Happy New Year to all Link Ethiopia supporters!
We hope you enjoyed some peace and fun over the holiday season just past.
Our big news is that we have at last found a wonderful office in London to use as the base for our ever expanding activities, and we are already settled in there very happily! The site is in Tufnell Park, in north London, and is part of a large modern church complex with a very welcoming and charismatic lady vicar. But it is also the home of the north London Ethiopian Orthodox Church, and they have shown us a big welcome – the sounds of a resounding Timkat festival are still ringing impressively in our ears.
On with the rest of our news update...
News from Ethiopia
- The World Bank has recently agreed to a grant of US$256 million to finance basic services in Ethiopia such as healthcare, education, agriculture and water. This grant is planned to assist in meeting the health sector’s Millennium Development Goals.
- Meanwhile the development of a new Technology Park has just been announced in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s capital. This site would provide an enhanced opportunity for investors and businessmen to join forces in making improved technology, to support both individuals and the economy as a whole. At the same time was announced a plan to network all fifteen of the country’s universities, encouraging lively and dynamic communication of an academic nature between professors and students. There seems to have been some very positive and well-focused thought involved here – let’s hope that the results are just as ambitious and thorough.
The Blue Nile falls - water that smokes
A hour's bus ride from the pleasant lakeside town of Bahir Dar brings you to the dusty village of Tis Isat. Collecting a youthful guide and an inexpensive entry ticket the visitor then embarks on a short walk that brings him to the edge of the Blue Nile river, where a boat is waiting to ferry him across to the other side. A more substantial walk then follows, through cultivated fields where one might just see a farmer ploughing his patch behind a pair of oxen, just as he would have done a thousand years ago. On turning a corner, the Tis Isat Falls suddenly comes into sight and sound. Here the Blue Nile tumbles down in resounding rush as it starts its main journey down into a deep gorge and on towards the Sudan and eventually through Egypt to the Mediterranean Sea. In recent years a new hydro-electric plant has siphoned some of the river's powerful water away from the Falls, and yet still the sight is still an impressive one. Locals say that there are plans to re-organise the power plant setup so that the waterfalls can be returned to their former grandeur. We'll keep you posted!
School Link focus
Azezo Secondary School, which is linked with The Misbourne School, has changed remarkably over the last few years. New classrooms, toilets and uniforms have helped to create a really positive atmosphere amongst the students. The Misbourne School have made their own contribution by helping their link school to set up the first – and only – internet connection in Azezo, which gives the Ethiopian students access to a wealth of knowledge they haven’t had before. In time it is hoped that students from both schools will use the internet as a means of regular communication between themselves.
Their link has been greatly enhanced by two student visits from The Misbourne School to Azezo Secondary School, the last of which was in October 2007. The students made the most of this unique opportunity to explore the differences and similarities between their two cultures, and by all accounts they learnt a lot from each other. Students also got stuck into painting one of the classrooms, now known as ‘The Link Cultural Centre’. The plan is to house computers and books in this room so that students can use it as a quiet study area. We are pleased to hear that The Misbourne School hopes that these visits to Azezo will become a regular biennial event.
Resourcing Project news
One of our most rural schools is called the Jenda Elementary School, situated in a community about 30 minutes walk from the nearest road, which itself is a further hour’s bus ride from Gondar town centre in northern Ethiopia. The school caters for 900 pupils, from Grades 1 to 8, but until recently it had no clean drinking water provision for pupils. Link Ethiopia was able to work with the Jenda community to fund the installation of a new water pump facility on the school site, which is now able to be used by students, staff and the local community. Thank you to all those who have supported Link Ethiopia with your regular donations!
Our Gap Ethiopia scheme
February 20th is an exciting day in the diary for four of our next teaching volunteers. Two young ladies from Backwell School in Bristol – Hannah Ray and Cassey North – and two young men from Dr Challoner’s Grammar School in Amersham – William Grave and James Harmer – will all be travelling out to the Gondar region of northern Ethiopia to take up their placements in two secondary schools in the region. Prior to that, they will all be in London for training sessions and will travel out to Ethiopia armed with teaching schemes and sets of learning activity books.
Meanwhile the hunt is on for our next volunteers to take up their places in the following academic year. Information is on the website about this, but more details can be obtained by emailing chris@linkethiopia.org Do you know anyone who might be interested? Let us know.
Link Ethiopia
Email: chris@linkethiopia.org
Head Office address: 4 Orchard Mews, London, N1 5BS, UK
Telephone: +44 (0) 20 7241 3544
Registered charity number: 1112390
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