The Rest of the Group Arrives!

I apologize that I have been so busy since the rest of the group arrived that I have not had time to post any more blog posts. With that in mind, I have still broken up the past few weeks into separate posts so each post does not get too long. I just have this one for now, but hopefully I will have another one or two on Sunday when we come back to town!

Thursday 6/13

On Thursday evening, the large group that I was to be meeting arrived from Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut. Thursday was a day for me to prepare to leave the orphanage for two weeks and to travel by dala dala back into Moshi, out of where the group is going to be based for the duration of their trip. After breakfast, I was walking back to my room to take a shower and Jacob was kneeling on the end of the playground closest to me watching me walk past. All of a sudden, he jumped up and yelled “Dada Natalie” while jumping on every syllable for emphasis (and adding an extra syllable because the children at the orphanage pronounce the ‘e’ at the end of my name like a long ‘a’). It’s little moments like this that have really made my time so far at the orphanage special.

After returning to my room, I took a shower that was very cold as seems to be the usual recently. I went for midmorning tea and then returned to my room to finish packing my suitcase and backpack. Around 1, I wandered down to the college with my backpack and handbag for lunch. I ate with Sister Elly, Sister Paulina, and Esther (a teacher), and at the end of our meal, Sister Elly made a big deal out of announcing that that was going to be my last meal at the college. When I return with the other volunteers, we will eat all our meals up at the orphanage. Sister Elly walked me to the main road to catch the dala dala, and she made sure I got on a dala dala that she deemed acceptable and that the “conductor” knew where I needed to get off.

There was a woman who got on the dala dala shortly after I got on who I really wanted to take a picture with. She was dressed in a very pretty traditional dress with a matching head wrap, she had the most beautiful face and pearly white teeth, and she had earrings that looked like they might have come from Claire’s jewelry store but really worked with the outfit. Even though I have been admiring all the traditional clothing here, I took note of this woman’s particular beauty, and I think her face will be one I remember for a long time.

I got off the dala dala at Memorio along with a few other people. The hotel is just a short walk up a dirt road from that stop. Of course I had all the taxi drivers yelling at me (the mzungu, or white person) when I got off the dala dala to see if I needed a ride anywhere. I cut over to the hotel on the dirt road and was able to get my room when I arrived instead of waiting until the rest of the group arrived later. I went to the internet cafe to catch up on what was happening at home. After that, I thought I should get something to eat for dinner, so I had some chicken and rice at the hotel’s restaurant. I returned to my room for a little while until leaving for the airport at 6:30. I rode the bus with Sister Melissa (the manager of the hotel) and Reverend Urio, who were riding along to welcome the group when they landed.

Shortly after arriving at the airport, we heard the plane land so we left the bus to go wait outside the arrivals hall (that’s probably too fancy of a word, but I don’t know what else to call it). It was fun to see all the tourists walking out of the airport, looking for the person holding a sign with their name on it. It was also fun to be part of the welcoming party for the rest of the group, because I got to see what it was like in a different role. This time I was not the one being welcomed, but the one patiently waiting for the group to make their way through passport control and baggage claim. (Customs is optional or I would also list that.) Finally I saw Anna and her friend Raechel come out the doors wondering where the rest of the group was. The rest followed shortly afterward, and as soon as I saw Rebekah I ran over to give her a hug. Sister Melissa had asked me to help her hand out flowers to the arriving travelers, but as soon as I saw Rebekah I sort of forgot about that job. I only knew about a third of the group, as the rest had come from Minnesota, so my greetings didn’t take very long.

When everyone had come out of the airport, Chad directed us to gather in front of a group of Maasai people who had come with their pastor to sing to the arriving group. There were only around 10 of them, but their sound was strong and they had some moves to go with their singing. I took a video of the whole thing, and the audio actually sounds pretty good in the video so that will be good to have and share. After that, all the suitcases were loaded into the back of a large pick up truck and the group piled into the bus.

