just a quick one...

Things are going well ..for the most part.... here in morogoro. The students finished their eight-week exam on friday and most did quite well. We celebrated a few birthdays this week and have had a lot of fun in class.

We had a rough day on thursday when we learned that Anethi one of the English students lost her sister. She had been sick with Malaria for some time and in the village she lives in about 3 hours from here, health care is nearly impossible to get for the few who are able to afford it. There are no hospitals or doctors there and even if there were most couldn't afford to see them. She was a young mother so it's an especially trying situation. Please pray for Anethi and her family.

If you want to help there are several organizations you can find online where you can donate a little money (really, like $10) to get bednets to people who can't afford them. Everyone agrees that this method of prevention is the best treatment for this disease. What most people in the west don't understand is that malaria itself is entirely treatable IF you can afford the treatment. I don't know a single person here who hasn't had it. What kills thousands of people every day is not malaria but poverty.

It's no vacation!

So in case you’ve been thinking from the last few posts that it’s all fun and games here in Morogoro,..here’s a “real missionary” blog...

It’s been quite a week!  Last sunday during dinner. There was a loud pop and we saw sparks coming off the corner of the dining room as the power went out.  After some investigation, we found that a bat had flown into the transformer knocking out all the electricity for our base.  Monday morning we woke up to find that we had no running water.  The pump that gets the water from the pipes into the tank is electric so no electricity means no running water.....Sometime THURSDAY Tanesco the electric company decided to classify us as an emergency situation. on SATURDAY they finally showed up.  I was so excited to come home last night to power!!! I got back to the base and walked into my room and turned on the light.... nothing.... I tried

 again.... still nothing.  The only building on the base not restored to normal?  the English school....argh.... 

It’s amazing actually the things you learn how to live with.   Thankfully God was really good and it rained almost every

 day....wow you should have seen us all scrambling to get our buckets under a crack in the rain gutters around the school at the least sign of rain.  And this being the rainy season, even when it didn’t rain, there was enough in the well for us to use for toilets and showers and laundry.

Last weekend, Neema and I took my friend Bebe (in the middle) out to lunch for her birthday!  Bebe is from Rwanda and she arrived shortly after I did.  We’ve suffered through some of the same culture shock and difficulties adjusting to life here in Tanzania.  She’s become a good friend. 

There are three kids here on the base.  Mira is only a couple months old and still kind of boring if you don’t go crazy over babies, but 1 1/2 yr old Abi and her 6 yr old brother Mordecai are absolute stars!  Their parents Isaac and Deborah are some of my favorite people around here and the kids are the sweetest. but the strangest thing??? they took Mordi to the dentist about a week ago and pulled almost ALL his baby teeth... The idea is that they have to get rid of the old ones so that the new ones can come in... I haven't figured out yet whether or not this is normal in TZ or if it was just a crazy dentist but I know one thing.. Mordi has been scarred for life! poor thing.... 

This week marks the halfway point of the English school.. we are struggling a bit. Literally EVERYONE has been sick this week. Malaria, what they call Typhoid here but which is really not, parasites, all sorts of badness.  They are working hard but it's so difficult to pay attention when you are feeling bad.  It's a little overwhelming when I think that I am only two months away from leaving.  Half of me is desperate to get home and the other half is devastated at the thought of leaving.  I know that it will be time for me to be home for awhile and I can't wait to see my family and friends but I really do enjoy life here...It's the problem I face constantly. I sometimes wish I was made to stay put so I wouldn't have to go through leaving people over and over again but I know that the life I would be giving up is too good!  In John 10:10 Jesus says "I came that they may have life and have it abundantly." I know that that is what I am living and experiencing everyday... life abundantly! 

the only lion I saw on safari was this one hanging from the rearview mirror of the minibus we went in.... sorry to disappoint...

Some SAFARI pics!

this giraffe was just standing by the side of the road posing for us.  

Our guide threw some cookies out the window to get these guys to come close.... Don't tell, we're not allowed to do this, she said... yeah right I'm sure she does it every time....

