Tumaini

Saturday 18 April 2009 – Yuvith and Perpetua

When I got the letter from Social Services for Omari yesterday, Mr. Mbaga also said there were some other letters included for us to look over. Since I knew I'd be at Tumaini on Saturday, I decided to wait and have Ferdinand help me translate the letters. One of the letters was concerning Amosi Juma who had been returned to his family in February. The second letter was concerning Yuvith and Perpetua. Mr. Mbaga has been following up on the information found in their mother's diary. The first set of information from the diary did not turn out. At that time we took the children to Social Services in February, I wrote about that here and they were returned to Tumaini the same day. Then several days later I heard more about their history from Ferdinand, see the story here. Since the first set of information didn't work out, Mr. Mbaga has continued to search out clues in the diary to find Yuvith and Perpetua's relatives. The letter he gave me on Friday says that Social Services think there are some relatives living near Sengerema. I'll be deciding in the next couple of days if we want to pursue this information at this point in time by sending the children on a trip.

Friday 17 April 2009 – Social Services

While I was in town today taking care of some personal business, I stopped by Social Services to pick up a letter concerning Omari. I mentioned a couple of posts ago that Ferdinand thinks he knows where Omari's relatives live and so we are going to attempt to have him returned by taking him ourselves. Usually you have to wait for Social Services to send a Social Welfare Officer with you but Mama Misana said that we could take him ourselves as long as we had a letter from Social Services to give to the Mwenyekiti (the village chairman – literally translates "the one having the chair"). I had also hoped to speak to Mama Misana again about Baraka. In a previous visit, she had suggested we have him admitted to Bugando, the hospital in Mwanza, and have him observed by a doctor. Only then would Social Services "take responsibility" for Baraka. I'm not exactly sure what "take responsibility" means so I need to get further information from her before we delve into this whole procedure. However, today I was not able to find out more information since Mama Misana wasn't in the office and none of the other officers knew anything about Baraka. I'll try again next week.

Wednesday 15 April 2009 – Medical Consult

Today I met with my friend who is a nurse and the wife of a doctor at a Mwanza hospital. I had copied down all the medicines in our dispensary several weeks ago and planned to meet with my friend to go over the medicines and what they can be used for. We are working toward creating a notebook of treatments for our Tumaini children so we can streamline our process. Not only did we discuss the medicines in our dispensary, but we also discussed common ailments and how to treat them here in Tanzania.

Some of the things we discussed were:

• Boils
• Malaria
• Worms
• Rashes
• Conjunctivitis

Tuesday 14 April 2009 - Swinging

We conducted an unintentional experiment on Sunday afternoon at the Mission property. The children have a swing set at Tumaini but we have not left the swings out for them to use. Visions of unmanned swings used as weapons aimed at other children's heads were just too frightening. So, on Sunday evening, the children were able to use the swing sets at the Mission property and had a marvelous time. For a while, we closely supervised their use of the swings but the older children helped and were orderly about waiting in line and helping the little children to wait in line. This had a lot of promise! As a result, Ferdinand pulled out one of the swings from storage on Monday and put it up for the children to use at Tumaini.

Today, while waiting for a visitor to come, I went up and played with the children on the playground. They were once again swinging and the little children were all lined up in an orderly fashion awaiting their turn. For the most part, everyone was well-behaved although some still need to learn good swing set etiquette. Such as, when someone cuts in front of you, don't just push him into the path of the swing, go tell an adult and let them take care of the person cutting in front of you. Thankfully, the child who was pushed into the swing, which was on its flight back downward, was not hurt. It was interesting to realize that swinging is a learned skill. I had not really thought of it in that way before. Several of the little ones would forget to hold on to the swing or sat too far forward. Even when I scooted them backward on the swing they would readjust themselves forward. Some of them had to learn the hard way by falling off (but weren't hurt!).

Since the really little ones had trouble staying on the swing, I plopped a few on my lap and sat down to swing with them, to the great amusement of the older children. I guess they didn't think I knew how to swing. My favorite moment of the day was when I put Latifa on my lap and we started swinging. She giggled and giggled and couldn't get enough. It was so sweet to hear her little voice and watch the enjoyment everyone else received from her pleasure.

Sunday 12 April 2009 – Easter Service

I walked up to church this morning and found all the Tumaini children sitting so quietly and nicely in chairs set up outside of the church. They were all dressed in their nicest clothes and anticipating the service, the food afterwards and the chance to play in the yard at our house later in the day. We waited outside for about half an hour and then everyone arrived and we could start the service. The children sat quietly, some sleeping in the laps of mamas, and others listening attentively. Even through the "harambee," the fund-raising service after the Easter service, the children were well-behaved.

