Zimbabwe, a first impression

‘Hello, how are you?’, ‘I’m fine and you?’ These are the first words you hear when you arrive in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe is a landlocked country which had a tumultuous period recently: between 2007 and 2009 it was confronted with a hyperinflation and a cholera outbreak. Next to this, Zimbabwe writes history with their president, R. Mugabe, who is governing the country since 1980.

After arriving in Harare, the capital of Zimbabwe, I travelled southwest to Bulawayo. Here, my first workday for VVOB took off. As VVOB states, it works on ‘ education for development’, which is realized through the Quality Education and Vulnerability Programme. For more information about this Flemish organization and their activities in Zimbabwe, you can check the VVOB website (http://www.vvob.co.zw/).

In Bulawayo, VVOB supported a three-day workshop called ‘Programme Makers One’ at Hillside Teachers’ College. During this workshop, 61 lecturers were trained (by eight other lecturers) to become facilitators. How did they do this? As you can see on the pictures, various participatory methods and a lot of energy were used!  




Introductory session

Teambuilding

role-playing

Bulawayo is not only famous for being the second biggest city in the country and for his mayor college, but is also known for hosting the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair (ZITF), which my colleagues and I visited. I learnt a very important lesson and a first step in “surviving Zimbabwe”: when the president and his convoy are passing on the street, everybody has to stand still, whether or not you’re on foot, by car or by bike!