The Sudan - 21

During these sorts of workshops we often try to break the large group up into smaller break out groups to do various bits of work. Its good for a change in energy to keep mixing the groups up and working with different people.
I like to have a little fun while creating the groups. For instance i might ask people to line themselves up in order of their height, and then i will count them off into their groups. It causes a little bit of chaos and some laughter.
Another good way is to ask the people to sort themselves into order of their birth date (not year), so imagine my surprise, and slight embarrassment when i gave our delegates the instruction to line up by order of their birth date... and everyone burst out laughing and remained seated. This time i was the one in chaos and confusion.
It turns out that they all had the same birthday! its true - they were all "January Babies".
Birth records are a relatively new concept in Sudan (perhaps Africa) - and no one in our workshop actually knows when they were born (they probably don't even know how old they are) - and so everyone of a certain age and more, simply celebrates their birthday on January 1st.