The Aldenhamian
Aldenham School Elstree Herts WD6 3AJ
enquiries@aldenham.com www.aldenham.com Design Beachhouse www.beachhouse-design.com
TheAldenhamian 2009
01923 858122
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School Editor’s Officials Notes 02
School Captain Gareth Thomas Kennedy’s Deputy School Captains James Massing Riding’s Joshua Nathan McGill’s School Praeposters Tom Cousins Beevor’s Daniel Purdy Aragon* Kennedy’s Nicolai Mueller Kennedy’s Cameron Grant Leeman’s Ben Weinberg* Leeman’s Tobi Caesari Leeman’s Oliver Coleman McGill’s Rajiv Dhutia* McGill’s Leyla Tosunoglu Paull’s Tatjana Koch Paull’s George Day* Riding’s Tom Chamberlain Riding’s Charlie Ferguson Beevor’s Greg Copley Riding’s Oliver Chamberlain Leeman’s *House Captain
The 2009 edition of the Aldenhamian has brought all the usual challenges (is there any more tea in the pot? Can we find that last article?) but we would like to thank all the people who have contributed to this edition. This year the Editorial team said “Goodbye” to Miss Addinall, and “Hello!” to Miss Nield and Miss Gratton. Without you ladies this magazine would have been the end of Miss Cushing’s sanity and so thank you to you both for your unending goodwill, good humour and good biscuits! We must also thank our student Editorial Team for the help they have given to this project, and for their ability to use a digital camera even in the dark, without the batteries and the memory card in place. We now have a great many shots of the backs of various peoples heads! We would like to take this opportunity to thank our colleagues for their patience and good humour when faced with never ending
requests for more articles and photographs. This also applies to Phil Wright for coping magnificently with Miss Cushing’s tears when she thought she had deleted the entire magazine and not backed it up. Looking forward to the next edition Phil! Of course, the Aldenhamian would not exist without the dedication, support and skills of Chris Covey and Jo Donnelly at Beachouse. Last, but by no means least, we need to thank the Headmaster for his continued support for this magazine and patience when explaining the different types of binding and glue to a clearly bemused Editorial Team. We hope that you enjoy this edition of the Aldenhamian, and that it provides you with a snapshot of life here in all its glory. Anna Cushing, Hannah Nield & Emily Gratton Editors in Chief
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TheAldenhamian 2009
Please send your submissions via email to the address below. The deadline for the next issue is August 31st 2009. The Aldenhamian Aldenham School Elstree Herts WD6 3AJ Email aldenhamian@aldenham.com Telephone 01923 858122 Website www.aldenham.com
Editors Anna Cushing Hannah Nield Emily Gratton
Student Editors Deshveer Babra Emily Kutchinsky Oliver Coleman Nicholas Hintze Anthony Lourides Joanne Uttley 2
Headmaster’s Welcome I am delighted to be able to introduce this edition of The Aldenhamian which reflects upon a very successful year at the School and the numerous encounters with others, both inside and outside School which the pupils have experienced. My Visitation Day Speech was able to reflect on the importance of these encounters throughout our School life, both those which occur every day and are apparently mundane, as well as those which are deeply moving and memorable. As James Joyce wrote: I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race. We should recognise the many ways in which our pupils are being shaped through their academic curriculum, their sport, their activities and their life within the House. Within this magazine you will be able to recall some of those moments, but also to recognise the tremendous efforts of the staff who work with them. I congratulate them and all the pupils on a really memorable year. It was however a year marked by a very sad moment at its conclusion with the death at the age of 95 one of my most distinguished predecessors, Peter Mason on July 29th. Peter Mason was Headmaster from 1949 until 1961 and will be remembered as an extremely gifted man who led the School through the difficult post war years. He moved on from Aldenham to become High Master of Manchester Grammar School, but it was notable at his funeral that his time at Aldenham was so clearly marked by the many OAs who joined governors and staff. We all cherish his memory and his work for the School.
