Alumni Profile: James Hughes, '60

The following is an excerpt from Part 1 of the yet-to-be-published memoir by James Hughes, ’60. Irrepressible: From a Drop-Out to a Professor Emeritus; One Man’s Journey to Bring Education to Parts of the Third World details his adventures while implementing curricula and training teachers in Kenya, the Yemen Arab Republic, the Kingdom of Nepal, and Pakistan in the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s. Hughes is a professor emeritus at Oakland University.

PART 1: Kenya—A Wonderful Introduction to Africa

Sometimes I Had to Pray For an Inspiration

Driving up the northern slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro was no easy task. The deep ruts in the ground created during the rainy season kept the vehicle in place, like the tracks for a train.

As we rounded switchback after switchback, I could feel my right shoulder getting bruised on each turn. The Project provided me with a driver, Edie, who spoke very little English, but I was thankful it was him driving and not me.

The vehicle was a three-year-old International Scout, with minimum comfort features. The U.S. wouldn’t buy air conditioned vehicles and no radios. One had the choice of rolling down the windows and eating dust or roasting. I chose eating dust.

The equator runs through the center of Kenya, and being on the coast, it was mostly hot and humid all year long.

I had only been here a month, and this trip was my first school visit outside of Mombasa. I had no idea what was expected of me today. I had only received a telephone message that this teacher needed help.

“Dr. Hughes, this is Mr. Ungali. I’m the headmaster at the Taita Hills School. Welcome to Kenya. I have a favor to ask of you.”

“Ask, Mr. Ungali. That’s why I am here.”

“I have a new primary teacher. She has a one-room building with classes one, two, and three. She needs your assistance getting the class started properly.”

“Is it far?” I asked.

“It’s a pretty drive,” he said, avoiding my question. “You’ll drive through part of Tsvao National Park and then towards Mt. Kilimanjaro. Your driver can get specific directions to the school from the local villagers.”

When I talked to Edie about the distance, he said “About three hours.”

“One way?” I asked. “One way.” The next day we drove off.

As my International Harvester Scout churned up higher and higher on these foothills, I could see the little school house ahead. One used the term loosely when applied to a school house in Kenya in 1966. There was an opening for a door, but there was no door. There were openings for windows, but there were no windows. A thatched roof of palm branches topped off the building.

Kenya had only been independent three years when I arrived in 1966. Jomo Kenyatta was elected the first president of this new nation in 1963.

Prior to independence, the White Highlands (areas around central Kenya) had been terrorized by the Mau Mau Rebellion. British colonialists had no idea whether they could trust their servants, or have their throats slit by them in the night. It had been rumored strongly that Jomo Kenyatta led this rebellion.

I visited homes in the White Highlands after independence. Owners had installed wrought iron gates that separated each room. A person would unlock the gate separating the kitchen from the dining room, and then lock it behind them. The same procedure was replicated as a resident moved from room to room within the house. 

The old British Colonial Government in East Africa had done very little for the education of blacks. Now, the Kenyan people had to create a whole new education system for themselves.

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) had created a project to help the Kenyans. I was part of that Project. Yet these last few weeks, there were times I wondered… “What on earth am I doing here?”

I knew so little about Kenya and its drive for independence. Of course I had read a lot before I came. But, now, actually being here was another story. I admit that those last weeks of graduate school were mental nightmares. In order to put my mind to rest after the dissertation orals and exams, the only thought I had was getting on a jet plane and flying away.

Flying—the longest flight I had ever taken was from Albuquerque, New Mexico, to Washington, DC, with only two time zone differences. The trip here took 22 hours and had about ten time zone differences. I learned what jet lag was fast.

There’s nothing exotic about a 22-hour plane ride. For me, the excitement lasted about three hours. In that time, I had a cocktail, and a dinner, and I was ready for bed, but we had 19 more hours to go.

The plane went from New York to Monrovia, Liberia, and on to Accra, Ghana, and then to Lagos, Nigeria. When we were landing to discharge passengers at Lagos, the pilot warned us not to try to take any pictures. We would not be allowed off the plane. As soon as new passengers boarded, we’d be off. As our plane taxied to a stop, armed soldiers surrounded the plane. Peering out the plane window was like watching TV, only this was real!

