The adventures of a Mullingar man volunteering in Tanzania

Shane Dunne certainly has been a busy man for the past three months. A volunteer teacher and sports instructor with LOHADA, a small, Tanzanian-led NGO, the Clongowney native has been helping street children and disadvantaged elderly people in the east African republic of Tanzania since September.Shane (23), a qualified plumber, was a casualty of the downturn in the construction industry this year, and instead of surrendering to the recession, he decided to turn his multiple talents towards helping people who are in need.Settling in the town of Arusha with other volunteers, Shane"s first port of call outside of school duty was an engagement party at as a small village outside the city, among a crowd of about fifty people.At the same time, he occupied himself with painting the dorms at the school - known as Camp Joshua - and buying curtains for the windows, helping out as much as he can to give the pupils" living space a revamp.The LOHADA organisation encourages Shane and his colleagues to travel and go on safari. To date, he"s been to Lake Natron, where he climbed an active volcano named Oldonyo Lygani, as well as climbing the third highest mountain in Africa, Mount Neru.At the moment, Shane is working in a HIV orphanage in Kitale, Kenya, which is home to over forty children who were orphaned due to the death of their parents from HIV and AIDS, or during recent civil strife.'We are helping 5 days a week at all hours, doing everything from getting the kids up in the morning to helping with food preparation, teaching, playing games or simply talking to them,' Shane told the Westmeath Examiner.'It"s a sort of counselling even though I know I"m not qualified, it"s better than somebody being there not qualified than nobody at all, and putting them to bed. It"s going to be very intense but a serious life changing experience.'Shane will then head south to Malawi in January for another two months, where he will work on a sports project which involves teaching a number of different sports to children.'At the moment there"s a ratio of about 150 kids to one teacher, so they don"t have time to play games or teach them, which is very important to a child"s life,' Shane explained.'In the evenings, we will be doing sports coaching with local clubs, who have a lack of trainers. Malawi is probably one of the poorest countries in the world, with the average wage being thirty cents per day.'Shane has embarked upon his journey in Africa with an English volunteer friend, and depending on funds, they intend to travel back over land to England through Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan and beyond, which should take them a number of months.LOHADA, the organisation Shane works with in Tanzania, was founded in the summer of 1998, when Happiness Wambura, a Tanzanian mother of five and a pastor"s wife, wanted to do something to help her community.Underneath a large tree in a park in the centre of the city of Arusha, Ms. Wambura gathered the children of disabled parents and took care of them, playing and singing while their parents begged for money to feed them.LOHADA grew, and through donations from outside sources, its childcare operations were moved to a row of rented rooms, and then a rented house, until the organisation built Camp Moses for the younger children in 2004.