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James Fowler, Headmaster
Cover: Aldenham pupils continue to hit their targets in all areas of school life. Photograph by Adam Scott 1 D rawing of School House Gardens by Toby Watkins
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2 S tudent editorial team takes a break whilst trying to decide how to spell antidisestablishmentarianism 4 The photo shows the previous six Headmasters of Aldenham on the occasion of the unveiling of the new portraits in the Dining Room, October 2004. Peter Mason seated at front
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TheAldenhamian 2009
3 James Fowler, Headmaster
Cricket Aldenham Cricket Club 2009 Season
TheAldenhamian 2009
Sport
Cricket
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This season has been very enjoyable and all the sides have had some success throughout the term. The table below lists the respective results of each side and it should be noted that the 1st XI has had an excellent season winning 7 of the 11games that they played. The 1st XI led by Tom Pettet recorded victories against QE Barnet, Westminster, St Benedicts, UCS, John Lyon, the OAs and the MCC. This is the second year in a row that the School has beaten the MCC and it was a delight that Bhasker Patel took five wickets against them. Bhasker will be duly invited to Lords on the opening day of the First Class season in 2010 which is a great honour. The star performers for the X1 were Tom Pettet (362 runs @ 60.33 and 17 wickets at 16.76), Greig Copley (206 runs @25), Bhasker Patel (16 wickets at 13.5) and Sajan Shah (14 wickets at 10.14). Ben Weinberg recorded his 100th cap for the 1st XI sports teams and he was awarded with an embroidered shirt and plaque to commerate this remarkable achievement. Elsewhere, George Stear (U15s) scored Aldenham’s only century of the season (100* vs Westminster) and Ollie Salami (2nds) took the season best figures (6-14 vs St Bendicts).
Both the above players represented the 1st XI at various stages during the season. Kishan Teli (2nds) achieved the rare and remarkable feat of a hatrick against Berkhamsted. I would like to record my sincerest thanks to all members of staff who umpired and managed the sides over the season. They give up enormous amounts of their time during the very busy exam term and I am sure the boys get a huge amount of pleasure and knowledge from their input. Thank you also to David Goodchild who continued as our Professional Coach and Paul Weekes who has had a tremendous impact on a numbers of the players across all the age ranges. I have included a Team of the Season (Manager – TRBM/MIY) and congratulations to all players and staff selected for this prestigious side. I hope that Cricket can continue to go from strength to strength at Aldenham School and look forward to the 2010 season. Mike Yeabsley
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Cricket Season results
Played
Won
Drawn
Lost
Abd/Can
Team of the season
1st XI
11
7
0
4
1
G Copley
1st XI
2nd XI
7
4
0
3
3
W Collier
1st XI
U15A
11
4
1
6
1
G Stear
U15A
U15B
5
3
0
2
3
T Pettet*
1st XI
U14A
9
4
0
5
1
L Robertson
U14A
U14B
6
1
0
5
1
J Haftel
U13A
U13A
5
3
1
1
1
R Batra
U15A
U13B
4
0
0
4
1
K Teli
2nd XI
Total
58
26
2
30
12
S Copley
U14A
A Barnes
2nd XI
B Patel
1st XI
1 Aldenham’s 1st XI team, looking very smart!
* = Captain
In batting order
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Cricket / Basketball
Team
Basketball
Richard Haigh
TheAldenhamian 2009
This season saw a massive re-building phase for Basketball at Aldenham. At the end of the last season we lost a large number of players, leaving only two players remaining from the entire squad of 20! This was without a doubt the biggest hurdle the squad faced, and they rose admirably to the challenges ahead. Several the players who were on the fringe last year really worked hard and made their contribution to the team this season, Eric Ho in particular. Of real benefit have been a number of new players, most noticeably Akshey Shah, Ronnie Ding and Dan Park. Our fixture record has not been great, winning only one of the five games we played but there are promising signs for the future, and it will not be long before the current squad are a serious challenge to any opponent they face.
