BMIS students had a warm welcome from Peponi and the day was very well organised. Our students competed in four different challenges.

• The Coding Challenge, Scratch for the U11 and HTML for the U13;
• The 3D Design Challenge, using SketchUp to create a 3D object with precise measurements and dimensions;
• The Control Systems Challenge, using Arduino to program a sequence of lights on a circuit board;
• The Logical Programming Challenge, with U11 designing the smart-home of the future, and the U13 designing an interactive service kiosk for a movie theatre.

Some activities, such as Scratch and HTML were familiar to our boys, and others, such as the 3D design and Arduino offered new opportunities for us to learn.

The competition, as always, was tough, however, it was also a lot of fun and a valuable learning experience, and it was a shame that the day had to come to an end. I know our boys enjoyed it (they were singing on the bus, all the way back to Garden Estate).

Thursday was World Book Day! What an amazing host of book characters rocked up to school in the morning- from the Three Little Pigs and Willy Wonka to Harry Potter and Wally! The blaze of colour, the brilliance of imagination and the wealth of creativity was quite something to behold.

After the costume parade of children, staff and parents, the children enjoyed a day of books, reading and stories. Lots of parents and some Secondary students joined us for a picnic lunch and came to share a story in the shade. After that, the children took part in two author masterclasses where they were either designing an animal character or creating a picture book.

We ended our fun day with a showcase of amazing writing that the children have created this week, stimulated by the discovery of a ‘Mystery Suitcase’ in the playground.

Thank you so much to everyone who was a part of this special day and helped to make it such a success.

Over the weekend, while digging a hole in readiness for some tree-planting, John and his team made an exciting discovery - they unearthed a battered, old leather suitcase!

After it had been checked carefully by Security for any danger, it was carefully opened in front of the children. Inside, we found a variety of strange items, such as paintbrushes, a map, sketches of shells and flowers, an old photograph and some delicate lace. We are pretty sure that the suitcase belonged to a woman, probably European- but who? Who was she? Why was she here in Mombasa? What was she doing? And how did her suitcase come to be buried here? The children were bursting with ideas about how the suitcase ended up here, from a freak Tsunami which flooded the area and probably drowned the poor woman, to a thought that maybe it fell from a low-flying aeroplane on a surveillance or exploration mission.

The unusual event sparked some brilliant writing across the Primary school, leading to news reports, stories, poetry and creative writing, which we showcased in a special assembly on Thursday afternoon.

There has been much speculation as to whether there may be other hidden treasures buried in the grounds, or even a body or two…!  I guess we will just have to wait and see if our sharp-eyed groundsmen spot anything else unusual as they go about their day-to-day business.

This year’s East African Model United Nations will definitely be one to remember. The  theme was “Tujenge pamoja” that translates to “Let’s build together.” We are very happy to say that the theme was well captured by each delegate with the high levels of debating that took place during the conference. It was an eye-opening week of challenges as well as fun. As students, we were able to take part in extremely intellectual debating sessions that provided sustainable and efficient solutions to global issues.

Congratulations to the Secondary students who took part in the Annie play! It was a great show!