Our first complete day of coaching in Buea started at the local high school where we had conducted the Coach Education on Saturday.

The field was spectacular with green fields surrounding and Mount Cameroon in the background (the fact that it was not really flat was not an issue!). What a view!

We coached around 120 kids, separating into 3 groups with a competition at the end.  Our challenge as coaches, as in every session, is to mentor and help the local teachers to gain confidence to run the drills, perform the demonstrations, focus on coaching points and keep it quick and fun!  The teachers all did really well and we’re confident that they will be able to continue the coaching, integrating HIV/AIDs messages once we have left.

The competition comprised of the 3 groups, each now with a team name including Red Dragon and the Cobras, performing the main skills against a time limit – catching, batting and bowling.  Head Coach Rich D kept scores and when reading out the scores, each team had won a discipline (how convenient!).  The kids went mad, as they always do, and we left them at their school buzzing from their mornings’ activity.

Our lunch run had not been very successful, with Pringles being the only item that we could find in the local supermarket that was edible – if we had wanted any type of cereal or powdered milk we would have been fine but we didn’t really fancy that!

The misty fog had been descending from Mt Cameroon all morning and as we set off for the afternoon session, we realized that the visibility had reduced to about 10 metres – making interesting driving past the tea plantation – the only way to describe it is as a ‘white out’ you get on the ski slopes!

We arrived at the next school and were informed that we had 60 kids in our session (boys ranging from 10-18 years).  We split off into groups and each group disappeared into the fog – we couldn’t see across the width of the field or even each others’ groups!

It was a challenging session due to the fog but also because each group doubled in size during our coaching! At the end the groups were so large that Will and Jono had a line of pairs practicing fielding that was 25 people long – 50 in the group!

Accumulating the number of kids on the way back, we realized we had coached over 280 kids in the fog! So a total of 400 in one day – awesome!

Back to the hotel we went for another evening of competitive card playing – Jo ‘accidentally’ looking at her cards and Will stirring up rivalries!

A great day and looking forward to more coaching (and cards) tomorrow J

 

Annabel