Tans in Tanzania

Shall We Call It A Day?

2011-07-03T04:25:00.000+03:00

30 June 2011. It was two weeks ago when we both stopped working to prepare for our move back to the states and to say good bye to all our friends. We used the whole two weeks, paring down our possessions and packing our bags. And spending a few last and precious minutes with as many of our Tanzanian friends as we could. Unlike earlier departures, there was no mad rush to get out on time—we had a leisurely morning greeting all of the last minute well-wishers.

Our departure today was for the last time. Is the work done? No, the work is never done, but there are times when one must move on to another calling. We pray that our presence here will have a lasting impact—that whatever work God has begun will continue until God says it is completed.

We have been so blessed to share most of the last three years with our Tanzanian friends at the Africa Inland Church compound in Mwanza. They showered us with love, and we tried to do the same in return. It was hard to say good-byes.

So just let me share my parting with my good friend Byemero. Over the years he and I spent countless hours together, working and discussing whatever cultural or doctrinal issues came to mind. Each day when we had grown tired from our work, Byemero would ask, “shall we call it a day?” marking the end of that day’s time together. And so it was today. There was no good-bye from Byemero. And none from me. Our last words were simply these:

“Shall we call it a day?”

“Yes, let’s call it a day.”

Hodi! Means "May I Come In?"

2011-06-07T09:05:00.000+03:00

4 June 2011, Saturday. We plan a quiet day at home, but starting at 8:30 ….

Hodi! Two boys, Kameli and Mkeno, arrive for computer “lessons” and play time.

Hodi! Missionary Faith comes for help setting up Skype on her computer.

Hodi! It’s Ephraim asking when he should come by to bake his birthday cake.

Hodi! Prisca and little Rebecca and Naomi are here to wash the sheets and towels.

Hodi! It’s time for Dehamu to bake a cake.

Hodi! Neema is here to bake a cake for her family.

Hodi! Samuel comes to ask what Ephraim should bring to bake his birthday cake.

Hodi! Now Neema is back to finish up her cake.

Hodi! Nashon is here to play games.

Hodi! “Can we charge our telephone here? We have no electricity” says Charlie.

Hodi! Debora arrives with the telephone and plugs in the charger.

Hodi! Neema is back again with her brother Saguda to pick up her cake.

Hodi! “Want to buy some souvenirs?” asks Tito.

Hodi! Jesca and Janeti come with a bag of their nicest clothes for fashion photos.

Hodi! Neema is back again to water the flowers in the garden.

Hodi! Ephraim says he must go get grass for the cows. He’ll bake the cake later.

Hodi! Elisabeth and Debora are here to get the charged phone.

Hodi! Mama D. wonders why Jesca’s and Janeti’s photos are taking so long.

Hodi! “Come take pictures of the newborn calf,” say Mama G. and Baba G.

Hodi! “Can I print two pages on your computer printer?” asks James.

Hodi! finally takes a rest at 9:45. A quiet day at home means Hodi!

A Break in Kigoma and Gombe Stream National Park

2011-06-02T15:53:00.000+03:00

We ate breakfast on the morning of 17 May on the deck looking over Lake Tanganyika into Democratic Republic of Congo. The mountains in Congo looked so close, but they are 6 or 7 hours away by boat, we were told. The lake was calm and inviting. Yet the battered rocks on the points suggested some serious wave action for generations.

We were in Kigoma, preparing to go to Gombe Stream National Park to see chimpanzees. Kigoma is a nice town, but far from most everything in extreme western Tanzania. The town and the area surrounding it are much, much less densely populated than Mwanza. Also more orderly and organized. Traffic is no problem whatsoever. And it is cleaner, but still showing signs of habitual littering.

Our boat and captain

On the 18^th we boarded a modest wooden boat for a 2.5 hour ride to the beach at Gombe Stream National Park, northward up the lake shore. The boat ferried us to the park, waited for two days in a nearby village, and brought us back to Kigoma on the 20^th. The boat was lake-worthy, with a tarp canopy to protect us from the sun on the way out and rain that fell on the way back.

Chimpanzees at Gombe Stream NP

Our visit to Gombe Stream was a lot of fun. We saw 4 chimpanzees in total. The first one I found by myself right behind the guest house. The park staff and researchers all said they never see them so close to the guest house. Indeed, they didn’t believe we had really seen a chimpanzee until we showed it to our guide, Sabas. It was high in the trees and never came down, eventually building a leaf nest in a tree and resting there for some time. The next day we saw three more. We had to hike up into the hills to find them, and there we got much closer to them. The biggest thrill was having to step off the trail to let this a mother and baby pass by, literally inches away.

Baboons

The birding at Gombe Stream was very difficult. In three treks, each of 3-4 hours, we saw and identified only 10 bird species, but 4 of them were life birds so I wasn’t completely disappointed. It’s true what they told us. Gombe is not a good park for birding. Not that there aren’t some good birds there, but rather that they are quiet, extremely dispersed, and nearly impossible to see in the dense forest. While looking for birds and chimpanzees we also saw many baboons and 3 other species of monkeys.

Sunset on Lake Tanganyika

We finally enjoyed some great swimming in an African lake. Lake Tanganyika is much deeper than Lake Victoria, and perhaps that is why the lake is free of bilharzia, a nasty parasite prevalent in Lake Victoria. So after the hot and sweaty hikes in the forest we would wade right into the lake and enjoy the clean, warm water. They say the snorkeling is great in Lake Tanganyika—there are several hundred cichlids in the lake (think tropical aquarium fish)—but we had no snorkel gear and saw no fish while we swam. Sunsets over the lake were spectacular.

Dr. Livingstone, I presume.

On 21 May we went to with our friends to the town Ujiji, site of Stanley’s famous encounter with “Dr. Livingstone, I presume.” There was a modest Livingstone Memorial there under two mango trees, said to be descended from the very mango tree that Livingstone sat under waiting for death or help, whichever came first. Nearby was also a nice, new museum building. It was sparsely appointed with life-size paper mache statues of Stanley and Livingstone and a couple dozen replicas of paintings and old newspaper clippings or journal excerpts. There was a friendly old man to “guide” us. He was entertaining as he told us some history and the story of the encounter.

The ride back to Mwanza was a long 12 hours, almost as long as the 12 hours it took us to get there. Some of the monotony was broken by the usual evasive maneuvers and running out of gas an hour from home. It was a great 10 day break.

Chimpanzee Mother and Baby

BZZZZZAPPP

2011-04-27T18:42:00.000+03:00

27 April 2011. BZZZZZAPPP!! So that, I thought, is what it sounds like when you plug a 115 volt computer into a 230 volt outlet. We had just made the mistake of plugging in one of the new computers before switching the power supply to the proper Tanzanian voltage. Yes, the computer’s power supply was fried, and who knows what else inside. It caused a bit of distress at the time, but it couldn’t dampen our spirits for long.

Yes, the long-awaited donation of computers has finally arrived from America. Nine of them. Enthusiastic “thank yous” to Perkins Coie LLP and my friends John and Lucas for the great gifts that you have given. Today Bahati and I had a grand time opening the boxes, converting the voltage switches (all but one!), turning them on, and installing antivirus software. I marveled at how fast these computers booted and installed the antivirus software. Oh, these are going to be a huge improvement.

The students gathered around, trying to get a look at the new equipment. The most curious one asked me to show him how to make the connections. As I did, he asked questions. “What does USB mean?” he asked. It took me a few seconds, but then “Universal serial bus,” I said. “What does that mean?” he pressed. He got no answer from me to that one. After the BZZZZZAPPP he asked, “Why is the voltage different in America from Tanzania?” Again, I had no good answer. It was a good time.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

3144 Very Bad Viruses

2011-04-22T07:11:00.000+03:00

21 April 2011. As of today, the AICT compound is closed for the Easter holiday. When combined with Easter Monday and a national political holiday on Tuesday, things won’t reopen until Wednesday. So we get a whole week off for Easter. Except Margaret—the clinic remains open on their regular schedule, so she will be working as usual.

Recently I was told the computer shipment from America is to arrive today! It is supposed to be coming by car from Dar es Salaam. But since the business offices are closed until next Wednesday, I’m not sure what to expect. It would be really nice if they do arrive today. It would give me a few really quiet days to get them ready for use.

