Liz Grant, from Scotland, volunteered with Tukae for three months in late 2004. Collected here are extracts from the regular emails she sent back to the UK.

We've been at Emau Hill for almost two weeks now and it is beautiful - high up in the Usambara Mountains where the weather is quite cool. Apart from the long drop toilet, having to shower using a bucket of water carried up from the river and the occasional mosquito, it is very civilised! The food is mainly vegetarian and, so far, we've managed to avoid any illnesses although that is probably tempting fate! The people are lovely but extremely poor - the average wage, if they have a job, is 50p a day and many have lost family to malaria or HIV.

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The last couple of weeks have been spent doing our TEFL course but we get let loose in the schools on Monday - a bit scary as they don't have much English and I'm not making much progress with Swahili!? I'm going to be teaching standards III & IV, both of which have almost 100 kids in the class, plus I've to give a 1/2 hour lesson first thing in the morning to the trainee nuns - I think someone, somewhere is trying to tell me something!? Fortunately the others who are out here with me - Jenni and Ewan from London, and Yani from Cornwall - are really nice so we're managing to laugh our way through some of the madder moments like mastering the art of the long drop toilet.............!

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You'll be pleased to know that I've survived my first week of teaching - lots of fun but very tiring and I'm not sure how much the kids understand! The others are taking bets as to how long it will be before they start speaking with a Scottish accent!? Both Jenni and I are teaching at a very friendly school but the classes are huge - 90+ in each of mine - and there are very few teachers. It's scary to see how poor everyone is and by the end of the week there are lots of dirty, smelly kids wearing the same clothes that they started the week in! Saying that, they are the loveliest people and we are treated like royalty - lots of little faces waving at us when we arrive in the morning, children falling over themselves to carry our bags, lunch made for us by the pupils and we keep getting presents of fruit to take back to Emau Hill.

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Yesterday, for a complete change of scene, we went to a huge party to celebrate the 50th birthday of the Usambara Nuns - sounds very bizarre but it was actually a really good day and the Nuns here certainly know how to enjoy themselves! The whole thing was a bit surreal - 400 Nuns chanting & dancing in the church, Nuns singing through a massive karaoke machine, Nuns wandering around the hall dishing out wine and gin (a great photo opportunity missed!) to accompany a fantastic meal, and the presentation of a spit roast goat which was shared between us all!? It was certainly an experience we were lucky to be a part of, and will probably never forget, but I suspect next weekend I'll be heading for the beach!

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Am getting into the teaching now - at first I was finding it quite tough communicating without any Swahili and we were all concerned that the kids couldn't understand what we were teaching! However we realise now that we're making the lessons so much more fun than they're used to, they're getting stickers and prizes that are completely alien to them and we're doing lots of singing, dancing and sport which they love! The children are so sweet - as we pass them in the car they start dancing (we've been teaching them the Makarena), they would carry our bags all the way home if they got the chance and I know I've definitely made it as a teacher now because one of the girls brought me in an egg as a present which is a real honour......evidently!
Saying all that I don't want to paint too rosy a picture - the people are incredibly poor and many of the children come to school with ripped clothes, no shoes and I doubt that many of them have lunch which makes me feel real guilty when I try to force down the potato stew that is cooked for us every day! A new desk costs as little as £10 and Jenni has priced a stationary pack for one student, for a year, at £2 - I'm going to have to look at ways of raising some money for them but Jenni, who worked for Merrill Lynch, has beaten me to it and got a huge donation which will pretty much kit the school out!

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I can't believe I'm almost half way through my teaching already! It's a lot harder work than I imagined - probably because I want to do it well - but it's definitely worth it just to see the fun the kids are having. Because they don't do any art or sport normally, Jenni and I have introduced a colouring class at lunchtime and we take netball and football on a Thursday afternoon but being referee is a dangerous occupation as they're really competitive!! On Friday we held a Sports Day which was a great success - we split the pupils into four teams and, as well as running, there were potato and spoon, three-legged and bucket on the head races, a Chuck the Welly competition and Tug of War! Unfortunately my team, the Twigas (giraffes), lost in the play off for first place but everyone had a ball, and it was great to see the less academic pupils do well!

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On my birthday we organised a Scottish evening for everyone at Emau Hill. As I was the only one who knew any of the dances it got off to a bit of a slow start but, after a bit of practice. they were all up doing the Gay Gordon, Dashing White Sergeant, Strip the Willow..........and I'd managed to get hold of some (Dutch) shortbread and whisky which added to the Scottishness! In return I was presented with a live chicken as a pressie which I had no idea what to do with - fortunately it was taken back to the farm and hasn't appeared on the dinner table....yet!?

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In spite of all the fun being had, life in Tanzania has been taking its toll! About ten days ago I developed an abscess in my mouth which was really painful and the antibiotics I was given made me feel really tired and sick so I had to take time off school. Fortunately I have managed to avoid going to the dentist as there is a tendency to just pull teeth out if there is a problem but, if the worst comes to the worst, I'll head for Dar es Salaam where there is supposed to be a really good clinic. I'm still not feeling 100% as it is really hard to shake things off in the heat - and I'm struggling with the food because all I want at the moment is your typical comfort food like tomato soup or beans on toast - but hopefully I'll be back on top form soon!

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I've had a great time teaching and can't believe that it has passed so quickly! The kids are fantastic - really friendly and polite - which more than compensates for the fact that only about 6 out of the 90+ in each of my classes managed to pass their English exam......or any other subject for that matter! It's scary to see how little they have, but, as they don't know any different, they seem much more content than children back home.

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I finished teaching three weeks ago but it seems so much longer as the last couple of weeks of the school term were taken up with exams and general winding down - for some reason I found myself refereeing football and netball matches, playing games with the kids and generally entertaining them. I can't believe how quickly the time has passed and part of me feels that I was only really getting into it but, it's safe to say that I won't be considering a career change as a result! On my last day the school held a leaving do for me which was great - lots of singing, dancing, speeches and I was inundated with pressies from the kids including fruit, eggs, spices, sugarcane, even 120/- (6p) which I was really touched by as they have so little!

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Our trip north was really good and, as planned, I went on safari - with a couple from Spain. We spent six days visiting Tarangire, Lake Manyara, the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater - camping for four nights and staying in a Lodge on the final night where I had my first bath for three months!? It was a fantastic trip and we weren't disappointed - we managed to see the Big Five and lots more!
I also found my way to Krispina's family home but.........she wasn't there! For some reason she was still at IBC but, in spite of that, I had a lovely day with her father, daughter, sister and brother who showed me round the local area and treated me like royalty!

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During my time here I've also been lucky enough to experience the real Africa - I've been to a wedding, taken a cultural tour to a village in the foothills of Mt Meru and, last week, I spent a day with the family of one of the teachers I worked with near Mt Kilimanjaro. On all of these occasions I've had the hair-raising experience of travelling either by dala dala (a minibus which can never be full!) or packed into the back of a pick up truck, and I'm convinced that nobody here knows what brakes should be used for! I've also had the dubious pleasure of having had 'scanty' malaria - a mild form of the disease which is easily treated - but, in spite of all this, I feel privileged to have found out what life in this country is really like................and it's tough!