Excellent! - excellentdevelopment.com

Excellent has now hosted its 3rd Quest Overseas Expedition to Africa - enabling young people to experience life in Africa and make a sustainable difference to life as they see it.
Claudia Ramirez was on the expedition and she was so taken by our work that she is now a dedicated volunteer!

Here's her story:

It all started with some searching on internet and a dream of volunteering at least once in my life...

The expedition is organised by Quest Overseas in conjunction with Excellent Development and from the time we arrived to the time we left, we were always on the move doing activities, working, teaching, planting trees, etc.

On arrival at the Garden Hotel in Machakos, we were welcomed with a fantastic lecture from Prof Mugambi (a legend!!), who gave an amazing talk about environmental issues and especially African ones.

Later, we had an introduction to the project from Joshua and Simon, the founders of the charity. Joshua is a great man who lets actions speak for him; he’s done so much and yet is such a modest and humble person. Simon is brilliant, you will imagine a serious, suit with tie kind of man but no, he is a young lad with funky hair who has put a great idea into practice.

After this off we went to Kola to settle in our new home for the next 5 weeks! The welcoming from the locals was exciting and heart warming, we felt like gods. There were presentations from everyone, a great lunch (introduction to beans and rice!!) and of course, Kikamba dancing and singing.

We soon started building sand dams with the Kyumbuni self help group, a usual day at the dam was start work at 8am (African time), work till 11ish when it was time for chai (African tea) and then more of work until lunch at about 2 and finally the last bit of cement mixing before going home at 5pm.

The work was to collect an average of 10 bags of cement, 30 wheelbarrows of sand, and lots of water –African style- and mix and mix! Once the cement was ready we would form 2 lines; one to send the Karais (metal plates) with cement, and the other to return the empty ones to be refilled. When doing these chains there was a lot of singing, we were also learning Kikamba (the local language) and learnt a few of their traditional songs.

We also taught at the Mbuani Primary and Secondary schools giving British Culture, English Language and Maths lessons. It was great to see how clever and eager to learn the students were but the most amazing bit was hearing them sing, woouu!!

We also helped to build a water tank in the secondary school and planted and watered trees in the Utooni Medicinal Forest, I planted 10 trees and it was great. Some of the volunteers did some research for their undergraduate dissertations on sand dams, terracing, tree planting and participation of the community.

It was amazing to see how Excellent Development gives people the tools and support they need. They are there for any community who wants to approach them and are happy to teach them to help themselves.

It is incredible how projects like these can change your life; I am 23 years-old, I come from Colombia and have been in London for 5 years. I have been working with autistic children but have always wanted to volunteer and get involved in environment related work, now I definitely know that this project was the start of my new career!

People in Kenya are just like in Colombia, no matter how many problems we have, there is always a smile...

There’s so much more I would like to write, but all I can say is if you guys have a chance, do something like this once in your life, you owe it to yourself!!

Claudia Ramirez


This is what some of my new friends, the other volunteers had to say:

“AMAZING, AMAZING, AMAZING!!!!!!! I had some of the best weeks of my life in Kenya this summer.”
Claire Dukei, July 2006

“I had a fantastic time out there and it was really great to interact with the local communities in the region. I hope the project work we carried out will help increase accessibility of water and conserve it in the future in times of drought.”
Emily Dukei, July 2006

“It's impossible to put into words how amazing my time in Kenya with the group was, I was devastated to leave and will always remember the last five weeks as some of the best of my life! My time in Kenya has given me a new perspective on how lucky I am, everyone in Kola and in the team taught me a lot.”
Phillippa Muthina, July 2006

“It was an absolutely brilliant trip and I really didn't want to come home again! The project has made me far more aware of the issues facing Africa and its people and has given me the confidence to travel in Africa. Keep up the amazing work, I will hopefully be back for more! It lived up too and surpassed expectations!”
Simon Mutuku, July 2006


The second Quest team are in Kenya right now, also having an amazing time...here is a quote from their first update;
"We are having an absolutely amazing time! We are all tired after our first few days, but it doesn't matter because it is so much fun! The people are amazing, and seem to be happy all of the time. It is inspiring!"