MNC MEETS THE GAMBIA
In 2019, our Head Coach Nicky organised for 20 members of our club to travel out to The Gambia for a week. This week shaped us as a club, and made us aware of how fortunate we are. Our Gambia Legacy is a massive thing for us at the club and we fundraise for the students and teachers over there often, and we are aiming to go back in the next few years with our young leaders.
Follow the links below to learn more about the planning and fundraising process, what we did on each day of our trip, and how we continue our MNC Gambia Legacy.
Young Leaders: Amelia Boyle, Grace Carr, Connie Chesterton, Imogen Chesterton, Kennedy Knight, Sophie Love, Grace Milligan, Imogen Thompson, Sophia Tiana, Maddy Till, Eva Washington.
Coaches: Nicky Knight, Anna Tiana, Karen Carr, Chris Till, Tracey Gilloran, Kelley Gilloran.
Parental Support Team: Kirsten Chesterton, Nigel Chesterton, Paul West.
Big Smile Project Gambia: Saidou Saine, Diana Saine
MNC MEETS THE GAMBIA LEGACY
The trip to the Gambia shaped many of our young leaders’ lives. Many of them went on to qualify as coaches, and as a club we still have contact with the PE Teachers we met out there.
We often refer to our ‘legacy fund’ when we fundraise. We are really aware that many trips like this are ‘one hit wonders’. We want to continue making a difference after we left, so we created the legacy fund. So far this money has provided 4 schools with the basic equipment that they would need to run netball sessions at their school, and built a placing surface at Deeper Life. We have a WhatsApp group with the PE teachers we met with, and every week they send us pictures and videos of their netball sessions. It has also supported one of the PE teachers, Bakery, through computing school, and helped him to buy schooling supplies.
Our aim is to visit the Gambia again, to revisit the schools we went to in 2019, but also to go to different schools, and meet more girls. Since we left, there have been successful inter-school netball tournaments, and we would love to enable more schools to participate.
FUNDRASING AND PREPARATION
What started out with one parent wanting to show her daughter that perhaps life can be more of a struggle for others, grew into a trip with 11 other young leaders from our club. Sadly, when it comes to sport, often it’s the boys who receives media attention, equipment and funding. This is no different in the Gambia, where schoolgirls often have no opportunities to participate in sport. That’s why as a club, which at the time had only 90 members, aimed to redress the balance with our project to create a legacy of netball in Gambia.
We planned our visit during the 2019 Easter holidays and hoped to educate PE teachers about the sport, as well give the girls some coaching ourselves. However, the amount of equipment required started to add up; balls, bibs, posts, cones etc.With the costs of obtaining and transporting equipment out to the Gambia being so high, the girls began fundraising. Redborne Upper School’s PE Department facilitated 24 hours of trampolining, with the proceeds being split between the Gambia Fund and Red Nose Day. 51 students across years 9-11 participated and kept the trampolines bouncing for 24 hours non-stop. The girls also ‘ran to the Gambia’, by running the distance from the UK to the Gambia between 11 of them.
The Young Leaders also ran a netball camp in the October half term, to raise money for the legacy fund. The next fundraising event was at Christmas. As the girls in the Gambia receive very little, we encouraged all members of the club to get involved and fill a ‘Bag for the Gambia’. Inside these bags the girls filled it with both things the girls needed, and things they would enjoy; toothbrush, hair clips, colouring pencils, notepads, soft toys, scrunchies, and Pencil cases. Tesco donated several boxes of sanitary products to be included, as on average the schoolgirls we were coaching missed 44 days of school per year due to lack of sanitary products.
Potentially the most popular fundraising event we held was the Gambian Food and Quiz Night. Several volunteers spent the afternoon cooking traditional Gambian dishes. Later that evening, we were joined by current and former coaches, players, and parents from the club to enjoy the food and quiz. The Young Leaders served as waitresses, and the night was a huge success.
Local Businesses and other Netball clubs also got involved by sponsoring bibs to send out, we were so grateful to P & I Milligan, Thermasolutions, DolbyVivisol, and Team Beds.
