Fabulous weekend in Abuja - 25th and 26th Jun2011 - Part I

Dear Friends, I am so happy that all of us - IBM CSC Nigeria 5 team spent our weekend in a productive and meaningful way. IBM celebrated its centennial on 16Jun2011 and all IBM locations around the world had celebrations that day. But all 13 of us were missing our countries on that special day. So, we had planned to celebrate one of the weekend in Abuja in a memorable way and wanted to make it very special for all of us and for IBM. Glyn, one of our team members gave us the memorabilia badges. We all wore with pride that day.

As part of our plan, we were planning to participate in Oral Polio immunization program in Abuja. But due to the lack of time, we could not undergo the training and we just had to observe the polio immunization. So, Glyn and Pradip worked with UBEC (universal Basic Education Commission) and arranged for a visit to the school of Special Education for visually and Hearing challenged children in Minna, Niger state. We started at 6:00 AM as Abuja has the street cleaning activity from 7:00 AM and no vehicles were allowed to run on the road from 7:00 AM to 9:00 AM on that day. Left Onyx early in the morning after breakfast. On the way, we got a chance to look at the ZUMA ROCK, which is a large monolith which is 725 meters tall and around 3.1 km in circumference, looks like a small mountain.  This is the symbol of Nigeria and is depicted on 100 Naira bill. Look at our team who are busy taking pictures of Zuma Rock :)

Zuma Rock !!!

Team busy picturing Zuma Rock !!!

Asha with Zuma Rock

The moments at the school was emotional. I felt very sad looking at those kids. We crib for small materialistic things every day. But 700+ kids were so happy, with out any pain shown on their face while they greeted us. I was into tears when all the children started forming line and started greeting us in their own way. We all started introducing ourselves and there were hoots when some of said were from India. I really felt that the children knew more about India and they liked India. I was happy to capture those moments in my camera share with you all.

All the children wanted to take pictures with us. We took a lot of photos. Kim started playing Soccer with the children. Soccer is Kim's passion. All of us felt that we should do something to these children and not just visit and go. So, we all collected some money and presented it to the principal and requested him to utilize the money for school and the children. Though it was just a drop i ocean, as Anick mentioned in her blog, every drop matters!!!!! While we were ready to leave, the children quickly came with a play depicting ABILITY in DISABILITY and with some dance shows. It was very interesting to watch them. We finally said Good Bye to them with heavy hearts.

Panaromic view of Gurara Falls !!!

Ok, lets get back to the fun part. on the way back to Abuja, we visited a falls in Niger state - GURARA Falls. Gurara is the name of the river and it means something like 'water pouring from somewhere'. I read this from another blog. The falls is 25 mts high and 700 mts wide. We enjoyed the scenic beauty and all of us went to the foot of the falls. i would say that was an adventure as there are no smooth road or path to take us to the foot of the falls. We had to climb up and down the small rocks to reach the foot. The local guides and our driver Chris helped us to reach our goal. We spent some time in taking some pictures at the falls and returned to hotel with mild body pains and heart full of joy :). I have posted a few pics. Enjoy!!!!! and you are all welcome for the feedback/ comments.

Asha @ Gurara Falls

Beautiful view of GURARA Falls !!!

#IBMCSC NIGERIA