Almost home...

Day 7 - Sunday

A well deserved rest day today after the hectic day before, mostly spent lounging at the poolside at the Lesotho Sun, the best hotel in Maseru. At the end of a lazy day strangely everyone seemed to be even more tired than at the start, go figure. Hopefully after a good sleep we'll be energised for the new week ahead.

Day 8 - Monday

Up and out early and a two hour drive today to the north western province of Butha Buthe. Upon arriving we were greeted with a pitch with about 8 inches of standing water in places and a lovely traditionally thatched stand which even had carpet on the floor! Apparently there are quite a few of these around the country as the king likes to visit a new village each year for his birthday and they build a stand and have events such as horse parades on the field outside. After some initial delay, several schools arrived and we began delivering our usual games. We hadn't as much time as usual and so had to condense the games, but the message seemed to get through even if the kids needed a little more encouragement than usual. They were a bit older and seemed more self-conscious. They were also immaculately turned out and all their uniforms were pristine and I doubt that was just for our benefit.

After lunch we then played another game against the local Kick4Life trainers. After a week of intense activity we were starting to get a bit tired but in the end we ran out convincing winners, 5 - 1 and I scored two goals and had a dodgy claim on a third! Due to the water the match at times was a bit crazy and one of our goals was a pantomime effort where our striker and the keeper floundered around in a giant pool of water lashing at the floating ball until eventually our striker won the day. I really hope we got it on video. During the match there was also a hailstorm with giant hail which really stung. Afterward we all stank of boggy water and the trip home was long and smelly, ameliorated though by a fantastic sunset and low giant crescent moon.


Day 9 - Tuesday

A big day today as it's the last day of our official tour duties. We traveled to Malealea which is a 1.5 hours drive up into the mountains. Here we got to over 2000 meters and enjoyed spectacular panoramic views of mountains and valleys. By and large the roads in Lesotho are outstanding but once you get towards Malealea they descent into red dirt tracks and with a storm coming overhead, the last few miles were windy and bumpy. After dumping our baggage, we proceeded down the road to the local primary school where we had visited on the previous tour, memorable for being the worst pitch I have ever played on with the best scenery and it was comforting to see that nothing had changed. Local secondary school kids came along as well and we delivered our last sessions. Those with the secondary school kids were doing the normal HIV games while those with the primary children were just playing and having a laugh. Afterwards we were treated to am amazing display as the primary and secondary school kids had an impromptu choir sing-off. We then presented them with some Kick4Life shirts and I also donated another of the Godmanchester Rovers kits.

After a quick lunch we were back on the school and on the pitch to play the local village team. This turned out to be the most epic match of the tour with them really running us ragged early on. They were soon 2-0 up but with two comedy goals which should never have gone in. Luckily I pulled one back before the break and we went in 2-1 down at half-time. In the second half we finally got to grips with the game and they began to tire. Soon we were pressing hard seeking an equaliser which eventually arrived. The game drew to a close with us in control. Extra time followed and in the first half we scored to go 3-2 up. We then scored again only for the long range shot to be disallowed because someone out left and completely not interfering with play was deemed offside. A dreadful decision, but still we only needed to hold out for 10 minutes for a famous victory. Alas though, it was not to be and we conceded badly from a free kick and then again a couple of minutes later to shockingly lose 4-3. We were disheartened but ultimately satisfied with our endeavours on this tour both on and off the field. After the match we donated a complete Liverpool kit to the village team which the club had generously donated to me to take out here. A nice end to a fantastic game and tour.


Day 10 - Wednesday

With our official duties now over we could now relax in Malealea and nurse our various cuts, bruises and injuries incurred along a very busy tour. Today we travelled to the Botsoela twin waterfall which is a spectacular trek down through green valleys, up hills and ultimately ending at a fabulous natural waterfall. I did this trek on a horse in the last tour and most opted for horses this time around but with a marathon looming in May I opted for the four hour trek by foot as some sort of training. It was a fabulous and thoroughly enjoyable walk in spectacular scenery and the payoff, plunging under the pulverising waterfall was one of the most refreshing things ever. Lesotho has an amazing rugged beauty and it would be a dream if they could overcome the major health problems which are here and emerge as a thriving tourist destination.

