More Visitors and A Busy Weekend

This will need to be short and sweet because I am behind schedule in getting a blog up every Sunday night. It is already late Monday and thanks to the kids' lack of sleepiness I am just beginning this at 10pm. We did have a reasonably good family game of Carcassone though, so it is not a complete loss to be up this late.

Greg, Beth Anne, and me, Woodstock '78

Working backwards, I was remiss on Sunday because we had our second visitors drop by on Sunday. Although they did not come to the house, I went out and met some of my old high school classmates. Some of you who are reading this either went to or are familiar with Woodstock School, a boarding school in the foothills of the Himalayas where I went to 12th grade. It is truly as magical as Hogwarts and our graduating class of about 60 has stayed in close contact these past 40 or so years, thanks to Facebook.

So about a month ago, Beth Anne Wray and her husband Greg Wray got in contact with me to say they would be coming to Arusha on Safari and wanted to know if we had time to have dinner with them on Sunday. For logistical reasons I ended up meeting them alone and had a delightful evening of catching up on several decades. They stayed at a place not far from us called Onsea House and if anyone is thinking of doing a classy safari in Tanzania, you might want to find a tour company that books it. The place has a gorgeous view and the food, prepared by a French chef, is fabulous.

It would have been nice for Rebecca and I to go together but that would have entailed bringing the kids and we had already asked them to make many sacrifices this weekend already. Earlier on Sunday we finally were able to attend the Arusha Mennonite Church with our country rep Sharon. MCC has an ongoing partnership with the Tanzanian Mennonite Church and it was important to fellowship with them and to greet the chair bishop. I have been to many local African services and this one, true to form, lasted over 3 hours. We knew we would be asking a lot of the kids as we were promptly escorted to the front row where we were quite conspicuous in everything we did.

Both Rebecca and I did reasonably well in introducing ourselves and greeting the church in Swahili: Tunawasalamia katika jina la bwana wetu Jesu Christo! We said a bit about ourselves and began and ended with the obligatory Bwana Jesus Asifiwe! (The Lord Jesus be praised.) The kids for their part did very well by not complaining about sitting in the service the whole time and understanding nothing. Oren even said he liked the singing and dancing, especially the very active kids' choir. I have about 3 seconds of video of that because my camera malfunctioned. We greeted the Bishop afterwards as well as the WOMAN who preached powerfully (I was impressed by that, since women aren't officially ordained in the Tanzanian Mennonite Church.)

After the service we went to get some gelato which is now available at a mall close to the kids' school. It was very strange to get such authentic Italian gelato in Tanzania (sorry, no pictures), but good for a special treat / incentive for exemplary behavior.

Continuing to work backwards through the weekend, Saturday was also a big day for us as we paid a call on an old friend from Burundi days named Wilfred Mlay. Wilfred and his wife Faith are Tanzanian and both retired now. He used to be a regional head of World Vision and was a very active part of the Great Lakes Initiative (GLI), a ministry started by Duke University to bring influential Christian leaders in the church together in Eastern and Central Africa to reflect on the Biblical call to be ambassadors of reconciliation. I had written several times about it in my Burundi blog in the past.


Faith and Wilfred live about 2 hours away in town near Moshi, in the western foothills of Mount Kilimanjaro. I was really looking forward to seeing the mountain in all its splendor, but it was covered in clouds. I tried to take a photo and you can see some bits of it, but not the whole thing. We still had a lovely time with them and enjoyed catching up after not seeing each other for several years. The kids showed great patience on Saturday as the adults pretty much just enjoyed adult conversation, and were glad for some uninterrupted down time when we got home that night.

NDI Director and Finance Officer

The week itself was quite routine, which was nice. One exception was my first solo trip out of Arusha. I drove to a town called Karatu outside the Ngorongoro crater to meet with our local Maasai partner NDI that will be implementing the maternal and child health project. I drove up early in the morning, and it took about 2 hours to get there. I spent the middle of the day with them, then headed back to Arusha in the late afternoon. I was home by 5PM. Karatu was a real reminder that tourism is a big part of Tanzania's economy and it seemed they had about 100 safari style hotels up there. Some were quite cheap but others looked extremely high end. I am hoping to see the project we are starting, beginning in the month of November, so we are trying to get a lot done to make sure it gets off to a good start.

Rebecca writing here: One final special occasion came at the end of the week as David's year four class led their primary assembly on Friday. I took an early lunch break to go visit. The kids' school, St. Constantine's International School, actually has its roots in some Greek Orthodox monarch's initiative (not sure of all the details). The four school houses are named after ancient Greek city-states, the school cook is Greek, and there is a definite emphasis on classicism in their education. In any case, it's a big deal to study the ancient Greeks from every angle, and in the past two weeks they have been studying democracy, as one of the school ideals. David's class prepared a few funny skits contrasting authoritarian government with democracy. 

At the end of the assembly, David's teacher Ms. Peacock (no kidding) appointed him and another boy to act out a morality play, contrasting "Give up Greg" and "Try again Tony." I guess that was in line with the next emphasis on changing one's mindset. David did well, reading the part of Tony, and I'm glad to see him having positive moments at school. He also says that his new weekly piano lessons at school are his favorite class (until he has to practice the left hand!! when he sounds a little more like Greg) I'm glad that he's still enjoying music instruction here; it was hard to see him give up the opportunities he had with the Maryland State Boychoir. 


I will also note that I have been so happy to see Oren laughing with friends almost every afternoon when I go to pick the kids up from school. His two best mates are Abraham (Ah-bra-ham) and Abraham (AA-bra-ham). One of them is always forgetting the name of the other, go figure. Still no after school get togethers though, and Oren is beginning to notice their absence. So we'd really appreciate prayer for at least one other 12 year old boy in town  who would be a good friend to Oren, and who is hopefully part of a family who could be good friends to all the rest of us.

Bonus video: 3 seconds of the childrens' choir at the Mennonite Church