Umoja (Unity) Day

We began our day with an early breakfast at 7 am, planning to leave for a catholic service at 8 am.  We were running late this morning leaving our lodge just a few minutes before the service began, but luckily we were running in Africa time and were just on schedule.

On the drive to church, we had a beautiful view of Mount Kilimanjaro. It was an amazing sight to see it peaking out from the clouds! Once we arrived at church, we noticed many similarities to Catholic service in the United States: the mass was structured and given in English, there was an offering period, and we were to anoint ourselves upon entering with holy and genuflect before we entered the pews. The main difference was women and men sat separately, with men on the right divide of the pews and women on the left. The school children clustered in the front and sang the songs which were accompanied by drums and clapping by the congregation. Also, the men and women showed great respect for the church by wearing their best attire, women in dresses and men in dress slacks and button downs. Lastly, the communion was given first to the elders, then middle and young adults, and children last. Our experience at our first African Catholic mass was beautiful and extremely interesting, and we were very grateful for the opportunity to attend and become immersed in the culture.

            Our next stop was the coffee plantation where we learned the process of making a cup of coffee from start to finish. In total it is a six-step process in making an Arabica cup of coffee. The plantation we visited was a community-run farm passed from generation to generation. Our guide showed us each step, starting from planting to the final step of grinding and everything in between, the end product being the best cup of coffee we had ever had! We finished our time on the plantation with a meal given to us by our guides, which included a dish of banana soup-which tastes nothing like you think it would! Our meal was interrupted by a rainstorm, which was pretty great to see considering Tanzania is currently experiencing a drought. We’re sure it was a welcomed surprise by the Tanzanian people because the drought has had a devastating effect on the production of crops and therefore an effect on their income and food sources. The rain only lasted a short period time-our day was still defined by the beating sunrays and 90 degree F weather. This inspired the motto that the team goes by: “see a chug, send a chug” to remind us to drink our water and stay hydrated!

            Now that we have gained perspective on the culture over the last three days, we are ready to perform the work we came to do. We practiced our projects for an orphanage, school, and community center that we will be visiting. After the training, we ate a delicious supper and got to further expand our cultural immersion by participating in a “dance party” with a neighboring tribe. An important part of their culture is to dance, sing, and make music and they were very excited to share that with us, as much as we were excited to learn and join them.

            It was another great day in Tanzania, and we can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings!

Umoja! (unity)- Anabel and Laney

(again photos are a challenge to load. 

We have posted some on Facebook on the Hope Without Borders  - USA/Intl.