by Sarah Logan
Tearfund is a Christian charity which seeks to raise awareness for world issues, speaking out for the poor, and speaking out for justice for those who haven't a voice.
Tearfund has many partners all over the world. They provide financial and practical support for local community projects which are already established. As part of this mission, Tearfund's Transform Programme sends volunteers to some of these partners. The teams of volunteers work at projects for 4-6 weeks on short term summer missions. Transform teams have up to 14 volunteers from all over the UK, and sometimes further afield. Teams do not require people with specialist skills or qualifications, but simply evangelical Christians who are willing to have a go at almost anything, and have a passion for the poor and who have 4-6 weeks of their summer to spare. Oh, and about £1600 as well!
This summer I took part in the Tearfund Transform programme for the second time. The process to participate began in January with a basic application form and a few references.
'…I call you to free those who are wrongly imprisoned and to stop oppressing those who work for you. Treat them fairly and give them what they earn. I want you to share your food with the hungry and welcome poor wanderers into your homes. Give clothes to those who need them, and do not hide from those who need help.' - Isaiah 58 v 6, 7
The Lord looked and was displeased to find there was no justice. He was amazed to see that no one had intervened to help the oppressed.' - Isaiah 59 v 15, 16
I was offered at place as a team leader on a team to Tanzania. Tearfund sent 4 teams to Tanzanian partners this summer. I was placed on the Imbaseni team, based in a remote village about 25km from Arusha in the Northern part of the country.
Arusha is the 'safari gateway' for Tanzania, the first stop for tourists who wish to visit the famous wildlife reserves of the Serengetti, the Maasai Mara and Ngorongoro crater. It is also the gateway for those who are arriving back from the gruelling 6 day hike to the peak of Mount Kilimanjaro - Africa's highest mountain.
The team was partnered with Scripture Union Tanzania who have a centre 25km from Arusha in the village of Imbaseni. Imbaseni Centre has an ambitious vocational training centre which provides education for locals who don't have enough money to get education in the towns, and who have some connection with a church. They can train in masonry, electrics, joinery, vehicle mechanics, secretarial skills and basic computing. Some have the opportunity to learn to drive using the centre vehicles. All students at the Imbaseni Vocational Training School receive formal recognised qualifications.
The centre facilitates many Scripture Union camps, with children and adults coming from all over Tanzania. These camps often have about 250 attending them.
The centre has accommodation for an undefined number of people…that is, it has accommodation for as many as turn up. If arriving on camp, you just need to be willing to share your bed with a couple of others!! It wasn't unusual to see kids scrambling into the 'top bunk' which is about 7ft off the ground with two more beds above it. No ladder, just climb.
It has a dining room and a conference centre, both of which are always in full use during camps.
The centre also has a milling machine for use by the women in the local community.
The Team
We were students, designers, lawyers, teachers and health promotion officers from England and Scotland. I flew the only Northern Irish flag on this team!! We were a mixed bunch of 9 girls and 2 (brave) fellas aged 18 - 28.
Accommdation
At this point I have to admit that we had what Tearfund terms as 'fairly posh' accommodation. Often teams find that the house the partner said they would be living in is, as stated, a house, it just doesn't have any windows or doors, or beds or grass mats.
Our posh accommodation meant that we had a house, with our own cooks, and beds. We had some living space too! We did have a shower and toilet in the bathroom…it's just a shame that the shower wasn't plumbed in and the toilet could only be flushed once a day!!
We were living within the centre compound. It was everybody's dream location…100 yards from where we were working!
Food
Being provided with our own cooks, we were very well provided for. African people place so much importance on guests and their standard of hospitality. Meals were large, and often very heavy.
Locals have a maize-based diet. Maize thrives in the hot humid climate.
The staple of most diets is a maize based dish known locally as Ugali. Think sticky rice or semolina, with a plasticine-like consistency. High in carbohydrates, less high in flavour!
We had two hot meals each day. Usually two of rice, ugali, pasta or potatoes with lots of vegetables (we still aren't quite sure what it was…a variation on spinach perhaps?!), a meaty stew known as Mchuzi, and sometimes chicken (kuku) or fish.
