Our housing - Leah

The family we are staying with are very nice.  The father, Eglah, is the drummer for the New Life Band.  The mother, Lulu, works in an accounting position and goes to school for more accounting education.  She goes 7 nights a week and gets home about 730 or 8pm every night.  On weekends she has discussion group all day Saturday and class Saturday night.  There are 2 kids - Irene is 7 and Ian is 2.
They have a very different way of living.  Their house is built in between 2 stores.  They actually have a dirt area that they can drive their car into and it is protected by the stores on either side and has a gate that closes.  The front of the house is at the end of the drive.  This is considered their 'yard' where the kids play and laundry hangs to dry.

Their home is nice,  but very small.  They don't have much furniture or chachkis laying around. They do have a tv and nice entertainment system.  They watch the Tanzanian equivalent of C-span most of the time.  It is very loud!

Living Room

The kitchen is very narrow.  They have a small 2 burner stove that sits on a table right inside the doorway.  They do have a decent sized refrigerator/freezer.  Pretty much any food that gets stored has to be stored inside it to keep rats and bugs out.  Yes, I said rats. They have rats and it is acceptable.  Lulu (the mom) told me that they were all afraid of cats so didn't get one (give me a cat any day even though I don't care for them).  They actually ate through the straps of E's backpack one night when we left it in the living room. There is a sink at the end of their kitchen.  There is no such thing as a hot water heater so water for dishes and showers must be heated on the stove. They do have a small microwave oven, but no actual oven.

Kitchen

Meals are served on a small table in the dining room off of the living room.  All dishes and pots and pans are stored in this room.  You fill your plate at this little table and eat in the living room.  The kids have small chairs that they use in this room.

Dining Room - china cabinet with all dishes and pots and pans

This family does have a toilet, many only have holes in the ground. Many places you go do not have functioning toilets at all.  The school that I am at has toilets but they haven't flushed since I have been here.  Toilet paper is an option that most people go without.  We have learned to carry it with us everywhere we go.  We also make sure to take advantage of bathrooms where we know they will have a toilet. The size of this room is about the size of an airplane bathroom.

Toilet

Showering is always interesting - as I said before, there is no hot water so we have to boil water then add cold water to the wash tub. We then use pitchers to pour the water over our heads.  When I got here and asked for towels we were given 1 small hand towel for both of us to share.  I saw that Lulu used a Kanga to wrap in before and after showers and mentioned that E and I would like to go shopping and get one.  She loaned us each one.  We can use those to help us dry off a bit also.  This is also a very small room.

Shower

Our room is decent sized.  It has a bed, a chair, and a small table in it. The window to our room is open and mostly screened only. There is a door to another house about 2 feet away from our window so it can get very loud sometimes.

Our Bedroom

The view out our bedroom window

School - Leah

Ever since we have gotten here we have been stared at and pointed to.  Since we are staying with a local family and not the expected tourist in the expected tourist locations.  I think that makes it harder for people to understand. We are definitely the wrong color for this area.  I have noticed and just accepted it.  Yesterday E started her new school.  She was so excited to be there.  We went to her new room and got introduced to her class and her new teacher.  Everything seemed fine.  Her new school is by far the best building I have seen yet in Arusha.  Very modern and clean.

New Vision School

Inside Courtyard

 Her Classroom

Shortly after we left she noticed that anyone walking by the room would point and stare or laugh.  She started crying because she then noticed that she was different from the rest.  Up until this point it hadn't really sunk in.  She is so blind to difference and aware of similarities. Add to that she hated the food.  They had porridge for snack and beans and rice for lunch.  They have rules that you have to eat everything on your plate so she gagged it down but it wasn't pretty.  Then just to throw fuel on the fire she saw several kids spanked with a stick.  This kid is so empathetic that this just did her in.  She got off the bus just sobbing and saying she doesn't want to go back.
Eglah, our host, and I tried to talk to her. We called the teacher and he thought that she was just homesick and wasn't aware of the pointing.  We talked to her about challenges and that people have to learn that she is like them and she needs to give them a chance.  We talked to Karen, our coordinator, on the phone. She also tried to talk to her.  There is no budging this kid. In reality, it is hard on me to be stared at all the time and I am an adult.  How can we expect a 9 year old to be able to handle it?
We decided to have her come to my school with me for a few days and make sure to point out the people staring at us.  Let her know that they don't know what to do with us.
Today she came with me to my school.  My school is much poorer than her school.  My room has no electricity (will write about this later), no doors, no windows.  Lots of mud and broken glass.  She was so much happier.  I had her bring a book and her journal today.  She sat in the back of the room and it looked like she was reading. She was actually taking notes about what I was talking about.  She actually took good notes and asked some really good questions about what we talked about after the class.
I think I have decided that she will continue to come with me.  I didn't like leaving her that far away from where I was teaching. Being in a different country and such a different environment I prefer her to be right with me.  I will see how the next few days go before I decide for sure.

