Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there. Myself included. The photo features me in my new FD attire that arrived this week. The hat was bought here to replace one I lost a month or so ago. The sun, as rarely as we have seen it in the recent past, still burns my head quite badly. Rebecca, David, and Oren surprised me with it on Sunday morning. The goggles and wet suit arrived this past Wednesday with some visitors I will talk about later. The suit did not arrive a moment too soon as I could barely stand to get in the pool on Monday and Tuesday as the water temp went down to 60 and is threatening to drop into the high 50s.
So backing up through the week, I have to say that work has definitely slowed up as we move more into the summer months. This is because vacation time starts for people both here and in the MCC headquarters in the US. Our partners are less active as well, by and large, and we are between reporting periods. Sharon, our country rep. is in Ethiopia doing a program evaluation for 3 weeks and I have been left with the job of interim rep. during her absence. Without her and other staff coming and going, the office seems pretty empty. I have spent some time helping our Mennonite Church partner prepare a proposal to renew their work on training health workers to identify skin cancer in people with albinism. I am also trying to get ethical clearance for some qualitative research we are doing to better understand why Maasai women in our maternal and child health program robustly prefer to have deliveries at home rather than go to a facility with a skilled attendant. But other than that, it is pretty slow.
The kids are finishing their last 3 weeks of school and last week was spent with Oren studying for exams that began this Monday. Because this is a British system school, final exams are a huge thing. Oren has an entirely separate exam schedule during the week and has 12 1-2 hour exams between Monday and Friday (2 to 3 per day). It is honestly quite daunting, especially for Rebecca who has needed to help him understand how to revise all the material he has learned over the whole year so he has a chance of remembering at least some of it during the exam. We have no idea how he will do, but I have even more sympathy for the end of the many Harry Potter books that described the Hogwarts kids' anxiety about preparing for exams at the end of the year. Much is at stake.
Despite the slow week in some ways, Wednesday was a big day because we had some long-expected visitors finally arrive from our home church. Kate and James, some friends from our small group in Baltimore, came out to see us and have a little vacation in Tanzania. We were very excited to host them and to get caught up on news from church. (K and J were just starting to date when we left, and it was great to see them so happy and excited to be on this adventure.) They also brought a lot of booty from home (including the wetsuit and goggles) and some birthday presents for Oren (fortunately he does not read this blog.) His birthday is June 29th and we want to be ready. It is also the last day of school for the boys.
This is K and J's first time in Tanzania. We met them at our home after choir practice on Wednesday evening. We had our favorite cabbee pick them up from the airport as this rehearsal was our last before a concert event we were to be part of on Friday. They were quite tired on the first evening, but Rebecca was able to catch up on news with them on Thursday when she took them to the market for fabric to get some outfits tailored here, then on to Coffee Lodge to see some of the handicrafts.
Friday was Eid which is a public holiday in Tanzania. The kids were thrilled to be out of school, but it is a day that is hard to plan around because it is based on the day that the moon is seen by the naked eye by an Imam here, so we are never sure until the night before, what day it will be celebrated. We were hoping it would be Friday, and we all went to the Cultural Heritage Center together to see the arts and crafts. From there we went directly to church for the concert event.
This was quite a spectacle with about a dozen choral and solo 'acts' of sacred and secular music to celebrate love. There were some very impressive musicians including a concert violinist, and a mixture of Swahili and Western soloists and choirs. The biggest contrast was our choir's rendition of excerpts from Vivaldi's mass, (the choir did Gloria and Rebecca and another woman did a beautiful duet Laudamus Te ). This was juxtaposed to two Swahili choirs that did some hauntingly beautiful swahili harmonies. They also came dressed to the 9's and well choreographed. It was really a beautiful evening and we were very happy to have J and K share it with us as James is a music teacher. They loved the Swahili choirs especially. I have posted a brief excerpt on the bottom of the page.
Saturday, J and K, left for a 5 day camping safari. They are currently somewhere in Tarangire, the Serengetti, or the Ngoronogoro crater. Our family had a Saturday at home studying with Oren. On Sunday I was a Sunday school teacher while Rebecca did a Baptism for a young man with quite a testmony of forgiveness for an abusive family situation. We went to see Incredibles 2 in the afternoon and had a quiet evening at home that night.
That brings us back to Father's Day where we started. This week is the long slog through exams for Oren and we have already spent two evening cramming for the next set. Both Oren and the parents will be happy when they are over.
Oops, the power went out again. We have been having electrical problems in our house almost weekly. That will make tomorrow morning's 5am wake up that much harder. Wish us luck!
One of the Swahili choirs
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