On Monday, march 23rd the ESAC school student choir from Dar es Salaam stopped by the Multicultural Café at Café Bönan to talk about their home country Tanzania. Principal Agnes Murage talked about Tanzania’s beautiful nature reserves, Mount Kilimanjaro , the island Zanzibar and the ESAC school project. The student choir had been touring around Finland for more than a week presenting Tanzanian music and dance to a Finnish audience. At the Multicultural Café the children also presented custom made dresses, made out of traditional Tanzanian fabrics. The audience was inspired by stories about Tanzanian wildlife, the beautiful colours of Tanzanian fabrics and not least by the story of the ambitious ESAC project – the creation of a nursery school and a primary and secondary school which today teach more than 350 students. However, some of the school buildings do not yet have roofs, the school library offers only a handful of books to its students and the children do not have access to computers. Principal Murage and her students were motivated by the Finnish ambassador to Tanzania Juhani Toivonen to seek support in Finland. The Esac project convinced many Ålanders to deserve their support and a special donation account for the ESAC schools has been opened at Ålandsbanken.
