Nine to Five (part 1)

Okay, so I'm not quite working a nine to five job yet*, but this week I've had the opportunity to spend 2 days in my future work site. We're on midterm break from language school and we're back in Mwanza to take care of some biashara (that is, business), including not just visiting our work sites, but also house hunting, learning to drive a manual car on the left-hand side of the road**, and getting our drivers license. Needless to say, it's been a jam-packed week!

Yesterday I joined forces with George O. (a fellow MKLMer/civil engineer who works in my office), Tanzanian George (our coworker), and a colleague from the women's desk (my future office). George-squared had to go out into the rural area to check on some dams that they were having constructed/maintained with help from the Food for Work Program. While out there, they also wanted to visit a priest who has opened a boarding school for unwed teen mothers. The school has no water, so the priest wanted a consult from the Georges on how he could engineer a water system for the school and dorms. George O. thought it would be interesting if my colleague and I tagged along to see the school and talk with the girls. Plus, I could see some of the rural area, as well as get a glimpse of the work they do in the other divisions of my office.

The ride out into the rural area was so beautiful! Words cannot capture the beauty. Nor could my camera. It's the rainy season, so everything is green and lush. There are beautiful rocks and boulders littering the landscape. Kids walk cows, goats, and sheep down the road and through the fields. Women in brightly colored cloths work in the fields along the horizon.

I posted some pictures over at Flickr of the scenery and the dams we visited, but the website's being weird and I can't grab them to paste on the blog. So I'll have to do do that later.

The school we visited yesterday was really interesting. The priest who started it is young, having been ordained in 2009. He's in charge of 2 rural parishes, each with over a dozen outstations. Yet he's managed to open this school for 48 teen girls. He's partway through the process of expanding the school and constructing new buildings. His vision is for the school to house several hundred students. This is quite a unique concept in this country. Unwed teens often are forced to drop out of school either because of the shame or because they don't have the time to go to school anymore. School is only required*** up to grade 7 here, so kids often drop out after that anyway. And girls are expected to do a large brunt of the housework. So having a child on top of that is usually a guarantee that it's the end of schooling for a teen mom.

My colleague and I visited a classroom and briefly met the girls. They were all about 17-20 years old. They were very interested in having us come out and speak to them in the future and do programming on gender equality for women. I'm not sure if I will end up doing any projects out there in the future, but it certainly was an educational experience just to go out and see what's being done.

Okay, I'm super exhausted and this is a long enough post as it is. More on day 2 at the job site later!


*Other than learning the language, which in and of itself is a 24 hour job!

**...while navigating in traffic with tons of pedestrians in/around the road, bikes, pikipiki (motorcycles) w/ passengers riding on the back, dalla dalla (buses) with people hanging out the window yelling, etc...

***I say "required" but there's no enforcement, so it is quite common for kids, especially in rural areas and on farms, to not be enrolled in school.

Long Rains

The long rains have started here in northern Tanzania. The change in weather was kind of sudden. Just one day, or evening, I think, the sky got cloudy, a wind picked up, and it rained for about an hour or 2. Then, almost even day or evening since then, we've had at least a little bit of rain. On some occasions the rain has been quite hard. Today as I type this, it's probably in the upper 60's and totally cloudy. It reminds me of a nice Fall day in Columbia. I LOVE it! Makes me want to curl up on the bed and watch movies/sleep.

Here's a little video to show you the rain and the view over Lake Victoria. It's not uncommon to see lighting coming through the clouds in that direction over the lake.



It usually doesn't stay cloudy and rainy all day. The sun will usually poke through the clouds and it will warm up to the 80's again. And then it starts again the next day.

Also, the Rossers (our fellow MKLMers here at language school) posted a fairly in-depth blog post about life in language school. I thought I'd share the link here since our life is pretty similar to theirs right now. In the post, they have a video of David talking to my favorite teacher, Dismas. I love me some Dismas! He and his wife just had a baby in December and in early February Chris and I went to his house to visit with them and hold the baby.

