A day of rest!! - Sunday 17th April 2011

After the hectic day we had yesterday, we were basically left to our own devices this morning; a slightly later breakfast before a chilling out, with the prospect of a football match in the afternoon against the local Sport in Action team.

As part of the continued links that have been built up with UCLan and local organisations in Kabwe, Cliff Olsson had arranged for a session to be held at Nkrumah College with local SIA volunteers, as well as teachers from local schools. The students were given the opportunity to come along if they wanted to, with Stuart Tomlinson, Sam Chouhan, Lucy Robinson, and Hannah Willis joining in.

Students and volunteers at Nkrumah College

On arrival at Nkrumah, there were no teachers there, and it transpired that the contact who should have been arranging teachers to attend had not told them. However, the session went ahead, but shorter than had been planned, as the temperature was getting a bit on the high side.

Although it was shortened, and without as many participants as planned, it was still a worthwhile exercise, with the volunteers seeing how games and training exercises can be planned to test participants to the full.

The afternoon football match was held on the pitch in Katondo, and we had heard that it was an event that the community supported very well. This was clear, when we arrived there, there were hundreds of children waiting for us.

Without going into too much detail, UCLan won 2-1, goals coming from Richie Sandham and Chris Caiger. Watch the post match interview video below. This was the first victory for a UCLan team, so were were all very proud to have beaten the SIA team on their own patch.

In the evening, we had to settle down to give some thought to how we wanted to plan the next few days, as everyone was split into small groups of three or four, to attend sessions at different sites in Katondo. This was where the hard work really started, and reality bit.

The groups were announced, with sites allocated, and each group working together to make their plans.

Today was the first chance for many of the group to communicate with the UK, as there is no internet connection available, and old mobiles had been brought out to use with local SIM cards. Shadrick, our SIA co-ordinator has been working really hard to get us all connected, so his arrival this morning with SIM cards and top up cards was a boost for our spirits, as we made those calls home.

Here is Adam Dixon's review of the day -