New Office Mates

Ummm, so a mama cat has decided the Head Teacher Office is where she would like to raise her babies. For the past two weeks, these guys have been sharing office space with Kayci, Jackie and me:

We've had a hard time keeping the young students from this very tempting opportunity to cuddle with our new office mates. Today, Noeli from kindergarten came in looking for "the small cats." Instead of petting them, we had a vocabulary lesson--"did you know kitten is the English word for a baby cat?" Teachable moments, people! Then, I whisked him out before Mama Paka (Swahili for "cat") could hiss at Noeli...she's quite protective.

Four people, three Mastiffs, a mama cat and four kittens...it's a full office!

KARIBU TANZANIA, MOM!

"Mama Julia" arrives in six hours.

I've been counting down to her visit with everyone at JBFC pretty much since I arrived. It's odd to think she will actually BE HERE tonight.

We've prepared her guest room, hung a mosquito net, and laid out "jifties" for her. (Tanzanians generally pronounce "gift" as "jiftie.") She will be presented with a "Agenda of Fun, in Brief" that will lay out our daily plans for the next three weeks. Because I'm a planner, just like her.

I'll be stringing her welcome sign in the car, which Kayci and I are running to right now.

KARIBU TANZANIA, MAMA JULIA!

Day in the Life - Mwalimu Mkuu

It’s 10:45 in the morning, and so far today, I have...

1. Talked with my parents for an hour to arrange last minute details for my mom’s trip. Did I mention I’m excited she’s coming? BECAUSE I AM REALLY EXCITED.

2. Worked with Kayci to handle yet another breakdown of our beloved schoolbus, Coaster. Seventeen text messages later, our teachers are at school and the day is running smoothly.

3. Interviewed a secondary school applicant while simultaneously greeting our teachers for the morning, collecting school fees from students, trying to find keys for Miss China’s classroom, getting a translation on a letter from the district education office, dodging the ferocious mama cat who has decided to keep her kittens in our office...and...I am not really sure what else.

4. Lead morning parade, one of my favorite parts of the day. That’s a blog for a whole other day!

5. Met with two fathers of students, who were both very gracious about my broken Swahili. I imagine it sounds like our kindergarteners speaking English. Who am I kidding? It’s more like our preschoolers speaking English, sweet dears.

6. Helped a student with a possible sprained ankle...and panicked Kayci in the process. I sent two girls to the house to get an ice pack for JULIE (injured student), but it got lost in translation... “Julia needs an ice pack. She broke her foot.” (After further inspection, it is not broken, just a sprain...?) At any rate, Julie is on her way to the doctor and should be on the mend soon. I’m so glad we had already arranged a city trip in our van for this morning AND that it was scheduled to leave twenty minutes after the injury occured. We helped a hobbling Julie into the van, and off she went with Mama Mage (getting glasses for two of our girls), Jackie and Mashiku (on their way to government offices), Mzee Kitula (buying building supplies) and our fabulous driver, Kanaeli!

7. Ran up to the house...twice...to retrieve things I forgot. My reward...hearing Mama Marium singing “Kweto Pazuri” while cooking rice for our school lunch and stealing a hug from Ester.

At the moment, I’m in Form One listening to a Swahili lesson from our interviewee of the morning, Mr. Malajiwa. I think I’m gonna hire this guy.

Now if I can just get our photocopier to work...

It’s hard to believe it’s not even lunch time...just another day in the life of Mwalimu Mkuu (Head Teacher) of Joseph and Mary School!

Christmas in February

So, Christmas came a bit late this year. It turns out, when your mailbox is an hour away from where you live...and you live in rural Tanzania...it sometimes takes awhile to claim your packages.

So...Christmas in February it is! And yes, ladies and gentlemen, that IS FIVE BOXES OF DARK CHOCOLATE COVERED PEPPERMINT JOE JOE'S. My mommy loves me very much. And possibly cleaned out our local Trader Joe's on my behalf.

Also in my Christmas boxes...a stocking and glitter Christmas tree I plan to put out for St. Patrick's Day, as well as a chocolate reindeer that bears a striking resemblance to an Easter bunny. There were all sorts of yummy snacks that I am trying to judiciously enjoy, along with new socks and a beautiful card.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Wageni!

We are lucky to receive lots of visitors at JBFC, and each one brings something special they share with us.

Megan and Tracy showered a lot of love on our girls in the eight days they spent with us in December. Tracy mastered the foot-powered sewing maching and hemmed massive tablecloths for our future restaurant.

Megan shared her gift for volleyball with our girls, and it was a huge hit!

In fact, some anonymous girls say they even like volleyball MORE than football. (Near blasphemy!) Megan and Tracy left us with twenty volleyballs so we can continue enjoying the sport, and the girls love playing after school and on weekends. The Maasai and our teachers also join in sometimes.

