Missionary Life

Hello!  Tuesday morning here...it's raining a bit, so a good time to put up a few pics. 

Here's one of the many coffee plantations.  This part of Tanzania exports alot of coffee.  The locals mostly drink tea so not a lot of coffee stays in the country.  It's all picked by hand too.
 .....and a lumber yard.  Most of the wood is cypress or mahogany.  

Here's the fruit stand where Jason and Sherri get much of their fruit.  Pineapple and mango are really good!

But....in order to limit the risk of amoebas, all fruit needs to be washed in a bleech solution first.  You'd be surprised how much time it takes for the basics.  Of course, no fast food and on a budget, you don't really go out to eat much.  No spaghetti  out of a jar either!  Simply doesn't exist. 

And the power in the country is really sketchy.  So fridge on....fridge off...all the time.  This week there has been two outages that lasted almost all day.  So, while it's great that the Branch provided an air conditioner to fight the heat...you need electricity for it to work!!  and, like last night, no fan when you go to bed either.  Then, you also have to try to remember what was all "on" when you went to bed, because right about your first REM cycle, the power will come back on and lights go on, TV goes on, etc.

....and if it's your wash day, and your clothes are in the washer...zap, there goes the power....oh, well...I guess it'll get a good soaking!  You'd be surprised how your life revolves around whether you have electricity or not.   And the Branch has provided a good generator, but you just can run it all the time.

To the right is a band that was playing a wedding.  It's quite different than wedding bands in the States.  What they do is they get in the back of a pickup and the whole wedding party parades around town with this band playing like crazy.  It's quite comical really, but also a traffic hazard!

 Here's Jason opening the gate to their house, which is a duplex.  It's quite a process to leave and to come home.  First you unlock the big gate, drive the car through, get out, shut and lock the gate.

Then open the "garage door" gate.  Drive in, lock the gate. 

Then unlock the gate door in the back of the house, unlock the actual wood door, and wala....your home!  Jason says it might be over-kill, but why take chances.  He's got so many keys you'd think he was a janitor!  And Sherri has not got Jason to let her label all the keys, so it takes even longer....Jason!!! let her label the keys!!


Speaking of hazards, here is a Dala Dala (bus).  Basically, here's how it works....you take a small mini-van, pack it full of people at the bus station and then head out to pick up more people.  And don't forget there's also "carry-on's"....like a huge bunch of bananas or a huge sack of flour or rice..

This guy probably has the best seat of all....at least he's getting fresh air!  "How many people can you get in a dala-dala", you ask?   "There's always room for one more...."  These buses are everywhere and we've never seen one not packed to the gills.

Almost none of the brothers have cars, so they either walk to the territory, or they catch a dala-dala to get to their territory.  Remember that much of the territory goes up the foothills of Kilimanjaro, so picture riding one of these in the windy hill roads....