Day 18

Today was Saturday and the start of the ACTT Retreat Weekend where all the staff from the 2 offices get together plus the ACTT agents. This year it was held in Moshi so the Mwanza staff and Agents had all travelled here over the last 24 hours. The first day of the retreat is usually more formal and the second day is more of a fun day.

We had breakfast as normal and were back at our house waiting for Robert to pick us up when 2 of the students, Sarah and Laura, arrived to clean our room. It was nice to have a chat with them while we waited.

Robert picked us up about 10 and we then went to the ACTT offices where everyone was gathered. Bruno had arranged for us to spend the day at Weru Weru River Lodge just outside Moshi. We all fitted into the 3 cars (just) and made the short drive there.

It is a nice lodge with lovely grounds. We had use of the conference room, an area for mid morning coffee and an outside area for lunch.

The morning was taken up with some presentations from Robert and Bruno covering ACTT’s performance over the last year, followed by some discussions in small groups with the group leaders then reporting back to the whole group.

Robert and Bruno did a brief introduction and then we had a break.

This was then followed by the presentations and discussion groups.

About 2.30pm we stopped for lunch which was served out in the garden.

 After lunch there were some awards for the best performing members of staff.

Thomas got the third place award

Faustine got second place

And Boniface got the top award........all were thoroughly deserved.

After that the staff gave us a thank you gift which was lovely and also one for Alison and Steve
We then gave all the staff a small gift each

As you can imagine these awards and gifts were lovely but did take quite a bit of time. It was now about 4.30 and everyone had some free time. Some of the guys went swimming, others sat in the gardens and chatted. The lodge offered camel rides so there were also some camels in the gardens!!

It also seemed that the lodge was a popular place for people to come for their wedding photos. There were several wedding parties around while we were there.

And of course before we left we had to have an ACTT team photo

We finished there about 6pm and Robert then dropped us back at More Than A Drop where we spent the evening.

Tomorrow will be a less formal day and we are all going to Arusha National Park.