How does this work? - Thursday Oct 10, 2019

We went to a school supported by Chalice in the community of Mkongo. Such a welcome...all the parents in different coloured t-shirts according to the family circle groups (each sponsored child has a parent who joins a circle group), children in their uniforms, elders, and traditional dancers and drummers . Some dancers have cashew shells tied on their calves in layers for percussion. Such signing and whooping!! At the presentation we sang our national anthem after the Tanzania anthem. There were several children groups demonstrating dancing and singing. It was evident they had prepared a long time for this encounter. The parents had also prepared many presentations and songs and dancing.

Each parent then in procession presented Father Pat, President of Chalice who has joined us, with gifts of chicken, eggs, peanuts, material, and even a woven mat. It was the first experience for many of us and it was very emotional.

After lunch, there was a downpour of rain with high winds. Such a blessing for the people of Tanzania.

The family circles had organized a demonstration for us showing how the micro finance portion of their monthly meetings. It is for them a time to learn to budget, document the debits and credits, the compulsory savings, the loans, and even the fines for being late or falling asleep! Could we learn something?

Some of us women gathered with their women to discuss issues, concerns, and listen to perhaps brainstorm approaches to solutions.

The children were paying outside with one of our younger members and were fascinated with the long hair, running their fingers through after removing her braids.

Learning is definitely a two way process.