Kabir, who has steadily supported JBFC for several years, came for a brief but fun visit this month, leaving behind a slew of toothbrushes and plans to return again this summer. We look forward to continued visits from our favorite resident of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

The Watts family spent two weeks at JBFC in January after climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro. They varnished desks, cleaned classrooms, planted rice, and taught workshops on conflict resolution for our older students. They also left behind a special project. When Steve, Christina, and Bob presented their gift to Veneranda, she was all smiles!

This chair (or “Vene’s Throne” as I like to call it) fits securely on top of the benches in our dining hall, which in the past were simultaneously too tall and too short for her. An accompanying stool makes it easy for Veneranda to step up to reach her bench.

Now Vene can easily join her sisters for dinner in the evenings. Every time I see her plop down on the bench, I marvel at how this chair has made such a difference for her.

We are so thankful to all our guests. They expose our girls to new songs, vocabulary, and ideas...they help us with special projects...and they infuse new energy into life at JBFC.

Speaking of guests...guess whose MOM is coming in seven days? Karibu Mama Julia!!

Losing Weight in Africa...

...is NOT going to happen if we continue to eat like this.

And I imagine we will.

Pizza Night is always a hit here. Tonight there was a margharita pizza and a chicken alfredo pizza. Can I just say that Kayci and I made the dough and alfredo sauce from scratch...she made the cheese with milk from our goats...we grew the basil in our garden...so the only things we bought are the tomatoes and whole wheat flour. Bargain meal...and delicious!

Kula salama! Bon appetite!

Happiness is...

Happiness is...

(Or, what happened yesterday afternoon/evening...)

Coming home from a wonderful, relaxing, fun weekend in town with Kayci and seeing the excited faces of our little girls, who run toward the car to greet us when we’re just on the edge of campus.

The sound of their giggles when we pile them all in the back seat for a short ride down the hill in the car, a rare treat.

The relief of assistance when twenty people descend upon the car to take everything to its place—10 kilos of onions, groceries for the week, four 20 litre jugs of water, overnight bags, wholesale boxes of soap...

Seeing the boys survived their first unsupervised overnight and, as instructed, did not host a raging party for all the fisherman who pass their house each evening. The surprise and delight of walking into the house to find they’d cleanned (it was spotless), organized, and decorated it. This was on the coffee table:

An uninterrupted afternoon nap.

Going down for Sunday dinner—PILAU, IT’S DELICIOUS—and catching up with all the girls and matrons.

The overwhelming flattery of Ester insisting on sitting on my lap to eat her dinner. Though she eats it at a tenth of the pace I do, this little girl finished a portion that rivaled my own! And, I appreciated that she took great care to pick each grain of spilled rice off my skirt. (We’re still working on her spoon skills—she is quite capable of using it as a weapon; she needs a little more practice with it as a tool for eating.)

Surprise public holidays*...no school on Monday! (And Happy Birthday, Mohammed!)

The beauty of our girls’ voices as they sing worship songs in groups on Sunday evenings for one another, and the camaraderie of this weekly family time.

Witnessing the confidence of two girls, who get up to perform funny skits for their sisters after Sunday evening prayer time.

Discovering the boys—who have no access to newspapers or the internet—know more about what’s going on in the world than I do. Apparently, there are record breaking snowstorms in the US/Europe and Chris Brown and Rihana might be back together...? (Confirmed by Google News)

An actual, real, HOT shower.

A comfortable bed, sans scorpions.

Drifting off to sleep with all these memories floating up into my fluffy white mosquito net.

*Edited to add...maybe it wasn't a public holiday...ooops...

National Exams...Or, "Proof Our Students Are Awesome"

Standard Seven, or 7^th Grade, marks the end of primary school in Tanzania, and it is the year all students take a national exam. Similar to le bac, it is a comprehensive exam that determines a students’ future education options. Only the students who score in the top 10% can attend government secondary schools. Because our school is private, Joseph and Mary students would be able to continue with their studies in our secondary school regardless of where they score, but we still hope they do well on the test, both for them and as confirmation our school is teaching them well.

We got the results back last month. All our students passed…and then some.

I wish you could have been in the JBFC dining hall to hear the ear-piercing screams and see the jumping/hugging/crying celebration when the girls heard they had all passed. Of the 22 students who took Standard Seven exams this year, ten live on JBFC’s campus.

It was a surreal moment to look at the list of the top students in the county and recognize almost every name in the first twenty. WE ROCK!

Based on our students’ scores, Joseph and Mary School was ranked among private schools…

1^st in our county

3^rd in our district of 201 schools

7^th in our region of approximately 10,000 schools

64^th IN THE COUNTRY OF TANZANIA.

All this in our second year as a school! These results do not compare us to government schools in Tanzania, but it’s safe to say private schools here will routinely out-perform their public counterparts.

We are so proud of our students and the teachers who have prepared them so well.

GOOD, BETTER, BEST! Well done, Joseph and Mary School!

Unwelcome Bedmates

Henceforth, I suppose any night in which I am not stung by a scorpion in my bed and undergo the resulting (and unsuccessful) electro-shock de-venomizer therapy to remove the pain (which throbs for about 12 hours and then just hurts for the following 24) will be considered a “good night.”

“Low expectations, positive attitudes.”