Preparation

Today marks the beginning of the season of Lent, a time of preparation and anticipation. I find it interesting and poignant that both Lent and Advent this year have been times of great preparation and anticipation for me, as I prepared to leave the country in December and am now preparing for work and cultural immersion in Tanzania.

This morning, as I sat in church listening to the readings, I was struck in a new way by those same readings I hear every year at this time.

"When you are fasting, do not put on a gloomy look as the hypocrites do: they go about looking unsightly to let people know they are fasting. In truth I tell you, they have had their reward. But when you fast, put scent on your head and wash your face, so that no one will know you are fasting except your Father who sees all that is done in secret."(Matt 6:16-18)

Most years I sit in church, hungry from eating little all day and thinking about how my hunger in my stomach relates to my hunger for something bigger and better than this life. But today, I was struck by the call to be quiet. To not be "showy".

I got to thinking about this blog, and my Facebook page, and the newsletters that I send home to friends, family, and supporters. And honestly, I became a little embarrassed at how ostentatious I am about the work I'm doing here. To give myself a little credit, there's practical reasons for keeping these methods of communication. I think it's important that we share our work so those at home are more aware of the issues and conditions of people in other places around the world. And, I know that a lot of people just want to know how we're doing and these are easy* ways to communicate. But I have to wonder how much of my writing is to "tout my own greatness."

So, maybe this is a good reminder to me that I need to look at myself a bit less and look at the greater work that's being done, as well as the One responsible for me being here.


*One could read that as "lazy" ways to communicate, I admit.

Video from Sunday's Mass

Here's a video from the drumming circle that was after Sunday's Centennial Mass.

MK Sister’s Centennial Celebration

This year marks the 100th anniversary the Foreign Mission Sisters of St. Dominic, more commonly referred to as the Maryknoll Sisters. Last year the MK Fathers and Brothers celebrated their centennial and this year they’ve passed the baton to the sisters. All throughout the year there will be celebrations in the various countries that has a MK presence.

About 15-20 MK sisters from across Tanzania and even some from the US and Kenya are all gathering this week for a variety of celebrations. This weekend we were fortunate to be able to attend the first half of the celebrations, which were held in our neck of the woods. We took a “pilgrimage” of sorts to the first Maryknoll parish in a small village about a ½ hour’s drive from the language school where we currently live. The Maryknolls first established the parish in Nyegina in 1951. And, what was cool about yesterday’s celebration was that there was one sister with us who was in Nyegina during that time. Sister Ann still lives in Tanzania, though she is about to retire in just a few weeks and return to the States.

The parish has since been taken over by the local diocese, but boy did they put on a show to recognize and celebrate the centennial. We were first greeted by a parade of children singing and dancing as the bus pulled into the church.



Then, we attended a very long, very hot, very crowded Mass. There must have been over 400 people jammed into the church. No windows, no air circulation. It was insanely hot. And the Mass lasted over 2 hours. But, it was such a great celebration that I hardly cared it was so hot. There was a ton of singing and dancing by both a children and adult choir. The Mass was all in Swahili so I only understood about 10% of what was being said. But it was abundantly clear that the priest and the community were singing the praises of the MK sisters. Maryknoll has a major presence in this entire area of the country. They started many schools, founded parishes, opened churches, promoted the education of women, etc. So all of that was recognized and discussed during Mass. All of the sisters and even the lay missioners were invited to stand on the alter and introduce ourselves in Swahili! Luckily, one of the long-term missioners took pity on us and introduced ourselves so we didn’t have to bumble through our elementary Swahili in front of the whole congregation. Several of the community leaders gave speeches and at the end of Mass the 2 longest serving MK sisters in TZ got up and were presented with gifts of cloth from a variety of community members. The people would approach the sisters who were standing on the alter, hold up their fabric, wrap it around the two sisters’ shoulders and then give them a joint hug and kiss. Then the next person would come up and do the same. They must’ve been presented with about 20 different pieces of fabric, each one more beautiful then the next.*

At the end of Mass we were ushered out of the church by a chorus of rambunctious children who we had to hold back for fear of them knocking over the elderly nuns. When we got outside there was a singing and drumming circle. The sister’s didn’t waste a second; by the time I got out there they were already dancing and waving their newly acquired cloth. The whole congregation flooded outside; kids climbed trees just to get a look at the circle. It was awesome. Then, we paraded down the road via drumbeat and dancing to the convent where the MK sisters were planting a commemorative tree.