Yesterday my neighbor, an AICT pastor and leader, came by with his computer . He had some virus problems he wanted me to fix. I started with my usual routine, loading Avira antivirus. But when I tried to connect it to the internet on my broadband DSL, the computer didn’t recognize the connection. That was just the first of many things that didn’t work right. So I ran Avira without the update—it was a very recent version anyway. To my utter astonishment, it discovered 3144 virus infections and moved them all to quarantine. When I then tried to perform some basic tasks in Windows , they failed. After many frustrations, I uninstalled Avira and installed Avast, another free antivirus. I ran a boot scan in Safe Mode, and before it was half-finished, it found hundreds more viruses. The main culprit seemed to be called Win32:Vitro. I did a bit of internet research and soon concluded it was hopeless to try to remove this vicious virus via a simple antivirus scan, so I terminated the scan and closed up the computer. This morning I told my friend the bad news. He must try to save all his files and documents first, then reformat and reinstall windows and all his other programs. I know this is an enormous problem for him. Like most computers I see in use here, this was a used computer that he bought—it came with Windows XP installed, but he has no disks for a reinstallation. And the same is true for all the other programs he has been using.

Since I had been using my computer and my flash drive to load the antivirus programs from my computer onto his computer, I was suddenly gripped with fear that I had infected my own computer with this nasty thing. I immediately shut it down, booted in safe mode, and did a complete system scan with Norton. It came up clean, so I slept easy last night. But my neighbor may not sleep so well. This morning he told me his Easter morning sermon (and everything else) is on his now unusable computer. Pole sana!

Computer Tech Woes -- Hope Is On The Way

2011-03-12T22:31:00.000+03:00

13 March 2011. Back in January 2010 I described my computer tech woes—the frustrations of trying to clean viruses from the ancient computers that the AICT Kisula secretarial school has to work with. These days the most streamlined free antivirus software requires about 192 MB of RAM under Windows XP. Most of the Kisula school machines have either 64 MB or 128 MB. Not only will the antivirus software not run, but every other task on the computer takes forever (in computer time, anyway.) These machines were meant to run Windows 95—just running Windows XP itself far exceeds the capacity of the machines. But still they will function, even with programs like Microsoft Office 2003. So they get along—at least until the viruses take control.

This week one of the computers bogged down and ceased to function. I tried to clean off the viruses, but the antivirus software would not load into the insufficient RAM. In short, it simply did not work. I tried to explain to the school matron why it would not run. It’s like trying to fly an airplane with a motorcycle engine, I said. She gave me the strangest look, and then she laughed. I’m not sure she understood the point, but at least she saw some humor in the description. Or maybe she just couldn’t believe what she heard and was simply laughing at me. Either way, I appreciated the laughter.

But since I first described this problem a year ago, things have been happening. A friend of mine from Alaska and my former Alaska law firm, Perkins Coie LLP, donated a total of 9 used computers and keyboards—many thanks to you all! Although used, these computers will be much faster and more powerful than those clunkers the school now uses. In late February I received word that the computers have arrived in Tanzania, at the port of entry in Dar es Salaam. This is very good news! But, what would be easy in America is often a far greater challenge in the developing world. Transporting these computers the last 1200 kilometers to Mwanza is proving to be a significant logistical issue. It’s not that there aren’t trucks and airplanes traveling the route every day, but rather the problem seems to be finding a transporter who is not only trusted and available, but also affordable on a limited budget. So for now I am waiting for the improved hardware to arrive. My American colleagues got them into the country, now my Tanzanian colleagues must also do their part to get them across country. Maybe this week, I hope. Hope is a real blessing. Sometime you might ask someone the reasons why they have hope.

How's Class? Good, but ...

2011-03-12T22:13:00.000+03:00

12 March 2011. The Excel classes have been going well. Not fast, just well. Our pace is controlled by our electricity shortage. We are still having electricity only about half the time—a nation-wide situation. Tanzania is in great need of rain, not only to refill important hydro-electric reservoirs, but also for farming and food security. Please pray for that, it’s more important than the Excel classes.

The English classes were going pretty well, too. The panic I felt at first has faded away, now replaced by a sense of enjoyment of the time spent with my students. And they now seem to enjoy the time with me, after they got over their feelings of intimidation. The first week of class was a good success. But then I took off a week to a attend conference in Kenya with Peggy. The week’s absence had a serious affect on class attendance. This past week, only one student showed up on one day. I guess other things came up. That can happen when you live life on the edge.

Mwalimu -- Teacher

2011-02-16T06:52:00.000+03:00

15 February 2011. Tuesday. The panic that beset me last week has subsided. On Wednesday last I learned I was supposed to start teaching Microsoft Excel and English on Monday, i.e., yesterday. So for several days I scrambled, whenever our highly irregular electricity was on, to find on the internet lesson plans and ideas for teaching these subjects. In no time I discovered that the internet holds several good and usable tutorials for Excel. One of them, in 27 lessons, complete with assignments, has become the mainstay of my Excel lesson planning.

English is another story. While there are lots of English as a Foreign Language lesson plans and ideas on the internet, I have no idea where to begin or what to teach. And just because I am able to speak reasonably good English, that in no way translates to teachable knowledge of reflexives, objectives, connectives, and intransitives. (Are those actually grammar terms?) After much flailing about in a rising sea of panic, I finally just started writing down some scripts for in-class conversations. Who are you? (Always the first lesson, it seems.) Formal and informal introductions of self and others. At the office. And so on. But I still don’t know what ability level the students will have.

Adding to my panic is the fact that the teacher in charge, Mwalimu (Swahili for teacher), has been absent from the school ever since our first meeting on Wednesday. So I can’t ask her if she has any students signed up. I don’t know what day class begins. Or what time. Or how long it is. Or what days of the week. I am in the dark.

By Saturday I had concluded that the English class would not start on Monday. I have a couple of lessons prepared, but there are many more to prepare once I learn something about the students and their abilities. Since the head teacher still hasn’t returned as of today, Tuesday, the classes have still not begun. I am so glad I didn’t have to start 2 brand new courses on the first day of my teaching career. I’m not a teacher!

Excel, however, did start on Monday. Not as scheduled at 9 AM, because the power was off. Without electricity, there is no teaching on a desktop computer. And I won’t even try teaching Excel on a blackboard. Besides, there is no blackboard.

The first Excel class went well, I thought. My three students were interested. They seemed to understand, for the most part. One young man spoke English well enough to be able to translate my words into Swahili when it was necessary—which didn’t seem to be too often. The students were able to demonstrate on the computer (we have only one to share) the things I taught and asked them to do. In the middle of our lesson the electricity went off again. I looked helplessly at them as we sat in silence for a minute. Then they started asking questions, and so did I. We took the chance to learn a little bit about each other. The young man wanted to know about American clothes and food. I learned they are all hoping to learn computer skills to help them get jobs.

By the time we all had a chance to talk a bit, the power came back on. So I resumed the lesson and we made it all the way to the end. I gave them a short assignment (open a new workbook, give it a name, and save it), and then watched them do it. Success!

I was actually looking forward to today’s second class (see how much the panic has gone!) But just minutes before the 9 o’clock class time the electricity went off again. It is still off 9 hours later. This is the 9th day out of the last 10 in which we have had no electricity for at least several hours once, sometimes twice, a day. It is supposed to be a 2 week class. Because of the electricity problem, they actually plan for at least 3 weeks to complete the course, maybe even 4.

So now I am Mwalimu Tans. I’m ready to go with Excel. But English ….

A Day Like Many Others

2011-01-11T22:58:00.000+03:00

11 January 2011 or 11/1/11. I have to laugh a little at myself today. I awoke right on time, when usually the day is already fully light. But today the skies were uncharacteristically dark. It was gray and overcast, the sign of the rain soon to come. Being a compulsive about this, I turned the computer on right away and downloaded the morning’s first emails. Then I went in to shave. I had just gotten a good lather when the electricity went off. You don’t just waste a good lather, so I got my headlamp and put it on. Now you can’t just shine a headlamp into a mirror and look at your face—the bright light shines right into your eyes! So I angled the lamp off to the side, but then every time I turned my head to see my cheek or neck in the mirror, the light also turned away and put me in the dark shadows again. The problem wasn’t insurmountable, but I did amuse myself trying to get the light just right so I could finish my shave. You might try shaving in the dark with a headlamp sometime, just to experience what my shave was like today. Oh, and to get the full experience, use only cold water.