Sport
Season review
Down by the River Ver side
Geography Yr 7 Trip Students had a great day learning some basic fieldwork skills and beginning to understand the geographical processes taking place in the River. The three Year 7 classes were dropped in Frogmore and began their trek back to Aldenham School early on the morning of Monday 22 June. Each class recorded data (width, depth and surface velocity) at three different sites along the stream. This data was then manipulated back in class to produce a small work booklet and a number of different graphs. This year, as the Reverend Bond was a class teacher for 7S, the Geography Department decided to make this a sponsored event in aid of Ripple Africa. Rev Bond is running and organising a trip
TheAldenhamian 2009
Trips
River Ver Trip
52 The 10km annual River Ver walk was once again a great success
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from Aldenham to support under-privileged children in Malawi. I would like to thank everyone who has supported this worthy cause and as a Department we managed to raise over ÂŁ300. The students were very well behaved on the trip and a number of them enjoyed entering the stream and collecting the data. I am not sure how accurate this data really was but the most important thing was that each of the children learnt a new skill for the day and had a great amount of fun! I would say this was a very worthwhile trip and would like to thank the staff (Mr Pullman, Mr Collins, Mr Milton, Miss Shinner, Revd Bond and Mark Calderwood) for all their efforts. Mike Yeabsley
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5
Trips
3
River Ver Trip
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1 E xhausted, slightly damp, but happy Year 7s 2 Are you sure you dropped it here? 3 Year 7 are confident they can do this! 4 Raphael realises there is no way back
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TheAldenhamian 2009
5 C hris Barrett finds the best stick to play ‘pooh sticks’ with
Fire and Ice
World Challenge Expedition to Iceland Aldenham pupils learn that both are to be found in
World Challenge: Iceland
54 Iceland as they trek across a stunning landscape After having been to India last year, we opted for an expedition a little closer to home, heading off to the land of ‘ice and fire’. I was a little surprised at the extent of the enthusiasm for an expedition to Iceland and with so many wanting to come I decided that the only way to facilitate it would be to run two expeditions. What no-one was really certain of was just what the weather would be like in Iceland, after all we were going in the summer, but then again there is a reason the country is so named! The other novelty would be the length of the day. It is all fair and well to hear that it never really gets dark at this time of the year but it is a bizarre feeling when experienced first-hand. Our trek would take us on the famous Laugevegur trail. The starting point was
some way from Reykjavik and before the trek actually began we had to buy all our supplies for the expedition – this was not a fully serviced holiday by any means. The first team judged the food situation better than the second but the groaning stomachs and interesting concoction of foods was all part of the experience. As we headed for our starting point, a place called Landmannalaugur, it was as if we had been transported to the Moon. In the distance we could see the glaciers but everywhere else the scenery could best be described as desolate. Nevertheless it was captivating to behold. It was like a lunar landscape as far as the eye could see, a result of the numerous volcanic eruptions that had taken place here. The colours of
2 1 Stunning scenery 2 I can’t see! Luke and Toby just keep plodding on 3 It’s all smiles after reaching the top!
TheAldenhamian 2009
Trips
4 Ooooh that’s cold that is!
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the rocks gave the terrain a surreal vibrancy and you couldn’t help but marvel at nature’s power in creating this magnificent setting. Throughout the trip we would be camping in some pretty tough terrain. Landmannalaugur was a bit different because just nearby was a hot spring where people could go and bathe. Some opted to do this although, with the air being pretty cold by now, I decided against it. After all I knew we had a visit to the Blue Lagoon at the end of the trip and I thought I could wait until then. We commenced the trek the following morning after a hearty breakfast of porridge cooked on our trangias. Not necessarily my first choice for breakfast but ideal when trekking. Our trek took us up over a lava flow
before dropping back into what looked like a flood plain. Quite possibly it had been cut off by the lava flow that we had just crossed, otherwise one could easily imagine that there had once been a large lake there. We then began a much more arduous ascent, frequently passing steam vents. In places the smell of sulphur was quite overpowering. The views became increasingly impressive and when we finally came up over a high ridge, the sight of the scene before us was spectacular. The horizon was dominated by snow capped mountain peaks, steam could be seen rising from vents and the colours of the rocks were stunning. One of the features of the trek that grabbed my imagination and filled me with anticipation was the crossing of several snow
Trips