“Be sure your seat belts are fastened. We’re ready for take-off,” the stewardess said. “Once we reach our cruising altitude, we’ll be down the aisles with beverage service,” she remarked.

“Great, a martini will taste good after that show of force in Lagos,” I thought.

We continued our flight to Entebbe, Uganda, and then on to Nairobi, Kenya. By then, the only thing I could think about was a shower and a bed!

The School

I could hear the children screaming. “He’s coming… he’s coming… the American is coming!”

As we parked the vehicle near the school, the children crowded around me. I was the first European to visit their school. Though appearing shy, the children wanted a close look at me. They stared wide-eyed at me, with eyelashes so pronounced, and close-cropped hair so trim, one would think a make-up artist had worked overtime on these young faces.

Elizabeth Matutu, the teacher, welcomed me graciously. “Thank you for coming. We heard of your arrival in Mombasa, and now you’ve come to help us!”

She took me into the school. It was bare. There were no desks or benches for children to sit on. There was no chalk board for the teacher to write on. They had no books or pencils and paper. They had nothing, just four mud walls and an earthen floor.

“You must help us,” the teacher pleaded. “I want the students to learn!”

She had taught the children songs and poems…things she could do orally. “I want to teach them to read, write and do math,” she told me. “But I have nothing.”

The students were in a one-room school for first, second, and third graders. They were dressed in white shirts and blouses, and green short pants and skirts. They had sandals, but left them outside the school doorway.

“It saves on wear and tear if the children go barefoot most of the day,” Miss Matutu said.

School uniforms were common. Colors depended on what fabric a village tailor had in stock.

Classes were usually mixed with both boys and girls. Only if a village had a large number of children, would a District Education Officer authorize a second teacher.

In Kenya, the medium of instruction was English. For these children, English was a second language. They spoke their tribal language at home.

“Recite the poem I taught you,” Miss Matutu urged her class.

The children spread apart and gestured with their hands as they recited.

“One, two, buckle my shoe (pointing to their bare foot)…Three, four, shut the door (pointing to the hole in the wall).” Five, six, and on they went reciting.

I couldn’t help but wonder what English words some children might be learning as they spoke “shoe” and pointed to a bare foot.

“I need to teach them to read and write and do math,” she repeated. “But I have nothing.”

There had been nothing in my university training to prepare me for this situation… and many others that would follow in the years to come.

I needed an inspiration, fast. Then the light bulb went on in my head! There was a gardener outside with a machete cutting branches off an acacia tree. Not speaking Swahili, I gestured to him to follow me inside the school. I asked the teacher to move the children, who had been sitting on the earthen floor, back to the walls. Then I took the machete and drew a large rectangle in the earthen floor. I took the machete and began breaking up the soil within that rectangle, into soft sand. When the gardener saw what I was doing, he went out and returned with a second machete. Together, we made a large sand box on the floor.

We then went out to the acacia tree, where I cut a small branch and stripped the foliage from it. Seeing me work, he joined me, and we made 31 pointers, one stick for each child and the teacher.

When we returned to the school room, I began to scratch numbers in the sand. The teacher saw immediately the opportunity she now had to teach. The gardener went back to the tree and cut another branch, but left the foliage on. This was the eraser.

The teacher now began to teach numbers. As she drew a number in the sand, she called out its name, “One.” In unison, the children cried out “ONE.” On she went, “two”… “TWO” called out the young students. In an hour she had taught the basic facts from 1 to 10.

I reclined and let Miss Matutu teach. I suddenly felt a soft hand on my arm. I glanced down. A child was intently tracing the freckles on my arm.

“Tomorrow, we will learn to spell our own names,” the teacher said, and the children clapped!

“In time, books will come,” I told her.

“Books will come, children,” the teacher cried out, followed by more applause!

“Thank the American,” the teacher told the children.

The echo of their applause rang in my ears as I got into my vehicle for the dusty and bumpy ride back to Mombasa. In my days, all the roads in the Coastal Province were dirt, except in the city of Mombasa.

I had actually done nothing that my graduate education had prepared me for. Yet I was grateful for that sudden burst of creativity! When there is NOTHING, there has to be some way to turn it into SOMETHING... something as simple as a stick in a patch of sand. Thank you, God!

© 2009 James Hughes