Last Day

Hey, guys, it's Henry. Today was our last day working with the Fountain of Hope and the XO Laptops, and, quite honestly, we're inspired by what we've seen. Enough teasing, though. Ellie and I had planned on gathering five of the teachers, and asking each of them to choose one student who they would teach (each of them occupying one laptop.) While this is what we began acting on this morning, the following group of teachers managed to assemble on their own, with most sharing a single laptop:

Moses (who chose to teach Frank), Joe Tembo, Joseph Bwalya, Stephen Siame, Benson (who, to many peoples' amusement chose to teach Isaac, the director of FOH), Vasco (the librarian), Vincent, and Kenny.
This group of teachers lived up to (if not exceeded) all of our hopes and expectations. As far as I could see, every one of the students, even after all of the teachers had left to go and attend to their various activities and obligations, were following every rule perfectly and exploring the laptops in a way that will ensure their longevity.
One of the more exciting discoveries that this group made was the potential of the "Chat" application. Vasco asked me how they could use the "Write" application to communicate with each other, and so I told him about "Chat," (which is basically an instant-messenger.) Within minutes, Vasco, Benson, and Moses had figured out how to use the application and began a conversation. Soon after, Vasco asked me how far away the laptops could be before they lost their connection. I had been told that the laptops had a 3-mile range, and so, after consulting Ellie about metric-unit conversions, I told Vasco that they could safely bet on maintaining connection for 2-3 kilometers. With this revelation, his eyes and smile widened, as he rose from his seat and called for Moses and Benson to go outside and test it. Vasco moved to the gate, Benson sat outside the hut, and Moses moved to the other end of FOH near the bathrooms; they were thrilled to find that it did not hinder their communications whatsoever. I suggest reading the entire transcript, which Ellie has posted below.
Although the teacher-student session was running very smoothly, as I mentioned before, the teachers all eventually had to leave (as they cannot dedicate their lives to these little machines that so abruptly entered them.) As more new faces came into the Arts Center and sat down at the unoccupied laptops, it seemed to me that we would have to begin a new lesson like those of the last few days. I found myself pleasantly surprised, though, when I saw that the students who had just been taught by our "professional" teachers stepped up and became teachers to the new kids without hesitation. If we are to take this as an implication for the future of Lubuto's XO Laptops, it surely is a good one.
After a couple hours, we closed the Center for the day, and sat outside talking to the kids, and exchanging our farewells. We exchanged e-mail addresses with Vasco and Vincent, so that we could continue to offer support from D.C. whenever we were needed. Vasco mentioned that he already had plans for a new protocol for laptop use; a plan to sit and talk about the basic rules and enforce them before anyone sits down at the computers. We also discussed the possibility of funding for Wi-Fi internet access, which could be a blessing in many senses (especially in its allowance of retrieval of lost/new software for the laptops), but which also has its obvious dangers and complications.
Overall, this experience has been amazing for both Ellie and I. For me, it has been especially emotional to be back in Lusaka, and my mind has been constantly flooded by nostalgia and affection for this amazing country. This will not be an experience we will ever forget.
Ellie and I would like to express our gratitude to all of the amazing people at Fountain of Hope; to Dipak and Rodgers for making our stay extremely comfortable and for being so hospitable; to the Coromvlis, and to everyone else who has made this trip such a rich experience for us.
To close, here are some non-XO pictures from our two weeks at the Lubuto Library