“What is this…Daraja?” asked one of the timekeepers at this weekend’s Zonal Championships, an annual Kenyan event in which students from various schools compete to represent their zone (region). “Oh, I hear it’s towards that direction,” slyly replies Wycliffe, Daraja’s Swahili and Geography teacher.

Apparently, a lot of people were asking the same thing this past Friday & Saturday when this phantom school that no one had heard of, and wasn’t even officially on the competition’s program until that morning was consistently placing 1^st and 2^nd in numerous competitions.

Given the little practice our students had, we figured Zonal Championships would just be a forum in which everyone tried their best. We didn’t really know what to expect. But once we got there, we gradually realized that, not only were we competitive, but our students were coming out on top in quite a few events! To see pictures of the event, take a peak at the Daraja Flickr Gallery.

Netball:

“I had a dream we went to district!” said Bennie. “I had a dream that we were celebrating. Then, I woke up and my blankets and sheets were on the side of the bed because I had been playing netball in my sleep!”

Despite having an official team for only a week—and some students, including Bennie, joining only 3 days before game time– Daraja’s netball team managed to reach 2^nd place in the regional athletics competition, qualifying them to represent Laikipia East at the district competition next weekend.

[By the way, if you are American, then chances are rather high that you have never heard about netball. Netball is an English sport derived from basketball. A few differences include: no dribbling, no backboard, and no calling out player names to communicate. Check out the wikipedia article

Track & Field: