Habari za Leo! How is your day?

Greetings again from Tanzania! It’s been awhile since the last blog post for various reasons. For one, we have been away from campus for several weeks now on Safari, homestay, vacation and various other excursions. The other reason would be that we did make it in to town the other day, but it was so nice (you have no idea) NOT to spend my entire town trip waiting for pictures and words to load on here! It was the best town trip in the world!!

Anyways, this week we returned to Masumbo and have been spending time catching up on sleep from our 12 hour ride, getting back into classes, starting up the service projects again, going on various trips, and enjoying our last 2 weeks in Tanzania!

Three weeks ago we returned to Ruaha National Park to finish up our Wildlife Behavior Course. It was a beautiful lodge and a great way to end the class.

We got to see a lion kill which you apparently never see. I decided not to put a picture on here because it is pretty graphic, I guess you could say. The smell was even worse!

We did also see a cheetah pair which is also rare! We’ve pretty much seen it all except a leopard. Some of us still have hope that we will see one. Might be scarier to see one out here in Iringa though.

After returning from Ruaha we had a bit of time back at Masumbo to prepare for our long village homestay. We finished up Swahili classes and also history. We also enjoyed the usual Saturday activity of volleyball at Philip’s farm.

Easter Sunday! We made our classroom into a church and had a service led by Dave Moyer and Shell Arensen (Dr. A’s Brother). We were first surprised with a breakfast and small Easter baskets, then we got to work setting up Masumbo.

After the service, which many students helped to lead, we enjoyed a potluck style lunch then some volleyball and rugby!

Quickly we packed up and before we knew it we loaded the Aardvark and we were off to Mbeya (5 hours south). Here we all were to face what could be the most challenging part of the semester. This is what we all work so hard for! We prepared and we were nervous, but excited ad ready as we pulled in to the church. We were welcomed with singing in dancing and a church service. Each homestay ended up being a very different experience for everyone. We paired up, some in threes, and were off to live with a Safua Tribe family. 8 full days we were to “survive” you might say on the beautiful mountains above Mbeya. I cannot speak for everyone here, so I will let everyone tell their own unique story and show pictures. For a brief example, Ellie and I stayed together with this family below. It was an incredible experience in so many ways!

It was comforting seeing our entire group every night as we met for church or soccer games alternating every day! Here’s the bridge we had to cross on our way to the school football pitch.

We really enjoyed the games playing the church men’s team twice (shown below) and then another town team. They were both very competitive teams. We held our own though! As always there were hundreds of people watching and it was quiet the event!

Now as we were on homestay some of our group (Aryn the TA and Angie the nurse) were off enjoying the beaches of Zanizibar! Wow it looks nice!

We all gathered the final morning saying goodbye to our families and getting ready for our trip even further south! One of the funniest parts of homestay was the gifts we received. Anything from corn, to beans, to baskets, to a chicken! Yup, a life rooster, and in a box!

Now it really gets exciting. Our plan now was to drive about 4 hours south to Matema, a town on lake Malawi with a resort. Here we would vacation for a couple days. Weeell, the trip turned into a crazy 2 days adventure! About half way there, we got a call telling us that one of the bridges was flooded so high that we could not make it through. After some time of debating, we decided to head back to Mbeya (2 hours back tracking) and stay the night there in order to wait for the river to go down. The rains that have been flooding the area are apparently more than they have had in 25 years!! So, we headed back for Mbeya where we had a connection with an SIL guy working at Grace College. There he had a classroom floor we could all sleep on. We enjoyed dinner and MAIL that Wazi brought !

Some also walked around the market, exploring the area. Eventually, we all hunkered down spreading across the floor in our sleeping bags. As crazy as the situation was we managed to make it fun and keep positive spirits along the way. It was sure an interesting birthday for Mitch!

Because of the present wet season and mosquito infestation I decided to actually sleep in the mosquito net. We actually call these “baby nets”…it’s a long story of why

We headed out early in the morning praying all would be well on the roads. It was an incredible trip getting to Matema, but eventually we got there! Everything was flooded! With our amazing Aardvark (army truck), Landcruisers, and Ejeti (our Tanzanian Die Hard) we made it though all the water just fine.

Malawi! One of the deepest lakes in the world (over 4,000 feet) and it was beautiful!

Here we enjoyed a restful time and some experiences you don’t get to do every day! The first day we hiked 5 miles up a raging river to a 300 foot waterfall. There really aren’t any words to describe this, so I’ll show a couple pictures and we’ll all just have to tell the stories when we get home.

Here’s the group fording the river. We not only had to go through the rapids many times, we found ourselves rock climbing over the river as well. Because of all the rain the waterfall was huger than ever and produced what felt like a hurricane storm under it.

The following day we all hopped in dug-out canoes and set out across the lake to a small village.

75 years ago a rock slide on the mountain face exposed clay that would change the village forever. They now use this clay to make pots that are only found here! We got the chance to see two women demonstrate the process of making the pots and some of us bought a few.

Other excitement at Lake Malawi included swimming, beach volleyball, jumping off a smaller waterfall, a morning bird walk, snorkeling, incredible food (because our awesome cooks came), dressing up (haha), and the usual more fun with Jason’s facial hair.

Our last morning we enjoyed the sunrise then loaded up again and headed out again very early. Again, Ejeti (our driver) was incredible spending his vacation at Malawi building us a new road to get out! It made the trip so easy compared to what we expected to run into. Ejeti’s the man!!

Well, that about wraps up our last 3-4 weeks. This is such a brief description of it all, but I hope it helps paint a better picture, or at least show a bit of what we are up to here in Tanzania!

We are almost done! I can’t believe it’s almost over, and how incredible this entire semester has been! I know it has really blessed our lives personally, each in a unique and special way. Most of us will be home in 2 weeks or so, while others are staying longer traveling around or even volunteering a bit.

That’s all for now!

Kwa heri kwa sasa!

(and this marks the first completely successful and not as stressful blog post!!!!! so exciting enjoy!)

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