Day 11 - Thursday

Well, I almost made it. On the last tour I got ill early on and really struggled for most of the two weeks. This time around I have been physically fine and in fact have definitely got stronger as the weeks have gone on and my lungs have adapted to the higher altitude. However, for the last two days I have developed an earache which has kept me awake at night and this morning travelled back to Maseru to visit the hospital as it was obvious it was not going away. We went to the Maseru Private Clinic and I didn't know what to expect but I needen't have worried. It was a very clean relatively new facility with no queues and a very thorough doctor. She quickly diagnosed me with an infected eardrum (Autitis?) and prescribed me with antibiotics, painkillers and an anti-inflammatory. I walked out of the examination room around the corner of the corridor to the pharmacy and picked up my pills immediately and then paid a total of 170 Rand (about 12 pounds). All done in about 15 minutes. If I had been in the UK, I would probably have been waiting hours. I hope the pills start to clear this up real quick as I have a lot of airplane time ahead of me in the next two days!


Day 12 - Friday

It all started so well. Got up early for breakfast and then got on the bus for the long (4.5 hour) drive to Johannesburg. Once we got through the Lesotho / South African border we drove for about an hour before stopping for brunch at a beautiful cafe-cum-craft shop called Living Life. The surroundings were glorious, a rustic rural cottage with fabulous gardens and the food was superb and sourced mainly from their own garden. Happy and refreshed we got back on the bus to resume our journey to the airport. We were about 150km from Johannesburg when disaster struck. I was reading my book at the time when I heard various members of the team exclaim and looked up to see a pickup truck rolling in the fields on the other side of the road. We screeched to a halt and barrelled out of the bus to rush to the scene. Before we reached the truck we could see it was a bad one, there was debris everywhere (it looked to be carrying Carling Black Label labels) and the truck was on it's roof and badly mangled. The back rear tire had blown out and it had careered off the road gouging a thick groove with the bare wheel as it went. Just in front of the truck we found one man injured but conscious and able to move his extremeties. We surmised later that he was probably wearing his seat-belt and had crawled out. About 40 yards further on from the truck we found a woman probably in her mid-twenties and it was obvious from the start that she was in a really bad condition. She was unconscious and only had a very faint pulse. This pulse disappeared pretty quickly and despite the absolutely heroic efforts of two of our team administering CPU, they couldn't revive her. All we could do after a few minutes was put a towel over her head. It was a truly shocking and devastating scene. The police took about 15-20 minutes to arrive and the ambulance an additional 15-20 minutes. By then we were getting back on our bus and heading onward in silence. It was a bitter irony that we had all come on the tour to help save lives only to see one extinguished before our very eyes. I think we all then just wanted to get home to our families while being conscious that somewhere the family of that poor girl were about to get the worst of news.

A busy week over.

Day 4 - Wednesday

A slightly more sedate start to today with a kickaround at 7am followed by breakfast at 8:30. Then most of the group split and went to visit Thaba Bosou which is one of the most famous landmarks in Lesotho, a flat mountain plateau where the Basotho tribes would retreat to defend themselves against the Zulus. This mountain basically helped maintain Lesotho's independence. However, having been there last year I decided to give it a miss this time and venture for the first time into downtown Maseru. Kingsway is the main street and it was as busy as ever with lots of traffic and the incessant hooting of taxi's horns even when nothing is in their way as they drive through the steam coming off the street from a recent rainshower amidst the torrid heat. Kingsway is a mix of ultra modern shops selling things like the latest mobile phones and rundown almost derelict buildings selling second hand items that I can't imagine anyone ever wanting to buy.

After lunch it was another orphanage visit and this time I went to MIS which is bigger than MeNeos and has more children. The kids there are not as placid as the ones at MeNeos, they try and climb all over you given a chance and even when not given a chance, but their enthusiasm isn't malicious, they just crave attention. We stayed with them for two hours and played games, mostly football related or arts and crafts. After that we went back to MeNeos where half the group were waiting and we spent an hour helping them finish digging and levelling the ground at the front of the orphanage. Hard work but still rewarding to be doing something which you can physically see is helping. On Tuesday when we visited I learned that they had no football, so while I was down town I got them one and gave it to the boys there. Needless to say, they were overjoyed. 20 Maluti (just over 4 pounds) well spent. Maybe one day one of them will grow up to play on the national team, the Likuenas (Crocodiles), who knows. They certainly have skill enough or at least more skill than me but that's not exactly a huge achievement. :) Tomorrow we spend our day preparing for the Test-Your-Team event and then have a game in the afternoon at the SOS orphanage against staff members from the Baylor Clinic, an American medical clinic that does a huge amount of work in Lesotho. We played them during the last tour and won so maybe they will be out for revenge, we'll see.