Because the power was off, there was no electric water heater for the shower today. So a pot of water heated on the stove (some of the best advice we got was to buy a propane cook top) poured into to a few gallons in a big bucket became my shower. Pour on a little water, suds up, and pour on a little more water to rinse off. It’s not a bad shower at all. Way better than the cold showers I took 2 years ago.

The rain really cools things off here. When I came back home from the office around 11:30 this morning, the indoor temperature was hovering around 23 C (or 75 F), way down from our typical 28 or 29. I was so cold that my socks and long sleeved shirt (both worn only on the coldest days) were not enough. Only with a blanket wrapped around me did I finally feel comfortably warm. And then I thought of the 32 years we spent in Alaska—especially the day when the managing partner let all the staff leave work early because the temperature hit 75 degrees and the day was just too warm and beautiful to stay at work any longer. My how we change.

The electricity is still off now as I type on battery power. It’s already been off 8 hours today. Yesterday it was off about 10 hours. It seems to go off about every other day, or sometimes every day. And sometimes it’s on during the day but off all night. Tanzania has been undergoing some serious electricity rationing for months now. I’m not sure of all the causes, but what I hear includes generator breakdowns, shortage of water for hydro, bad maintenance and lack of parts and, especially, burgeoning demand. Even the locals, who often seem blasé about poor infrastructure and service (they know how to get along on little), are beginning to complain that the constant interruptions are killing their businesses. It’s true. If you try a day at work without electricity, let me know how it turns out.

Happy To Be Back In Mwanza

2010-11-26T22:03:00.003+03:00

26 November 2010. After 5 months in America, we are finally back in Tanzania. For many reasons, it feels very good to be back.

For one, our Tanzanian friends make us feel so welcome. Take Charlie, one of our neighborhood friends. He's about 8 years old. The first day back when Charlie first saw us, he ran home and announced to his mother, “Margaret is back. Now we can eat cake again!” And it’s true. Charlie and his family have already had a banana cake baked by Margaret, and so have all the other kids and their families. We brought back from America some new picture puzzles and the kids have already put the farm yard puzzle together a couple times. We share with each other the English and Swahili words for the farm animals. But the kids don’t know a Swahili word for llama.

For two, it means a rest from medical appointments and procedures for a long while. We were blessed to have the time to get these things done and by excellent results all around. Enough said about that.

For three, it will suspend our well-developed American spending habits, if only for the simple reason there aren’t too many things here to buy. From the perspective of Africa, I better see in my own typical American life-style an enormous temptation to spend my time, energy and money on things of little importance—as opposed to dwelling on those true, noble, right, pure, lovely and admirable things the Bible (Philippians 4:8) encourages us to think about. For the next few months we’ll keep the plastic card quietly tucked away, out of service. Our lives will be slowing down, giving us more time to think about what is really important. That will be good for me, but will I remember it when I get back to the states?

For four, we can see changes for the better in Mwanza. The internet for example. This year it took only 2 weeks to get our internet reconnected and operating properly. I called the company every business day for the entire two weeks. Not to complain or express anger, but just to remind the man and keep him posted on the situation. I can tell from my visits to his office that he is very busy, and has a constant stream of distractions. The patience I’ve learned in the past kept me calm even when the promise of service “tomorrow” proved overly optimistic for nearly a week. He really tried hard to get my connection working, he followed up when he said he would, and I think he was more frustrated than me that it took so long to get working. But really, I am very pleased. We live in one of the poorest countries in the world, yet the internet service we have this year is very good, very fast and reliable (when the power is on, more about that in a minute). Things are noticeably improving and the price is coming down, too. What a difference from just 2 years ago!

And for five, we find joy in the oddities of life here. Like electricity. In the last two weeks, we have lost our power more than half of the days. Usually it dies for a few hours, and usually at night. When that happens after dark, we often just go to bed. But sometimes the power is off all day, like yesterday. It was Thanksgiving Day and Margaret had a pecan pie in the oven when the power went off about 8:30 AM. Fortunately the baking was far enough along that she just left it in the warm oven until it was perfectly done. That pie was delicious! We shared the pie and the holiday with a number of other American missionaries at one of their homes. They live only a couple blocks away. They had power all day, while ours was still off when we returned home after dark. It came back on sometime late in the night while we were asleep. So, we have learned to keep the candles, matches and flashlights always in the same handy places. When the light goes off, we can always find them, even if we have to grope in the dark. Last week we had friends from Nairobi staying with us. The first time the power went off while they were here, they laughed at how we didn’t even pause in our conversation when the house went dark. We just calmly stood up, reached for the flashlight and candle, and acted as though it were a normal everyday occurrence. And indeed it was. Even now, as I write this blog, the electricity is off and my computer is on battery power. So we adjust and get along with the electrical power, on or off. But the power outages do wreak havoc with the food in our freezer. We finally had to throw out some meat because it had thawed and refrozen so often. But there is good news even here—our freezer is only 10 inches wide and 4 inches high, so there wasn’t much to throw away.

We really are happy to be back in Tanzania.

On to Exotic Places

2010-06-03T09:56:00.002+03:00

3 June 2010. My favorite Swahili-English dictionary is dog-eared and dirty, but the first draft of my translation of the current AICT constitution is now finished. All 51 pages of it. Swahili is still very much a foreign language to me. My conversations with my 7 to 9 year-old friends are my best. So the translation work is not easy. I feel both relief and a sense of accomplishment to be finished with that job.

The number of our days here is growing very short. Tomorrow is the last day of volunteering for both Peggy and me. After that it’s “summer vacation!” We’ll spend another week in Mwanza wrapping things up and packing. Then we’re off to exotic places – Dar es Salaam, Zanzibar, Grand Rapids.

While our work is coming to a close for the season, we are not yet done here. There is still work for us to do, things to learn and see, people to get to know and love. God willing, we plan to return again in 3 months to remain for another 10 months. In the meantime, we look forward not only to visiting exotic places, but reconnecting with our families, friends, supporters, churches and CRWRC. They have all be very faithful to us while we were away. To them and to God, we are very thankful. It is good to be loved. Very good.

Mystery of the Water From a Closed Faucet

2010-05-05T11:07:00.002+03:00

5 May 2010. Wednesday. Yesterday I had one of those AHA!! moments, solving the Mystery of the Water Flowing From the Closed Faucet. Let me tell you about it.

We have very basic indoor plumbing in our house here in Tanzania. In the bathroom there is a sink, toilet (western style, thank you very much), and a shower. Right next to the bathroom is the kitchen where there is a sink and one faucet with cold and hot water taps. That’s it. There once was a homemade solar hot water system, but that was broken long ago. Consequently, the house has no hot water (except only an instant hot water heater installed right on the shower head). There are hot water taps at each of the faucets, but when you turn them on you get nothing, not even cold water. The only taps that work are on the cold water side. That’s our situation.

A few weeks ago we noticed a very odd thing happening. When the shower was on in the bathroom, water flowed from the kitchen faucet even though the tap was closed tightly. Not just a drip, either, but a steady flow. It only happened when the shower was on, and no amount of tightening the kitchen tap would make it stop. I pondered that for days. I concluded it couldn’t be excessive pressure, because if anything, the water pressure on the kitchen faucet would decrease when the shower faucet released water. I even looked for an answer on the internet. I found lots about leaky faucets, but as far as I could tell, no one else ever had this problem of water flowing from a closed kitchen faucet only when the shower was turned on in the bathroom. I could think of no earthly explanation for water flowing from a closed tap, but I wasn’t ready to call it a miracle, either.

The extra water really wasn’t that big a deal. The only time it was an actual annoyance was when trying to do dishes while someone else was taking a shower. The extra water flowing into the dishpan did disrupt the chore a bit. That aside, the plumbing works fairly well, most of the time, and we are certainly grateful to have indoor plumbing. I chalked it all up as an unsolvable mystery and decided to live with it. But it still troubled me.

Then, just yesterday when the shower was running I decided to wash my hands, taking full advantage of the extra water flowing from the kitchen faucet. It was fun, not even having to turn the faucet on and off. As I stood there rubbing my hands and looking at the mystery water, a very intriguing question came to mind. Was the water coming from the side of the HOT water tap instead of the cold water side? I twisted off the hot water tap, and lo! The flow stopped. Once I discovered that, the solution instantly came to me.

This is a puzzler worthy of Car Talk, don’t you think? Send in your answers (to me, not Tom and Ray) on the back of a $20 bill! Be sure to enter often.