The drum and dance circle outside the church.


The sisters dancing in the circle.


The procession to the treeplanting.


The sisters plant the tree.

After the tree was planted most of the congregation dispersed and we were served a fabulous meal by the sisters who now run the parish. They had tables and chairs setup under the trees and it was quite an idyllic spot to sit and enjoy the breeze after being cooped up in the hot church for so long.


Enjoying a rest under the tree before lunch.

Yesterday’s celebration was such a tribute not only to the MK sisters and their history, but also to the Tanzanian people. It was everything I love about this country. Celebration. Beauty. Faith. Music. Dance. Community. So lovely!

It should also be noted that the drive to Nyegina was absolutely beautiful! As we wound our way around Lake Victoria, we drove through some of the lushest farms in the country. The lake was to our right and the farms to our left as we passed small huts and family compounds. People stopped to look at the bus full of wazungu (Westerners) as we drove by and kids waved and yelled hello. Absolutely spectacular.



*The sisters were generous enough to give us lay missioners some fabric. So I got a bolt of pretty purple fabric that I hope to get made into a dress or shirt.

Giving and Receiving Consolation

This was my daily reading the other day. Thought it was appropriate since we were going back to Lisa's Pride this Saturday.

Consolation is a beautiful word. It means 'to be' (con-) 'with the lonely one' (solus). To offer consolation is one of the most important ways to care. Life is so full of pain, sadness, and loneliness that we often wonder what we can do to alleviate the immense suffering we see. We can and must offer consolation. We can and must console the mother who lost her child, the young person with AIDS, the family whose house burned down, the soldier who was wounded, the teenager who contemplates suicide, the old man who wonders why he should stay alive.

To console does not mean to take away the pain but rather to be there and say, 'You are not alone, I am with you. Together we can carry the burden. Don't be afraid. I am here.' That is consolation. We all need to give it as well as to receive it.

-Henri Nouwen, Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith

My First TZ Haircut

Big "ups" to fellow MK Lay Missioner, Liz, for my first haircut in East Africa! This afternoon she cut a few inches off the bottom and I think she did a great job.



When I got home I also thinned it out a bit with a little trick I learned from watching my hairdresser cut my hair so many times in the past. I'm not sure how professional it looks, but I'm happy with it. And my main goal was not to mess it up too royally and it seems that I've achieved that. So hooray!

Great Hadithi Quote

Each week we have to memorize dialogue and stories in Swahili in order to help build vocabulary and get us used to the flow of the language. This week's hadithi (story) is about women's equality in Tanzania. The best quote is:

"Wanawake duniani pote wanajiunga pamoja kudai haki zao."

Roughly translated it means "Women around the world are all joining together to demand their rights."

Nice.

African Jog

I'm pretty proud of myself because this morning I got up early and did a run for about 1/2 hour. It's the first time since we've been in Africa that I've jogged, although I have been doing some other exercises sporadically. I was reluctant to start jogging because I wasn't sure how it would go over in this culture where seeing a white woman run down the road in shorts is quite an unusual site for the locals. But I conferred with the director of the language school and he assured me that it would be no problem to do it, especially if I go early in the AM.

So, this morning I found myself running down the dirt driveway and up the road, over to the seminary next door, and around their soccer field a few times. It felt great to stretch my legs a bit. It was also wonderful to be able to take in the sights and sounds of my neighborhood as people were waking up. Sometimes I have these perfect moments when I'm suddenly hit over the head by the fact that I'm in Africa. I can't tell you the number of times while living in the US that I would ride my bike down a street or go for a walk and think "Some day I may do this in Africa." So, this morning as I was running around the dirt field, avoiding the cow crap on the ground, yelling "Shikamoo, Bibi*" to a worker in our school as he rode his bike up the driveway to work, I couldn't help but be grateful and think "Yup, here I am."

