Matron!

It’s been a week of new experiences for Irene. Firstly, she’s begun to sort out the ‘new’ computers for the Vocational Training Centre (VTC). Well, ‘new’ if you regard 15 year old Pentium 2 computers with about 130kb of memory running Windows 98 (does anyone remember Windows 98?) and Microsoft Office 1997 as ‘new’. Still, they are better than no computers at all for a computer course and will at least give the students, who probably have never touched a computer before, a chance to use a ‘mouse’ and to see how a word processor works.

Secondly, she has been asked to be ‘matron’ to the teenage (16 years +) students, especially the 14 female boarders and 4 males. The rules are very strict – for example, the boarders have to be in their unlit dormitories by dusk, (7 pm or after they have been fed) and must not leave the grounds of the VTC at all. She has decided that if she is going to be matron she is going to ‘champion’ her boarders, and has already got agreement that the boys dorm, a tiny room with just enough room for a single bunk bed for 4 boys, is too small, even by African standards, and will need to be changed during the Easter holidays.

Thirdly, she was asked to speak at a quarterly Fellowship meeting at the Cathedral last Saturday on the text Rom 12:2 – a renewed mind. Most of the audience did not speak English so the Cathedral Vicar translated for her. She must have been appreciated because twice the congregation began spontaneously singing their favourite ‘revival’ chorus during her talk, indicating their pleasure at what she was saying.

As for Malcolm, he had another trip to one of the Parish Churches, this time Kabami, to audit the books of 4 of the neighbouring Parishes. One of the treats is that, as is the custom here, he was given a cooked lunch of plantain (green looking savoury bananas cooked like mashed potato), rice, greens, beef and ground nut sauce. This is as honour as normal meals for local people would just be rice and beans since meat is too expensive.