I woke up to my alarm instead of a rat, music, or banging on my door! I had snoozed it a couple of times and then decided to get up at around 8:40am to work on packing some more. For the first time in a month, there was no WiFi in the house! There was no time to waste checking notifications or playing games any more. With the lack of distraction, I soaked in the fact that I would (probably) never wake up here ever again!
Paul eventually came by to ask me to boil my water for the day so I turned on the kettle and went outside to check my clothes. I fully expected them to be wet yet 85% of them were completely dry! Bwana Asifiwae (praise the Lord!)! I took in all of the clothes that were dry and moved the damp clothes into the sun for more coverage. The combination of a breeze and direct sunlight did an amazing job for a humid environment. On the way in from my second trip taking clothes in, Paul asked me to grab some avocado leaves for tea from a tree nearby. The small tree didn’t have many leaves to pluck from it, but I took them anyway. Paul was still in his underwear and couldn’t leave the front porch without being seen.
Tea was being prepared on the propane stove as the kettle was used for boiling water for bathing. Waiting for my water to boil, I went outside once more where Peter and his son were there. I didn’t know if I would see them again so I took a quick photo with them. Little did I know that I was looking quite rough with my bed head and tired face. There are no mirrors around and you often forget to check if you look decent!
When I arrived back inside of the house, Paul had just now begun to prepare breakfast. It was 9:15am when he started peeling potatoes so I knew I might be late for church. With my water boiled, I had my bucket bath with a lot less water than the past couple of days but it still got the job done! Afterwards, I got dressed and finalized my packing for the moment (I needed to pack the damp clothes and towel when they were dry). By the time I was finished with everything, I went outside to find Paul washing many dishes! He told me to go “take down” the food and I went inside to take the pot of boiled potatoes off of the stove. We sat down together and ate boiled potatoes with salt and avocado leaf tea. Salt in Swahili is “chumvi”! To my surprise, the tea tasted like a sweet avocado drink thanks to the heaps of sugar poured in! From what I’ve been told, avocado leaf does not have any caffeine making it a popular drink for 7th Day Adventists here!
At this point it was 10:15am and I began my journey to the village. When I got to the top of the hill, several mechanics asked for Yona to come and help (I’m used to Paul, but that’s not what anyone local here calls him). Since I don’t have a SIM card out here, I am unable to reach Paul through technological means. I run down the hill to relay the news and Paul tells me to write down his number, and a phrase in Swahili to tell the mechanic to call him (something like “piga namba ya Yona.”). I ran back up the hill and showed my phone to the mechanic. At first he thought the phone had an active call, but I had to tell him that he needed to read the message on it! After the mechanic typed in the number and called Paul, I started my walk to the church once more.
Even after promising he would, Paul did not come with me to church as he had too many chores to do. He does have a lot to do, but I found it to be a very lame excuse. I let the disappointment roll off my back and I enjoyed the walk to the church. The weather was beautiful and on the way down a massive hill, Paul’s friend John was walking up! I yelled out “Mambo!” and he responded “Poa” which is how many interactions go out here. The village dog also walked with me for a while as I pet it with my knuckles and noticed a large tick on his face (poor thing).
I finally made it to the church and walked up to the front. It was 10:35am, but here it’s okay to be that late! I sat in Eli’s row with Mr. Luka and his daughter Comfort. We were told at the very beginning of church to never sit with each other and make friends, but I figured it would be fine if I did. Besides, people in the church always bring us up to the front to sit together so I thought I’d speed up the process this time around. Henry was also there at the church but was sitting a couple of pews back. Moses arrived shortly thereafter which meant going up for a couple of dances! Henry did not come for any, but in total we did a lot less dancing today than usual. Even though I danced less, I still got my ear drums blasted standing near the speaker for several minutes. I noticed that Hosea and Dan were there, but no Miraclin! I also noticed that the amazing guitar player was the local man Niko from yesterday! It goes to show that there aren’t set jobs out here. One day you’re digging trenches, the next you’re helping fix a truck, and on Sunday you’re playing for the Lord!
With the dancing finished, Sunday went on as usual. The sermon was given by another preacher I had not seen before and the message was completely in Swahili. It was on Job 22 where Luka translated for us via writing in his notebook! If I understood what Luka wrote, the message was about the importance of cultivating your relationship with the Lord and the prosperity and spiritual peace such a relationship gives you. What a wonderful message that I feel like has connected to my time here. The more that I’ve dug into my relationship with Gpd the more I’ve been at peace with being uncomfortable in all aspects. There was also a lot of prayer today and I made sure to give my thanks to God for the wonderful time I’ve had here in Madisi. Knowing that I would not dance here again made me quite sad!