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fields, some of which were several hundred metres wide at a time. However, walking through snow is no easy task and is physically very draining such that, as the trek went on, I would come to dread another large snow field crossing. Our second campsite had us at over 1000 metres and camping on rocky terrain, surrounded by snow. I challenge anyone to pronounce the name of the campsite correctly – Hrafntinnusker. Undoubtedly it was a spectacular setting but very exposed. For the first team, when we arrived here we found that our main kit bags had not yet reached the site and we were desperately trying to keep ourselves sheltered and out of the wind and rain but at this site there was nowhere to provide this shelter. For the second team, they had all their kit but they had had to endure some torrential rain before getting there and had to put up their tents in windy and bitterly cold conditions. There were a lot of unhappy faces and there was little incentive to come out of our tents once they had been set up, except to get some food. When we woke up the following morning the skies were clear and we could begin to fully appreciate our setting. Indeed our spirits were greatly raised after a decent night’s sleep and we were soon off on the next stage of the trek. We had many snow fields to cross today but there were not so many steep ascents. The first team did opt for an extra ascent and were greeted with some spectacular views for their efforts. Getting back down was an interesting experience since we had to work our way down through
TheAldenhamian 2009
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World Challenge: Iceland
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TheAldenhamian 2009
Trips
World Challenge: Iceland
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6 a scree slope which always offers a few challenges and tests everyone’s balance. It is rarely the case that an expedition goes by without there being a few cracking comments made by the students. The one that stood out for me occurred on this day when we were having a chat about Michael Jackson. The conversation had moved onto the possibility that his body would be embalmed and put on show, at which point I commented that I had seen Lenin’s body in Moscow. As a History teacher I was appalled when someone asked who Lenin was, but the response from one of the other boys was, to my mind, quite priceless – “the chap in the Beatles”. Needless to say they all knew a bit more about the Russian revolution by the end of the trip.
Towards the end of the second day of trekking we had our first river crossing to contend with. Despite the suggestion that everyone come with a second pair of shoes/sandals for these crossings, not all had heeded the advice. This was where they would come to regret it – trekking in wet boots is no fun. One thing that was immediately apparent once we stepped into the water was that it was bracing to say the least. The following day took us over three more rivers, some deeper than others. Thankfully we all crossed without incident although it took a while for some to warm up their feet and legs. We also found ourselves trekking through what can best be described as a volcanic desert. The sand was all black and
the desert extended for several miles before we finally got to our penultimate campsite. By now we were all experts in camp craft and the tents were quickly up and meals prepared. With just one day of trekking remaining, we all slept well that night. The final day gave us a more diverse trek. We went up and down mountain sides, crossed rivers and to cap it off, walked through the closest that Iceland has to a small forest. When we got to the final campsite there was a sense of real achievement at having completed a tough and arduous trek. Of course the end of a trek can be thwarted by difficulties. Although the second team enjoyed an uneventful conclusion to the trek, the first team found that once again there had been a mishap
5 Cold? Us? Never!! 6 Mr Pietrek helps out crossing the river 7 Just keep walking, just keep walking! 8 Hendre and Darshan lead the way back down the “massive hill�
World Challenge: Iceland
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Team 1 Ben Chorley, Jack Chorley, Toby Varian, Luke Moss, Hendre van Vuuren, Darshan Patel, Matthew Ralph, Josh Nixon, Archie Fry, Tom Jackson, Jon Roden, Charles Bloom, Mr Haigh
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with their team kit, with much of it having been sent off to Reykjavik a day early! With no tents or food what was to be done? Perhaps because they recognised their own fault on this occasion, the campsite offered to put the students up in their camping huts where there was also some food available. These are the events that provide a bit of spice to every expedition. Then it was back to Reykjavik for a bit of well deserved rest and relaxation. We first headed off to the Blue Lagoon which was an ideal way of unwinding after the trek. Another classic incident took place here when one of the girls found a wallet in the changing rooms and handed it in to the reception only to realise ten minutes later that it was actually her own wallet! On the
final evening both teams enjoyed a slap up meal to celebrate the completion of a successful expedition. I would like to conclude by expressing my thanks to all of the pupils who came on the expeditions. They were a pleasure to take and I hope the experience has given them a taste for similar adventures in the future. On behalf of all of the pupils I would also like to thank Mr Haigh and Miss Parkin for helping to run these expeditions. Nicholas Pietrek
TheAldenhamian 2009
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Trips
Team 2 Cameron Sinclair, Stephen Wright, Annabel Mizel, Alice Erman, Chris Hudson, Louis Hallet, Mark Rodger, James Jarvis, Andrew Rennie, Anthony Coote, Miss Parkin
