The college is a slightly crazy and very frustrating place to be at the moment. When we went to the UK in June there was no teaching going on and the place was pretty dead. Once we returned in July the summer programme was supposed to have started, but as with a lot of things in Ethiopia last-minute changes were made. All government-employed teachers were required to attend two weeks of political “workshops”, which meant students were late enrolling for the summer programme, etc. The programme is for existing 1^st cycle primary school teachers, who are only qualified to Certificate level, to upgrade their qualification to a Diploma, and therefore be able to teach in 2^nd cycle primary schools. 2^nd cycle teaching is higher status (i.e. less poor than the lowest-of-the-low 1^st cycle) and only badly paid instead of really badly paid.

Gill offered to teach one of the summer programme courses on Spoken English. She quickly discovered there was no workscheme and worse was to come. The planning of the timetable has been a classic example of an institution not being able to organise a piss-up in a brewery e.g. the evening before teaching was due to start, staff timetables were issued at the end of the day when most staff had gone home. After a generally very positive experience of the college since we arrived, our opinion of the management’s ability to plan and organise has hit rock bottom. The senior staff are great people, but there is a shocking lack of strategic planning and co-ordination. When we finish at the end of October the college would like us to stay and would try and find jobs for us. However the real need is management and leadership, which the college itself doesn’t see.

One of my colleagues was asking me about our visit to the UK. He was particularly fascinated by the change in the number of daylight hours throughout the year at home. He explained that in Ethiopia people in rural areas tell the time by noting the light level, as sunrise (approx 0600) and sunset (approx 1830) hardly change at all during the year. He wanted to know how people can tell the time at home if sunrise & sunset times vary. He was astonished about most people at home using watches: “even in rural areas?!” was the response.