News

We were very pleased to be asked and to be able to deliver two days of training to a group of head teachers working with Handicapped International to improve inclusive education in Burundi. The aim was to visit and learn from the activities which Bethesda is doing, we introduced them to new inclusive sports and games that can be included in the school system to help integrate people with disabilities. The two days finished with a joint canoeing session with the head teachers and a group of children with disabilities from the Jean Bosco centre, overall it was very successful and the head teachers were amazed and inspired by what they saw 

Bridget Hathaway arrived in Burundi on 23rd Jan 2012 to help train our staff and other volunteers in disability awareness and basic care techniques for people with disabilities, so they will be able to begin working in the villages surrounding Muyinga. She will be here for seven weeks intensive training and will be taking our staff for a work placement in Tanzania, visiting a pre-existing "Community based rehabilitation" project. This is an exciting development for the project and we hope that this new aspect of Bethesda's work will make a real difference in the lives of people with disabilities in the Muyinga area.

Another activity for The Bethesda Project was started on 9th Dec 2011! Raft building is an activity in which teams are given four blue barrels, six wooden poles and lots of rope; they are asked to build their own raft which, as a team, they will then try(!) to paddle across the lake – racing other teams to the finish! 

Our staff enjoyed the training and we are looking forward to introducing it to groups soon.

Members of the local church in Muyinga volunteered to help plant a euphobia fence all the way around the new Cibare Site. It took three mornings work to plant a tree every half meter around the 1.2km perimeter – a massive 2,400 holes dug and plants planted! It's been really exciting to see the plants taking root and the fence taking shape!

See the gallery for more pictures of the planting….

Vicky Whibley and Chris Binks arrived on 15th Nov 2011 to help the project for one month. They have been very busy and extremely helpful – teaching First Aid, drawing an Orienteering map from scratch and setting new routes, teaching our new Raft Building activity and designing and planning a Low Ropes course for our new site. We hugely appreciate all they have given to the project,

see the gallery for more pictures of their stay.