Day 5 - Friday

As with most previous days, today started with a kickaround from 7:15 to 7:45 just to loosen the muscles after the day before and then we were off to the Maseru Club in central Maseru to help prepare the pitch for the Test-Your-Team event on Saturday. Last night there was an amazing lightening storm which went on for hours and was a veritable fireworks display. After that a lot of the pitch had standing water and lining it out in old school style with bags of lime by hand proved interesting. If it rains tonight we may arrive tomorrow to find all our lines missing and have to redo the whole lot again. After setting up the pitch we had a quick lunch and then went to visit Rastemelah school in Maboto, a district in Maseru city itself. Those of us who had been on the previous tour knew what to expect but it was a shock for the newer folk to see the kids screaming and running towards us like a stampeding herd of buffalo! They are so enthusiastic it defies belief, we felt like one of the Beatles. Not John obviously, but just above Ringo. We spent the afternoon there playing with the kids and not really delivering HIV prevention messages as there were a lot of younger primary school kids there. So we just played games and sang songs and generally had fun. We have learned a new song / dance routine called "How Funky Is Your Chicken" which could sweep the world and be a sensation in clubs the world over. Or maybe not. :)

After the school we went to play the game with Baylor. We had been dreading it because the pitch was one of the worst we played on last year so it was with bemusement and disbelief when we arrived to see it completely green and being mowed. Well, mostly mowed as some bits had standing water, but you can't have everything. As it turned out it flattered to deceive and proved a very sluggish surface which sapped the legs. We started well but soon deteriorated and the rest of the match was a bit of a battle which we finally managed to win 4-3 thanks to a last minute (but definate) penalty which I luckily managed to slot home. No pressure there then! :) Tomorrow during Test-Your-Team we are playing a shortened (about 30 mins a side) game against the Ex-National team and if we perform like today we'll be murdered.

So tomorrow is the Test-Your-Team and we start at 6am getting things ready. Then 8 schools from around the vicinity will bring students with them and we will play a soccer tournament (two four group pools and the top two from each group going into the semi-finals). The age group is under 18 and every team is 7-a-side with at least 3 girls in the squad of 10 and one on the pitch at any one time. Teams will earn points for winning, playing fair but also being tested for HIV. There will be 20 tents dotted around the fields which will be testing all day with medical staff and councillors at the ready. We will be in pairs and sticking with one school the whole day including encouraging them to get tested. It will be a very full on exciting, tiring and potentially devastating day. I look forward to it but with some trepidation.


Day 6 - Saturday

Up and about at 5:30am and lots of work to do before the event started at 9:30 with the arrival of the schoolchildren, although timekeeping in Lesotho can be a moveable feast so nobody was expecting the schedule to be rigidly adhered to. Jobs to be done included sorting out the food, relining the pitch in the places where the lime had disappeared, setting up the goalposts for the smaller 7-a-side pitches and erecting the testing tents. The basic plan for the day was that there would be 8 schools bringing a total of 80 children each, so in theory 640. Each group of 80 would be split into 4 groups of 20 and each group of 20 would have some Kick4Life trainers playing games with them and encouraging them to get tested. Amongst the 80, the school would have included a squad of 10 football players which must have included 3 girls. The 8 schools would be split into two pools of 4 teams and each play the other three teams in their pool. The top two from each pool would progress to the semi-final.

In the event all 8 schools showed up but with varying numbers, some had 80 but others barely managed 50 and I think the total was somewhere between 400-500 kids. It was hard to tell exactly as there were random children just turning up as well (which is a good thing if it encourages them to get tested). I must say that we have all remarked on the children in Lesotho and how well behaved and respectful they are. It's hard to compare things across cultures and there will be positives and negatives, but I can't imagine that many 14-18 year old children showing up in the UK on a Saturday morning in their school uniforms and then playing often silly and simple games and joining in without complaint. The games we played vary from some Kick4Life curriculum games (which all have a message about HIV protection / prevention / education) to games the kids chose themselves such as maybe just dancing and singing in a circle. And boy do these people love to dance and sing! It is a part of our culture we have sadly lost (or are losing) but out here everyone from babe to elder will start singing and dancing at the drop of a hat. It is a really liberating atmosphere to be in when someone will just start up a song and a dance and everyone in the vicinity joins in with delight. Lesotho (and perhaps Africa in general) has huge medical and social problems no doubt, but it also retains a cultural identity and community spirit that most western countries could well do with re-education in.

