The CRC - Day 1: The Tour and Finding Our Way

Building tour led by Hawa and Isata -- two 17-year-old girls of the CRC. Isata is waiting to receive her exam results to hopefully progress to senior secondary school; Hawa goes to senior secondary school in the afternoons. She is anxious for positive results so that she doesn't have to be the only one of the older girls going to school in the afternoon.

We first looked at the new buildings -- very nice looking but still needing work to complete them; work that cannot be done by us and must be done before the children can begin to use them. Frustrating.

We visited with the workmen finishing the last two tiers of the new wall around the compound; all good workers, day-laborers, eager to please though, of course, not as machine-like as "experienced" workers, and using only the most rudimentary of tools to mix, transport, measure and set.

On to the outdoor kitchen to meet the cooks and to the library to survey the book cases there and discuss the carpentry project.

We then met with Lappia, Patrick, and Douda at the UMC Limb-Fitting Center back behind the dorms; started in 2000, they have fit some 200 legs of people and children. Then, as if to drive the point home, Mr Senessi, the electrician for the center, brought his 22-year old daughter whose left hand was amputated by the rebels in Freetown in 1999. Memunatu is her name.