A Few Days in Arusha

My confusion about the weather has been cleared up. As I mentioned in a previous post, I thought that this would be the dry season as it is Uganda. But it is rained every day that I have been her, and yesterday it rained for about 12 hours straight. It turns out that the transition to the rainy season normally happens at the end of February, but this year due to some influences in the Indian Ocean, it arrived a month early. It caught the farmers off guard because during February they prepare their fields for planting. So many of the farmers hadn’t prepared their fields and are now playing catch up.

My host from World Vision Tanzania is Daniel Muvengi. He is in charge of the spiritual nurture/development of nine eastern African countries: Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, Sudan, Ethiopia, and Somaliland (Somaliland is the northern part of Somalia that has it’s own government and is fairly stable). I am here to see if there a way that I can help support World Vision staff here in some fashion that will work for WVT. I have supported staff in Uganda over the last several years and was wondering if there is a way that I can serve WVT. I thought that we had a productive meeting and am looking forward to more discussion and hopefully another trip here to meet with more staff to help flesh out how this would work. Below is a picture of Daniel, Shalom (on the left) and Fadhili

On Sunday Daniel took me to worship with him and his two sons, Shalom 12 and Fadhili, 8 (Fadhili means “mercy”). His wife, Christine, and daughter, Hope, 15, were in Nairobi so I was not able to meet them. I enjoyed the service and the singing which lasted 2 hours and 45 minutes. During one of the songs, five elementary age students danced in the front of the stage. They were having a good time and I enjoyed watching them. The church was small so I didn’t feel comfortable taking pictures during the service. I would have loved to videoed them, but I think it would have been too distracting. Below is a picture of the front of the church.

                                   

Afterward, Daniel treated me to lunch with his sons. The lattes were good. He then dropped me off at my hotel and we said our good-byes. I taxi driver that Daniel knows well then took me to the Masai Market not far from the hotel where I did a little bartering for some souvenirs. All in all, it was a good day.