6th Day's a Charm-Elizabeth

(I am sorry, just found this post of E's from last week, I forgot to publish)

Africa is great! It is a lot like America in so many ways! But it is also very different.We have to use little plastic pitcher for showering and we have to boil the water,put it in a bucket then dip the pitcher in the bucket than pour the water over our body. The shower is very small it is 2 by 3 ft :( the house also has many rats.But other than rats so far the only animals I have seen were:goats,cows stray dogs,and chickens.Speaking of chickens guess what our neighbors have.If you guessed rats your right (that's where we get ours from) but they have chickens too so every night we hear bawwk- bawwk-bawk bawk!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


School is also hard people pointed,stared,and laughed at me.Their snack and lunch were also bad,we HAD to eat everything. We ate porridge,rice,and beans then that night I was sick and threw up. But now I'm in mommy's class and learning laboratory science!!!!! It is a lot funner than I thought it would be!!!!!!
But I am sure we will have much more fun to come!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

First Days - Leah

We arrived in the middle of the night after 26 hours of traveling.  (A note here, we really enjoyed Turkish Airlines - lots of little amenities and great staff).  We got through the Visa process just fine then through customs.  When we arrived to our luggage 2 gentlemen picked it up for us.  Someone started asking us questions.  Thankfully one of the members of the New Life Band was there to pick us up with our hosts and was able to get it all "straightened out".
Since it was middle of the night we couldn't see much then on Friday we just stayed in the house all day recuperating from the trip.
Saturday we finally went out with Lulu to explore and go get groceries and Elizabeth's school uniform.  I love visiting grocery stores in places I to.  I think you can learn so much about a culture from their local grocers.  Saturday afternoon I went to see the school that I will be teaching at.  I got to meet a few of the teachers that teach there and the students that will be in my class.

Here is a picture of the outside of the school

Here is a picture looking in my clasroom

 The inside of the classroom

As you see from the picture, there is no electricity.  They are bringing a generator into my classroom to help run the projector.  That is a whiteboard on the far wall.  A few years ago a paint company donated a lot of whiteboard paint to the project so many of the classrooms have them.  This building is a continuing work in progress.  As you can see many of the rooms have no windows.  I find it kind of nice because there is a nice cross ventilation of the classroom. I was told that tomorrow there will be tables and desks.  

We have not been to Elizabeth's school yet.  We will get her enrolled tomorrow.  Here is a picture of her in her uniform with Irene!

Today we went to a Christian Music Concert at a local church.  It was a lot of fun.  Even though we have no idea what they said most of the time we definitely got the idea!  There was a lot of dancing and singing by the members of the audience and our host and one other from the New Life Band received awards for their service to Christian Music.  

These are the first few days.  There are a lot of thoughts running through my head but those will have to wait until a different night.

First Post - Elizabeth

OMG!!!!!!!!!    I'm so Exited!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (and scared ) But mostly exited.


                                          THIS IS WHERE I'M STAYING...


                             





I'm staying in Africa for 3 months, We are taking 2 planes,the 1st plane trip goes to Turkey,Then the 2nd flight goes to MT Kilimanjaro.I am going to school at New Vision school.1 of my biggest fear is that being the animal lover I am is that I will pet an animal with rabies and get it.But if I do we will have an emergency flight.