I should’ve mentioned this many Sunday’s ago but “Mungo” is God, “Bwana” is Lord, and “Yesu” is Jesus!
After the sermon, I went to the nearby house as usual with Henry, Eli, Luka, Comfort, and Moses to eat lunch. We simply enjoyed each other’s company and let the four year old Comfort be the main center of attention as she jumped on chairs and played made up games with us. Moses had to leave for a bit which worried Eli and I as we didn’t know if we would see him again before we left the village for the last time! Since Eli has internet service, he got Moses' contact information just in case.
Eventually the food came and we ate ugali, greens, and beans! Like always it was all very good. Moses came back (phew!) and we all chowed down in silence. There was also an old man that came to eat with us as well which is normal as there are usually a couple of people we haven’t seen before that come by and say hi.
With the food eaten, Eli, Henry, and I pretend we’re making an episode of a podcast where we essentially recapped all of the fun we’ve had for the past month. Lots of making fun of each other and simply having a good time. We wash our hands and it’s time to go! This means it’s picture time and Eli and I take some cool photos with Moses (poses are all the rage out here).
We say all of our heart felt goodbyes and that we’ll meet again if “God wishes”! Henry, Eli, Luka, Comfort, Moses, and began to walk out of the village when a very old woman asked us to shake our hands. We of course obliged and shook her hand as she said many things in Swahili (not sure what it meant, but I hope it was good). We got to the junction where to turn away to go back to our houses and said our final goodbye to Moses! Walking down the hill we take in the beautiful scenery and take our time up and down the large hills.
We get back and split our separate ways. I ran into Susan and we talked for a bit about how fortunate this experience has been and that she’s excited for our work in Bukimau. She is such a kind and sweet woman! I head down to Paul’s house and notice there are a couple of monkeys in the trees overhead. I was able to snap a couple of photos of them (a lot better than the images I got of the monkeys last time).
Back at the house, John is there cooking but no Paul! I brought in the rest of the clothes and my towel from the line and packed up everything for good. I made sure to take a selfie and picture of my packed up room before taking my suitcases out to close my chapter there. Paul finally arrived and told me that food was ready. I could smell and see that small fishes were made and I thought for a second that I was going to have a miserable last meal (again, I’m not complaining that there’s food, I just feel very sick when I eat them). To my surprise, Paul had made me a yummy cabbage vegetable sauce to go with my rice. Paul and I ate together and enjoyed the last lunch between the two of us!
Once finished, Paul had some work to do so I went to Peter’s house! I was able to retake the photo from this morning but with his wife!
We hung out and talked for a bit until he told me that we were making a video for his students. Peter was excited for me to visit his classes, but since I’ll be gone, he wanted a video to show them. We put on fancy lavalier mics and a neighbor took a video on a phone to interview me! I talked about how much I’ve enjoyed Tanzania, the food I’ve eaten and made, and how I’m sad to go. I took one more set of photos with the neighbor and went to go check on Paul.
It was 3:00pm which was when Johnathan asked all of us to be at the office to get ready to go. I relay this information to Paul, but he tells me, “no”, and that we’ll go up when Hosea calls us to. I would understand this response if we were actively spending time together, but he’s spending time calling people and working on his computer! I felt like a parent waiting for their child to finish their videogame. Couldn’t the work that you could literally do whenever you’d like wait and we could go now? I ended up waiting an hour sitting in the main room while Paul was working. I asked several times to go, but he would not let me. It was hard to not be extremely upset and not just leave on my own accord. I gave him grace and the benefit of the doubt that what he was doing was very important. I got to use Paul’s hotpost and talked with Eli to make sure that it was actually okay for me to not be up there yet.
After a lot of patience, Paul was finally finished. We went to say an official goodbye to Peter and the neighbors! I took a selfie with Paul and John who were helping me carry my bags!
My carry-on wasn't too heavy, but my checked bag that Paul was carrying was quite the opposite from all of the water and snacks I had inside of it. We trudged up the hill, got to the office, and everybody was there! The car we were going to take was being worked on as the rear right tire was all cattywampus and needed alignment. I went inside to pack up the Kolibri Project and projector into my checked bag, only making it heavier!
When the tire was aligned (mostly), we packed all of our stuff into the car and it was time to say our goodbyes! We took a ton of pictures with all of the hosts and had a great send off. Mr. Chesco made sure to tell us to “addi more” every chance we got food and I learned something astonishing! Mr. Chesco was Luka’s teacher. That means that Mr. Chesco is late into his forties or early into his fifties when he genuinely acts and looks like he’s twenty-something. It’s either the lack of processed food or stress that significantly slows down the effects of aging out here! I said goodbye to Paul and thanked him for being a great host! I’ll probably never see Henry again so I made sure to say goodbye to him as well!