*Shikamoo is a term of greeting to someone who is older or should receive respect.

Why I Talk About Rape

Why I Talk About Rape

Because of my previous job, I tend to talk pretty openly about rape. It’s definitely a conversation-stopper and sometimes I feel like a “downer.” But this article makes some excellent points about why people need to talk openly and honestly about the issue. She puts it better than I could've.

I'm Published!

The Sexual Assault Report published an article that I wrote right before leaving my previous employment. They don't have the article online, so here's a screen shot of it. If anyone is interested in reading it, let me know and I can email you the scanned copy of it.

Makoko Language School

I thought I’d share a bit about what it’s like at language school, so y’all have an idea of what life is like for us these days. Makoko Language School was started in the 1960’s by the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers and for the years has trained missionaries and other westerners in Kiswahili, as well as local languages from this region. The school has since been taken over by the local Catholic Diocese but it continues to teach in much the same manner.

We have 5 classes a day, each 40 minutes long with a 5-minute break in between. Classes run until 12:30, followed by ½ hour lunch and an hour rest. After the rest hour we have 45 minutes in the language lab when we listen to tapes (YES, tapes!) of the stories (hadithi) and dialogues (masungumzo) from the morning classes and practice exercises (mazoezi) from the lessons of the day. After language lab we can be free for the rest of the day, spend more time in the lab, or get help from the teachers who hang out at the school until 3:30.

At first onset it may seem really slack that we are finished our day at 3:30 (or possibly even 2:45 depending on whether I quit after language lab). But after doing this for 2 weeks I’ve quickly learned that my brain can only take so many hours of language acquisition before I’m totally fried. Usually by the time classes are finished and it’s lunchtime I’m so mentally exhausted that I can’t comprehend anymore. The hour nap after lunch has become a necessity for me to get through the day!

Despite my mental exhaustion, after language lab I have been spending time with the teachers hanging out under the tree in the yard. This is good because it allows me to practice some Swahili mixed in with English and I also get an opportunity to ask them questions about Tanzanian culture and customs. The teachers are native Tanzanians from various tribes and different parts of the country. They represent a diversity of ages and they are all really fantastic people! In fact, this weekend a few of us visited the home of one of our teachers to meet his wife and 3-week-old daughter.

I feel like I’ve been handling the challenge of language school very well up until this point. It’s a lot of memorization, but I’ve been able to do whatever was thrown my way with ease. Up until today, that is. Today I feel like I hit a wall. Hard. I can’t really say why, but today I just couldn’t remember anything that we’d learned last week and I was totally overwhelmed with all of the rules and agreements in the language. I was mixing up my “hiki’s” with “hili’s” and my “wa’s” with “ya’s”. Sheesh! We have a dialogue to memorize tonight and I’ve just barely gotten a grasp of it. I know that these feelings and frustrations are not unusual to learning any new language and I know that I will climb this wall and keep going. But man, it’s hard. I just have to keep telling myself that I’m not the first person, nor the last, to learn this language. I WILL do it!

In the meantime, in addition to studying I’m trying to keep my body active by exercising and playing Frisbee, reading a ton of books and watching DVDs. Yesterday I started watching the TV series Glee. I’ve only watched 2 episodes so far, but I have the distinct feeling that this show may just be the thing that gets me through language school.

Lisa’s Pride

This past weekend we went to the house of a fellow MKLMer and a Maryknoll Sister to help them with a program for children with HIV. The program is called Lisa’s Pride and is named after Sister Marion’s family member who died in the states of complications from gallbladder surgery in 2005. We had a great time on Saturday playing games, putting together puzzles and jumping rope with the kids. The program keeps track of the medical needs of the children, gives referrals to the family and provides nutritious foods for them to take home each month. Us students practiced our limited Kiswahili, but I still felt like it was not enough to actually communicate. I look forward to being able to speak a bit more with the kids and their adult caregivers in our future visits to the program.







After the program was over, Liz and Marion thanked us for our help by serving us the best lasagna dinner ever! They even gave us dessert! What a treat!