How this all came to be - Leah

As you all know, Elizabeth and I are spending our summer in Africa.  I have told people that we will be blogging about our experiences and that we would share them.  I have decided that rather than 2 blogs, we would do just one and we would put the name of whichever one of us was writing it on the title of the post.  I think that this will be easier for both of us.  I keep getting asked about how this came to be. I truly believe that God had a hand in it and wanted to share why.  

In November 2012 I was volunteering at Orchard Ridge's Fair Trade Sale.  I was hanging out in the Vendor Room just to make sure that vendors had snacks and keeping things clean. I was supposed to be done but there was a spot that no one was covering so I decided to do it.   Karen Klemp from Hope 2 Others in Sun Prairie came in during that hour.  She was talking to someone else about her work in Tanzania and I mentioned that I had always been interested in Mission Medical work but no one ever wanted lab support.  She looked at me and told me that she needed a lab person right then.  We talked a little more. They were planning a clinic and needed someone from the lab side that could help with the design.  Then she needed someone to go over and teach people to work in the lab and to open the lab and get it started.

As we talked I was really interested, but  I told her that I could never leave Elizabeth alone that long, she assured me that she could come with me and go to school. I said I would never be free during the school year, she assured me that the groups usually went during summer months. I was very excited about the prospect but also very nervous. This was way outside my comfort zone. I told her I would consider it and let her know. I went home and talked to Gary about it.  It was a really cool opportunity, but came at a price.   I pretty much had decided that this was just too much and that it would be a huge undertaking and probably wouldn't be possible. 

A few days later I was online with a friend of mine who was talking me through downloading podcasts to listen to in the car.  She worked me through it and the first group I came to was Ted Talks.  I love Ted Talks! I immediately clicked on in and the first one to pop up was about Africa.  I told her this and she said "knock, knock".  We many times had talked about how often God knocks but we are too busy to really listen.  

That next Sunday I was in church and Winton was giving his sermon.  During it he asked how can we really grow while in our comfort zone?  He talked about what it takes to step out of our comfort zones and that everyone should.  Knock, knock...

At that time I decided that Elizabeth and I would be going to Africa!

                                            

Over the next year and a half I slowly got life ready to take off for the summer to Africa.  There was a lot of planning that had to take place and a lot of work to get done.  I had to try to figure out what would be logistically possible to teach.  What type of lab equipment I could take with me or I could get there.  How do you teach when people don't have books, there are no projectors, and the electricity sometimes works?  Here we are 2 weeks away and I am still asking myself these very questions.  

Elizabeth and I will be leaving on May 21, 2014 and coming home on August 4, 2014 (yes, a little over 10 weeks - talk about immersion travel).  The first 7 weeks or so we are going to  be in Arusha and staying with a member of The New Life Band and his family.  They have a 7 year old daughter Irene and a 2 year old son Ian.  

                                               
Arusha is very near Mt. Kilimanjaro.  During our time there we are going to be able to go on a safari, and attend a traditional African Wedding.  We are also hoping to do a one day climb of Mt Kilimanjaro.  I hear that there is a really nice one day walk that ends at some amazing waterfalls.  While in Arusha I will be teaching in a school and will be covering basic topics like Anatomy and Physiology, Basic Lab Skills, Specimen Collection, Hematology, Microbiology, Parasitology, Urinalysis.  The clinic that was suppose to be opening there this summer has not been started yet so we are hoping to train people that can get jobs in local pay for service clinics until this one opens.

The final 3 weeks we will be in Dar Es Salaam on the coast of the Indian Ocean. Hope 2 Others was given a clinic there that is already built.  I will spend the first week setting it up and getting it ready and the next 2 weeks working in it with the people I have trained and working out kinks in the workflow. While there I have promised Elizabeth that we will dip our toes into the Indian ocean (hopefully do some snorkeling).  We also are going to be spending one weekend on Zanzibar Island.  

It is going to be a crazy ride.  I have told many people that I feel that I am being called to do this.  I don't know why, and I am not sure when I come back I will know why either.  I don't know if it is for me, or for Elizabeth.  I may not know for 10 years why this has all unfolded around me but here we go!