It was about 45 minutes back to the hotel, and after some juice to welcome the group, I showed Rebekah to our room. We thought it would be a good idea to go to bed right away since she had just been flying for two days and I hadn’t slept well the night before, but our going to bed plan didn’t work out so well because we hadn’t seen each other since we left school the first week of May and I was really excited to tell her about what I had experienced so far.

Friday 6/14

Considering we both couldn’t sleep the night before, it was a little rough to get out of bed on Friday. We had a full day planned, so we had to be at breakfast around 7:15 if we wanted to get something to eat before we left. First we went into downtown (I use that term loosely) Moshi to exchange money. I was getting low on shillings so I exchanged some too for the next two weeks. I also needed to get more minutes for my phone so I went into the shop where I originally got the phone to get more minutes. The shop is conveniently located about 3 shops down from the bureau de change where we exchanged money. The rest of the group got their first taste of the street vendors as we waited for everyone to exchange money.

When everyone had exchanged money, we made our way to Agape Lutheran Junior Seminary, which is a secondary school southwest of Moshi. The school accepts applications and entry examinations from students when they are 12 to 13 years old. If accepted, the students attend the school for four years under the ordinary level, after which time they take the state examinations. If they score well enough on these examinations, the children can return for two more years of the advanced level. There are currently 500 students at the school, but in the past there have been upwards of 800. The school was started to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Lutheran church in Tanzania in 1983. It moved to its current location in 1998 just as its first class was preparing to sit its state examinations. They are currently working on creating 4 more classrooms, a chapel, and a dispensary so that students do not have to go to the hospital for minor treatment. It costs 1.3 million Tanzanian shillings for tuition for one year, which is about $1000, maybe a little less. Sister Elistaha Mlay has been the headmistress of the school since 2004. For the past two years, she has been away receiving her advanced degree, and she just returned to the school on Thursday after receiving her degree.

The children are on break right now, so we were greeted by Sister Mlay and invited to sit down around a table in a meeting room upon our arrival. Sister Mlay gave us a background on the school and her own time there and then we were invited to enjoy tea, peanuts, and mandazi (little dense cakes). She told us stories of how when the school first began, there were no teacher or staff quarters built, so the teachers stayed with the students in their dormitories. She said she loved that because she was so close with her students. She could listen to them and help them solve their problems. She said that always her “heart is with the kids,” and she also said, “I’m not afraid serving God in any situation.” Sister Mlay also shared with us the story of Gloria Joseph, which I will recount for you here.

Gloria’s father died when she was finishing primary school, and Sister Mlay and the bishop of the northern diocese of the church attended his funeral. They decided the best way to assist the family would be to take the oldest child (Gloria) and educate her well so that she could raise her family out of poverty. They brought her to Agape even though she couldn’t afford the school fees, but her educational background was very poor so she had trouble getting started. Sister Mlay sat with her and continued to teach and support her through her ordinary level. When it came time to take the national examination after four years she finished second division (very well). She said she did not have the money to continue her next two years and Sister Mlay did not think the school could continue to support her financially. Sister Mlay reached out to Pastor Chad for help, and he said he would make sure her school fees were taken care of. Gloria finished first in her class at the end of her advanced level, and Sister Mlay encouraged her to apply to college. Gloria could again not afford the fees, so Sister Mlay sent her with 500,000 Tsh (of her own money) and said “see what happens.”

Gloria kept calling Sister Mlay and telling her of the troubles she was having at school and how she was still not able to afford the fees. Sister Mlay went to Nebraska around this time and was talking to a lady who had visited Agape before. She asked how Gloria was doing because she had washed the woman’s hands when she had visited Agape. Sister Mlay told her about the problems she was having paying for school and the woman said she would pay for the rest of Gloria’s college education; she told Sister Mlay to send her Gloria’s college payment schedule and she would make sure the fees were paid on time. Sister Mlay had never met this woman before, and she was offering to pay Gloria’s way through college. Gloria graduated from college and decided it was probably time to find a job and get married because she had gone as far as she could afford with her education. She was then talking to the woman from Nebraska about her plans after college, and the woman thought she could do more to help. She knew that Gloria was very smart and could easily be accepted to a master’s program, so she offered to pay Gloria’s way through that program too. Gloria is currently getting her master’s degree at a university in Dar es Salaam and is apparently doing very well.

