Another movie to make you think...

We watched 'Crash' last night. Very interesting film. It makes you think really hard about the nature of prejudice and stereotyping, and how often we assume things from peoples' exteriors. I would very much recommend it for viewing (but don't get it mixed up with the film of the same name which came out a few years ago - you might get a nasty shock! This one has Don Cheadle, Sandra Bullock, Matt Dillon etc etc in it).

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I had a good time in Dar this week, and got a lot of stuff done, so I was quite pleased. Libby didn't have quite such a good week, having to look after the children all by herself. She also had a possible flea-sighting on Thursday, which brought her crashing down a bit. Please pray for the flea thing, as it really is quite disruptive for her.

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Fortunately the kids start school again next week, so hopefully that will ease the pressure a bit. 1 more week to get ready for the audit!

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For your diaries...we are 90ish% sure that we will be coming back to the UK for 19 June to 19 July.

Busy busy

Sorry for the delayed post - we have been very busy recently, and it's starting to warm up a bit, so we're a bit sluggish!

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I am busy preparing for the audit (week after next) and I am off to Dar for the rest of the week tomorrow morning. [Having said that I've just had a message to say that the plane is 'unserviceable', so I won't be leaving until 10.00am - rather than the planned 7.30am. Bit worrying that].

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Libby is not looking forward to me going, and her being left with three still-off-school-and-getting-increasingly-naughty children. Please pray for her, because she finds it particularly hard when I am away.

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We made it to church again this week. I was on Sunday school duty, so Libby got the preach. This was a bit of a mixed blessing. One of the elders was preaching (based on the story of Jesus being left behind in the temple) that you shouldn't pray at home, but should come to church every day to do your praying! Not sure what to say to that really.

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Our friend Rachel (Marks) is coming out to see us in a couple of weeks, so we are planning our travels. We're wondering whether we'll be able to handle going down to Dar on the Thursday, picking her up from the airport first thing Friday and then driving straight home. It has it's appeal, but we wouldn't want to be totally wasted for the duration of her stay! But having said that, Dar is so hot at this time of year, staying there probably wouldn't be all that restful anyway.

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Still no resolution on the Banking Act thing. The lawyers promised me last Friday or Monday, and are now saying maybe tomorrow. It seems that a couple of the partners want to poke their oar in - which is good I guess, as long as it doesn't cost more than their original quote (which was painful enough as it was!)

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I realise that I never told you the end of the plane registration story. The name which won (courtesy of being the choice of the Chief Engineer!) was 5H-ERI (or Romeo India in pilot-speak). Heri is the Swahili word for (and I quote from my 'kamusi ya Kiswahili-Kiingereza') "1. tranquillity (sic) 2. happiness, advantage, blessedness, success". It usually gets translated as 'blessing'. [Interestingly only one of those words, when looked up in my English-Swahili dictionary comes up with 'heri'!]

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Heri is also the name of our Tanzanian hangar forman (i.e. main man) which is nice too.

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So there, you go.

Hey wow, a picture (and of Libby too!)

After having a complete nightmare trying to upload pictures for the past few weeks, here is one that worked! This is Libby and Caleb on our holiday at 'Lazy Lagoon', over Christmas.

I'll have to try this again (unless that's pushing my luck).

We actually made it to the 7.30 church this morning (although not strictly speaking at 7.30). It was actually really good. It was English translated into Swahili (or Swahili translated into English, depending on who was speaking). Most of the songs were in English, and it was lively, with a Sunday school that was also half English. The preach was also good (although the other MAF people said this is by no means guaranteed!)

It's also nice because the MAF families who go there meet for coffee afterwards - and we got to go!

So, all-in-all, pretty good - so I think we're going to give it a shot (so you could pray that we manage to get up on time! - I think this will be the biggest challenge).

