Young Africa: Agri/Vocational School

Hello, Everyone. Hope you are all fine and enjoying school and work, and life!!

Here in Mozambique the ruling party, Frelimo, won the elections, surprising no one. There were many observers from the UN, different countries and each of the parties. It was peaceful and everyone had the day off. We saw very crowded voting stations at schools.

We visited the most wonderful vocational school called Young Africa. This school, started by a remarkable Dutch woman and her  equally remarkable Indian husband is just outside of town. It is (almost) as fabulous as our Vocational School on Hogan Road!  They teach cooking, sewing, building, computer repair, music production, auto repair, plumbing...all those skills essential to keeping society functioning. What was just bush 3 years ago is now a 3 acre campus with lovely buildings, all buzzing with good work. The students run a beautiful outdoor restaurant, where we ate Portuguese specialties.

The really neat thing is that Doreen and Raj started Young Africa in Zimbabwe 10 years ago. As soon as it was sustainable, well established, and running seamlessly, they handed it over to the Zimbabweans. It continues to do well. They hope to follow that model here and then start an agricultural vocational school on the border of Zimbabwe and Mozambique.

If anyone who goes to Voc is reading this, can I trouble you to tell Mr. Adams to google Young Africa? I’d love the teachers there to see their Mozambiquan counterpart!   (Perhaps someone could forward this email to Voc? Thank you!!)

Learning skills, getting a good education, staying healthy, trying to get a job, is the pursuit we all have in common. If anyone at Voc could write a little piece about their course, how it is going, and what you hope to do with the skills, I could share it with the students in the same course at Young Africa. It would be so exciting to compare courses.

The students speak Portuguese, one of  their own local African Languages, and are learning English. I can finally get a few words out of my mouth. If our AFS students have trouble with fatigue, depression, feelings of inferiority in discussions, shyness, all due to struggles to speak English, cut them a LONG LINE of slack. I am getting a first hand dose of all of that!!
Sending many Greetings!!     Emily/ Ms. Wesson