all get loaded and find room on just one truck, so no additional trips would be necessary.

Arriving in Niaguis we were not only greeted by smiling teachers, but also by a large group of 12 - 16 year-old students, who were highly motivated to demonstrate their strength. My worries, that we would be unloading furniture for hours, vanished into thin air within minutes. It was incredible how quickly the more than 250 pieces of furniture got unloaded and carried to the ca. 30 meters to the kindergarten. (Pictures of the unloading are in the attached album). After not quite an hour, every piece of furniture had found its home in the right room. The classrooms look very good now after being furnished, and the children have ideal furniture for all of the different kinds of activities. Very pleased with themselfs and also very proudly, the children show me their spelling exercises on the black board and in their exercise books. The children seem especially motivated to concentrate on their assignments, when working at the solid and beautiful tables.

In a next step, all of the toys that got donated in Switzerland can get brought to the kindergarten too. That had to wait also, because we wanted to have a storage place for everything and we also wanted to be sure, that the toys will be treated carefully.

Greetings, 
Marielle Furter

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