Once the day got started, it was non-stop action. First there was an introduction and then a brief speech from one of our own Kick4Life coaches who told everyone she was HIV positive for 3 years and living a full and healthy live thanks to the freely available anti-retroviral drugs (ARV's) that Lesotho's government provides. Since the prevalence of HIV amongst adults in Lesotho is about 23.4% or just over 1 in 5, I suddenly wondered how many of the other coaches who have become our friends this week might also be in the same situation.

Speaking of the coaches, they are a tremendous strength for Kick4Life. There are almost 500 in the country now in most districts and most are voluntary. They range from early teens to adults and they are incredibly adept and keeping the children entertained while constantly reminding them of the key messages of how to prevent or survive HIV. And for us, they are just great fun to be around, they keep us going all day long. Me and my partner Dave are ever reliant on our coach Nandos who bounds around the place keeping kids playing, sometimes chastising them if they don't join in and then a second later having them grinning with a flash of her trademark smile. She also constantly reinforces the important messages and ensures that they get it.

There were constant football games as the tournament progressed, constant circles of children playing games and singing and also slowly at first, but picking up as the morning moved on, queues beginning to form for the testing tents. With all the hustle and bustle, it is tempting to forget what the main purpose of the day is. When you are busy trying to remember things, playing games to keep your group amused, your focus gets distracted but I must say it gets reset pretty quickly. I found myself outside a testing tent with 6 kids from our group who we had just been laughing and playing games with when it suddenly struck me how utterly awful it was for them to be standing there, maybe 16 years old queueing outside a small tent in a field waiting to hear if their lives are about to be changed forever. No child should have to deal with that, it breaks your heart.

It was a very long and boiling hot day. The football tournament played out and the school I was assigned to, LIFE (I don't know what it is an acronym for), actually went on to win! I'd like to say it was my excellent coaching skills but in truth I saw very little of it as I was busy playing games, encouraging people to test, drawing water for people in the queues and sometimes just waiting with them. At lunch-time we played our fourth game of football, a short exhibition match against the ex-national team. It was 20-minutes a side and we were really up for it. We had lost 1-0 last year to them and to be honest were delighted with that. This time around we amazingly managed to win 2-1 (I headed home the first, 3 from 4 games now, I should think about renegotiating my contract :)) and as a team it was our best performance by far. We had a gameplan and stuck to it and it worked, despite the ref adding an extra 6 minutes to the second half in the hopes they would equalize!

After the football we got back to our duties and I requested to observe when a test was being performed. I had been thinking about this all day and decided that I shouldn't come all this way and not see the real reason we were here. With the consent of one of the children, I sat in the corner and quietly observed while she sat with the counsellor who would also test her. I didn't know quite what to expect, the enormity of the situation could breed any mixture of emotions for the child involved and I was nervous. In the event, it was a very strange few minutes. Certainly there was tension, but it wasn't unbridled. The counsellor kept talking to her in Sesotho but I knew from the few English words involved that she was talking about HIV and AIDS but her tone wasn't grim and she even got a few smiles from the girl. I got the impression she was reassuring her that this was a disease that it would be bad to have but if you have it, it is not the end of the world or your life. I found it very reassuring and I think the girl did too as she seemed to relax more as the test went on. The test itself involved swabbing the thumb with an alcohol wipe, then pricking it with a disposable lancet (sort of like a small one pronged stabler). Then a drop of blood is squeezed out, picked up with a small capilliary tube and placed on one end of a testing strip which is about the size of a standard plaster. A drop of chase buffer is applied and then over the next 2 minutes the blood moves down from one end of the strip to the other. In the middle is a blue bar and if one red vertical line appears to the right of the blue bar, the test is negative, two red lines, one either side, means positive and none means the test needs to be performed again. It is I believe a standard antibody test. We sat there and the counsellor chatted while we all watched the blood move down the strip and when only one red line appeared, it was smiles all around. A negative result. There followed some post-test counselling and then it was all over. It's impossible to describe what it felt like watching someone go through that, but I'm glad I did. It certainly reinforces the fact that we need to keep doing all we can to combat this disease.

At the end of the event I presented the winning football team with a set of shirts which had been donated by Godmanchester Rovers and also a set to the school who had the most students tested. They were delighted with this and also with the whole day and lots of them wanted us to visit to deliver the education sessions whenever we could. So a very successful and rewarding if utterly draining day. Afterwards we learned that about 75% of the kids got tested and the prevalence was about 3%. The problem is, as people get into their 20's in Lesotho and get more sexually active, the prevalence skyrockets. At least those 3% will now have the proper medication they will need to carry on with their lives.