Iba-Oloja Primary School (ibeju)

Charity work isn't all hard work. Actually not much of it's hard work at all. But when the only way to get to a school is by canoe you could do a lot worse on a nice sunny day. (during the Wet all the swamps around Lagos are completely flooded in a foot or so a water, so canoe is the way to travel...)

I won't bore you with the details other than to say, a group of us headed about and hour or so east of Lagos to check up on a school we done some work at last year and deliver some more school supplies. Unfortunately, we had a film crew hanging around so everything took twice as long as you had to keep going back and doing everything two or three times so that they could get it on film. It confused the crap out of the locals when the film guys were yelling "hug them again!! I didn't get it!! Now say that again louder and look this way!!"

Anyway, on to the pictures...

No strollers or prams around here, kids are lashed to whoever's
looking after them by a "wrapper", even if they're on a motorbike

Loading up the canoes

heading through the jungle to the river

I had the easy job. Mussilu did the paddling
while I bailed out the canoe every so often

On the river

Mr Mufu was kind enough to show us how to do a little
fishing on the way home (didn't catch anything though)

Due to the rains, we had to walk 100m or so through the swamp to get back to land

Iba-Olaja primary



The kids doing a role call and having a little sing

As usual, you always get swamped by kids who all want to be "snapped"