Home Visits

Today, I got the opportunity to visit the homes of a couple of students. Dan, Director of Operations of Peace House in the states, is visiting Peace House this week and one of his tasks was to get some footage of students' homes and interview their parents to add to the video for their big fundraising banquet in Minnesota this fall.

First we went to Ndajiri's home and visited her mother Elizabeth and her younger sisters. She also has three brothers and another older sister. Elizabeth and Ndajiri are Maasai, but have moved away from their traditional culture. With their cow, chickens and maize, Elizabeth tries to support her large family.
Next we went to Hussein's home. The children in his neighborhood were very interested in Dan's camera.




This little boy was beautiful, but also very afraid of me. The other children tried to tell me he just didn't like visitors, but I think he just doesn't like mzungu (the swahili word for "white man") very much.
Here, Angelo, Peace House's social worker interviews Mariam, Hussein's mother, about Hussein's opportunity to attend Peace House. She expressed ger gratitude and hoped that Hussein, as the oldest of her children, would be able to be a role model and provide hope to his younger siblings.

Lastly, we visited Lillian's home and her mother, Mary. Mary contracted an eye disease a while back and by 2001 was left completely blind.


It was so incredible today to meet some of the students families.

One of the things I would have done differently for this trip in retrospect is to have done a home stay. I know that a home stay would have seemed too intimidating from the States, and I highly doubt I would have even signed up for one, but after being here, I wish I had. Of course, home stays would have been arranged with people who had the means to accommodate me and not with already overburdened families like these, but there is such a spirit of hospitality here. "Karibu"is a Swahili word that anyone in Tanzania would pick up in about 5 minutes. People say it all the time. It means welcome, and it's truly the spirit of so many here. The other telling bit of language is that all the older women are addressed as "mama" (or "bibi", for the visibly wisened) and the younger women as "dada"-- mother, grandma, sister. Everyone is family. I admire the warmth of the spirits here, especially of the women.

There are only a handful of days left in this adventure, it's hard to believe I arrived over two months ago. I have learned so many things in such a short time, and still have much, much more to learn.