This is what was happening – the hot water taps in both the shower and the kitchen sink had been left in the open position. Normally that didn’t matter, because there was never any water pressure on the hot water side. But, with both taps in the open position and the shower turned on, the rising water column in the shower stem (which rose to the highest point of plumbing in the entire house) created enough pressure to push cold water backwards through the shower’s open hot water tap and further backward through the hot water pipes until it flowed out through the kitchen’s open hot water tap. When the shower was turned off, the water column drained out of the shower stem, lowering the water level to below that of the kitchen faucet, thus stopping the backward flow of water through the hot water pipes. Turning off either or both of the hot water taps prevents any backflow of water from the shower through the kitchen faucet.

Mystery solved. Problem fixed. Mind at peace.

Computer Faith

2010-04-18T09:41:00.003+03:00

It is remarkable that I can sit here in Africa looking at images on my computer monitor and with just a few key strokes, a package of goods will arrive days later on a doorstep in America. No catalogs, no telephone calls, no letters. Nothing but mysterious electrical impulses cause it all to happen. What was unimaginable to the common man less than half generation ago has not just come to pass – it’s become passé. But how can something that so profoundly affects our lives be so technically complex as to be incomprehensible to ordinary people?

Take Skype for example. How can 20,000,000 people talk at the same time without their conversations getting just a little mixed together somewhere between here and there? And how do my voice and picture get around the world instantly, anyway? I don’t know, but I have seen the proof it works. Computers and the internet are amazing. Sure, sometimes things break down and I get frustrated. And at times, because I can’t fix the problems, I even get a little angry. Yet somewhere and somehow there seems to be a fix. With a bit of well-informed help the problem can be resolved and the computer can be working properly again. Once again, I am soon amazed at what the internet can do and how it affects my life. We have much faith concerning our computers. I cannot explain how my computer communicates from Africa to Amazon and then to booksRus; or how booksRus finds PayPal; or how PayPal gets approval from my credit card company; or how Amazon tells UPS to go to booksRus to get my book to deliver it to Main Street USA. And that just touches the surface of the astonishing series of electrical impulses and human responses that gets the book to my American doorstep. It all depends on countless unseen computers working silently (or so it seems to us) in unknowable places. I can’t explain it, but I do have much faith that it will happen, that my credit won’t be stolen, my life won’t be ruined, and that one day I will actually get to enjoy the book I have been promised to receive.

I was thinking maybe God is a bit like that. His ways are so complex that we cannot comprehend them – he is God after all – yet he profoundly affects our lives. God is hard to explain, yet evidence that he is at work is all around. It is hard to know how or through whom God is working. And it is especially hard sometimes to know why God does or allows things to happen. One can get frustrated and angry at those times, too. Yet I have faith that what God has promised will happen. Faith that God will stand with me and help me, whatever my problems may be, and my life won’t be ruined. And although I cannot fully explain or even comprehend how it can be possible, one day (and forever more) I will actually get to enjoy the home in heaven that I have been promised to receive.

Yes, I think God at work is a little bit like computers and the internet. Only better, much better.

Computer Tech Woes

2010-01-25T14:25:00.001+03:00

Well, my future as a computer technician seems headed in the same direction as my efforts to grow zucchini. It was not difficult to find troublesome viruses on the old computers in the church’s computer training center. Making educated guesses, I found two viruses on my own before even starting anti-virus software. So after downloading from the internet a couple free virus removal tools, I looked forward to getting all the viruses off the machines.

It all started out so well on Day One. Proceeding on two machines at the same time, the antivirus software almost instantly announced it had found viruses. But after that things started downhill. The virus removal tools worked at a snail’s pace. After a full day of labor, one machine was not yet half scanned. The other virus removal program running on the second computer didn’t even tell me how much longer I’d have to wait. In fact, I wasn’t even sure it was still working. I suppose it all had something to do with the fact the minimum requirements for the virus removal programs were at least 192 MB, 512 MB recommended, and I had only 64 MB to work with.

Day Two started out as slowly as Day One ended. Neither removal program had finished its work the day before. When I started them again on Day Two, would they begin again from scratch? Or would they pick up from where they had left off at the end of Day One? Oh, I was so happy to see them pick up where they had stopped the day before. Both of them. So I watched as the programs proceeded, every bit as slow as before, to complete their scans. Every once in a while I needed to answer a question posed in a dialogue box. But, like all Windows-inspired dialogue boxes I have ever encountered, they give no intelligible clues as to what will happen if you say “yes” or “no.” Like always, I guessed. Eventually, both computers finished the scans and came to a point where reboot was required to complete the virus removal. My how that sounded encouraging as Day Two came to a close.

On Day Three I on the two computers and watched them reboot. For hours I watched. All day I watched. On one of the machines, nothing happened all day. The other machine gave me an error message – something about certain operating system files being missing or corrupted. Neither machine rebooted. At the end of Day 3 I went home, very discouraged, to think about what to do.

Disaster is the word for Day Four, as well as Days Five, Six …. Focusing on the one machine with missing or corrupted OS files, I decided to try to reinstall the XP operating system from an old disk lying in a desk drawer. What did I have to lose, after all? It was clear the computer wasn’t going to run the way it was. So I naively started the reinstallation. I could give you all the details, but you would only laugh. At me. For being so foolish. After a couple days of effort, I finally got the installation to the stage of asking me for the Microsoft security key. Groan! Such a thing, which clearly once existed, is nowhere to be found now. I should have known. I should have known how this could all come to a halt for the absence of 25 precious digits and letters. Less than an alphabet’s worth.

So today neither of the computers I “fixed” is now working. The poor woman in charge of the computer center was so happy at first that I was helping with the computers. But now, she looks so confused. Understandably, she is reluctant to let me touch any of the other computers. She was so trusting.

But I have a plan. I have my friends looking for donations of old Microsoft operating systems. Maybe XP, or maybe even better, 98 SE. Complete with those 25 digit security keys, for sure. If they can mail a couple copies to me, I’ll get those computers running eventually. I have 5 more months to get it done. That will be enough, won’t it?

Now, if I just had a plan to replace the Microsoft Word and Excel programs that were on those old machines.

Zucchini-less

2010-01-10T08:36:00.001+03:00

It’s a good thing I didn’t come to Africa as an agricultural consultant. My zucchinis have all gone to rot. My hopes were so high after that first promising zucchini-let. The plants grew big and green with lots of yellow blossoms. They looked beautiful, but they never developed another further fruit.

Indeed, I have to admit the whole garden has failed. The green peppers and spinach I planted never produced a plant. Even the watermelon that grew “wild” from the compost developed only one melon, and, infested with insects, it rotted from the inside. Should I blame it all on the bugs? Or maybe it was the el Niño weather we are having. The normally dry month of December was anything but dry this year. Probably bugs and the weather both contributed to the loss. But what do I know about weather and the crops?

The only thing I know for sure is how much hard work it is to grow vegetables using only hand tools. Now, each time I pass by the large fields with men, women, and children all using nothing more than a hoe to cultivate, I must nod with respect acknowledging the hard work that they do. And then when I pass by the piles of those same vegetables in the market, I marvel at how little we pay for all that hard work. How did it ever come to pass that they should be paid so little for the back breaking work that they do?

With my garden nothing more than history, I have something else to look forward to. My latest assignment at work is to try to make the AICT computer lab’s ancient computers work faster and better. I can’t do much about the slow processors and RAM limitations – forget about the recommended 4 gigs, we are talking 64 MB here! But I think I can wipe off some of the viruses I have already identified. Tomorrow could be interesting. But then, every day is interesting here.

Zucchini Setback

2009-12-05T21:29:00.000+03:00

Saturday morning. I wasn’t feeling so well this morning, so instead of weeding my garden as I should have, I just sat quietly on the stoop and watched the birds. Black kites preened in the trees while others flew overhead in all directions. Marabou storks formed large kettles, soaring ever higher into the warming thermals. Gray-headed sparrows perched in the mango, avocado, and poinsettia trees and chirped incessantly. One lone village indigo bird sang and sang from a high snag. A long winged and long tailed falcon soared by leisurely, but didn’t linger long enough for me. It might have been a Eurasian hobby or an Eleanora’s falcon, but there are so many falcon possibilities that I could not sort it out before it disappeared. The African palm swifts have such long and narrow wings that I wonder how they get enough lift to fly, but surely they were designed more for their spectacular aerobatics than for sustained flight. Eastern gray plantain-eaters laughed like maniacal monkeys as they gathered food and nesting materials. Yellow-vented bulbuls shouted their loud song from every direction and a young bird snuggled up to its parent, hoping for special attention or a little food. Three willow warblers, recently arrived for the winter after their breeding season in Europe, gleaned bugs from the overgrown hedge. Creation is full of wondrous things.