We then toured Agape, although school is not in session right now so there were no students present. We saw the cafeteria, classrooms, and dormitories, and we met three of the teachers at the school.

When we left the school, we went to a market in Mweka, which is the traditional village market and occurs once a week. Pastor Chad told us before we got off the bus to be careful about taking pictures, so I didn’t even take my camera with me to get pictures of the stands at the market up close. One stall at the market had a rack of beautiful fabrics taking up one whole wall, but I didn’t get a chance to buy any. We didn’t stay at the market very long because we had a lunch stop to make.

We all piled back into the bus and went to the Midlands Lodge for lunch. Mama Moshi greeted us when we pulled up. She started the lodge as a family business out of their home, and they often house people who are climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro before the climbers embark on their journey. We sat in the garden outside the house, and there was a table set up with a buffet. The food was delicious, and it was good to relax after a busy morning.

After lunch, we took a very brief bus ride to Kikoro Primary School nearby. The students are also on break right now, but they all put on their school uniforms and came to school just to greet us. We got off the bus on the main road and then walked down the dirt road to the school, and as soon as the students found out we were almost there, they all came running down the road to meet us. We walked the rest of the way to the school with kids surrounding us on all sides. When we got there, we handed out a few soccer balls and a little bit of candy. The headmaster invited us inside to get water or a bite to eat, but Rebekah stayed outside with the kids because they were so excited to see us. Nelson was in a classroom handing out the rest of the candy because he could tell the children to sit down and wait their turn, so we went in and out of there until the candy was handed out. We sat on the concrete outside when the kids came out of the classroom and took pictures and videos with them. It was hard to say goodbye to the kids when the rest of our group came out, but we were late to our next stop.

We got back in the bus to make our way to Pastor Stephen Massawe’s house. One particularly persistent kid ran behind the bus for a while until someone called him back to the school. When we arrived at Pastor Stephen’s house, some of his family was there to greet us. Stephen’s brother had just died, so some of the other family members that were supposed to be there were scattered in other parts of the region. We looked around the outside of his house for a few minutes, and then he took us back to the Chagga caves. These were dug over a century ago to house people of the Chagga tribe (especially women and children) during civil war. There is a vast network of caves that spreads under Stephen’s property and is separated into kitchens, bedrooms, and other rooms. The caves could hide up to 200 people at a time.

Friday night we ate dinner at El Rancho Indian restaurant. Rebekah and I had our first alcoholic drinks since arriving in Tanzania! We had Savanna Dry hard cider.

Saturday 6/15

I realize that was only one day and this post is already really long so I’ll try to shorten things from now on. Saturday morning we had breakfast at the hotel and then boarded the bus to go to Ushirika wa Neema Deaconess Center in Moshi. We first went to the Montessori college there. Sofia, the principal of the school, welcomed us to a room for a briefing on the school. The school teaches teachers in the Montessori style, and it is the only one in the whole Evangelical Lutheran Church of Tanzania. It was started in 1992 with 14 female students. Originally the church would send students to Dar es Salaam (the largest city in Tanzania) to the Montessori college there. The school can accommodate 64-66 students at a time, and now both men and women attend the college. The course takes two years to complete; the first year is spent learning at the college, and for the first three months of the second year, the students are placed in a classroom for field work. The students at the college also learn how to make materials for their classroom in the workshop. Two of the sisters who work at the orphanage were trained at the Montessori college, including Sister Loema who is responsible for teaching the oldest kids at the orphanage.

After Sofia’s briefing, we toured the library and the kindergarten classroom where kindergarten is taught during school days. Sofia explained how the classroom materials were laid out on the shelves based on different concepts. After our tour of the Montessori college, we walked over to the chapel for a briefing from Reverend Urio on the deaconess center. The center was started in 1980 with 10 sisters. There are now 83 sisters. This center trains the sisters who work at places like the orphanage I’m staying at. Reverend Urio explained that they are currently trying to build a hostel for female students who are studying at one of the four nearby universities. Another current project is starting a community for single women who are too old to come to the center as young sisters but still want a community lifestyle.

