A.M.L.N.F. (Asante Mungu Leo Ni Furahidei)

Saying goodbye.

Learning the liturgy.

Hanging out with the neighboring village's pastor during the sermon on PH's chair.

The calves wanted to hear the sermon too.

Bibi wa Kidege (Kidege's grandma).

The choir.

The women singing before church.

So many funny face in one picture.

Newborn calf

Who would've thought that we'd run into camels in Tanzania!

Looks like a scene from the Sahara... except one the cisel plantation.

(note: a new blog was also added earlier this afternoon - check it out)

I would like to add to my last post before I start a new one. Sylvester (one of the maintenance guys here) is back after a break to take a driving course in Dar Es Salaam. I am so grateful for his presence here… not only is he always smiling but he also is so very patient and persistent with letting me practice my Swahili. I swear I could talk to him for hours. Today while I was talking with him, Cho (one of the Korean men) came over and started to talk to us. Cho is such a great person. One day I smiled and said ‘habari’ to him and since then he has always made a point of saying hi and attempting to talk to me. Today we were the only ones at tea so we talked about all sorts of things through a combination of broken Swahili and English. This weekend the long course students are finished so they will all be leaving and going out to their work sites – it will be very lonely here without them. But I am just grateful for everyone here who is patient and willing to help me practice my Swahili. Where I used to think only in Spanish or English, now every once in awhile I find myself searching my brain for the Spanish word because it has been replaced by the Swahili word. Granted this is only with very simple words… more complex words still come out before I can think of the Swahili equivalent.

This is where the title for the post comes from (Thank God today is Friday).
Now to the update from yesterday – we went to Kidege’s village. He said he went home about a month ago (he’s been home a lot more recently than the 4 months that is has been since I spent time at home). We were able to meet his father on the way into the village, however he had to take a child to the hospital so he couldn’t be in the village with us today. We got there and had tea and Cassava in Kidege’s home. Then we headed off to the tree under which church is held. We waited for quite some time and eventually the kids decided to go for a walk around with Kidege. We got a nice following of kids and just wandered. We stopped for awhile to look at a mother cow and her newborn calf that was learning to stand and then also at the building site for a water pump that is currently about half built. We slowly headed back and waited again while the women sang before church started. The service started and soon enough the sun had moved and the Americans were no longer in the shade so we moved. When we did that, one of the women came over and gave me her kanga to use to keep the flies away. She asked if I had bites all over my legs – my legs make me look kind of like I have the chicken pox since I have so many bug bites. It will be a true miracle if I don’t get malaria with how many bites I’ve gotten so far. The service continued and when it was done we did the usual circle for shaking hands. Then we headed back to Kidege’s home for some rice for lunch and then we came back to LJS.The visit made me notice how people practice religion here. PH had told us before stories that many people will sing religious songs at night as a type of devotion. But I noticed that when people go to church they take it very seriously, but not to the point that they don’t have fun with it. People don’t always know the liturgy but they sing out what they do know. When people pray they tend to fold their hands and bow their heads down – it looks like a very traditional, submissive posture for praying. The songs they sing are done with so much passion. People listen very intently to PH’s sermons – they aren’t sleeping or ‘resting their eyes’ during the sermons. And just think, services here last several hours!
Overall, I’ve noticed that religion is taken very seriously here and it is more than attending a one hour service. Prayer is done with purpose and without distraction. Religion is faith. It is real. And people embrace it. Amen.
Peace.