TRAVEL DAY - 11TH APRIL
Our flights left from Gatwick Airport, and Thomas Cook only has one person on the check in desk so the queues to check in were incredibly long. There were issues with our Charity Luggage allowance and one lost boarding pass but eventually we got on the plane. When we arrived to our hotel at 2am we discovered that not only were our rooms spread across the entirety of the hotel grounds and not together as originally planned; we also only had 16 beds for 17 people. Even once the issues were resolved and we were all in our rooms ready for a quick sleep before an early start we had the first of our room floods but fortunately there was another room available.
DAY ONE - 12TH APRIL
On Day 1, most girls were running on less than 5 hours sleep, with some running on even less due to having to get up early to sort kit and the donation bags out. We were out of the door promptly at 9, into the waiting trucks.
The transport for this trip was one of the highlights. We had open top trucks to transport us to and from the schools, which meant that the tops of our shoulders and our thighs got very tanned.
We split into two groups, one going to Kotu High, and one to Deeper Life. Each school has its own issues facility wise, Deeper Life had lots of space but no hard court area and Kotu High had a hardcourt area but lacked space. over 90 girls showed up to each school, and at the end of the day the girls loved reciving their Maulden bags. It was heartbreaking to see how excited they were over something as simple as a bar of soap.
Later in the day we went to a local restaurant and was able to listen to a local Gambian instrument whilst we ate our lunch. We then went to a local forest and monkey park, where we were able to feed a troop of monkeys. Some of us were brave enough to allow the monkeys to climb on our shoulders and eat a banana.
DAY TWO - 13TH APRIL
Day two brought a major change to our plans. We had initially intended to meet the local PE teachers and teach them how coach netball. However, we discovered that they would be at a local sporting event and wouldn’t be able to attend. So Nicky and a few others decided to attend the event to potentially meet some PE teachers for our course the next day.
The rest of the club stayed at the hotel and had a relaxed start to the day, exploring the pools, the beach and meeting some of the local wildlife. We were fortunate that the hotel had some amazing residents, including incredibly friendly wild monkeys, a flock of vultures, some small crocodiles, and other reptiles. In the afternoon, we went for a buffet lunch at a Paradise beach, and spent the afternoon relaxing, playing ball games in the sea. The current took us by surprise, as we often found ourselves several meters further along the coastline then we originally started. The beach also had some interesting wildlife, with cows randomly appearing halfway through the afternoon, which is apparently a regular occurrence.
DAY THREE - 14TH APRIL
Day Three was the day we hosted our session for the PE Teachers. Only having 6 teachers enabled us to have 1-1 time with them, and it was far easier to build relationships, ask questions, and join in with the play. The relationships we built with these teachers also aided us when teaching the schoolgirls later in the week, as many of the PE Teachers showed up to help even though it was their school holidays.
As our Young Leaders outnumbered the PE Teachers, they were able to spend some time inside the classrooms and explore. Saidou explained that there are 60 children to an average classroom, and even so many families cannot afford to send their children to school, as many either cannot pay for it, or they expect them to look after younger siblings, and in some cases there are no schools near by. He explained that on average, children will walk 5 miles along rural paths and main roads to their nearest school, setting off early in the morning and returning late at night. In the past, most children had to walk over 10 miles to attend their local school, which was unattainable for many. We got an insight into the expectations on these young girls even in the few days we saw them, one girl in particular wanted to take part in the netball so badly, but as she had to look after her younger sister, she brought her along. The younger sister was so well behaved, didn’t make a fuss and entertained herself that it was clear that it wasn’t out of the ordinary.
Our day was finished off with an evening meal at the hotel and then karaoke night... with the coaches treating the girls to a brilliant performance, the group later being dubbed the Maulden Choir.
DAY FOUR - 15TH APRIL
Day Four was the first day of coaching the girls. We had prepared for around 80 high school girls but well over 200 girls of all ages showed up. Between a lot of improvisation, bigger group sizes and help from the PE Teachers it all worked out in the end. Running around for over 3 hours in 40º heat was challenging not only for our girls, but also for the school girls.
