Field Day

Field Day. Those of us who were lucky enough to, one glorious day a year, experience the joy and wholehearted competitive spirit of Field Day probably remember stations, with a few minutes spent at each of your favorite activities: bozo buckets, relay races, playing with the parachute, Frisbee tosses, etc.

At Nyakoi Lower Basic School, it’s quite a bit different.

Let me preface all of the action by saying that there is no such thing as a “waiver” or a “permission slip” in Gambian schools. Teachers do what they want, students do what they want, and if a student goes missing or gets hurt, it’s the kids fault. I could decide one day, to take my class, leave school, walk to the river through a field of ravenous hyenas, take a swim amongst crocodiles and hippos, and if a kid or two happened to not make it back, I am not accountable. Knowing all that, let me describe the events of the day.

SPRINTS

By far the most popular event, every student wants to be the fastest. Children line up on the dusty football field, filled with large, dead, scratchly weeds, and race until the teachers tell them to stop. Of course, since the footwear of choice in the Gambia is flip flops year round, students race barefoot. Being conscientious teachers, most races are run on the relatively weed-free dusty parts of the field, but for the longer races, there just isn’t enough space. “Oh, you must have a spare pair of shoes for students to wear – even jellies would do!” you might say. While we don’t have shoes, we do, for some reason, have like 18 pairs of men’s navy blue dress socks. So, to protect these young children’s tender feet, they must don these ridiculous socks. Seeing Gambian children with tattered school uniforms running in argyle socks is one of my favorite moments thus far.

Another of my favorite moments is seeing the full-caftan-wearing Koranic teacher, a usually somber and solemn man, high stepping in circles and screaming in glee as his student (members of the Yellow Kunda) finished the race in first place. He led the rest of his kunda in lifting each winning yellow racer and chanting “YELLOW, YELLOW” until the next race was about to start.

We also had a teacher race. I don’t want to go into it, but let’s just say that Gambians are fast. Very fast. And I overestimated myself. And I now have to get water for one of the teachers whenever he wants it for the next week.

BUCKET RACE

From a young age, girls are expected to carry large amounts of water, groundnuts, firewood, and dinner on their heads. The competition has a race specifically designed to play to those young ladies’ strengths. Students must carry a bucket on their head for sixty meters, as fast as they can, without using their hands. In a foot race, with me running, and them balancing buckets, I would win – but it’d be close.

LONG JUMP

For the long jump, we all went to the sacred ground where daily, the whole school gathers to pray at two and five o’clock. We immediately dug up that holy ground, and shoveled together enough sand for students to land safely in. During this and the high jump competition (see HIGH JUMP) one teacher was in charge of re-raking all of the sand back together after each jump. Occasionally, students who were observing would start to encroach too close to where the jumpers were jumping. And that’s just not safe! So the teacher in charge, upon noticing this, would immediately start spinning around, darting from one side of the course to the other, wielding his sharp and exceedingly dangerous rake, and alternating between shrilly blowing his whistle, and bellowing, “N ko! N ko!” which is the equivalent of “I say! I say!” If it were a British man doing it, it’d be the most hilarious act of slap stick ever, but in this situation it was slightly more menacing.

Another dangerous highlight of the long jump happened as I was looking at my records, writing a students distance. I heard a collective gasp/scream go up from the crowd of students, and heard a gradual stampeding away from the jumping grounds. I looked up and three full grown horses were rampaging towards all of our students! Right in the middle of field day! A few teachers got them under control, and escorted them out of school grounds. In all the excitement however, one horse forgot his manners, and crapped right in the middle of the landing pad. Oh, Africa.

HIGH JUMP

The high jump is the most dangerous event thus far. The rake is still present, along with the spinning “N ko”-ing teacher, but now we have two wobbly wooden poles with numerous nails sticking out of them. Supported by those nails is a huge bamboo pole that goes flying into the crowd of spectating students anytime an athlete doesn’t clear a height.

But good god. These kids can jump. Just like I wrote about in my blog about Gambians playing basketball, these kids have never seen these sports that they’re attempting to do. They’ve never been properly trained in the technique and finesse involved in events like the high jump. All they’ve been told, and all they know is in the name.

Jump. High.

At the beginning, the students could jump high enough so that all they have to do is get a running start, leap over, and land on their feet. As the bar moved higher and higher, the acrobatics and their in-air form got more and more Superman like. Kids were getting running starts of twenty yards, and then vaulting themselves, completely horizontal, hoping to clear the bar, or die with honor in the process. There were some spectacular misses, and some ridiculously close calls involving rakes, careening bamboo, and toppling towers of nails.

Overall, it was a success. I laughed A LOT, I saw students enjoying themselves at school, and I had undoubtedly, my favorite day in the Gambia thus far.