After touring the deaconess center, we loaded up the bus again to go to the orphanage where I’ve been staying since arriving in Tanzania. The group had brought soccer balls and clothes to donate, so we unloaded those. After playing with the kids for a while, we went down to the college for lunch. I left toward the end of lunch to finish packing my suitcase that I was picking up from the orphanage because I didn’t want to try to take all my things to town on the dala dala on Thursday. We said goodbye to the kids and loaded up the bus again.

We drove just up the road to Machame Lutheran Hospital which I had walked to with Sister Elly a couple weekends earlier. There we met Bob Kasworm, a man from Nebraska who has been working at the hospital for many years now and also a friend of Pastor Chad’s. The hospital had received a shipping container full of medical supplies earlier in the day and were still in the process of emptying it. We toured the grounds of the hospital which are basic but adequate. We visited the new nursing school on site. If anyone is interested in finding a way to help out, the nursing school is always looking for sponsors for students at the school.

After finishing our tours, we visited a nearby house that was recently built through the Houses for Health program. Houses for Health was started four years ago, and since its formation has built 73 homes for people in the villages around the hospital who have chronic conditions made worse by their poor living conditions. Many people who receive a house through the program have HIV, tuberculosis, or orthopedic concerns. The houses are simple two-room cement block structures, but they are far better than the mud huts typical of the region. It costs $4000 to build each home. This program is another good way to get involved if you are looking for a way to help.

From the completed house, we went to visit a 17-year-old man named Prosper and his family at their mud home. Prosper is a candidate for a house from the Houses for Health program, but funding hadn’t come through yet so he couldn’t be approved. Prosper has epilepsy and other undiagnosed developmental disabilities. He can’t walk, so in order to get around he slides around on his elbows in the dirt. His parents are getting older, and when they are gone, another family member is going to have to move back to their parents home to take care of Prosper. Having a cement block house instead of the mud house will improve living conditions for Prosper and also be an incentive for a sibling to move back and take care of Prosper.

On our way down the mountain, we stopped at Protea Hotel for drinks and a snack before heading to dinner at 10 to 10 Pizza Restaurant.

Sunday 6/16

Sunday morning meant church time! When we arrived at church, we were greeted by all the children singing, “Welcome, welcome, how do you do? Welcome, welcome, how do you do? Happy to see you, happy to see you, welcome, welcome, how do you do?” We were directed to walk around inside the new Rev. Chad Brekke Library. After signing the guest book (which happens everywhere we go), we went downstairs for breakfast. After breakfast, we went in to the sanctuary to start worship. Rebekah and I got caught in the procession of pastors on the way into church because we had to go to the bathroom before we could go in so we were a tad late. The church service was over two hours long and each guest received a pack of coffee as a gift during the service.

After the service, the whole congregation processed outside to finish singing the last song and to begin the auction. People who cannot donate money as an offering will bring vegetables or a chicken instead. After church these items are auctioned off and the profit gets credited to that person as their offering.

After the auction, we went back to the basement of the library for lunch. After we had each finished a plate of food, they brought in the goat that had been cooking all morning. The tail of the goat is presented to the oldest person present so Ron from Prince of Peace received it first. He passed it off to someone to take outside to find someone older out there to take it.

After leaving church, we went back to the hotel to relax a little before dinner. We met Pastor Stephen and his wife, Haikael, and their two children at the hotel, and they came with us to dinner. Rebekah was pretty excited that she got to hold their daughter, Fides, the whole way to the restaurant.

We arrived at Kilimakyaro Lodge and went to find a good view of the sunset. When the sun had set, we went back to sit down at the tables in the grass outside. The buffet dinner was delicious, and they had free wifi! All in all, it was a very beautiful place.

The next morning, we left for safari. That will be coming later in the next post!

Here is another picture slideshow to accompany what I’ve written about in this post. Enjoy!

Natalie