And last but not least, the elephant that almost sent me to heaven. Let's call him Steve:

Steve was walking down the road that we needed to pass and African elephants can be a bit aggressive!  Our guide told us all to keep our heads and everything inside the vehicle and not to shout andtold the driver to stop and let him pass. Steve moseyed off the road and she told him to go ahead slowly.  This caught Steve's attention and he turned back to us.  At this point just curious and probably a little scared himself.  We stopped.  Steve turned away.  The guide tells the driver "pole pole" (slowly) and our driver probably at once terrified of losing a) his passengers b) his vehicle and thereby his business and c) his life, decides instead to punch it and tears out of there, roaring past Steve who whirls around and trumpets that big elephant noise, sort of bowing like he might just take off after us at a full gallop and skewer us all one after another on his tusks like a shish kebab.  Thankfully he decides that we are no longer a threat to his peaceful afternoon and just watches us go. I could practically hear him saying "yeah.... that's right... and STAY OUT!"

Brrrrr......

would you believe it?  I'm in Africa and I'm cold!  I mean, we're not talking a New York winter or anything but we've come into the long rainy season.  Being so close to the equator, there's not really spring, summer, fall, and winter like I'm used to.... basically it's just always hot.  But during April the temperatures here drop quite a bit in the evening and it's raining--or threatening to--pretty much all the time.  It's actually kind of nice because it means I can have a rainwater shower most days and still have fresh water to wash my clothes with.  

Well, we said goodbye to Regina last week.  She was finally able to go back to the states to be with her family.  She's been

 away from her husband for over 5 months!  I'm sad that she is gone but I am so happy for them that they will get to be together

 again.  I was really proud actually.  At her little goodbye party, Kanuti, one of the english students, spoke on behalf of the class--in english!--to thank her for her time and work here and everything and he was SO GOOD!  Oh finally! Here's a picture of the class!                                                   

And will I ever learn?  I've needed a haircut for about a month now and I just decided to give it a go and cut it myself....not wise. Luckily, hair grows and I'm in Tanzania.

Zanzibar!!!

...is the most incredible place!  I'll try not to make this the LONGEST post EVER but there's so much to say!!!

School let out on wednesday because of Easter and Muhammad's Birthday so Bev and I took

 off Thursday morning for Zanzibar.  After almost an entire day of traveling we arrived that evening at our "hotel" (and I use the term loosely) It was unbelievably hot, the nightguard/desk guy was undoubtedly intoxicated and we were woken at 5 am by the call to prayer from the mosque next door (In case you've never lived next door to a mosque, it's very, very LOUD).

Needless to say we checked out in the morning and wound up at the amazing Haven Guest House where the owner/manager greeted us like we were old friends and proceeded to arrange the rest of our stay in Zanzibar-a spice tour and a trip up the coast-all at incredibly good prices.

We left straight off for the spice tour.  Zanzibar is called the spice island and there are all kinds of spices, nutmeg, ginger, vanilla, cinnamon, turmeric, lemongrass, and OH the CLOVES! growing wild all over the island.  The air is just rich with them!  The place we visited was more of a farm and our tour guide was pretty funny, well, at least his english was pretty funny...

It was so strange to suddenly be thrust into a group of so many wazungu (white people).  We're a bit of an oddity in Morogoro but Zanzibar is sort of a holiday hotspot for a lot of Europeans and since we were doing kind of touristy stuff we met a lot of them.  It was an interesting time to be traveling though as we met up with a lot of people from different places who are living and working in TZ and on break for the holidays.  I have found that it is absolutely impossible to meet boring people in Africa.  Everyone we met had some incredible story about where they were from and why they were here: The american guys working with street kids in Dar-Es-Salaam, The Austrian girl who is here checking up on a million different projects for a group of philanthropists back home, The young scottish couple who are having a few days rest after climbing Kilimanjaro, The polish guy (in the shortest short shorts ever seen on a man) who is teaching in Mbeya and whose grandmother thinks he's a "bloody idiot and won't he just stop messing around and come home and get married already," and our new friend Shilpi, the Indian-Dutch-German girl who is in Arusha working with some sort of agriculture analysis company.