Rest in Peace, Juanita

Chris's Grandmom died last night. She's been ill and on hospice, so it was not unexpected. Chris wrote a very nice blog post and tribute to her over at his blog.

My First Weird Food Experience

Soursop. We had this fruit for lunch the other day. It was cut in circular segments, like you’d slice a loaf of bread. It’s got a tough green skin with spikes on it. And the fruit inside is slimy and sort of stringy. The flavor is really, really sweet and very floral, with a hint of sour as well. It sort of tasted like I was eating perfume. I’m not a huge fan of it on its own, but when I ate it with watermelon it was much better. The other fruit sort of cut the sweet fragrance of the soursop. I definitely think it’d be good with yogurt and other fruit in a shake, so once we’re on our own I may try it that way.

Choices

I have been reading daily reflections by Henri Nouwen and I ran across the following passage about making choices. It reminded me of a conversation between me and a fellow missioner back in New York. We were talking about the concept of things happening for a reason. I’ve never been one to subscribe to the line of reasoning that “everything happens for a reason” because there are just too many senseless, awful things in the world. Poverty, untimely death, suffering, injustice.

I would much rather subscribe to the following thought. It allows me to remember that I can’t control everything in life, but I always have a choice in how I handle the good and the bad that comes my way.

Choices. Choices make the difference. Two people are in the same accident and severely wounded. They did not choose to be in the accident. It happened to them. But one of them chose to live the experience in bitterness, the other in gratitude. These choices radically influenced their lives and the lives of their families and friends. We have very little control over what happens in our lives, but we have a lot of control over how we integrate and remember what happens. It is precisely these spiritual choices that determine whether we live our lives with dignity.

-Henri Nouwen, Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith

Things That I’m Excited About Right Now-all having to do with windows

We’ve swapped our bedroom with our study room at Makoko, so our bedroom is now the corner room with double the windows, double the breeze and double the sunlight. Brilliant.

The birds are happily chirp chirp chirping outside the window.

The smell of dinner is wafting through the windows and it smells like fresh baked bread. And although the bread here leaves a lot to be desired (it’s your standard, cardboard-ish American homemade white bread, which I guess is better than store-bought white bread, but miles away from the crusty Italian loaf I’d give my right arm for), when I start to smell dinner and homemade bread, my salivary glands start working overtime and I get really excited at the possibility of dinner. The food here is tasty, but simple. I’ve yet to get bored with the lack of spices, olive oil or pasta. So my mind starts to wander at what could be on the table tonight.*

*I’ve just returned from dinner and it was pizza! And, it was not half bad. I thought that’s what I smelled earlier, but I talked myself out of it because I didn’t want to get my hopes up.

Arrived at Language School

Today we traveled by car to Musoma (about 200 km from Mwanza) to the Makoko Language School, where we’ll be living for the next 3 months. It was an easy ride up along a main paved thoroughfare and the scenery was so beautiful through the entire ride! We went along the edge of the Serengeti and saw some zebra, wildebeests, gazelles, and baboons just chilling and doing their thing along the side of the road. So cool!





This week we got to visit all of the placement sites for the new missioners, as well as have individual meetings with our future supervisors.





It’s really exciting to hear about the cool work I’ll be able to do after language school is finished. Though I have to say, I can get easily overwhelmed when I think about the fact that I can’t speak the language, know very little about the culture, have little to no information as yet about the current gender issues in the region, and am quite scared to drive on the roads. Yikes!

I’ve been feeling kind of sick and yucky on and off throughout the week and I’m still not sleeping totally well through the night. But I think I’ll start to even out a bit now that we’re at language school and I will be able to establish more of a routine. And, one of my major accomplishments for the week is learning how to pee in a squat toilet without it splashing all over my feet. Baby steps, people, baby steps.

We haven’t had a chance to take any picture of the school, but we’ll be sure to do that in the coming weeks. Also, click on any any of the pictures in this post to see the rest of the pictures I've uploaded onto Flickr (that is, if Flickr would speed up and load my pictures!)

