Friday, August 1, 2008
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
pictures of guinea fowl
We get to see our families in the next month, my parents and brother arrive on Thursday yippee!!! Alex's parents and sister arrive a few days after my family leave! We can't wait, we hope to show them what life is like here and have some precious time together.
Alex introducing Pumba to our new additions (and distracting him with a big bone!)
We eventually saw our madness and have decided to keep them separated!
How they grow!!! Feb to July
Our first mountain and walk for 6 months. In Morogoro visiting friends
Relaxing after a long day!
Alex introducing Pumba to our new additions (and distracting him with a big bone!)
We eventually saw our madness and have decided to keep them separated!How they grow!!! Feb to July
Our first mountain and walk for 6 months. In Morogoro visiting friends
Relaxing after a long day!
Thursday, July 3, 2008
June
We celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary last week so took a couple of days off and headed to the Dar Es Salaam and surroundings, it was a much needed break and we had a great time.
June has been a challenging month, the ‘experts’ all say that 6 months is a notoriously bad time in the ‘transition curves’ and that has been true for us, we felt as though we hit the bottom, frustrations with language learning, culture, team, no power, no water and just living here where nothing really works as it should (well that’s what we think anyway) but we are maybe on the way up again, that or we are looking forward to a some precious time with our families in the coming months. I have been trying to organise some ladies get togethers with some of the other workers out here, we took advantage of a very experienced worker (left of photo) and really enjoyed 3 sessions together of training and encouragement. I have also had the chance to meet some more of the local ladies and practice my Swahili! Alex is battling with the motivation needed for language learning but enjoys the odd chance to go spear fishing and snorkelling – hard life isn’t it.
We have 2 new additions in the form of Guinea Foul, I have named them Spotty and Dotty but Alex is not convinced yet. They are so beautiful, the challenge has been making sure Pumba doesn’t eat them, after a few moments of trying to get him to be calm around them, we realise our foolishness and have had to resort to total separation of the animals!!!
June has been a challenging month, the ‘experts’ all say that 6 months is a notoriously bad time in the ‘transition curves’ and that has been true for us, we felt as though we hit the bottom, frustrations with language learning, culture, team, no power, no water and just living here where nothing really works as it should (well that’s what we think anyway) but we are maybe on the way up again, that or we are looking forward to a some precious time with our families in the coming months. I have been trying to organise some ladies get togethers with some of the other workers out here, we took advantage of a very experienced worker (left of photo) and really enjoyed 3 sessions together of training and encouragement. I have also had the chance to meet some more of the local ladies and practice my Swahili! Alex is battling with the motivation needed for language learning but enjoys the odd chance to go spear fishing and snorkelling – hard life isn’t it.
We have 2 new additions in the form of Guinea Foul, I have named them Spotty and Dotty but Alex is not convinced yet. They are so beautiful, the challenge has been making sure Pumba doesn’t eat them, after a few moments of trying to get him to be calm around them, we realise our foolishness and have had to resort to total separation of the animals!!!
June Photos
school visit to the Sultans Harem
Fellow students
Shipbuilding on the school trip
Ladies coffee morning at our house,
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Power is back
"Umeme is back!" As you stand in the market you hear this said all around you. Power is back, halleluajah! Came on yesterday and I managed to get a wash in the machine and completed before it stopped again for 5 hours, but as I write now, it is on again, for how long remains to be seen! There is quite outside, not the roar of the generators that we have got so used to in the last month! Can't believe it has taken a month to fix! Can you imagine the riots that would have happened in the UK if the same had happened.
On other news; I went with a fellow worker (who is actually on sabbatical here) to visit some local ladies in their houses, these were ladies that my friend had met and wanted to introduce me to before she leaves. It was great to have some more contacts. we stayed 2 hours in this one house, the conversation was in Kiswhaili and I am amazed to say I understood more than half of what was being said! The lady is very keen that I continue to learn the languauage so I will visit next week and take my school books with me.
We had the first dreaded email from home the other day saying there is a poblem with our house in Bristol. Our poor tenants have no hot water in the shower so Alex's wonderful brother and friends from our church (the same ones that run this blog) headed round to try and fix it, alas it looks more complicated than hoped (always seems to happen)
We are so grateful to Chris and and Jon for taking time to sort this out for us THANKYOU guys! You are superstars.
Which reminds us again how blessed we are to have so many wonderful friends and supporters, so thank you for taking time to read this and think of us, we appreciate it so much!
On other news; I went with a fellow worker (who is actually on sabbatical here) to visit some local ladies in their houses, these were ladies that my friend had met and wanted to introduce me to before she leaves. It was great to have some more contacts. we stayed 2 hours in this one house, the conversation was in Kiswhaili and I am amazed to say I understood more than half of what was being said! The lady is very keen that I continue to learn the languauage so I will visit next week and take my school books with me.
We had the first dreaded email from home the other day saying there is a poblem with our house in Bristol. Our poor tenants have no hot water in the shower so Alex's wonderful brother and friends from our church (the same ones that run this blog) headed round to try and fix it, alas it looks more complicated than hoped (always seems to happen)
We are so grateful to Chris and and Jon for taking time to sort this out for us THANKYOU guys! You are superstars.