Snacks were provided often…it seemed as though we worked around our meal times. We looked forward to these breaks however…Chai (sweet milky tea), Tanzanian coffee, or hot cocoa, with as many Mandazi (deep fried doughnuts) or samosas as we could possibly eat!!
Again, our food was very posh compared to that of other teams. Another Tanzanian team had boiled cabbage and bread three times a day!
The Work
The team were told that we would be making bricks, doing other practical works and some teaching in local schools.
On arrival we found that funding for the 'other practical works' had not been received, so we spent three weeks making bricks. We worked alongside the masonry class from the vocational training school. It seemed that our first day of work was quite a spectacle for them…every local person turned up to watch the 'mzungo builders' - the white builders!
The bricks were made by mixing seven barrows of volcanic rock with a bag of cement and 4 buckets of water. Then we shovelled and mixed at a pace before the centre of the mass hardened!! It was a good work out for the new muscles we were finding!! Each bag of cement made about 40 cement blocks of about 25kg. At least that was the theory!
We were also teaching in two local schools. A privately funded primary school and a government controlled secondary school.
The experience of each school was very different. The primary school was about 30 minutes walking from where we stayed. It had small classes of about 15 or 20. The total number enrolled at the school was 50.
The principal and his wife looked after many of the children who attended the school - about 70% were orphans. Only as small number were local children who afforded the fees to attend. It was an English medium school. We were asked to teach the children English.
July marks the start of the school year in Tanzania, and we found that many of the children we were expected to teach had never been exposed to English - we were teaching their classes on the first week of their school life! It was encouraging to find that some of the older children were able to understand us enough to explain to the youngest in the class.
The secondary school was much more structured. It was a government controlled school. We were asked to teach English classes, although sometimes we found that this meant we were allowed to teach the technology class or maths class in English!!
Classes here started at 8am with assembly at 7.45am. As teachers we were also expected to be present at assembly. This involved repeated choruses of the national anthem 'Tanzania, Tanzania!' and some canings of the badly behaved the day before. Sometimes badly behaved simply meant that they refused the porridge offered during lunch. At this school the enrolment was about 850, and school days took place in a morning session and an afternoon session to accommodate all the pupils. Some classes took place in unbuilt classrooms - strategically placed where the teacher could stand out of the heat of the sun in the shade of a tree!
On our final day of teaching at these schools, we were all invited back to say our farewells. At the secondary school a special assembly was called. Suddenly, 850 children appeared in perfectly straight rows in front of us where we had a final rendition of 'Tanzania, Tanzania!' and a ritual caning. This was the most difficult situation we faced…how much gratitude should we show at such an exhibiton?! We were presented with flowers and went on our way.
At the primary school, the children had been kept behind after classes so they could greet us. During the week coming up to this, the teachers had been returning from the school telling us stories of how the children had not had a porridge break. This porridge break was often the only meal the children would receive each day. It was a very poor school in the middle of a poor community.
Arriving at the school that day we were ushered by the children into the classroom, where a table was beautifully set with many pots of food and sodas. We sat at the 'top table' as we were thanked by the children for the teaching they had received. Then these starving children sat and watched us eat the food which we had been served. I will never forget looking along that table at the faces of the girls who had taught at this school, watching the tears roll down their cheeks, knowing that the school could not afford this gesture, knowing that these children in front of us had starved to provide this for us, and recalling the delight of the children when they were given simple gifts such as pencils.
Africans take huge pride in their hospitality.
We attended a number of different churches. Two were Anglican churches and two were a denomination known as 'Calvary Assemblies of God.'
Services were typically 4 hours long, with lots of singing and dancing and 3 sermons. In a cramped space, on a wobbly bench, this often seemed much longer!
For the first 3 weeks we attended churches in Arusha. These 'city services' were quite western, some were English speaking and some were Swahili. The church always provided a translator. It seemed that Mzungo's - white people - often attended these churches.
Our final experience of church was much different to the other services we had attended in Arusha We attended a local village church which spoke only Swahili and some of the local 'Meru' dialect. We took David, our own translator, on this occasion. When we arrived we received a warm welcome and breakfast. This stood us in good stead for the 5 hour service we were about to endure!
