These days Tanzanian schools are opening for the new term. It is a stressful time. School fees must be found and paid and all the needs of the new term looked after, from notebooks to mattresses. Three of the students that I support for their education are returning to their various schools.

Lenkangu returns for the second term of his first year in Teacher Training College. He is the young man that I have talked about in the past. He dreams of

teaching in Maasai country. Lenkangu talks often of helping to raise the level of education among the Maasai. Most teachers will do anything to avoid appointments to bush schools, so Lenkangu shouldn’t have a problem to get assigned to a Maasai school. This term he will be assigned to some school in Tanzania for six weeks to do student teaching, then back to the college for the rest of the term.

Fabiola returns for her final year of secondary school at St. Joseph’s high school run by sisters. She has done very well so far except for math that seems to be the waterloo of so many Tanzanian students. Otherwise, her marks are all A’s and B’s. She hopes to do better in Math during this final year.

Tuke has just finished primary school here at Olbalbal and has been assigned to begin Form I at the government secondary school at Malambo, a small village across the plains from us here at Olbalbal. He is very excited about leaving Olbalbal and beginning the adventure of high school. He has never traveled beyond Ngorongoro so Malambo will be a new world for him. Getting him ready for school has meant looking for everything from pencils to blankets and a mattress.

Lesisita has begun to study electricity at a trade school run by the Spiritans. He started school a month ago. I called the

priest headmaster yesterday to see how Lesisita is doing. It seems that he is serious and is fitting well into the program. He is hoping to find a good job afterwards to build his life and support his mother.