Eventually I wandered into the garden to see whether the weeds or the zucchinis are winning. The weeds are indeed gaining ground, but for now the zucchinis still prevail. There are many blossoms where I expect soon to see more zucchini-lets, but a few days ago I sadly discovered that my first small zucchini had rotted on the vine. It had not grown much at all since I first proudly described it. Maybe we had too much rain – there has been a lot. Or it could be the bugs. Inch-long grasshoppers, boldly striped in black and yellow-green, are particularly fond of the zucchini leaves, and scores of tiny flies too small to describe swarm out of the plants when I pull back the leaves to look inside. I may lose the entire crop to bugs if I don’t use insecticide, and since I have none, that is a distinct possibility. I discovered another plant in the garden that may be my only green pepper seed to have sprouted. I’ll have to watch this one to see what develops. The tiny watermelon seedling that sprouted from my compost a couple weeks back has become a blossom-laden six foot long vine and is still growing. Even as my zucchini prospects become dim, I am brightened by the thought of a few sweet watermelons some day.

Zucchini-lets!

2009-11-17T22:43:00.002+03:00

17 November 2009. I have been avoiding the garden for a week or so, but I can easily see from the kitchen door that the weeds are starting a reclamation project. So today I went out in the cooler part of the afternoon when the sun is low and the shadows long. I like to loosen the dirt with a shovel and pull the weeds by hand, especially near my zucchini plants. When my weeding took me close to the single mound of my September 23 test planting, I peered inside. There, bright and healthy looking, was a dark green 3 inch zucchini-let. Whoo-hoo! In a week, maybe less, I’ll be stir-frying that very zucchini.

It has been 8 weeks since I planted that mound of seeds. My second planting was on 14 October, so at that rate we ought to have a second crop in mid-December. Maybe we’ll have zucchini bread for Christmas this year. Maybe I’ll try a third planting – but now there is a risk there won’t be enough rain; the short December-January dry season is coming.

My green pepper and New Zealand spinach seeds all seem to have failed. But as if to make up for the loss, a tikitimaji (watermelon) has sprouted from my earliest compost site. It is growing very well and I can’t wait to see if it produces some melons. And today I discovered another plant in the garden. It looks just like green beans my mother used to grow. I’ll be watching it, but will it produce enough beans for even one stir-fry?

Wild Ride

2009-11-15T08:09:00.000+03:00

14 November 2009. I am so glad we always took our kids on Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride when we visited the Disney parks. Nothing else could have prepared us so well for yesterday’s adventure.

In typical theme park fashion, our trip began at the counter where the people formed into a dense cue (mob, really) to buy tickets for the short ferry ride from Mwanza to Kamanga. Once there we each took a seat in the AICT (Africa Inland Church Tanzania) Toyota Land Cruiser to begin our ride. With 8 people on board (4 CRWRC volunteers and 4 church staff members) and all the stuff needed for a day or two on the road, it was comfortable, but full, when our ride began. Along the rough gravel road we sped, lurching and bouncing along, dodging bikes, cows, and potholes along the way. Every once in a while there would come from the 3 poor souls in the back, sitting sideways on barely padded benches, “ouch” and “oooh!” as the car bounded over particularly painful or exciting bumps. After about 25 kilometers of this seat-gripping ride, we stopped unexpectedly in the village of Sengerema. Sitting together in the far back, Peggy and I looked quizzically at each other – grateful for the breather, but wondering why we stopped.

Soon enough it came clear. Two more staff members, carrying their own box, briefcase, and a small suitcase, piled in. Now we were more than full with 10 people on board. There were 4 wide people jammed into the 3 not-so-wide seats in the second row, shoulders forced into alternating layers. Four more people were wedged into the back among piles of stuff. Once uncomfortably situated, off we went again. In no time at all we encountered road construction and the adventure got even more exciting. For the next 75 kilometers we watched the ever-so-enticing smooth road-under-construction pass by in our peripheral vision while our car bounced, lurched, and veered down the temporary so-called road beside it. Potholes, bumps, trees, cattle, bicycles, goats, pedestrians, trucks – every imaginable obstruction came zooming into view, only to be avoided at the last second by our imaginative driver. Could he really be in control or were we riding on tracks like Mr. Toad’s, carefully designed to avoid all the obstacles?

Finally we reached smooth roads where the car picked up more speed, and soon we were in the larger town of Geita. Thinking we were near the end of the ride, we were a bit surprised when the car took a sudden and unexpected turn off the road and came to a stop a short distance later. Time for “chai” – breakfast in Swahili. Refreshed by tea, chapattis and relief for our bruised bladders, we were off again. After another 20 or 30 kilometers we reached the first of two medical clinics scheduled for a visit that day. The time was spent quietly for us volunteers. I was grateful for the rest, but I couldn’t help but think, with just a little dread, “I think we have to go back the same way we just came!”

After the business was completed, all 10 of us, plus gear, piled back into the car and headed for the second medical clinic, about a 90 minute drive away. By now I had moved from the bench in the back to the second row because Allan developed a sore back from the second row seat. Go figure. But if he wanted the straight-backed, side-facing, barely padded, no-leg-room, high-bounce-zone back seat, I was willing to take the normal padded seat with plenty of leg room, even if it meant a shoe-horn fit and resting the back of my shoulder on the front of my neighbor’s shoulder. From this relatively comfortable position I could not turn around to look at those behind me, so it came as a complete surprise to me to learn the next day that there weren’t 10 of us, but then 11 people in the car. Just before the car pulled away, the doctor from the clinic climbed into the back with yet another box. He wedged himself in among Peggy and the other 3 people in back and stuffed the extra box into space that didn’t really exist. The doctor only rode with us to the main highway, about 10 kilometers, and then he jumped out and went on his way, leaving us with 10 again. While I never noticed he was in the back of the car, I’m sure his presence was closely felt by the other 4 back there.

The next 60 kilometers was a tame ride by comparison to the morning’s. The gravel roads were a little wider and a little smoother, and the cattle, bicycles and pedestrians seemed nimble-footed. Some of us even grabbed a little sleep between all the lurching and the bouncing on the way to the second clinic.

When the business was completed there, it was already late afternoon and the staff was eager to get started for home. But our host insisted on serving us all a meal. Our leaders being too gracious to say no, accepted the invitation and we all sat down for a very delicious meal. We ate quickly, but still had a minute to take a photo of our host family standing in front of their wall poster of Barack Obama and Martin Luther King, Jr., entitled “The Dream Has Come True.” When the meal was finished, the 10 of us piled into the car again. But wait -- now there were two more occupants to fit in. One of the staff members bought 2 live chickens, and each one “found” a place under the two side seats in the back. After cleaning up a little of what chickens leave behind when they get stressed, we got on our way, bouncing and lurching along the “good” gravel road back to Geita. At Geita we made the turn east and headed back toward home. I was anticipating (unhappily) the road under construction that lay ahead, when suddenly we made another abrupt turn into a crowded bus station. Our driver pushed ahead, honking the horn as standers-by briskly side-stepped to get out of the way. After driving in a circle around the parking lot and pulling to a stop in the middle, 8 men appeared out of nowhere shoving handfuls of pineapples into every open window of the car. Altogether our group bought a dozen of the largest pineapples – 3 for about $1.50. Where there were already chickens, boxes, bags, suitcases and no leg room we added the 12 pineapples and were ready to continue our adventure.

Still with a long distance to go and the last ferry to catch, our driver tried to make up time on the short stretch of smooth paved road leading away from Geita. At that speed it wasn’t long at all before we reached the big construction zone. He slowed down to ease the car onto the exceedingly rough temporary road, and then brought it back up to off-road speed again. “At least,” I thought to myself, “this is the worst stretch of road and it won’t get any worse than this.”

And then it got dark. Trucks, cattle, pedestrians, bicycles carrying long poles of sugar cane sideways – they all zipped by, briefly flashing in the lights of our Land Cruiser. Bumps, puddles, potholes, dips, brush – all were still in the road, but they only required a noticeable reduction in speed only if the driver could not swerve around them. And now, with the construction crews gone for the night, there was a wide-open, brand new, not-quite-finished roadway seemingly inviting us up for a lovely and fast drive. So up on the smooth surface we went, no longer swerving around potholes and bumps, but now dodging construction barricades, rocks, piles of dirt, and other obstacles purposely put in the way to keep unauthorized cars from driving on the unfinished road! When we encountered a night crew at work and the unfinished road became impassable, the car returned to the bumps and lurches of the temporary side road.