After the service, 3 sermons and 3 offerings later, we went outside where people had gathered in a circle. Then began a ritual which amazed us all and has changed my attitude towards church giving. Those people in the congregation who could not afford to contribute to the offerings, had brought whatever produce they did have, whether it be firewood or a mere bag of rice, and proceeded to auction it off so that they could contribute to the offerings of that day. I cannot imagine such an event in a western church…do we take financial contributions as seriously as we should?
We were then provided with another large feast, made by the people in the congregation. Local women had stitched together their 'khangas' - skirts - to construct an enclosure which would shield us from the heat of the sun and from the eyes of passers by. We were seated at the 'top table' again and served up a meal of rice, pilau, chicken, pasta, nyama na ndizi (banana and meat stew), and various other delicacies. We were not expecting to see the entire congregation carrying in their pews and benches and sit in front of us while we ate. Again, another uncomfortable experience with many dilemmas! Should we eat it all to show our gratitude - the common practise - or are we expected to leave some so that everyone else can eat too?! We were assured by our host from the Imbaseni centre that it was expected that we would eat it all, so having squeezed in every last morsel we thought we'd done a good job.
No one had yet explained to us that such occasions were likened to a Western wedding feast. As such, after a meal we would provide cake. On African occasions such as these the 'cake' is goat. It is brought in at the end of the meal, whole, and presented to the guests. The hosts would then carve it and serve it to us. And again, we were assured that we would be expected to eat it all. Not the invitation we wanted to hear! Should this be a suggestion for our next church lunch?!
Maasai people
Thankfully the church lunch had not been our first introduction to eating goat. The day before was spent on a traditional Maasai boma - a homestead. This tribe had become friends with our Scripture Union host, and it was his third visit to the boma. In Maasai tradition this signified that we were friends of the tribe. In honour of the occasion we were presented with a very live goat, which was to be our lunch. Somehow I now appreciate that there are occasions when it's better not to know where your food comes from!!
It was a typical African experience. Sitting in the heat of the afternoon sunshine, petting a goat and looking grateful whilst telling the tribesmen, 'Yes, the meat on this goat looks wonderful - that looks like a wonderful meal!' - another moral dilemma? Do we offend the tribe by saying it's no good and saving the goat? Or do we agree that's it's a wonderful specimen, the meat will be great, thus sending the goat to it's demise?! Having been with a Maasai and having been told a little of their amazing history and stories of hunting and survival, we chose to agree with everything and avoid a show of their spear skills on ourselves!
Having watched the slaughter and the gutting and the cooking of our bleating companion, we were determined to eat and enjoy!
We were shown the territories of the tribe by the young men of the tribe. They were 14 -16 years old, wear black and paint their faces as a symbol of holiness after their circumcision. They stay outside the boma and herd the animals for three months, to prove their hunting abilities and that they are capable of caring for the tribes animals.
After our magnificent lunch, we had a tribal forum with the elder of the boma, their laidan - the 'king' - and the mother of the laidan, the only woman who was allowed to be present during the formalities of the day. This was an opportunity for us to ask them questions about the Maasai people, and for them to ask us questions about our culture. It also turned into their great crusade to find a western wife, to add to the other wives they had!!
After the forum, the formalities over, we were able to go and meet the women and children of the tribe. This was an amazing time - these women and children rarely left the boma, and had hardly ever seen mzungo - white people - before. The children were thrilled with gifts of sweets and the women, many widows, gratefully received gifts of bread and sugar.
My time in Tanzania was wonderful. I have attempted to give you a small insight into the many aspects of life there, and the experiences of the team. So much happened and we saw so much that we will continue to remember things we have seen, things we have done, the people we met and the stories we shared.
We hope that as a team we were able to impact the lives of those we lived and worked with and, in a smaller way, all those we met. We hope that in some way they learned a little from us, as we learned much from them. We hope that they will remember us with the fondness with which we remember them, and that we have given back to them even a small part of what we received from them.
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Edge Trip to Romania 2004
Rwanda 2003
Romania 2003
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