Newspaper Articles

Not to toot our own horns, but I thought I’d mention that Chris and I have had some press lately about our move to Tanzania. Right before we left the US, 3 newspapers interviewed us. So far 2 of them have gone to press.

The Columbia Star*
The Vicksburg Post (You have to have an account to view the V’burg Post so I’ll cut and paste the full text of the article below.)

*There are several mistakes in the Columbia Star article. Oh well!

On a mission: City native, wife follow ‘calling’ to Tanzania
by Pamela Hitchins
Jan 02, 2012.

The year 2012 is not just a new year for Vicksburg native Christopher Reid. It’s a time of many “news” — new job, new home, new language, new country, new continent.

Reid, 35, a 1995 graduate of Warren Central High School, and his wife Katie, 33, a native of Philadelphia, have signed on with Maryknoll Lay Missioners, a Roman Catholic organization dedicated to living and working in poor communities in Africa, Asia and the Americas.

The Reids arrived Friday in Tanzania, on the east coast of Africa, where for the next 3 1/2 years they will bring their backgrounds in social work and community involvement to work primarily with women in the country’s second largest city, Mwanza, located on Lake Victoria.

“It is a leap of faith, with some pretty big unknowns,” Chris Reid said in an interview at the Highway 61 Cafe. “Will I be able to learn the language? Will they even want to talk with me? Will I be able to make a connection with them?”

On the whole, though, the Reids are excited and happy to be on their way to do the work they’ve trained, prayed and hoped to do.

“Even on a bad day it will still be interesting,” Chris Reid said.

Family members say he’s right for the challenge.

“I don’t really want him to go, because he’ll be away for so long, but they have to go,” said his mother, Patricia Reid. “It’s their calling.”

“My brother’s my best friend,” said Erica Reid Gerdes. “I’ve learned so much from him throughout my life. It’s difficult knowing I won’t be able to see him and talk to him as often as I might like, but I’m still learning from him — to not hold back, to take risks, to follow the passions I have, as well.”

At Warren Central, Chris Reid played trumpet in the Big Blue Band and was president of the art club before going on to Hinds Community College and earning a degree in graphic arts. Katie, raised in Philadelphia, got a bachelor’s degree from New York University.

Both Chris and Katie have a record of community and social service. They met in 2001 when they were members of AmeriCorps NCCC in Denver. For Chris, raised a Baptist, it was also a time of spiritual seeking and discovering the Catholic church, he said.

At the same time, some pivotal reading, like Barbara Kingsolver’s “The Poisonwood Bible,” got him interested in Africa, and Bible studies and Catholic instructional classes he attended sparked his desire to work for social causes.

“I was really struck by the stories of the people that were down in the dirt and working to help others,” Chris Reid said. “Yes, the history of the church, the hierarchy, these things were interesting, too, but it was the social justice that I found inspiring. It struck a nerve with me, and here we are six or seven years later actually going to do the same thing.”

Katie Reid’s path was a bit more direct.

“I remember from an early age wanting to do social justice work,” she said. “I also remember from an early age wanting to move to Africa. That’s how I ended up with a major in social work.”

Following their Americorps service, they were married in Cape May, N.J., and then moved to South Carolina where each earned master’s degrees at the University of South Carolina, Columbia, and compiled extensive resumes of social work, including homelessness councils, sexual trauma victims, mental health agencies and juvenile justice programs.

Chris converted to Catholicism as he and Katie married — not because he had to, the couple said, but because of an authentic, from-the-heart response. They began looking for ways to serve overseas, though the illness and death of Chris’ father, David Reid, such a mainstay at the 61 Cafe that his hat still hangs over the door, intervened. The couple finally was able to sign on with Maryknoll this year.

“We told them, ‘We want Africa, but we are so committed to this work, you can put us anywhere,” Chris Reid said. “That’s how called we are. Maryknoll also sends missioners to Asia and South America, and they could have sent us somewhere else. But when I interviewed, it worked out to be Africa. We got all of it. We got exactly what we wanted.”

