“Don’t be a human doing, be a human being!”
After several hours of contemplation, I finally decided to get out of bed at 7:30. I got myself together just in time for a great breakfast of Mama Toni’s porridge and, to our delight, French toast. Edward returned to us safely, and though we were sorry to hear of a death in the village we were also very grateful to hear the good news of Angela’s, Edward’s wife, improving health. We decided on job assignments and headed off to our first day of work as Global Volunteers.
Kayli and Danielle went to the clinic where they oversaw the store closet being organized and treatment of several patients, including an unexpected 80-year old man. I went with Marcia to the school where we observed an English lesson about the family taught by Mr. Maketa and a math lesson taught by Ms. Msue, who were both newcomers to the school and town just like us. One of the goals we set for ourselves was to reflect on our talents. I have now confirmed that teaching is not mine, but I enjoy very much watching and learning from Marcia and I hope to one day find my calling just as she has with her students. Greg and Sam hoped to do construction work on the headmaster’s house but unfortunately the mason did not arrive. However, they made themselves useful to Rachel in the library sorting past examination papers and then joining Marcia and me in the Form 1 classroom.
After our morning work we met Moses, Samuel, Paulo, and Emanuel, ages 7 and 8, and we loved playing games with them – especially jumping through hoops in the mud. Maybe Tanzanians should look to a future in long-jumping instead of soccer…
Then we had a great lunch of African foods, including the Tanzanian national dish, ugali. Edward made us laugh with talk of baby and bamboo juice factories. After lunch we played cards amongst ourselves while it rained. We gave Ben the victory hoping from his friendship in exchange, but no such luck. Hakuna matata, he will come around eventually. When we began to feel stir crazy and the rain had let up, we played with a soccer ball in front of the house with Freigo (10) and Stefan (6) while mama and baba looked on. Then Ben led the girls on a hike to the waterfalls. Walking through the village we got to practice our greeting, ‘Kamwene,’ and got laughed at a lot. Greg and Marcia also took a walk and visited the pub and heard and saw the bus fly by.
We shared an excellent meal of pasta and guacamole. We shared a lot today in fact and I feel we are getting to know each other very well in a very short time. We are very excited to see what tomorrow brings.
-Jennie G.
0 comments:
Post a Comment