The Notes ‘n Totes was a HUGE success. 600 kids at 10 different schools in California and Arusha, Tanzania.              Ages 11 – 17. The children in Africa were thrilled to receive their tote from America, and to have a new pen pal.
There were some things that I did not anticipate due to cultural differences. For instance the kids in Africa could not figure out their pen pals gender from reading the name of the US student. The names in Africa are so different from our names. The kids in Africa got a huge giggle from one letter giving the names of the boys pet chickens. In Africa chickens are not pets. They loved the notes that had photos and or drawings attached. Their classrooms had no books, or colored papers or any materials available for them to use in creating their notes as compared to the classrooms in California that are creative hubs of activity. Many of the boys wanted to be penpals with girls in the US and many of the girls in Africa wanted boys for penpals. That surprised me. All the students in Africa felt acknowledged for their caring for the environment and were very curious to learn the different ways in which their pen pal was working for a better world too. Next I will take the letters from the African kids to their pen pals in Santa Barbara. I will give another update once that is done. A video is being made about the project but will not be finished for about a month. Thank you again for all the teachers and students and others who collected totes, organized their classes to write notes, and donated money to make this project such a success. I plan to repeat the project on my next trip in August.