We popped back to the hotel for lunch, and then we were straight back out to again to visit our driver’s home. In the gambia, families live in a series of small rooms where they sleep, all opening onto a courtyard where they cook, eat and the children play. Meeting Omar’s children and their friends was one of the highlights of the trip. We had initially planned to just stay for an hour, but Omar’s family cooked food for the girls, and the girls were loving spending time with his children. We played water games with his younger children, helped fetch water from the well. Although it was a novelty us, after two or three goes our arms were aching – we couldn’t imagine having to do it several times a day, everyday. The older children then offered to braid our Young Leaders hair, and they all agreed that they were the best plaits they have ever had. Omar’s youngest daughter fell asleep on one of our Young Leaders, and when we asked where her bed was, we discovered she slept on thin mat on the ground. This broke our hearts and we decided that this was one area where we could make and immediate difference. Nicky went to the bank that evening and withdrew the money to buy a bed for the family.
DAY FIVE - 16TH APRIL
On day five there was yet more flooding in our hotel rooms, and the hotel were quite difficult about assigning alternate rooms, so we took it into our own hands. We woke Chris up to move all the kit into his room, and moved the mattresses into Nicky’s room
At the schools we had our first full scale netball games, even having an England vs The Gambia match at Kotu High. We were able to introduce positioning to all of the girls which was a struggle, but they got it under control eventually. In the afternoon we went to Sailors beach, and spent some time looking round the craft market. There were so many talented craftspeople making wonderful items that we purchased as little gifts for our friends and family at home. We also met a group of local fishermen, pulling in their lines.
DAY SIX - 17TH APRIL
Day six was our final day at the schools and we hosted a netball tournament. Each young leader and a team or two, and they were responsible for coaching them in their games. It was the perfect end to our time with the girls and was a brilliant showcase for their improvements. Leaving the schools for the final time was incredibly emotional, knowing that we wouldn’t see these girls again, despite them making such an impact on our lives.
When we returned to the hotel in the afternoon to wind down. Everyone made a picture with a sand painting artist, and after we spent some time tanning and relaxing by the pool. We then returned to our rooms to get ready for our final dinner, where the waiters were so friendly and made our final meal special. They really embodied the Gambian spirit as the Smiling Coast of Africa.
DAY SEVEN - 18TH APRIL
Day Seven was our departure day, so we spent the morning, practising our synchronised diving, water polo and water volleyball before packing up our stuff for the flight home. We also met one final time with the PE Teachers, and gave them the last few bits of equiptment. The airport was tiny, with only one small departure lounge and a cupboard as a duty free. We landed back into Gatwick the next morning, with some questionable burns and tan lines, just in time for easter.
YOUNG LEADERS REFLECT ON THE TRIP
“This was a trip of a lifetime and an amazing experience. It's taught me to not take things for granted, even an empty plastic water bottle.
I really enjoyed visiting Omar's compound and seeing where him and his family live. The children were so happy and welcoming. I was lucky enough to visit the compound twice, and got to go in the house and see the bed that we brought his children. It was a big shock to think that these children hadn't slept on a proper bed before. I was really glad that as a club that we could help.
This trip was an amazing experience and one that I will always remember.Gambia is definitely the smiling coast of Africa as the people are always happy. I've created so many amazing memories with such an amazing group of people.”
- CONNIE, AGED 14
“The trip was amazing but heart-breaking at the same time. It's amazing how happy and content they are despite the fact that they have so little. The trip was a challenge, but also brought us closer as a group of girls.
My netballing highlight was my team winning the tournament on the last day. Four days before none of them had even heard of netball, and they managed to play a recognisable game of netball. The joy and sense of achievement that the Gambian girls felt was a reminder of what our sport is about.
I've learnt that even the most experienced coaches can't plan for everything, and that you need to be able to adapt constantly, and that I really enjoy coaching and seeing the difference you can make literally in a few days.”
- GRACE, AGED 15
COACHES REFLECT ON THE TRIP
My best memories are twofold: from a netball point of view the tournament on the last day, which showed how far the girls had come on in just a few days. From a wider view it was the privilege of sharing an afternoon in Omar's compound and the fun we shared with that community.
The trip has made me think deeply about what we have here and that other communities don't, and brought out a determination to make our legacy project work. Being with a fantastic team doing a very worthy task is something I will never forget!"
- CHRIS, FORMER CLUB CHAIRMAN