African Child Day in Tattaguine

Nathalie Fauveau - Posted on August 24, 2010

Senegal recently celebrated African Child Day (Journée de l’enfant africain). Traditionally, World Vision organizes activities for the children and their communities on this day. This year, in the context of the recent World Cup, World Vision’s Tattaguine program organized a big sporting event.

It was a busy day with the track and field events running at the same time as the boy’s soccer games. The boys participated in quarter finals, semi-finals and then the final championship game. The girl’s soccer tournament, on the other hand, consisted only of a final championship game. Before the soccer finals, there was some additional entertainment, then the finals and last but not least, handing out the awards.

The winning and second-place teams got cash money as a prize, and the other two teams from the semi-final received brand new jerseys. In the track and field competition, the first, second and third place girls won school bags filled with school supplies.

Not everybody got prizes, but every child was happy to participate and the day ended in a celebration of music and dancing.

This type of event usually involves the whole community. It is a great opportunity for education and advocacy campaigns. This year, World Vision, in partnership with the other villages, decided to focus the public about the issue of schooling, particularly the education of girls. With the support of World Vision, songs and skits were prepared by the students from a local school on that issue.

Mame Thiokh was one of the contestants participating in the track and field event. She is a sponsored child. She is in fifth grade and although she prefers playing soccer, she was selected by her school to represent them in the track and field competition. She was competing against six other girls in the 1000 meter race and she came in third place. “The director asked me to participate because I run fast, and not many girls wanted to run. I could have won, but on that day, my foot was hurting so it slowed me down.” At that time, the World Cup wasn’t finished yet and Mame said: “I wish Senegal had a team competing. But, because they don’t, I will support the French team.”

At school, she is on the high jump team. Her favorite subject is math, especially solving math problems. She ranks pretty good in her class and has high ambitions. She wants to become Minister of Education!

She has a younger sister, Helene, and three brothers: Diene, Djidiack, and Sandokh. Yacine, her mother says, “We are thankful for what World Vision is doing in our village. We trust them and know they want to help us. We were very glad when Mame received the money from the friends in America. We often don’t have the means to buy school supplies, and that gift helped out a lot. Thank you!”

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