After the services, they were free to go outside and prepare for the food. It had been a rainy morning and so we gathered under the little kibandas beside the church building. The ladies realized that the children couldn't eat well sitting in the kibandas so someone pulled a large tarp down and gathered the children into 5 or 6 circles. The children all sat quietly and patiently waiting for their food. Finally, the servers came out with large platters of rice heaped with beans, greens and goat meat. Each circle of children received a platter and they ate heartily.

Soon it was time to walk down to the Mission's property. The children all wanted to walk beside me and some in front. I told them that I was first and they had to stay behind me. It worked for part of the time, but they were too excited to get to the house. When we arrived, Ferdinand gave them instructions about what they were allowed to do and not allowed to do. Then they took off running to the backyard. It seemed that for the older girls, the big hit was the swing set. They took it over and sometimes allowed the boys to swing. The boys, of course, enjoyed playing with the soccer ball, football and beach balls. The little children enjoyed playing on the plastic slide and pretended to "drive" places. They would peep out at the adults and wave their hand saying, "bye." We also provided soda pop for the children and they all enjoyed that very much.

As events sometimes go here, all did not go according to plan. The children, 51 of them, were only supposed to stay for an hour since there were so many of them, the yard is not very big and it had been a full day of events. There were supposed to be two dala dala that brought the children to the church in the morning and to return them in the afternoon but only one dala dala showed up. So while the children were playing at our house, the one dala dala returned two loads of adults back to Shadi and got a flat tire in the process. As a result, the one dala dala was very late in coming to get the children. The children came down to our house around 4 p.m. and the one dala dala did not arrive to pick up the first load until 6:30 p.m. The final load of children was picked up at 7:30 p.m. Even though the time spent playing was longer than we had anticipated, the children had a wonderful time and we all thought it had been a special day.

Friday 10 April – Joseph and Mwita

I was able to put Joseph and Mwita's photos in the children's album in the right sidebar. Please take a moment to look at our newest children.

Thursday 9 April - Mambo

Today was a good day for catching up. I made lists of all the things that still need to be done and a list of things I still needed to talk with Ferdinand about. I gave him a couple of hours to rest before I paid a call on him. He is suffering with malaria this week and hasn't been working much. One of the things we discussed was the Easter Service in Sweya. The children will be transported to the church by two dala dala's. After the service and dinner, the children will come down to the mission's property to play in the backyard. Before I left the house this morning, I asked Mama Lucy, the groundskeeper, if she could get two crates of pop. The children will each have some pop to enjoy when they come to play. I'm looking forward to their coming.

Omari may be able to go his relative's home soon. Social Services has written a letter on his behalf to give to his village chairman. We just need to pick up the letter and then make the trip with Omari to find this place. Ferdinand may be able to make the trip with him the first week of May.

The nursery school teachers are on mid-term break from 8 April to 20 April. The younger children are always a handful but now they will have more unoccupied time on their hands. They will be keeping us on our toes.

Wednesday 8 April – Trouble with Locks

I arrived at Tumaini about mid-morning and had to immediately try to open one of the containers. We have some contractors who are working on buildings for Bible Institute and the building supplies are being stored in the Tumaini containers. I had given Ferdinand a new copy of the key for the locks because his old key was starting to tear. The new key is causing some problems and they weren't able to get the container open on Tuesday. Unfortunately, the key I brought wouldn't work either and the new key still refused to open the lock. After wrestling with the lock for a while and then discussing what we should do, I headed up to the house to greet the workers and the children.

The workers seemed reserved as they asked me about my journey. But when I told them that I rejoiced to return to Mwanza their expressions brightened and it seemed to please them to hear that. The younger children were all pulling on me and asking to be held. Little Joseph asked me what my name was. That amused me. As I was leaving Tumaini, I passed most of the older children as they were returning from school. They were waving and calling my name. It's nice to be back.

Tuesday 7 April – Return to Tumaini

After a refreshing week in Nairobi with my friends, I have returned to work at Tumaini. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate with my "return to work" plans. I awoke very early this morning to a downpour which continued for more than an hour. It abated and then continued off and on for most of the morning. Since I needed to take the van with several gas canisters and the weight scale (for weighing food), I decided I would wait until Wednesday. I didn't relish the thought of getting the van stuck in a muddy ditch along the way.