One of the most surprising things was how interested people were in Jesus!  Zanzibar has a long and deeply rooted Islamic tradition and I have been told over and over again how difficult it is to come here and do any sort of missionary work but it seemed like everyone

 we met, taxi drivers, waiters, our boat captain on our snorkel trip,  the moment they found out we were christians, wanted to know how they could become christians as well...time and time again, we heard how people believed that what we were saying was true, that they were not fulfilled with Islam that they knew they were stuck with their sin and had no hope and that they knew and believed that Jesus was the answer, that he had died for them and wanted to forgive them BUT if they would dare to seek out a pastor or walk into a church they were sure to be beaten or even killed.  It was at once encouraging and devastating...so many people eager to believe but trapped by fear.  Pray that doors will open for this island, that God will give people courage to come to him and protection when they do.

We spent three nights in Nungwi, a beautiful beach town on the north coast. We walked out on to the beach the first morning there and laughed at all the crazy tourists roasting themselves in the sun, "a white-people barbecue!" we said... and then proceeded to get burned ourselves... ah enter humility... On our third day there we booked a snorkel trip with the honorable Captain Supa (sounds like super) It was awesome until we actually got in the water where we encountered a gazillion tiny jellyfish!  Their stings aren't dangerous but they aren't pleasant either! I only stayed in the water maybe ten minutes and then decided "I've been snorkeling before and this really isn't fun anymore" and crept up to the roof of the boat for a little nap in the sun with a few of the passengers and most of the crew!

We spent the last day in Stonetown shopping and meeting up with the waiter we had met in Nungwi. He decided to become a christian and we prayed with him ON Easter Sunday.  Pray fro Stefan as he's now hoping to get some support to come to a discipleship school that we have at the base in Morogoro (like the one I did in England).  

All in all it was an incredible time.  YWAM has talked about opening a base on Zanzibar and I would do some serious talking with God about that.  It would be a great way to spend some time!

Just in the nick of time...

SO this week has been D.R.A.M.A filled...
Started off Monday feeling all happy and excited because I was getting my 2-yr work permit that day...then no news on Tuesday.... still no news on Wednesday....Thursday I get the head exploding news that my permit has not been approved. Why? well, it could have something to do with the fact that immigration has NEVER EVEN SEEN MY APPLICATION!!!!!! There was some sort of mix up with the YWAM base in Dar Es Salaam who has been taking care of all the papers there and my papers have been sitting on someones desk for the past four months as they were making weekly(at least) trips to the immigration office to deal with all the applications....except mine. Oh and did I mention that my temporary permit expired on Sunday?!?!?!?!?!

Thankfully the guy who works in administration here has a really good relationship with the local immigration office and he was able to convince them to extend my temporary permit until I leave in June (more than a month longer than they are supposed to) It all ended up working out for the best as I've saved around $40 in not taking the longer permit but there were 24 rather panic-filled hours there.

I won't bother much with the safari news until I can post photos other than to say that it was amazing and that we were nearly killed by an elephant with tusks the size of ....well I don't know, the size of something really big and pointy....you'll just have to live in suspense for that story.

As far as school goes, the students are doing pretty well. We've started to get into some more difficult material but overall they are handling it nicely. What they really love? The hokey-pokey! It's great for teaching body parts and I've found that when we're all getting to the point where we're frustrated and tired...it's hokey-pokey time! No matter how discouraged you are (student and teacher alike) it is physically impossible to hokey-pokey and not smile...it's always a great tension reliever. The day is usually full of little moments though. Tanzanians have a difficult time distinguishing between "R" and "L" sounds so several times a week I have to remind the class of things like the fact that God is Holy....not "hory."

Well, I'm off to Zanzibar on Thursday! I'm SOOOOO excited! I'll try to post from there but if I'm silent for a while that's why. Ok. times up for today...