Uncertainty as Pupils Share Classrooms with Snakes

                          
Rift Valley, Kenya: Salabani Primary in Baringo South is literally a bush school.
In the last two months, pupils have been learning in the bush, dodging snakes and hippos after the school was submerged by water from Lake Baringo.
Each class is assigned a specific tree, which also acts as an anchor to the mobile blackboards.
As the more than 500 pupils compete for shade in the sweltering Baringo heat (currently 36 degrees Celsius) they also have to contend with insects and ants.

According to deputy headmaster Joel Chemjor, the flooding began claiming part of the school grounds in September last year. Two months ago, the entire school was under water.
“The children are very discouraged,” he says. “Snakes are crawling around as the pupils try to concentrate on their studies and the dust is also not good for them. Many of them have flu.”
The teachers’ quarters, the library, the school store and 18 toilets have been submerged as well. What was once the playground is now a mass of water, with a layer of greenish-yellow hyacinth.
Salabani Secondary School students are using the partially submerged classrooms as bathrooms, oblivious of the health risk posed.
Teachers have been forced to take refuge in nearby houses, but those are just temporary premises as most of their property remains under water.
Children are difficult to manage because they are all over the bush. But that is the least of their problems, as they live each day afraid that the swelling lake might also swallow their living quarters.
The 500 pupils use three mobile toilets, each five feet deep. Their teachers use toilets at Salabani Secondary School, which is a kilometre away.
Another threat is from Lake Baringo hippopotamus. The animals invade the area from 7.00pm and leave at 6.00am. Nobody dares be in the school compound between those hours.
The pupils have no shoes and have to contend with thorns of the infamous Mathenge bush and poisonous cactus.
“Even the pupils’ population has reduced drastically and our classes are leaner these days. Parents have resorted to transferring their children to distant primary schools such as Lomayana and Eldepe Isinya. The rest are here because they have no choice,” says Mr Chemjor.

Adapted From Daily Nation