Window that links remote village to rest of the world

• Teachers and local pastoralists have only one tiny position from which their phones can access mobile network

The story goes that a former head teacher at the school, Mr Kisur Sanduku, once placed his cell phone on the window as he chaired a staff meeting.

According to Mr Topora, who was a teacher at the school at the time, they were all surprised to hear their head teacher’s phone ringing.

It was like a miracle to the teaching staff and the school community. “We could not imagine it. It was such a big surprise as no network was accessible to us in the school compound,” the head teacher recalls.

Mr Sanduku is now the head teacher at Nang’arua Primary School in the same district.

From that time, they all started placing their phones on the window to receive calls. And with time, they discovered that the network was stronger at the elevated point. So they decided to put up the support.

The school’s biggest problem is to limit villagers from flocking to the staff room to make and receive calls. The din caused by the rowdy villagers sometimes disturbs teachers and the pupils.

“Sometimes you find long queues of villagers outside the staff room waiting to make phone calls,” a teacher at the school, John Lokidap, says.

But all the same at least teachers can now receive sms whenever their salaries have been paid to their banks in Marigat or Maralal towns, 90 kilometres away from the school.