We got in the car, and Hosea drove us to the Vinton home to pick up Jonathan (literally a 30 second drive). At first Hosea was the only one to leave the car, but the rest of us figured we should get out of the car and say goodbye to the Vintons as well. At the front door we learned about how the end of July would work for us. Essentially the plan for the three of us is that we would leave the night of the 28th on a night bus, sleep on the bus, arrive in Dar Es Salaam on morning of the 29th, check into the KB Hotel (same one as we stayed in at the beginning of the trip), go to an island to swim for the day, sleep, wake up and go explore Dar Es Salaam with the Vinton family on the 30th, check out a museum or two, drop Michael and Miraclin off at the airport in the afternoon, and leave Eli and I a whole additional day of exploring Dar Es Salaam before we’re dropped off at the airport of the 31st! Right now it’s unclear how we’ll get to Mafinga (this is where the bus ride starts), but I’m sure we’ll either go back to Madisi to pick up Michael or we’ll be picked up from Bukimau. With these plans relayed to us, we now have something fun to look forward to and work towards for the next three weeks; I’m super excited!
With the car packed tight, we left at 5:00pm! Before the trip really began, we made several stops to get gas, air for our ties, some business things, and finally started going at 5:30pm. When we got gas I noticed the unit price was around 4400 shillings for a single liter. After a good bit of conversions that comes out to around $6.40 for a SINGLE gallon of gas (be thankful for $4.00 back in America). During the trip we talked about a whole myriad of things like Johnathan’s upbringing and all of the adventures he had as a kid growing up here in Tanzania. One of the big things he did was run his own businesses by selling data vouchers for phones! He would get someone to run into town and pick up 100,000 shillings worth of vouchers and then sell each voucher for a small mark up for profit.
We also learned how the pool tables work here. Essentially the first person will pay the owner 1,000 shillings (you only pay the owner every 4 or 5 games), then if the next person wants to play, they pay the first person 1,000 shillings. The winner stays on the table and you can see how if you’re really good at pool you can make some decent money!
The drive this time around seemed to be on a completely different route, but it was only the sun being low that made things look so different.
This trip was also a lot more uncomfortable than last time! I chose the middle seat to see out the front, but that meant I did not get to move my legs at all! We eventually stopped at the same spot as last time to get gifts for some people at Bukimau and stretched. Because we were there at Bukimau for such a short time and didn’t get to know our hosts well, we did not have to get them gifts. We stood outside of the car and by this point it was completely dark out! The area was bustling and we all continued our conversation. The point of conversation was Mr. Chesco and all of the computer issues he’s had over the years! Therefore it was completely in character for him for his laptop to be completely messed up as it was. It was quite chilly out and the constant wind only made us feel colder! There were a couple of kids that walked by and called out “mzungo” and from Susan’s advice I replied “wapi?” which means “where?” in Swahili to make them laugh!
Eventually we got back into the car and arrived around 8:00pm. We were greeted by Rozadina and brought all of our stuff into her house! Inside of the main room where we eat, there was a mountain of dried maize and ants coming in to eat it. There was music playing so we got our boogie on and crushed the ants while we danced. Alfred popped by and danced with us for a bit too. Soon enough it was time to eat! For dinner we had yellow rice, peas with potatoes, and an avocado smoothie. I finally got to have peas here and they truly are amazing!
At first I didn’t want to drink the avocado smoothie as I thought it would taste bad, but it ended up being delicious! Johnathan and Hosea came to eat as well, but sat in the main room on couches. My host Joseph came by to say hi and it was great to see him again! Us three talked for a while until Eli’s host took him. I was taken a little while after and went with Joseph with all of my luggage to his house which is only across the road from Roza’s house (Miraclin stays with Roza).
We went into my room and everything was exactly where I had left it!
The room I’m staying in is a lot nicer than Paul’s (no offense to Paul). The bed is not lumpy, there are no rats or pests hanging around the room, no rat poop everywhere, and no obscenely loud music playing! Since I know that I will for sure be here for three weeks, I unpacked my bags and got my room situated! I then sat down and blogged while I listened to the wind rustle the trees outside. One thing I’ve noticed that’s different from Madisi is that the wind here almost never ceases! I felt cozy in my bed and went to sleep. My new life in Bukimau starts now where I have three weeks to complete a project that would regularly take six! Wish me luck!
How exciting to FINALLY be back where you started out - you look genuinely happy and I hope the last 3 weeks are amazing for you!
ReplyDeleteHow great is our GOD! I’m so thankful you made it! Goodbyes are tough. Curious, were you able to remove the tick from the dog? Poor thing. How fun to find an outfit and your belongings right where you left them. All things are possible with GOD. We will be praying for you and that you can complete project.
ReplyDelete🙏🏽