Malawi Reverend Dan Bond shares some of the unforgettable experiences from the 2009 Ripple Africa trip to Malawi 1 The boys get ready to play football
TheAldenhamian 2009
Feature
Malawi
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1
Feature
were enjoyed and names exchanged. I had the honour of standing up in front of a class of 60 fourteen and fifteen years olds (who were all impeccably behaved, I hasten to add!) and introducing ourselves. I should have felt daunted, but the warmest of receptions that we had experienced helped me feel at ease. We all left the school agreeing it had been a profound and positive beginning to our visit. From the school we walked a short distance to the community library where we presented the textbooks bought using the money raised by Mr Green’s London Marathon sponsorship. After listening to the librarian’s thank-you speech and a short account of the workings of the library, we were taken on a more sobering visit to a house in the village belonging to a lady called Mary. Mary is a widow and mother of four children who suffers from HIV. Her home had been washed away during last season’s rains and one of our tasks while we were in Mwaya was to labour for the local builders as they pieced together two external walls and rebuilt her outdoor pit latrine. The head builder, Joy, introduced us to the team we would work with and led us to the site of our
TheAldenhamian 2009
Returning safely from Malawi, eleven students and four staff all agreed that their experiences had been life changing, thought provoking and would positively affect the way they approached and perceived charity work for many years to come. Two and half weeks of a three week trip to Africa was spent camping in tents on Mwaya Beach in North Malawi. The idyllic surroundings are home to a friendly, welcoming community which is being supported and encouraged by the work of Ripple Africa, a charity founded in 2002 by Geoff Furber (OA). Doing justice to our sensational time at Mwaya beach is very difficult in a written article, but it is hoped that through trying to convey what we experienced to staff and students we will enable more people to be a part of our relationship with this beautiful part of the world. Our first day was spent touring the area and meeting the community. There is little to beat the feeling you get from walking into a school and being surrounded by the wide grins and laughter emanating from so many happy students. We were soon welcomed inside the classrooms, where handshakes
other main project for our stay: the site for a community health centre. The site was a cleared area of land so we were able to see the building develop from scratch. By the end of our two and a half weeks, we had completed the reparations to Mary’s house and had also dug the health centre’s foundations. In addition, we moved hundreds of bricks and supported the professional bricklayers in putting down several courses. Our work resulted in the forecast for when the medical centre will be ready being brought forward by two weeks; seeing our hard-work and sweat translated into visible progress in the building was extremely rewarding. Some of the most enjoyable and fulfilling times of the trip were the afternoons in which Aldenham and Mwayan students tutored one another. Relationships were established and local languages, English, Science and other subjects were learnt and taught. Regular sessions were organised and the students became absolutely committed to establishing a disciplined and caring attitude towards one another. The Aldenham students were also exposed to some of the more serious issues which the local communities were struggling with through visiting and observing different areas of the village. Although we were never in a position to make any real lasting change, these experiences were good stimuli for group discussions and will inevitably remain on all of our consciences. The HIV/AIDS epidemic is having a huge imact on daily life in Mwaya. During a challenging visit to an existing health centre around ten kilometres away, the reality of this ever-worsening problem became apparent. A recent testing of 4000 local people found that over 1200 of them are suffering from the disease. The number of children who we met who had already lost their parents to the disease is testament to the reality of these statistics. In addition, poor health education means that other diseases like Malaria, Tuberculosis and Lleprosy are rife, and alongside HIV are overwhelming the
Malawi
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TheAldenhamian 2009
Feature
Malawi
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limited resources of the health service. In the UK we have many doctors available in every town, but the one doctor in the health centre we visited caters for a population of almost 250,000. It was humbling to witness committed staff doing all they could to counsel patients, teach health education and prescribe a limited array of medicines for people. It made us realise how fortunate we are to have an effective health service in the UK. Deforestation has also profoundly transformed the landscape, particularly over the last 20 years. Driving from Lilongwe to Mwaya it was noticeable that the southern part of the country is almost devoid of forests of large, indigenous trees that can be seen in the northern region. The area of barren land caused by tree-felling is rapidly spreading as more trees are cleared due to a growing pressure on securing agricultural land and sourcing fuel for cooking within homes. Ripple Africa had begun a two-pronged attack on this destruction of the natural environment, producing and demonstrating a more efficient way of cooking food and providing young