Almost a year on from the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, we look at how life in the Gambia has been affected, and how the RTB community have been working together to overcome new challenges.
The past twelve months have been challenging for everyone. In every aspect of our lives, we have had to change our habits and routines to fit the most unexpected of circumstances. In a way, this has brought many of us closer through the shared experience and struggle. We have learned to work from home instead of our offices, we speak to many of our loved ones online, and have had to put many projects on hold. But for some more than others, the Covid-19 pandemic has meant completely reimagining their lives in order to have some semblance of normality.
A country like The Gambia, where most of the 2.5 million inhabitants live in rural or non urbanized areas, was always going to feel the strain of reduced human contact. With many close-knit communities that are in contact every day, respecting and enforcing basic social distancing rules has been extremely complicated. Numbers from the government have been mixed, with some suggesting the cases might be much higher than what official figures suggest.
In the midst of all this, Run the Bases has kept going, and where possible offered the children and communities we work with support and a little distraction in such a trying time. Our in-country coaches have made themselves into central figures of their community, and for as far as possible tried to keep operations going, balancing their own personal health and safety with the long term aims of our organisation. Naturally during the first few months of the pandemic, characterized by uncertainty and confusion, Run the Bases temporarily suspended all sporting activities, with coaches limiting themselves to periodically checking in on their athletes. Since a change in regulations however, we are slowly starting to see children returning to training, and our coaches could not be happier. To offer you an idea of what things have been like in the past few months in the Gambia, we have collected some thoughts from our coaches on what exactly their experience of the lockdown has been:
Adama Jarju
“Even though 2020 has been one of the most difficult years, it hasn’t stopped us from carrying out our work. During the pandemic some of the activities we did were sport sessions and watering the trees within the community. We did not achieve all of our goals, but proceeded in little steps and achieved the achievable. At the moment we are focusing on allowing children to play and love what they do.”
Lamin Jatta
“The experience of the lockdown has been quite tough as a manager, because we could not have meetings or speak with the coaches because of social distancing guidelines from the World Health Organization. That alone slowed down and frustrated our operations throughout the year, because being able to gather and speak to coaches every month or two months is very important to discuss medium and long term projects. We need to receive important updates from some communities who would otherwise be isolated. When I stepped into help the coaching in Berending in August, I also realised that the masks that RTB had provided, while extremely useful in day-to-day life, were a severe impediment to playing and enjoying themselves in the same way the children had done so far. Running with a mask is quite frustrating. We did our best to manage and carry on with sessions, but obviously social distancing is very difficult in a sport such as softball where athletes often come in very close contact.”
Jimmy Jatta
“The circumstances have been difficult but the work we have done has been amazing. I have been personally very frustrated during this time, as life in the Gambia has been very hard in all areas of sport and education. Specifically in my village of Madina, all children are frustrated with the experience of lockdown, which has been stopping them from enjoying their games. It has also slowed the process of learning the game of softball, which they were enjoying so much. Wherever I go during lockdown if I meet kids they will ask me about when lessons are going to resume, and all I can tell them is that it will be very soon and encourage them. This has also obviously slowed down our long term goals and overarching aims for the project, but it hasn’t stopped them. In my community a lot of children are missing out on school and many lessons due to lockdown. Once this all ends, I want to make sure we are training every week and making the most of being able to be back together. I will encourage them to study hard to make up for the lost time during the pandemic. One of the things we will be most looking forward to is the competition, as I know the children miss this very much.”
Philip Gomez
“During the pandemic it has been very difficult to get all the children to train, due to restrictions and lockdown regulations. Some parents see it as a risk, so our participation is very up and down, with some children some week and some on the other. We are trying our best, but obviously struggling to keep to the standard that we would like to be at. We strongly hope all this ends soon, and that we are able to return to some kind of normality. The work we have been doing with the children and communities has been invaluable, and it needs to resume as soon as possible.”
