Mud Drive

 

Boys travelling in style!

Mud Drive 2010

 

We had quite a rainy weekend this weekend, so as the pool was not an optiong, the guys all went on a mud drive.!!

Vines

 

Tarzan

 

Josh came to get me one afternoon this week to say that Caleb was playing Tarzan. I thought it was some kind of joke, but no, there he was swinging on the vines on a tree next door. He really is an African boy!

Wedding: ¬ sub-post

It has been suggested from certain quarters that the final paragraph of my previous post was a bit 'raw'. Fair enough :) Rather than retract it, I thought I would expand a bit.

It is a factor of life here that, as 'wazungu' we have a distinct social status - or to be more precise, we have a social status that doesn't fit into the hierachy (I maybe be repeating earlier posts here - bear with me). It is partly our financial independence, partly our educational status and partly the fact that we 'come and go, and we can come and go, whereas Tanzanian's are here forever.

Whatever the cause, the fact is that we are different, we feel different and to a certain extent we are made to feel different by the way we are treated.

With regard to education, the Tanzanian education system is inferior to the Western systems. That sounds really elitist and colonial and lots of other negative things. But it is actually an unfortunate fact. Almost all learning is by rote; classes are huge, and the teachers are limited in the own education. It is not really something that I had appreciated while in the UK, but the education system there provides a very broad base before we specialise. This means that whatever we do in later life, we have some (maybe hazy!) grounding in most areas. In Tanzania, it seems very much that basic education is strictly the 3 Rs. Talking to many 'professional' Tanzanians (if you understand what I mean!) it is clear that although they are skilled specialists, outside of their specialism their knowledge is limited. Things like basic medicine - which in the West we are probably not even aware that we know - is something that is only for 'doctors'. This is why some of our National staff find it difficult when some of the International Staff - who's specialisms are in something different - 'interfere' in their work activity. E.g. to a Tanzanian it is an alien concept that a Pilot (for example) would know anything about how to mend a car, or fix plumbing or electrics. In Tanzania these are things that are carried out exclusively by 'fundis' in that area. ('Fundi' is one of those useful Swahili words that covers a multitude of English words - think craftsman/artisan/expert/professional/specialist).

The upshot is that, although I am not trying to excuse it at all, as a wazungu here it is very easy to slip into a 'superior' mindset, and think that a better education means 'I am a better person'. Of course this is not the case, but coming from a Western meritocratic culture, it is an ingrained mindset that I constantly need to fight to redress. This is something that my Tanzanian colleagues call 'underrating' (I assume this is a direct translation from Swahili - it doesn't translate well but I hope you get the picture).

I hope that clarifies a bit what I was thinking when I wrote the offending paragraph! It is something that I would be grateful for prayer for, as it makes relationships quite hard. Although friendship doesn't have to be based on equality on every level - it does make it a lot easier!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wedding

[rare post from Daniel moment!]

I attended the 'wedding' of the Bishop's daughter yesterday. Wedding is in inverted commas as technically they got married in Dar a week ago - Western style - and this was (in my reading of it) the traditional bit for the family and Dodoma well wishers. The Bishop is married to an Australian, and his daughter (Lisa) was marrying a Kiwi.

It was quite fun actually. I was invited as 'The MAF Manager' - receiving my invitation the day before! I think I enjoyed it more because I made the deliberate decision to go. I think I am more keen to do this kind of thing, because of the prospect of us leaving - and therefore not being able to do them in future. This was actually the first Tanzanian wedding where I have been to the reception - the one's I have been to previously I have skipped out before it got to that point. Maybe this was easier, because it was only reception!

It was quite a good example of how being a mzungu in Dodoma elevates you to a social status you would not usually have in the West (well, I wouldn't!) The marriage was attended (among other folk), by the Mayor of Dodoma; the MP for Dodoma; the General Secretary of the Anglican Church; the Vice-Chancellor of St John's University etc. Made me feel quite important :)

I made the major mistake of forgetting to take my camera, so all I had was my phone - so apologies in advance for the quality of the pictures. Oddly, the first one came out quite good quality, and the rest were a bit blurry. I will upload a bunch which will, I guess, come out above this.

The reception was in some ways quite similar to a British wedding (i.e. speeches, food, cake cutting), and in some ways not. In particular the Gogo dancers (not the kind you may be thinking of! The Wagogo are the local tribe - if the pictures come out OK, you will be able to see the traditinal dancers) and the many choirs. Also (and I don't know if this is traditional or just something the MC made up on the spot), the couple sliced up a piece of the wedding cake and then each had to feed a piece to various members of the others' family. Quite entertaining! You will (hopefully) see from the pictures that the cake had a whole bunch of extra 'cakes', which were given to various people (e.g. one to the Bride's parents, one to the Groom's parents; one to the Mayor; one to the MP!)

It was pretty traditional African timing as well. The invitation said 10.00 - and because I was going in convoy with some other people, we got there at 10.00 - which was a mistake to start with, as it didn't start until 11.00. There was then an hour of dancing/singing (a 'short introduction' as the MC called it), and then speeches, more dancing and singing, before they let us loose on the food about 14.30.

The most interseting thing I found was meeting well-educated Tanzanians. This is not a breed we come across much in normal life here, and I found it good for redressing my opinion of Tanzanians gemerally, which can tend towards the patronising/'superior'.

Anyway, off to try the pictures...

Pirate ship!

 

 

Walking the plank!!

 

Pirate Party

 

5 Today

 

A superhero poses before school on his 5th birthday.

Sophie Honeywood

This week started off boiling hot. The temperature in the car was reading 45 degrees C and the pool was 31 degrees C. Needless to say we have all been fairly cranky and I have had 1 if not 2 pulling my hair out afternoons. The pool is always a life saver on those days, there doesn't seem much that nice blue water can't wash away! On Wednesday night we had a huge rainstorm. On our corrugated iron roof it sounded like the roof was caving in. We had two small people join us in bed who were scared of the rain. Bethany slept through it all, as normal. Thursday was much cooler and there was a miraculous transformation in all our temperaments and we ended up being quite nice to each other. Caleb had a good day because he found 3 huge snails in school and brought them home in a cardboard box. His neighbour Josiah found huge black millipedes, so they were both extremely happy. What followed was endless hours of happy play, digging holes for the snails, making houses for the snails, losing the snails, looking for the snails. Unfortunately they have all now escaped to better pastures. Caleb still lives in hope that he will find them again or he will bring some more home from school.

Even more exciting this week was the birth of my new niece Sophie Honeywood to my sister Rachel and her husband John. I have spent a fortune on texts to the poor parents asking for updates on what was happening. I even had a skpe phone call with my mum at 3am one morning just after the baby had been born. Incidentally skype works really well in the middle of the night. I also took a big step yesterday, for me anyway. I said I would never join facebook, but I know it will be where my brother int law will post pictures of the baby, so I gritted my teeth and joined. It has the bonus feature of making you feel really popular, for at least a day, as lots of people want to be friends with you. Not sure if I can be bothered to really spend a lot of time on it, but now at least I can look at baby photos!