Maryknoll calls its workers “missioners,” not “missionaries,” and their focus is not overtly evangelistic, Chris Reid said. They respect the culture of the people and do not try to change them or effect a religious conversion. Missioners simply live among them, helping where they can.

His Maryknoll trainers told Chris that when he and Katie are able to let go of the idea of “I’m going to change the world,” that’s when they will actually start being effective, he said.

“Lower your expectations,” he said they were told. “You are an accompanist, accompanying people in their stories.”

Their first task will be attending an intensive residential language school for three months where they will learn Swahili, and then they will have a two- to three-month initiation period at their jobs, mostly honing their language skills.

The Reids will not know exactly what their duties will be until they are knee-deep into them, but Maryknoll had to provide a general job description in order for them to get visas.

Katie will be working with the Catholic Diocese of Mwanza in programming, focusing on gender-based projects like support for single mothers, gender and HIV/AIDS, and women and agriculture. Chris will work with the Buswelu Women’s Cooperative, where groups of 10 women to 15 women work on income-generating projects, he said.

Introduction to TZ and Mwanza

We’re coming to the end of our 3rd day in Mwanza and I’m just now feeling like I have the brainpower and energy to write a real blog post. It’s been a terrific few days, but the jet-lag really got me, plus we’ve been pretty much on the go the whole time.

Now that I’m sitting down to write this I feel like I’m at a loss as to say what exactly we’ve been doing. I think everyone probably expects these amazing stories and moving pictures that describe our experience. But the first few days have mostly been filled with getting settled in and acquainted with the area.

We’ve taken walks around the surrounding neighborhoods, gone into downtown, done a little shopping.


Here’s David standing to the side as our host (not pictured) buys some fruit at the closest market.

For those who don’t know, Tanzania has amazing fresh fruit and vegetables. Tomatoes, mangoes, avocados, cucumbers, pineapple, papayas. All for really cheap. So, needless to say, the food is amazing. Each night our hosts have been making a salad of sorts out of finely chopped cabbage, carrots, tomatoes and cucumber with a dressing that is to die for. It’s almost like a smoothie with purred avocado and dill. My favorite food so far, so yummy!



Here are some shots of the house we’re staying in. It’s a pretty typical moderate income house.

The neighborhood is in a “suburb” of sorts in the outskirts of downtown Mwanza. Mwanza is the second largest city in TZ, so the population is pretty high where we are. We’re surrounded by shops and houses, just like any suburban/urban area you’d have in the US. However, you can’t fairly compare this neighborhood to one in the states. It’s the developing world, so the infrastructure is just not there. The “roads” off the main thoroughfare are all dirt and rutted. There aren’t sidewalks, just paths through the dirt or grass. Cows, chickens, birds, and goats roam around or are tied to the side of the roads. And it’s the rainy season so there’s a lot of water flowing down culverts or sitting in large, muddy puddles on the roads.


Here’s a pretty good shot of us walking down a street near the house with shops in the background.


And here’s the road that leads to the house, you can actually see the house in the background.

Last night we had a great time with some of the larger MK society (2 sisters, 2 priests and a brother), as well as all the current missioners in Mwanza. We all got together for dinner and drinks and then played games and put together puzzles. To be honest, I was so tired I could barely make conversation. So when our hosts said they wanted us to put together puzzles and play games I was a little less than thrilled. But it actually helped me to focus and I ended up having a really good time.


The party is raging!


Chris engaged in conversation, what a champ!


Playing games.

I would’ve put down bets that we all would have been passed out well before midnight. But after our guests left around 10:00 we got on the Internet and then right before midnight we started hearing quite a clamoring outside. There were kids running up and down the streets singing, hooting, and banging on pots and plastic drums. So we headed out to the yard to join them. It was so cute, all these giggling kids yelling and singing. I wish I had a picture of them, but it was so dark it wouldn’t have come out anyway.

Tomorrow we start our official orientation schedule of full days getting acquainted with the region and our sites. As a group we will all go to each person’s work site, so I’m looking forward to seeing where we’ll be working (at least for the first little bit of our time here).

Happy New Year to everyone!