The school year got off to a good start the first full week of August, while many of our friends in the US were still hitting the beaches and going to State Fairs! But since it pretty much feels like summer all year in Cameroon, we can hit the beaches at any of the breaks during the year.

Throughout the week students had bits and pieces of orientation every day. The first day was orientation for new students only. We had 20 new students this year. Several of our returning students served as hosts and buddies to the new students, showing them around to various stations where they did such activities as get their lock and learn the combination for the locker, learn how to log in to the computers, have their ID photo taken, learn how to buy and use lunch tickets, and find out where the PE showers are. It’s a bit of a fire hose of information for them.

The rest of the week all students attended classes and were given a bit of time each day on orientation.  Returning students can always use a refresher on study hall etiquette, emergency procedures, and other topics. All week the theme was The Olympics, so students were grouped into country teams, complete with “badges” to identify them and the team they represent. Teams sat together for orientation sessions and stayed together for group discussions.

On the last day of “orientation week” we spent the afternoon on a “Decathlon” event. All students were put in their country groups  and given 10 challenges to complete. Each challenge was explained and supervised by a member of the non-teaching staff, which was a fun way for students to get to know the custodians, cooks, and office staff.

These events included “Cameroonian bobsled” which required them to stuff as many members of their team into a vehicle to be driven around the parking lot (by the school’s Director).

 

Another event was synchronized swimming — in which “the lawn is your swimming pool”.

In the javelin throw, students threw soccer corner flags as far as they could while standing inside the small ring.

The final event involved all teams at once playing tug of war.

Regardless of which country team won these Olympic games, by the end of the week students had gotten acquainted with each other and were duly oriented to RFIS!

P.S. If you’re counting, you do not see 10 events making up a “decathlon” — that’s true. I just didn’t get good pictures of all  10 events! There are more pictures on our facebook page if you want to take a look.