On the 20th February 2025, St Michael’s saw their first 6th form cohort embark on a trip of a lifetime – Challenges Abroad, Tanzania. I had the absolute privilege to accompany Will and Meredith, as we embarked on our epic 30 hours travelling on mini buses and planes to arrive at our final destination; the Tanzanian Hub, which was to be our home for the next two weeks.

The first weekend was getting ourselves accustomed to our new environment, experiencing new foods (all vegetarian), new beds and a new language (Swahili). We visited a Culture Art Centre and a local market, where it is totally acceptable to barter for your chosen goods. Who knew that Meredith was a financial shark and won the accolade of best haggler after getting the cheapest price for the much sought-after Tanzanian football shirt. I did hear a rumour that a special order was put through to replenish their stock after we had visited!

On Sunday, our challengers had to prepare for their first lesson in the primary schools we were to visit the following day. They were going to be teaching 4 hours a day, 2 hours in two separate schools; Killinga in the morning, back to the hub for lunch, and then off to Usa River for the afternoon sessions. Our mission was to deliver STEAM lessons in the first week, and conversational English in the second week, and what lesson our students prepared for the schools. Every day they spent at least two hours preparing for the next day, after their teaching was completed. The first week saw them teach anything from Chemistry on how mixing bicarbonate of soda with white vine vinegar into a fanta bottle can blow up a balloon, to learning about our British Monarchy and making crowns. Those crowns were worn for days! The second week was teaching anything from directions and how their villages looked to producing posters highlighting everything that Tanzania had to offer. The classrooms have now been wallpapered with the posters which brought life to their very dull environment, and we left them with a reminder of what they had achieved. Of course, the pupils talk in Swahili, so every new English word our challengers needed to teach their pupils, they learnt those words in Swahili so they could communicate with ease. Every new day saw the children running up to us shouting the new words they had learnt from the day before.

On the first day of teaching I have to tell you I cried. I was so moved by what our students were achieving and how they threw themselves into the challenge and the way they were with the children. I cannot tell you how proud I am of how well those lessons were planned and executed by our students, with no involvement from us teachers. The way they built in expectations and kept a common theme through their teaching was a joy. From day three, as soon as we arrived the pupils were moving their tables around the room so that we could start the lessons in a big circle, something they did every day to teach them the new words we would be using for that lesson. It was incredible!

You can never have a trip that is all work and no play, and the middle weekend saw us all enjoy a weekend safari in two separate places. The first day was at the Tarangire National Park and the second at the Ngorongoro Conservation Area which holds the seventh national wonder of the world. We were so lucky to see all the Big 5 over the two days, albeit the Rhino through binoculars, because they are really shy animals you know! Everyone had an amazing time, and at one point we were so close to a pride of lionesses that we could stroke them. We saw elephants walking in front of the jeep and a giraffe who decided that he was quite curious about who was looking at him. Thankfully the lionesses were not hunting him but a buffalo in amongst the elephants!

On the last day of trip, we took a very tired bunch of students to a rather fancy lodge for a few hours before we were due to fly home. We were able to use the swimming pool and spa, and had a

wonderful lunch, which wasn’t vegetarian. For those of you that have seen I’m a Celebrity Get me Out of Here, you would have thought they had been starved for weeks; they ordered everything off the menu that had meat or fish in it. I can confirm that everything was demolished!

I do believe that this trip has changed our challengers, and they have experienced a trip of a lifetime that will stay with them forever. We are about to see two more challenges head off to India this Easter and two more to Panama in the summer, and I know they will have the best time. With your generosity and support, we have managed to raise £3,500 but we still need to raise a further £1,900. If you could spare any amount to support our challengers, we would be really grateful. Please click on the QR code or follow the link to the Go Fund Me Page to make your donations, with a massive thank you from all of us! https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-children-and-families-in-unfortunate-circumstances?utm_campaign=fp_sharesheet&utm_medium=customer&utm_source=qr_code