Which reminds us again how blessed we are to have so many wonderful friends and supporters, so thank you for taking time to read this and think of us, we appreciate it so much!
Friday, June 6, 2008
The Water Project
Final preparations to the trainer at Hans compound
One of our regular locations. We arrived 3 mins earlier!
Our team leader Hans
PAI is our NGO
Another regular location. The high tank is now redundant with power to pump the water up.
People are really getting desperate and are using anything that can hold water when we come.
Water and language
Still no power here, rumours are it won't be back until mid July and then it will only be tempory as some long power cables have to be completely replaced!!
The men on the team have been busy all week driving water all over the place, people are getting desperate as they rush to the van as soon at it arrives and try to carry water in anything and everything. Still there is no outward protest, no rioting, the patience of the people prevails.
We are well, enjoyed having no formal lessons this week, it has been a good chance to write up language notes, get out into town and do some jobs on the house. We have new team members arriving 31st July so are starting to prepare and house hunt for them. Really looking forward to meeting them properly. Next week we do an hour a day of formal lessons, really hoping that one day we will just wake up and be fluent!!
The men on the team have been busy all week driving water all over the place, people are getting desperate as they rush to the van as soon at it arrives and try to carry water in anything and everything. Still there is no outward protest, no rioting, the patience of the people prevails.
We are well, enjoyed having no formal lessons this week, it has been a good chance to write up language notes, get out into town and do some jobs on the house. We have new team members arriving 31st July so are starting to prepare and house hunt for them. Really looking forward to meeting them properly. Next week we do an hour a day of formal lessons, really hoping that one day we will just wake up and be fluent!!
Thursday, May 29, 2008
no water
An exciting opportunity to serve these people in a practical way is presenting itself. Basically the island has been without power for a week and it is predicted to be without power for at 3 more weeks (Africa time - so multiply that by a number of your choice!) The knock on effect is that very few people have water.
Julie & I are well, very relieved to be finishing the first stage of language school tommorow. the situation is providing a much needed opportunity for Alex to do some project management which is a real breath of fresh air after being no good at grammar!
The day to day frustrations aren't any easier so we are seeking to exercise extra grace and patience, we are however making some good friends so that is a plus point.
Julie & I are well, very relieved to be finishing the first stage of language school tommorow. the situation is providing a much needed opportunity for Alex to do some project management which is a real breath of fresh air after being no good at grammar!
The day to day frustrations aren't any easier so we are seeking to exercise extra grace and patience, we are however making some good friends so that is a plus point.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Stomach bugs and no electricity
Sorry for the delay in posting we've been away (Sarah R)
Well this last week Julie has had her first bout of illness, a stomach bug picked up from some of the children on the team led to a few days in bed and lots of visits to the bathroom. It did also give us the chance to check out the malaria diagnosing facilities here as she was running a fever and malaria is always the first thing to check for, thankfully no malaria and we can report the test facility is great. Since Wed last week we have had no electricity, This is a real pain as you can't fill up your water tank without power and the tank will only last you for a couple of days. We managed to scrounge the use of a generotor for a couple of hours to re fill our tank though so that is wonderful. Whilst it is a massive inconvenience for us it is really devastating for the locals, the government is having to provide water drops for people and we see ladies queuing for hours for this. Also many trades, carpentary etc rely on power for completing work and with no power they have no way to take money home for their families. So once again we are so thankful for the provisions we have.
Our May update was sent out in the last couple of weeks, if you were expecting it and didn't recieve it then do check your bulk mail or send us an email and we will resend it. If you would like to recieve it please post a message with your email address and we will make sure we add you to the list.
Well this last week Julie has had her first bout of illness, a stomach bug picked up from some of the children on the team led to a few days in bed and lots of visits to the bathroom. It did also give us the chance to check out the malaria diagnosing facilities here as she was running a fever and malaria is always the first thing to check for, thankfully no malaria and we can report the test facility is great. Since Wed last week we have had no electricity, This is a real pain as you can't fill up your water tank without power and the tank will only last you for a couple of days. We managed to scrounge the use of a generotor for a couple of hours to re fill our tank though so that is wonderful. Whilst it is a massive inconvenience for us it is really devastating for the locals, the government is having to provide water drops for people and we see ladies queuing for hours for this. Also many trades, carpentary etc rely on power for completing work and with no power they have no way to take money home for their families. So once again we are so thankful for the provisions we have.
Our May update was sent out in the last couple of weeks, if you were expecting it and didn't recieve it then do check your bulk mail or send us an email and we will resend it. If you would like to recieve it please post a message with your email address and we will make sure we add you to the list.
Monday, May 19, 2008
Visit from John
We have had a wonderful weekend with John our homegroup leader from Bristol who was on a flying visit to see us and the rest of the team here. It was such a joy to spend some time with him. He also brought out so many goodies from people at home and we are just blown away with the generosity- THANK YOU so much to those of you who put together all these wonderful suprises.
On other things we are in our 3rd out of four weeks of school and feel totally saturated with grammer and rules and vocab, but are so encouraged that by some miracle seem to be learning it!
On other things we are in our 3rd out of four weeks of school and feel totally saturated with grammer and rules and vocab, but are so encouraged that by some miracle seem to be learning it!
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