Surely Adam and Lesley were due to be back at school in Kenya in the second half of August… has Adam found the second year so demanding he has no time for blogging? Or perhaps they never reached Africa at all?

In fact, we arrived back at RVA only on 19^th September, a month later than planned. Several maths teachers had to cover my Algebra 2 classes, and Lesley’s responsibilities were adjusted to take account of our late return.

The reason was that whilst we were back in Europe, at the beginning of August, my mother had a fall. She fractured her hip and had to undergo a hip replacement operation. She survived the operation, but due to her severe dementia she could not cope with the recuperation needed after the operation, and eventually passed away at the end of August.

We postponed our return to Kenya three times : firstly when it looked like she might be transferred to a nursing home, and we wanted to be there to help with that transition; secondly when her condition deteriorated and she was put on end-of-life palliative care, and the third time when she had passed away, to stay in the UK to help my father and brother with the funeral preparation, and to attend the funeral itself.

Although it is never easy to lose a parent, I was fortunate to be able to see my mum in hospital every day for a period of nearly three weeks, and to be able to be on hand to help my father with the funeral preparation. The funeral itself was very moving, with our children acting as pall-bearers, and many spoken tributes and live music from family and friends.

However, it was lovely to get back to school, and to be greeted not only by friends and colleagues, but also by many students who were genuinely pleased to see us return. I have spent the last ten days getting up to speed with my classes; many of the students have had three different teachers over a period of four weeks, and several of the weaker students have needed some extra support. 

Since we got back, I have attended three Grade Level meetings (where the academic progress of all students in a particular year-group are discussed); we have restarted dorm cover for the boys primary school dorm (this year only five boys, so not too demanding); we have met with our Caring Community group (seven Year 7 girls who are a delight to be with); I have also organised a Wizard tournament for 20 students. Here you can see the proud winners, all students I taught last year.

I am also supporting two students who do their Maths IGCSE later this month. I was able to give them each some one-to-one lessons via Zoom whilst I was in the UK, and they are doing final mock exams this week before the real exams after half-term.

So as you can imagine, things are quite busy. But already knowing how life in Kenya works, and in particular how the school functions, and teaching material that I already know from last year, makes this year a completely different, and even more pleasurable, experience.