At last the lights of the village of Sengerema came into view and I felt a surge of relief. Not only was the road better after Sengerema (or so I thought), but this is where we picked up 2 passengers in the morning, and I naturally thought they would get off in Sengerema. I’m sure all of the folks in the back seat were disappointed when only one got out – it meant the lucky 3 in the middle seat (still including me!) finally got some hip and shoulder room, but there was no relief for the 4 in the far back.

Without even a break for our even-more-bruised bladders, the car turned back onto the road toward Mwanza. At the traffic circle in Sengerema we turned onto a different road out of town than the one we drove in on because the late ferry goes from a different village than the ferry we rode in the morning. My spirits quickly brightened when I realized this road, unlike the one we drove on in the morning, was paved, smooth, and fast. But just as quickly my bright spirits faded. Within a few short kilometers we ran into construction again. So with another 20 or 25 kilometers to go, it was back on to a temporary side road every bit as bad as before. It was somewhere along this stretch that one of the chickens broke loose, pecked Peggy’s feet, and fluttered its wings between the knees of one of the other lady passengers. Whoa! On and on it went like this in the dark.

When finally the dim lights of the ferry terminal came into view, I heard from the far back prayers of thanksgiving to God in at least two languages – English and Swahili. There was such a murmur of relief that it may also have included prayers in Dutch and Sukuma, but I’m not sure. My personal prayer at that moment was to thank the Lord that Allan, so many hours ago, wanted to trade his middle row seat for the bench, boxes, suitcases, pineapples and chickens in the back. I was maybe a little hot and sweaty from the crowded seating, but 10 hours later at least my butt wasn’t sore and my legs weren’t cramped.

The 9 remaining people were more than eager to get out of the car and stand quietly waiting for the ferry to arrive. Not even a little rain and a cloud of lake flies gathering under the lights could drive any one of us back into that car sooner than necessary. While waiting we came within a scale’s width of having a few fresh fish added to the carry-on baggage. One of our group looked long and hard at the pile of small fish laid out by boy fishermen in the car’s headlights. Fortunately for those in back, no fish were bought. Much to my surprise, though, when we got back in the car after crossing the lake on the ferry, another, unfamiliar woman climbed into the middle seat beside me! I wondered the whole way home who she was and why she hitched a ride with us. The 25 or 30 kilometers back home to Mwanza were spent, once again crowded together, either bouncing and lurching through another construction zone or driving at high speeds on the paved road into Mwanza. The finale of the trip was a brisk ride through the side streets of the city as we dropped off one of the members of our group at his home. We made unexpected turns to the right and to the left, feeling lost as we ventured into areas we’d never seen before, only to be surprised when we finally emerged from one side street onto our own road, not 3 blocks from home.

Like Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, this one was exciting and full of surprises to the very end.

Zucchini Garden

2009-10-10T22:09:00.001+03:00

You would not have predicted it when I (Gordon) was a child, but now zucchini is one of my favorite vegetables. I love to cook it in a stir-fry. But zucchini is quite hard to find in Mwanza. Sometimes one vendor has it in the distant big market (never in the near market) and once in a while it can be found in the vegetable stand near the U-Turn Grocery. So even before we left Tanzania last May I was planning my future vegetable garden. I figured that the way things grow here in the rainy season, a few green vegetables ought to grow, too. While we were in the states I bought some seeds -- zucchini, green pepper, and spinach. Shortly after we arrived, some rain began to fall. It seemed a little early for the start of the short rains, so I thought I would plant just a few seeds in a little test plot. Now the zucchinis in my test plot are growing seriously fast, but if the other plants germinated, I still can’t tell their sprouts from the blanket of weeds that is also sprouting everywhere.

I know I will enjoy the zucchinis and other vegetables come harvest time, but today they are nearly killing me. Encouraged by the success of my test zucchinis and with rains now coming often, today I started preparing the ground to plant the rest of my seeds. Before I began I had visions of long rows of green peppers and spinach. Zucchinis would be spreading in all directions. So much would grow that I could open my own little vegetable stand at the market. But the reality of digging out the carpet of grass and weeds with my short-handled hoe hit suddenly and painfully hard. Just one hour of hoeing, even with my alternating of five minutes of hoeing with five minutes of rest, had me walking around the rest of the day with my back slightly stooped and held at just the critical angle (listing five degrees to the right) to keep it from going into spasms!

Thank goodness the daily downpour came early today, giving me a perfect excuse to cut short my garden work and run for cover. But the job is not done. My cleared spot is only about 10 feet long, and I still haven’t pulled all the weeds out of even that small area. I have more hoeing and raking to do, and some shoveling, too, before I am ready to plant. Maybe tomorrow. Or perhaps in a few days. I might even have to think many thoughts of stir-fry to convince my back that it really will be worth it to go back out in the garden.

My visions of having my own vegetable stand are gone forever. The long rows of vegetables I envisioned have shrunk to a rather small plot. Today I gained some new-found respect for the men, women, and children that toil day after day in the fields around Mwanza with nothing but a hoe. It is a back breaking work that they do, growing food and crops. And for all their work they get very little income. Despite working very hard, they are still desperately poor. The farmers deserve more than they get. In the future I’m going to be more serious about looking for the Fair Trade label when I buy goods made or grown in developing countries.

Welcomed Back to Mwanza

2009-09-23T19:48:00.006+03:00

19 September 2009. We arrived back in Mwanza on Thursday to a very warm welcome. It is good to be back.

We are quickly settling into the same, comfortable house, and are expecting to resume basically the same kind of work we did before. But already we have discovered some changes. The Christian Reformed World Relief Committee (“CRWRC”) development staff has moved back to the states, and for the time being we are in possession of and responsible for the CRWRC car. It’s parked right outside our front door. Someday we’ll have to screw up our courage and take it out for a drive – they drive on the “wrong” side of the road here! Also new is that the two dogs next door, Bubba and Lucky, just puppies when we left in May, are now old enough to run guard duty in the compound at night. And we are experiencing a little bit of the dry season for the first time. Things are quite brown and some (but not all) of the trees have dropped all their leaves.

Even though it’s still the dry season, it rained very hard last night. In the middle of the storm we were awakened by a sound we had never before heard on the compound. WEE-OOOH! WEE-OOOH! WEE-OOOH! It sounded like a car alarm. Could it be our CRWRC car? In just a few seconds it stopped. Was someone trying to break into the vehicle right outside our door? We got up to investigate, but in the dark silence we could see nothing amiss. So back to bed we went. Just as we were drifting back to sleep, again we were startled – WEE-OOH! WEE-OOH! WEE-OOH! Up again to investigate, more certain that it was our car, and someone was messing with it. Fearful of what we might see, we peered again out the screened windows, our flashlights sending out diffuse beams into the rainy night. In the dim light I thought I glimpsed a dark figure moving in the shadows behind the car. Could it be? There it was again! It was Lucky, one of the guard dogs. And just then Margaret caught sight of Bubba, the other guard dog. As Margaret watched, the dogs crouched down low and slinked under the vehicle, setting off the alarm yet again. Lucky and Bubba had found a fine place to get out of the rain, but it was keeping the whole neighborhood awake. Every time Margaret would reset the alarm, the guard dogs would trigger it again. Finally Margaret decided that the only way to keep the alarm quiet was to disable the sound – but that seemed OK, at least for the night. With the guard dogs lying in ambush under the car, nobody else was going to come close.

Taking a Break

2009-05-12T12:31:00.005+03:00

A working draft of Gordon's translation work is completed, and Margaret has finished her work at the clinic for the season. We are packing our bags and saying to all our new friends "tutaonana" -- not good-bye, but "we shall meet again."

In just a couple days we will be leaving Mwanza and returning to North America for about 4 months. We will be reconnecting with our family and visiting with our friends and supporters while there. Then sometime in September we will return, God willing, to Mwanza for another longer term.

It has been a real blessing to have spent our last six months in Tanzania. We have learned much about another culture. It is sometimes amazing to see how God works in the hearts and lives of people who live a life quite different from what we are accustomed to. If our paths cross in the next few months, be sure to ask about our experiences. We would love to share something of what we have experienced in Tanzania.

