I'm led out of the head teacher's office and into the muddy playground. I can see about a hundred kids sitting in their seats of their makeshift outdoor classroom, the only place big enough for the whole year. As I walk past they break into a rhythmic clapping. Then I'm on the stage. 'Good Morning Techas' rings out and the headmistress replies 'Thank you, Howayew?' they reply 'Fine thank you' before we sit down.

Head teacher to my left, Eleanor to my right. The teacher introduces me and tells the children I am going to present to them on life skills. I thought I was doing an HIV presentation. I stand up and decide I have to make an impromptu link. As I tell two hundred eyes how glad I am that I worked hard at school and university so that I could get a good job where I also work very hard I push thoughts of courses where I only made two lectures in a whole year, late essays, last minute cramming and crossed fingers hoping for the 'right' questions out of my head. I reflect, how my teachers would laugh if they could hear this right now. I make a bad link and get into the HIV presentation.

We spent a lot of time trying to get the tone right, many of the kids have HIV from their parent. There are loads of myths and a major misunderstanding of the virus here. As I talk, I make sure I am slow and clear so that they can understand me and we keep the words simple to make sure that everything is understood, they often get presentations that they often don't understand as too many complex English words that they are not familiar with are used. Thirty minutes later I finish and sit down to a round of clapping and another teacher stands up to to say something in Swahili to the children. The head teacher leans into me and whispers,

'They don't speak English'

WHAT!

It turns out that they do and they understood the presentation, she just meant the other teacher was asking some questions to make sure they had got everything. We then open up the Q&A session. The questions show the degree of myths being circulated - do condoms spread HIV? If not why do they grow HIV on them if you leave one in a sink for a week? How can you wash clothes from an HIV person without catching HIV? Can you kiss someone with HIV? Did HIV come from American monkeys? Can you live a long life if you have HIV but can't afford a healthy diet? We spend another forty five minutes answering and explaining. When we leave the kids follow us asking more questions.

This wasn't what we came to Usangi to do, we're not medics but meant to be advising on business but we know lots about the virus, we'd made sure we knew all we could before we came on the placement for questions like these, but we are so glad that we got the chance given the questions we've been asked. We spent three afternoons this week giving the same presentation and spoke to nearly the whole school.

Our other work this week has been business presentations to Women's groups. We decided to nudge them towards the idea that they can begin businesses without grants, simply by having a good idea and using the produce they grow in their gardens and working their way up slowly. The first we ran in the office. The second was in a muslim prayer meeting. Most of the village is Islamic and pretty traditional with it. Many of the women attend prayer meetings where they pray to be better women for their husbands, two or three men sit outside and listen to their pledges and add anything they think of import. In a society where the men are regularly passing HIV to their wives I have to admit I didn't feel very comfortable being a part of this.

When we got there Eleanor was ushered into a room and I was told to wait outside to sit with three other men. Three hours later Eleanor hasn't returned and I've been sitting there in silence listening to the continuous chants of the ladies inside. Finally I get told to go into the room. I am led in by the other men, one of whom does a ten minute talk in Swahili that contains the word 'Allah' a lot. I look around for Eleanor and spot her hidden by a colourful, full Hijab and looking fed up. Then I'm told to start my presentation. Not really what we'd pictured so I start presenting, pausing after each sentence to allow for a translation. I decide to cut it right down from its forty five minute version to about fifteen minutes that emphasizes how you have to be disciplined and committed, deciding it would be the kind of language they'd warm too…I finish and now have Allahs blessing. Before being led back out of the room where I sit in silence again and am fed doughnuts and tea. Finally, Eleanor appears, hot and feeling sick in her outfit. We decide to pull out of presentations at future prayer meetings! Over three hours for a fifteen minute talk.

Very insightful, interesting and an experience I think we'll always remember.

When we get home, we've started to run an after school club for the kids of a local primary school, a little bit like scouts but with twenty kids from 4 to 13 we've had to adjust quickly with games that teach English and can be understood by everyone…Bingo has come to Usangi. The classes are great and the kids love them, they've started knocking on our door if they get out of school early. We've started getting used to the continued shouts of 'TEACHA, TEACHA'…

After a busy week of presentations and teaching we decided to treat ourselves to a weekend in Moshi, the town near Kilimnjaro. We didn't go for the views but for the food, Usangi may be many things but a centre of world class cuisine it is not. The only places you can buy food for lunch serves up little bowls of animal bits - mainly liver, tripe and tongue. Dinner at our homestay is nice but very repetitive so when we sat down to a curry our mouths were watering and it didn't disappoint.

That's us, next week we continue to work on alternative funding processes. Feels a bit like work.