They also had a children's 'choir' and then an adults 'choir' perform midway through the service (this seems to be a common thing in Tanzanian churches, from what we've experienced - there's always some kind of 'performance piece' in the middle). I put 'choir' in ' ', because I can almost guarantee that the picture that the word choir conjures up is nothing like what I'm talking about. I'm hoping to take some video footage of it before we come back, so you can see what I mean.
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For advance notice, we are planning to come back to the UK for our furlough/home assignment/holiday in June/July, so hopefully we'll get to see a bunch of you then.
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Just for info, there are huge thunderclaps going on as I write, so I'm expecting more rain to add to the excess of rain that we've been having lately. It seems that this year is trying to make up for the drought last year. Unfortunately this means that there is the risk of the crops getting destroyed by too much rain instead! Please pray this doesn't happen. (It also means that every few days we start sweating as the rain gets to within about an inch of coming into the house!)
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Libby and I have been reading the books 'Waking the Dead', 'Wild at Heart' and 'Captivating' by John Eldridge. We thoroughly recommend them. All men should read 'Wild at Heart', whether you're a Christian or not. If you're a Christian, you should definitely read it (and 'Waking the Dead'). I think these are the first 'Christian' books (other than novels) which I've actually had trouble putting down (as opposed to 'trouble picking up', which is usually the case). We're hoping that the things he talks about we will actually be able to take on board and live out (as opposed to the usual 'water-off-a-ducks-back' effect - which is usually what happens).
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[At this point further photos failed to upload and I got fed up trying].

City Cell Church

'Interesting' morning. One of our New Year's resolutions was to keep trying different churches until we found one we were happy at. So this morning we screwed up our courage to 'full', and went to 'City Cell Church'. We'd noticed this one a few times, as it is on the main road, and has a sign outside saying 'City Cell Church, 9.30am Every Sunday, All Welcome'. This seemed like a fairly good time to us, and the fact that the sign was in English as well as Swahili was encouraging.

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So, not wanting to walk in late (ha ha - this shows we're not fully tuned into Tanzania yet) we turned up promptly at 9.30. There was only one lady there, in the process of setting up, who greeted us warmly and showed us to some seats at the front (despite our efforts to sit in our usual one-from-the-back row). The building appeared to be a derelict former cinema (although Caleb found a ticket outside, so maybe it's still a cinema), with dirty old no-longer flipping back up seats - and three rows of garden chairs at the front.

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At about quarter to ten, I asked the lady what time the service started (as we were wondering whether we had made a mistake). She said (without the hint of a smile) "9.30".

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After about another five minutes it all kicked off (by this time we numbered half the congregation). It was very Tanzanian. The sole accompaniment was a very poor quality tape recording played very loudly through a very big, very old amplifier, and a guy at the front singing through a microphone. Everyone (except us, of course) up the front dancing and singing.

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I went up the front to do the obligatory 'this is us' speech (quite proud of my Swahili efforts - although I may have given the mistaken impression that we spoke Swahili, as they stopped translating everything at this point!) and then they launched into the worship. Which was fine, but we don't know or understand any of the songs, and we just can't bring ourselves to get up and dance. As Libby said, they dance the way she dances when she's on her own in the kitchen, and has made absolutely sure that no one can see! I think maybe you need to be born doing that kind of thing, to not have the self-consciousness that we Brits seem unable to shake off. Caleb doesn't have a problem doing it. In fact, if he had carried on with his dancing we might have lasted a bit longer. But it's very difficult to get anything out of any church, when you have to constantly chase after a hyperactive nearly-two-year-old who just wants to climb in and out of the side door, pick up every piece of old rubbish off the floor, and sit on every ex-cinema seat in the building.

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So at around half-ten, when everyone else was either kneeling face down on the floor, or had eyes firmly closed, we slipped out the back and went to the ice-cream parlour.

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We were very pleased with ourselves for trying, but I don't think we'll be going back. I hope we didn't offend them too much by leaving early. But it's a bit difficult to know when to leave, when you know that there's a good chance it could go on for hours. As I remarked to Libby, "It will be probably be full to capacity by 12.00". But I don't think we could hang on that long.

So, next week we're going to try 'Kanisa la Mungu la Tanzania'. This is the church that three other MAF families go to (and our houselady) and has services in Swahili translated into English. I believe it also has a Sunday school of sorts.

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The down side is that it starts at 7.30 :(

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We have made it once, but left early as I got fed up of chasing Caleb around the premises for about an hour before Sunday school even started. But, to be honest it's probably the best option.

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I realise that having written this now we are somewhat committed to making it next week, so am sorely tempted to delete the last few paragraphs. But I won't - it will probably help if we have some added incentive for getting up that early!

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