April Newsletter

2009-04-15T21:56:00.005+03:00

(click on the images for full page view)

The Miracle of Rain of Stones

2009-03-26T19:59:00.004+03:00

The long rains have begun. Last Tuesday it was a deluge. We have not seen it rain any harder than that. Just when the rain was heaviest we heard “ping! ping! ping!” – the sound of hail hurtling against our steel roof. With a look out the window we could see it beginning to accumulate on the grass. It was a little larger than pea-sized. Only 40 minutes after the rain started, it was over and the sun was back in full force. In no time all the hail was gone and it was just as hot as before.

Soon after it stopped the neighborhood kids came by the house. I asked if they had seen the hail. Yes, they had, and they were quite excited about it. Most exciting of all – they ate some. It was “nzuri” (good) and “baridi!” (cold!)

Later we talked about the hail in our Swahili lesson. “Mvua ya mawe” – rain of stones – is its Swahili name. Such a thing happens here maybe once a year our teacher said.

Our favorite and very enthusiastic taxi driver had seen it too. “God did a miracle today,” he declared. “He made ice fall from the sky.”

Chapel

2009-03-04T14:37:00.012+03:00

March 4, 2009. For months we have been attending chapel services before the beginning of work each day. The health clinic holds chapel at the facility where Peggy works, and the national office where Gordon works holds its own chapel in a nearby building. Most days I (Gordon) feel great about the chapel if I can find the Bible passage and read along in my English/Swahili New Testament. All the better if I know the tune of the hymn and can sing along in my Swahili song book – even if I can’t understand most of the words of the hymn. But the messages and the prayers in Swahili go by too fast for me to catch any more than a few words here and there.

Yesterday’s chapel followed the typical pattern until the end, when I was surprised by a request that I lead the chapel this morning! My friend Mr. Byemero encouraged me to go ahead and do it, even if I only knew two Swahili words. So I accepted the request and later made my preparations.

I spoke from 2 Cor. 5:15-6:1 about reconciliation (upatanisho) – the restoration of people back into a good and right relationship with God like that which existed before it was destroyed by sin. Through Christ’s death believers are made right with God. For this reason, believers no longer consider anyone in the same worldly way they did before.

First, Christ has reconciled each believer to God and has made each believer a new creation. God no longer counts our sins against us. Therefore, we must view ourselves as believers in the same way that God views us. We will make mistakes. But because we know God does not count them against us, we should not either. Instead, as co-workers with Christ we must seek to reconcile and restore whatever has been broken by our sin.

Second, believers now also view unbelievers in a different way. Because God loves them so much that Christ died for them while they are still sinners, so must we love those who don't believe. We have been appointed by Christ as his ambassadors (mabalozi) to carry the message of reconciliation with God. Some ambassadors are sent by their king to take a declaration of war, but not the ambassadors of Christ. We go with a message of peace and reconciliation.

Finally, we should not receive God’s grace in vain. In other words, we should not let God’s grace be wasted. Instead, we should do what we can each day to promote reconciliation and restoration of the world through the work of God’s grace.

My two Swahili words? Mabalozi wa upatanisho. Ambassadors of reconciliation. Big words.

Serengeti!

2009-02-23T21:52:00.013+03:00

Serengeti! What mission to Tanzania would be complete without a safari to the Serengeti? The name means endless plain in the Maasai language. And the endless plain is home to countless animals. We excitedly watched a herd of 36 elephants walk around our car. A lone cheetah, spotted in the morning mist on the distant horizon, slowly strolled closer and closer until it crossed the road in front of us and lay down to rest in the shade of a tree not 30 meters from our car. We looked eye-to-eye with a male lion and his entire family group – and understood why it is called his pride.

We didn’t see all the animals of the Serengeti, but we saw enough to make us marvel at the variety of God’s creation. The zebra has his stripes, the giraffe her astonishing neck, and the hippos soak in the pool all day long. Each animal equipped in some special way for life in this marvelous place.

Of course, the birds hold a very special interest for us. Our guide, a most friendly Tanzanian named Ben, was able to show us not only lions, cheetahs, leopards, serval, African wild cat, and a myriad of hoofed animals, but also well more than a hundred bird species. Most of them so new to us that we struggled to find them in the bird book. Often so many appeared at once that we had to look first, and hope we could identify them in the book later. African ground hornbills, lilac-breasted rollers, white-crowned shrikes, fawn-colored lark, cinnamon-breasted bunting, and on and on. Secretary birds that somehow do not remind me of the office. Starlings so striking they are named “superb” – astonishingly beautiful to our American eyes so used to seeing only the boringly drab Eurasian starling. What fun it was!

Two days in the Serengeti makes me want to rush right back. Next time, maybe the wildebeest migration will be in the northwest part of the park where we can reach it easily from Mwanza. Or maybe the cheetah will show off his speed. Or maybe the leopard will change his spots. Or maybe not. Whatever we see the next time, it is sure to be very, very special.

Peggy's Day At The Makongoro Clinic

2009-01-26T21:10:00.015+03:00

I volunteer daily at the Africa Inland Church of Tanzania’s Makongoro Health Clinic in Mwanza. It consists of an out-patient clinic, an in-patient hospital with 29 beds, a mother/baby clinic, and an HIV counseling and testing clinic. My supervisor is Matron Jovina Machia.

Our day starts out with a 20 minute staff devotional time. Along with all the health clinic staff, we sing praise songs, read from the Bible and hear a 10 minute sermon, all in Kiswahili. After devotions are finished we attend the morning meeting with the doctors, the heads from the lab and finance departments, and the 2 matrons (head nurses). We hear the night report, and discuss any concerns that have come up, again, all in Kiswahili. Then Monica and I dispense any medications that are needed that shift for both the out-patient clinic and the in-patient hospital.

When the meds are finished, Monica (the other Christian Reformed World Relief Committee nurse volunteer from Canada) and I usually go to work in the hopsital wards. Soon one of the doctors comes by to do rounds. We go as a group from bed to bed while the doctor speaks with each patient about how they are doing. Still, all in Kiswahili. Then the doctor makes the orders for that day, but now in English! All the patient charting is in English, and the written orders are, too. So the Tanzanian nurses love to have us do the writing in the Rounds Book, because it has to be in English!

For the rest of the shift, we work alongside Tanzanian nurses. We often dispense medications, usually intravenous quinine for the treatment of malaria. And we admit new patients, again usually with a diagnosis of malaria.

In the hospital there are three large rooms or wards, one a children’s ward, the second the women’s ward, and the third a men’s ward. There is also one “private” room with 2 beds and a private toilet. The rest of the patients share common bathrooms (one for the men, one for the women and one shower).

The hospital is on the same compound that we live on, so it is only a 2 minute walk to work. Except that on the way we must greet every person we meet. Near or far, we must ask “Harbari za asubuhi?” (“News of your morning?”), and “news of your home,” and “your family,” and “your work,” and “Mama (or Baba) hajambo?” (“Mama has no problems?”). And then we walk on until the next person we see and go through the greetings again. It is a very fun ritual, but it slows down our walk a lot. Fortunately, even our boss understands that being late sometimes cannot be helped!

Gordon's Work at AICT

2009-01-16T15:50:00.006+03:00

This year Africa Inland Church of Tanzania (AICT) is celebrating its 100th year. It was started in 1909 by missionaries from America, called the Africa Inland Mission (AIM), which is still active in Africa today. Sixty years after its founding, the AIM turned over the ownership and supervision of the Tanzanian church to local leaders, and AICT was formed. The two organizations have been operating in partnership in Tanzania ever since.

The AICT church has about 1,000,000 members. They are spread across Tanzania, but concentrated in the northwestern part of the country where the church began. I (Gordon) am volunteering at the national headquarters under the direction of General Secretary Joseph Gisayi. I have my own office, which I share with a couple geckos and a few cabinets full of records. Lately I have been reviewing five-year plans. First the strategic plan for the entire national church. Next the strategic plan for the health department. The plans are written in English, so I am able to offer many editorial suggestions to help clarify the text and intent of the plans. Soon I will be reviewing plans for other departments of the church, like the publishing department, the finance department, and others. The health department plan is already finished; all of the others are presently drafts, or not yet even written. The church is in the midst of an intense planning process to focus its strategy and operations in accordance with its vision and mission. In summary, AICT’s mission is to spread the Gospel of Jesus to all people and to promote holistic human development to help the poor achieve major improvements in their mental, physical, and spiritual growth and development.

