I have spent the last six weeks with two other people sharing knowledge and skills with the staff and students of Olng’arua Primary School, a remote school in Isiolo County. Like many primary schools in northern Kenya the school has young and untrained teachers with little experience outside their communities. The school operates on a …
It was just after sunrise, I stood outside a mud and grass thatched hut and listened to a little girl crying inside. Ten minutes earlier the 12 year old girl had been sitting on a cured cow skin outside the door of the hut, naked and surrounded by a crowd of local women. The girl, …
In parts of Isiolo district there are still large areas of natural acacia woodland. However the rate at which the trees are being cut down and carted into the local towns suggests that won’t be the case for long. Every day bicycles, donkey carts and lorries, piled high with wood, make their way along the dirt …
She led me into the dark interior of the mud house, a narrow doorway providing the only entrance and light. Near the doorway was a low wooden stool, handmade, she asked me to sit on it. I was in a small subdivided area of the house, next to me a bed made of cow hide …
It is three weeks since the last conflict related death in Isiolo. If you were to visit Isiolo town today you are likely to be told that the troubles are over, “Isiolo is peaceful now”. For some, and for the moment, this is true. However the residents of the worst hit areas, just a few …
Isiolo town and the immediately surrounding areas have been suffering repeated bouts of conflict and general insecurity since late last year. More than 40 people have been killed in the last 2 months and while the families of those who have died are devastated the conflict has much wider reaching consequences. Isiolo is often referred …