McGregor Waldorf School

Katleen's Travelogue 5

Thursday 31 May

Today I scheduled a meeting with the International Department of the KATHO – a campus in Kortrijk which houses various colleges that offer a variety of trainings. Since several years now there is an International Department offering last year students the opportunity to do their Practical Training (usually a 3 month period) abroad. The costs of such a training session is subsidized by the government.

I did my tertiary education at IPSOC, which is part of the Katho campus, and where I studied Assistant Psychology as it was called then. I had some time left before the meeting so I popped into Ipsoc. Still the same building, seeming so much smaller than at the time. I asked if Mrs. Van Rossen was there – she used to be a teacher of mine and is still there. It was good to meet up with her especially when she exclaimed that I still look very much the same. She has a daughter who studied for doctor and who did practicals at Pretoria Emergency Room. So we had plenty to talk about.

I then met with representatives of 2 colleges and Mrs.VandenDries who coordinates the international department. I talked about McGregor and our school and they talked about what they usually can offer. Then we discussed what would be possible for us. I had talked about our need for a JAVA instructor (computer) but we would need a teacher which is not available. But the students of Ipsoc (social workers, orthopedagogen, students psychology) could means something for our primary school: help teacher with remedial teaching, organizing afternoon activities in the village, help with diagnoses, etc.

In the end we agreed that I would send them all the visual material I have and write a proposal about our school and our needs after I discussed all this at our school.

Friday 1 June

The opening of the exhibition leading up to the Art Auction is today!! Luc, my artist friend had dreamt about having wonderful sunny weather to accommodate all the visitors outside of his gallery but that afternoon, there was a ‘wolk breuk’ in my hometown. For two hours straight the rain came pouring down in buckets. I had to go fetch Mary from school at 3 pm which left me and Mary absolutely soaking wet. It did remind me of my childhood days when we would get home all wet. We would have to get dry clothes on and sit in front of the fire to get warm.

By the time my family and I arrived at the gallery Ten 9 Bruggen in Oostnieuwkerke at 6 pm, the rain had passed there too but not so heavily. The weather cleared up although it remained fresh. We all helped to finalize the preparations for the evening and soon the people started arriving…

Raf

Downstairs in the gallery Luc had tastefully arranged various artworks of participating artists while upstairs were exhibited all the works for sale. It was a wonderful evening with lots of people, some of whom I knew but most not. There were surprises which left me delighted. Pascaline and her family from the Netherlands whom I met in McGregor and who have a house there had told me that her parents were from the same region as where I was born. Here parents showed up at the opening! Then later on someone exclaimed that he had involved me in an accident some 30 years ago. Looking at this man’s face I realized that yes this was the guy who also did his practical training at the same institution as I did 30 years ago and yes, I was involved in an accident with him…

At some stage Luc started the evening with an introduction after which I told about the school and the importance of art. Then the major of Roeselare. Mr. Luc Maertens, who was at some point Minister of Education, gave a speech. It was a most interesting talk in which he referred to Art and Esthetics, Art and Education and Art and Religion. I was most impressed and thanked him for his words.

Then the more practical part of the evening started where people could already place a bid on the works for sale. Luc was the more businesslike and secured quite a few bids, while I talked socially to various people about our work and about South Africa in general. Where ever I go there are always people who have visited South Africa for it is truly a popular tourist destination. All this was surrounded by jembe sounds coming from the drums of Sidy Cissokho from Senegal.

All in all a successful evening hopefully leading up to a successful Art Auction. My brother filmed throughout the evening and will do so at the Art Auction as well. He will then make a dvd so people at home in South Africa will be able to taste the atmosphere.

Tuesday 5 June

This morning I took the train to Roeselare where I met up with Dirk Detemmerman from the Noord-Zuid Verbinding – Provincie West-Vlaanderen. I had applied for funds last year and a week before my visit €12 000 was deposited in our account. Most of that money will be spend on developing the small businesses that the school started setting up. I wanted to thank the provincial government and talk to Dirk about possible donations in the future.

I arrived there so see a group of youngsters dressed up as Indians! After talking to Mr. Detemmerman, it became clear that the building also houses other organizations, one of which is solely working to sensitize local people about the situation in other countries. Anyway I had a very good talk to Dirk, who worked himself for some years in the Fillipines and who is a teacher as well. He pointed out that the Province of West-Vlaanderen is the only governmental organization who has a large budget for helping developing countries but that there are about 250 small private groups scattered across the province who gather money for projects. These small groups appear to gather a lot of money for the various projects they support. It became clear to me how much need for support there is in the world. There are literary thousands of projects knocking on Europe’s door for money from countries like Africa, South America, Asia, Russia, South Europe (previously communist countries), etc. There are also thousands of organizations who gather money but it is very labour intensive to find out which organization matches your projects. And having a personal connection seems to be vital.

Anyway Dirk gave me some pointers for future application and I left happy to have a face to the e-mail address. He also feels that our thoughts of making the school as self sufficient as possible is a valuable one and one which we should pursue.

Friday 8 June

I went to visit the class of my 17y old niece Charlotte, who had in the month running up to my visit in Belgium, talked to the director of her school and asked if the school could organize something.

I have learned that the school’s programme is fixed from the beginning of the school year (September) so there was not much I could do anymore but I made arrangements to have our school on the agenda of their ‘fundraising for Third World Project’ week around Easter 2008.

But I could go to Charlotte’s class who had warmed up her fellow students during their Religions lessons with her testimony ‘my aunt is an inspiration to me’. I showed the power point presentation via a beamer to a class of about 12 girls and 1 boy. I then asked them what they thought was similar between them and the children in South Africa and then what they thought was different. I asked them if they had heard about Apartheid and explained quite graphically what it meant at the time. I also talked about my personal journey to Africa. They asked how I came to adopt Mary and I told them about that too. These young people were full of attention and I really appreciated their listening. The director had told me that the school was going to donate €500 to our school and I asked them what they would like our school to spend it on so they could feel that their efforts went to something they feel important. They choose to use the money for outings and camps for our children.

Saturday 9 June

Mary’s school festival !!! They rehearsed for many weeks and this afternoon they showed the result of their efforts at the Cultural Center in my hometown. Its was a total spectacle in which all the children from the very little 3 y olds till the grade 5ers participated. The theme was – cheese wih holes !

Schoolfeest

The pictures I took are unfortunately all too dark but the story was worth watching. I found I afterwards that Mary’s teacher had brought the idea and the grade 5 teacher had then written an original scenario. The red thread of the story was carried by the older ones while each class has a short part in which they performed a dance. It was really sweet – Mary’s class was dressed as farmers and farmers’ wives (boeren en boerinnen). Mary was very seriously performing and she had informed me that I was not allowed to wave at her during the dance!!! Her class really stole the show but all of it was really great. All the costumes were original designs and made by parents and teachers. The décor was also made by parents. It amazes me how parents are involved in the education of their children something I miss in our school. The cultural center was full as all the grandparents, parents, brothers and sisters, aunties and uncles showed up to watch their loved ones.

After the performance there was an evening of eating and drinking at the school. I volunteered like many other parents to take a slot at the bar and had a great time. The mother of a boy in Mary’s class said she was real happy that I volunteered although I was only for a few months at the school. I finally felt accepted by the parents and they want to hear about our school so in the last week of our stay we will try to organize an evening.

Sunday 10 June

Now we have to travel to Schopfheim Germany but luckily our train is at 11 am so we did not have to get up too early.

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McGregor Waldorf School

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