The five-year plans of the church are impressive, as are its existing operations. It already operates a theological college, two successful secondary schools, a nursing school, two large hospitals, two health centers with small inpatient wards (about 30 beds each), and 18 smaller health dispensaries, along with many other programs. But with much still needed to be accomplished in Africa, its five-year plans focus on improving and expanding its operations, not only to increase spiritual care, but also to contribute towards sustainable and affordable access to quality social and economic services (health, education, agriculture) for the people of Tanzania, with particular focus on the poorest communities and those affected by disasters. Among the goals AICT seeks are improvements in access to safe water, increased education for village children, HIV/AIDS counseling and education, improved agricultural practices, and greater justice and gender equality for women. Interestingly, it has chosen significant reductions in national infant and maternal mortality rates as the primary indicators of success for many of its food, health, and sanitation goals. The church recognizes that it cannot accomplish such significant changes by itself, so it expressly states that it plans to contribute to the work of the national government and other churches and NGOs in achieving these goals.

I still have much trouble understanding Swahilli, but it did not take me long to understand, even in Swahili, that the church in Tanzania believes in the power of prayer. If you will, please pray with me that the plans and work of the AICT will, along with that of its partners, be effective to improve the spiritual, mental, and physical condition of Africans in Tanzania, both now and for many years to come. As they say in Swahili, tuombe -- let us pray.

Lunch

2009-01-04T17:39:00.004+03:00

Several days a week we share lunch with a Tanzanian family in their home. We start by washing our hands in warm water poured from a pitcher into a bowl by one of the children. After prayers we are invited to eat a simple, but well-prepared meal. The staple of the lunch is ugali, (a thick corn meal) or rice. Also there is a cooked green and a bit of meat -- kuku (chicken), n'gombe (beef) or samaki (fish) -- cooked in a sauce. The ugali is dipped into the sauce and eaten by hand. Our inexperienced fingers have some difficulty getting the ugali to our mouths without it crumbling to bits and without the sauce dripping down our chins. We enjoy the tasty food and, especially, the experience of sharing the meal with the children of our host family. Our attempts at Swahili conversation with the children and our host are sometimes very amusing. Like the day Peggy tried to tell the mama the food was good by saying "chakula ndege," which translates as "bird food" instead of "good food." Another day Gordon was taking a picture of the family and got them all to smile by loudly saying "chapati" (it means "chapati"), which made them all laugh. Now when the kids see Gordon across the grounds they wave and shout out "Chapati!" And that makes him smile.

Gordon's Ant Story

2008-12-29T08:13:00.005+03:00

This entry is from Gordon's personal journal, December 3, 2008.

I have to mention the ants. Maybe 10,000 of them. Or a billion? Who knows. They are making good use of the house, and I am guessing they live in the attic. Little brown ants. Marching in neat lines. Up and down the walls. Across the floors. Always searching for the smallest crumb of food and throwing a big ant party when they find one. But what are they looking for on my computer screen? Give them a shot of Doom, and they just find another route to follow in their quest. Aside from the nuisance of just being there, they seem harmless enough. Not like those large black ants I wandered into yesterday. I was just exploring the back yard when I found myself about a step from an interesting ant hill. The same time I discovered the ants, they discovered me. Wow, did I jump. They have a serious bite. First my foot. Then again. Then my leg. Then both legs. Ants in my pants! And still climbing up. I ran to the house, slapping my legs as I went. In a few strides I reached the door, ripping off my sandals. But ants continued biting my feet and legs. Off came my pants, and frenzy happened until all the ants on my feet and legs were dead. Much to my relief, they never reached the critical height of my underwear. My sandals on the step were still under attack by a dozen more ants. Somehow without getting bit herself, Peggy killed them and the ants still looking for me in my pants. I respectfully left those pants hanging for hours before I dared put them back on. I am so glad these were biting ants and not the stinging ants. At least the pain ended when the ants died. Siafu they call them. So watch where you walk, because not all ants are the same.

Ant Update. December 29. Although there are still minor skirmishes with the little brown ants in the house, I have declared victory. When they do send a patrol to investigate, which is not often now, they number only scores, or maybe hundreds at the most. A little well placed ant dust (well, lots of it actually) has brought them to their knees. As for the biting siafu ants, I still dare not venture into their well-defended domain. Take a look at the picture of the siafu and you will see why.

Christmas in Bulima Village

2008-12-26T16:51:00.005+03:00

We just returned from five days in the village of Bulima with a number of new friends. The drive took about one and a half hours on a good road. Christmas morning six of us walked down to an outdoor church service attended by hundreds of Tanzanians and six westerners. A choir competition had just ended the day before, so we were treated to singing and dancing by four different choirs. The pastor spoke about the example the three wise men show us: to seek out Jesus, to worship him, and to give him our best gifts – from our hearts. It was all in Swahili, but a Wycliffe worker in our group was able to translate the essence for us. We enjoyed the three hour service very much.

Christmas evening a group of 14 gathered for dinner and fellowship in the home of an instructor at the local Nasa Theological College. We were 1 Briton, 3 Germans, 4 Americans, 4 Canadians, and 4 Tanzanians. For most of the non-Tanzanians, this was our first Christmas in Africa. We shared many foods, including delicious roast goat and a dish common to most of our dinners in Tanzania – the best fruit compote available anywhere. We sang Christmas carols and three men shared reflections on different aspects of the Christmas story. Gordon chose to reflect on John 1. Our thoughtful two host families had gifts for each of us. Two things were especially touching about the gifts – the reaction of the two young Tanzanian boys (residents of the Children’s Rescue Center in Mwanza) to the gift of shiny new black shoes and the gratefulness of the young women whose Christmas packages had been permanently lost in the mail.

We are still adjusting to the many differences in the local culture, so we really appreciated the mix of the familiar and the new. It was a memorable Christmas, illustrating to us how much the Christmas story means to people of all cultures all around the world. Merry Christmas to all our friends, old and new.

Our Neighborhood

2008-12-17T18:10:00.005+03:00

We live in a home on the Mwanza compound of the Africa Inland Church of Tanzania (AICT). On the many acres of the compound are located a large church building, the offices of the Mwanza Diocese of AICT, and the national headquarters of AICT (where Gordon volunteers). Only a few steps away from the national headquarters is the AICT Makongoro Health Center. There Peggy volunteers alongside the Tanzanian staff and another CRWRC volunteer, Erin Carter from Canada. Occupying several buildings, the health center includes an outpatient clinic, a 30 bed short-term inpatient unit, an HIV/AIDS counseling and volunteer testing clinic, and a mother and baby clinic. There is also a guest house where short term visitors can get lodging and a restaurant for simple Tanzanian fare. Other buildings on the compound house a computer support and training center, the technical support department for maintaining clinic and hospital equipment, the Christian education department, missionary support, development, and other AICT church offices. And finally there are several residences. Most of the homes are used by AIC pastors and staff members, but two houses off in one corner are homes to us and our friend Erin. From there our commute to work is about 2 minutes on foot.

Our Home In Mwanza

2008-12-13T16:18:00.005+03:00

It's hard to believe we have been in Tanzania for three weeks already. We have been so busy just getting basic supplies for our home, visiting the store and market nearly daily for food, and taking our Swahili lessons. We can greet Tanzanians in Swahili in many different ways, but after the greeting our skills fade like a falling star. The picture is our Mwanza home - our nyumbani. The weather is superb, the birds are spectacular, and our new Tanzanian neighbors are very warm and friendly. Both of us are going to start our volunteer assignments on Monday, so say a special prayer for us.

a bit of an update - from the Home Office

2008-12-09T17:24:00.007+03:00

I got an email from the Tans on Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 13:20. Here's a summary of what they had to say:

Hello, we just today got internet access at our home. Now we can get to our emails regularly.

We are both doing well. Some initial hardships have been overcome. We are working on our Swahili. We even conducted a simple transaction in Kiswahili the other day - bought a bottle of water, cold.

From the Home Office

2008-11-20T22:47:00.005+03:00

On November 20, Gordon and Peggy boarded a plane out of Grand Rapids' Gerald R Ford International Airport. It was the first airborne leg of their journey to Tanzania but it was far from the first leg, which began well over a year ago... stay tuned for more of their story. They'll touch down in Dar es Salaam tomorrow, and maybe they'll give us an update.