sapplings to be planted and protected by the locals. The despair we felt from seeing trees cut-down and burned was partly compensated for by hope: individuals at all levels in the community are taking on the message and growing large numbers of new trees to replace cleared areas. Ripple Africa is working closely with local chiefs and their tribes to emphasise the need to change the way in which the forests are being treated. The hope is that together the charity and the chiefs will be able to initiate more sustainable techniques to safeguard future needs and make sure that this beautiful forest region was not lost forever. Having some very passionate footballers in our group proved to be very useful in integrating us within a number of groups in the village. Students and staff played many games of football in which we were supported by the cheers and, unfortunately, laughter of a large crowd. This was rather a distraction to even our most proficient players, so at times our first touches of the ball were limited to little more than a clumsy lunge! Lots of fun was had and some great footballing talent was witnessed, which begs the question as to why Aldenham could not send their 1st XI to Malawi next year for their pre-season training. The staple diet of the region is cassava, fresh vegetables and maybe some fish. Cassava is a plant that is harvested all year round for its root. The root is extracted from the soil, soaked for three days, dried, and then pounded into a fine powder. This is then added to boiling water, kneaded with a wooden spoon and served in a similar way to how we eat mashed potato. It is a strange consistency and bland in taste, but is improved with a relish made from the plants’ leaves. The village shops sold local produce which changed on a daily basis, depending on supply. The variety of foodstuffs which we are used to harvesting from the shelves of our local supermarkets simply wasn’t available. Some of the farmers have improved their irrigation techniques, which has enabled them to begin to diversify their crops, incorporating carrots and lettuces into their produce. They have begun to substitute cassava for the more nutritious
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1 Digging the foundation trenches for the medical centre 2 The medical centre starts to take shape 3 Linda likes Cassava 4 The devastating effect of mankind on the Malawi forestation 5
5 Revd Bond and his Malawi counterpart
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Malawi
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TheAldenhamian 2009
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maize, which requires guarding to protect it from being poached by the resident monkey population! I hope this gives a summary of some of the experiences we had over our time in Malawi – I suppose the power of our trip comes from speaking with the staff and students directly about their thoughts, emotions and the special individuals we were all privileged to meet during the three weeks. One of our students commented during the end of our trip: “It is going to be difficult to return to a less friendly country!”, and in many ways he was completely right. In Mwaya, one cannot simply ‘nip from A to B’, because everyone either walks or bicycles to their destination, encouraging a natural greeting of “Hello, how are you?” Unlike in the UK, this is a genuine enquiry which demands a detailed response. The conversations I had while walking along the dusty roads that connect village to village were always amazing and always worthwhile. In fact, the constant ‘face-to-face’ interaction with people took some getting used to, but this was the very thing which made the experience so profound. We all learnt so much more than we taught and, on reflection, felt extraordinarily blessed to be given such a wonderful and life-changing opportunity. My one most emotional memory? Well, it had to be meeting Simon on one of those dusty roads I have just mentioned. Exchanging the Malawian handshake, we were soon talking to one another as if we were old friends. Knowing I was a ‘pastor’, discussions about the goodness of God easily broke the ice and allowed the conversation to flow between us. I asked him where he was going and where he had been to. He told me that he was going home for lunch after spending the morning counselling HIV/AIDS victims. He continued telling me that he had been a Christian for three years and was a member of the local Pentecostal Church, which was providing the counselling. We spoke more about his valuable work before he told me that he felt so blessed that his children were not HIV+ and that only him and his wife had been infected with the disease. Having suffered in silence for many years, he had felt called to get some proper medical help and devote his life to supporting others with the disease. As we parted company at the end of his driveway, he grabbed my hand, blessed me, thanked me for the conversation and guaranteed that we would meet very soon. Maybe we will.
Malawi
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Feature
1 Simon was just one of many amazing people we all met in Mwaya, a community which lives with many difficulties, but clings to much of what our own communities have allowed to crumble. I end by thanking firstly Geoff Furber and the Ripple Africa staff for all they did for us and for all they do for Mwaya, and secondly the people of Mwaya for welcoming us and teaching us so much about their country and themselves. Revd. Dan Bond
1 The Aldenham Team and the finished house for Mary
TheAldenhamian 2009
2 Miss Matthews helps dig at Mary’s House
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