What a Week!

For many of you, the World Cup is what you are excited about (and rightfully so. I mean, Cape Verde Islands being in the World Cup is reason enough to watch!), but this week I am excited because we had guests come to visit our little school and hang out with us for a few days! Last year a friend of mine contacted me about when I would be in Tanzania as she was coming for a mission trip (which was actually her fourth time coming to our beautiful country). Unfortunately, our trips did not coincide last summer. But this year…they DID! So not only did she come to visit, but she brought a friend and coworker along for the ride. They spent the week before coming to us on Kome Island which is located in Mwanza region in Lake Victoria which is an area of Tanzania that I have not visited yet. They worked with a group called “Twelve21Global” which was founded by a man named Yusuph Emmanuel who is from Tanzania but lives in Texas now. (Go check out what his organization does; it is really amazing!) After finishing their work on Kome, Maddie and Brittany flew to Arusha to spend time with us. On Wednesday we toured our Namayana Nursery School as part of “The Namayana Project”, and they were able to see what we have done over the past five years. Then we planted some bushes and plants in front of the classrooms to help beautify the environment for the students and teachers. Finally, we met with the church elders and had lunch with them. It was such a wonderful time of fellowship and fun!

After the tour of Namayana, we went to visit my little plot of land that I purchased a few years ago. I am still working on saving the money to fence it in and build a little house, but I am hoping to get started on that this year! While we were there, we were able to meet my jerani, neighbor, next door. His name is John Twee, and he is a lovely baba with a beautiful home and farm. He wanted us to stay and have chai with him, but we had to get to the Maasai Market in Arusha, but he assured me that keeps a watch out for me and my property. I am very thankful to have a jerani like him! At the Maasai market, Maddie and Brittany shopped and bargained. I didn’t plan to buy anything, but a sweet mama was selling Brittany some beaded rings, and I really liked them, so I bought some also. I had to get home by 7:30 that evening because I had a Zoom meeting for a school assignment. Online school is awesome because you can work from anywhere in the world as long as you have internet access!

On Thursday we went to Tarangire National Park with some of the students and the staff. We had a fantastic time! We were able to see two lionesses, water buffalo, bull elephants, zebras, wildebeest, baboons, monkeys (blue vervet), mongoose, warthogs, impalas, giraffes, and water bucks. The grasses were still very high, though, and it seemed like we didn’t see as many as we normally do, but everyone was happy that we saw a lot of different kinds of animals. On Friday we met a friend of theirs who had been a translator for them on Kome Island for coffee before we flew out to Zanzibar for the weekend! If you have never been to Zanzibar, it needs to be on your bucket list. This is my third visit. I always stay along Jambiani Beach which is simply gorgeous. Watching the Indian Ocean go so far out during low tide and then come right up to the seawall at high tide is incredible. We had planned to go watch the sunset on Saturday, but it was raining and cloudy, so we settled in for the night with pizza and Netflix (ha ha! Maddie got it to work. I still haven’t turned the tv on in my apartment, so who knows if I can get it to work or not?!). Sunday, they got to tour Stone Town with another one of their friends before leaving to go back to America, and I flew back to Arusha to return to life here. All in all, it was a great week!