Despite what you might think – a Drill isn’t just a power tool and we’re not talking about finding oil.
In a quiet corner of Calabar in the south east of Nigeria you’ll find something much more precious – one of the World’s most endangered primates. You’ve probably never heard of them, that’s because Drill monkeys are only found in this part of the world and it’s estimated that there are only 3,500 left in the wild.
Pandrillus Ranch is the World’s leading facility in terms of breeding primates in capativity and along with the various other animals you’ll find here amongst the token crocodile and cheeky chimps you’ll also find the people keeping the Drill’s alive. She’s probably the best in the World when it comes to Drill so naturally we hung out with Liza Gatsby and this is how we saw things.
Roll the tape!
Pandrillus run two sites in Nigeria, the other of which is four hours north which is a more of an open air affair with the wide open spaces of natural environment available. As you’d expect looking after hundreds of monkeys is more than a handful and paying staff, finding young ophan Drills and expanding Drill sites isn’t cheap.
Donations are the lifeblood of the organisation and if you’d like to see Drill sometime in the future yourself, you can do you bit to ensure their survival and swing some money their way.
Wait!
Wouldn’t working with monkeys be like the coolest job ever! If you think it would be then you’re in luck. Liza and the guys at Pandrillus are always looking for volunteers and no matter what your background they can find something for you! We know, epic right? Get in touch and make it happen here!
We’ve travelled Africa overland but our first steps off land out at sea were something special.
When we arrived in Togo there was something we’d never seen before. It was the Africa Mercy – It’s the largest non-governmental hospital ship in the world and it happened to be docked in Lome while we were there.
Luckily for us, we managed to get on board. We were able to see first hand the amazing work that the guys from Mercy Ships have done and continue to do in some of Africa’s poorest countries in providing much needed medical assistance to those who can’t access or afford it.
The guys arrived in Togo on February 10 to service a nation in which it’s estimated 70% of the population live on less than $2 a day. They’re changing lives everyday and we’d have filmed our time on board, but the guys at Mercy Ships are far better at telling their story and here’s how things shaped up for the crew on arrival in Togo.
That’s just a glimpse of what these guys are dealing with everyday.
For everything you’ll need to know about Mercy Ships, hear stories from its patients or to make a donation check out their website and if it sounds like the kind of thing you’d like to get involved with – you can. Here’s all the information you’ll need to volunteer yourself.
We’ve followed the Football fever for over 12,000km through West Africa but at one small football club in Ghana we saw first hand the importance of football and its influence on young lives.
Across Africa and in particular Ghana, football is ingrained into the lives of almost every individual from an early age. Using this affinity, as a football club, Keta are bringing the wider community together through working on a number of local projects.
Sandlanders FC has implemented a program which ensures every player in the team has a skill or a trade to use off field generating life skills off the pitch to support the skills on it.
We visited Keta to get a feel for the club ourselves.
We can’t talk about a football club without mentioning scores. After a warm up of song and dance like no other come half time it was all tied up at 0-0 with Keta being hosted away at Action Rangers. The second half heated up and we saw grassroots football at its best in Africa.
In front of close to a thousand fans, Keta took the lead early in the second half and celebrated in emphatic fashion, cartwheeling to all corners and providing a polished dance routine. In the nervous nineties deep into injury time Rangers levelled amongst controversy equivalent to France’s Thierry Henry v Ireland with a handball featuring to see the game finish as a 1 all draw as the crowd swarmed the pitch from all sides.
That aside, Keta Sandlanders FC might have only finished second in division two of the Ghanaian Football League but they are certainly on top of the table when it comes to preparing players for a live off field. The club already facilitates a share house for the players and has implemented an off season on the job training schedule for skills work in the Ghanaian capital, Accra.
If you’re in the area, have some skills in either coaching or teaching a trade there are plenty of opportunities and you can get involved with the guys yourself via the Keta FC website
Had a tough day at work? The air conditioning in the office failed again, the bus was 15 minutes late, projects are piling up and there was no chicken noodles left at the shop for lunch?
We hate it when that happens and we’ve had some rough days like that here in Africa, but just imagine if your day was a little more like this.
Imagine if in your local capital city, there was a quarry hidden away behind a few overshadowing buildings. Imagine if this was a quarry with no machinery where people worked for 12 hours a day breaking down, lugging and sorting pieces of granite with their bare hands in unfathomable conditions.
You don’t have to imagine, this is a day in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso and this is a reality for hundreds of people who work in this mine day in and day out, from sunrise to sunset in extremely dangerous conditions.
Of course, this is before you even consider where you are in the World – the middle of West Africa, where temperatures often exceed 40 degrees celcius. This is before you consider the additional heat which fills the mine, generated from burning scrap tyres, used to heat rock in an effort to soften the granite so raw strength and hand tools can penetrate. This is also before you consider the toxic fumes which fill the air with the smell of burning rubber, not to mention a myriad of other safety issues.
This is life for hundreds of children that are born into a life in the mines and if you were to think back to when you were 10 years old or younger we imagine the environment you grew up in was markedly different.
What’s it like for the children of the workers here?
They can grow up at home or stay in daycare or with a baby sitter, right?
Unfortunately not, these Western luxuries aren’t an option as entire families work in the mine, struggling to make ends meet on an unimaginably low wage. Facilities simply don’t exist and when they are avaliable, they are out of reach of most Burkinabe on their level of income.
Children as young as 10 years old have been found working in these unsafe conditions for even the most experienced workers.
Travelling overland through West Africa, you are constanly reminded about the daily struggles people endure to feed their families and to meet their basic needs. Here in Burkina Faso, we’ve been lucky enough to meet people who are taking a lead in trying to break down barriers.
Thankfully a local organisation AEJTB – Association des Enfants et Jeunes Travailleurs de Burkina (Association of Child and Young Workers in Burkina) in partnership with Save the Children Canada established a nursery, the Bii-songo school 10 years ago. It was built adjacent to the site for these children to spend their days in a safe environment away from the harsh life and dangers of the quarry and provides the opportunity for the children to receive basic education.
What’s it like in Bii-Songo?
For us, entering the gate of the school was surreal. We aren’t rockstars but try to imagine deafening screams of excitement from around ninety four year old children as they swarm you on mass with hi-fives and hugs, their smiles so big you that it even hurts your facial muscles.
If you’re lucky, you’ll be treated to a couple of welcome songs from the kids and you’ll never forget the sound. The teachers do sensational work and it truely is a santuary for learning, in what seems a world away from the dangers of the open granite mine and the life that accompanies it.
There is still much to do, young children are still around the mine outside of school times – metres away from flying pieces of rock, swinging hammers and the toxic fumes.
You can play your part the work of these organisations by helping people improve the lives of children. By getting involved in the work of Save the Children in Burkina Faso you can ensure that kids can continue to go to school away from the dangers of an open quarry. These guys facilitate numerous projects with local organisations all of which are run by Burkinabe for Burkinabe.
By supporting this work you are giving these kids a chance to learn in a safe environment you can play a part in giving them an opportunity to get a good education and a future where they have the ability to work wherever they choose to.
This is your chance to stand with the children, the workers, and the communities of Burkina Faso striving for a safe, prosperous and better future.
We were lucky enough to be allowed to film an extraordinary tour of the school and mine and as soon as an internet connection permits – we’ll have that online so you can get a feel for the mine up close and personal.
