FRANCIS KITIME SCHOOL DAYS AT TOSAMAGANGA IN 1940S

Life at the boarding school was not easy, the priest in charge of discipline would wake the students up at 5 o’clock every morning.
 When Francis first joined the school, Father Ramelo was in charge of discipline and stores and later Father Barabanti who was then a very young priest, he would wake them up with a Latin greeting ‘Benedicamus Domine’ meaning ‘Let us bless the Lord’. The boys would wake up wash in very cold water and then all go to church for the morning mass.

Food was terrible, lunch and dinner was the same, stiff porridge (ugali) and boiled beans, actually sometimes it was just a lot of salted water and a few beans here and there. Because off shortage of plates students ate in pairs, one was free to choose a partner, but  unlucky fellows ended up being chosen by bullies and were always hungry. A group of five students were chosen daily to cook, them and their friends would at least for day that eat better.
Beds were just planks of wood put together. After the holidays the students would report early so as to have a choice of straight planks, if one reported late he would have to sleep on rough planks for the whole term.
During all the time that Francis and his sister Isabela were at the boarding school, few relatives visited them , but their grandmother Bibi Kongo came to visit them every Sunday, she would bring them home cooked food, and Sundays were great days for the pair.

The long holidays were in the month of July to September. During the holidays Francis and his sister went to stay with Bibi Kongo, and of course their sick mother was there too.
During the long holidays of 1945 Francis went to visit his father who was then teaching in Mbeya. The first buses had arrived they had wooden seats; there was a special bus for students from Mbeya and Tukuyu he got into that bus, and the journey started, the roads were very bad, it took a whole day to travel from Iringa to Chimala, where they arrived very late and had to sleep over and continue the journey the next day arriving in Mbeya around 11 am.

Bus aina ya Albion 

His sister Isabela’s holidays were always spent with her grandmother Bibi Kongo.
In 1950  Francis again went to Mbeya to visit his father Mwalimu Raphael, he had completed his school and a teaching course, so he had gone to Mbeya to rest and await for posting by the government. While in Mbeya that December of 1950, he got a letter of his first appointment as a teacher Grade 1. In January 1951 he began his teaching career at Njombe Middle School. He  was 19 years and some few months old