Church scare

Posted by Ali

The sound of voices chattering and sandals slapping on the stone walk outside my cottage jerked me from a deep sleep. I listened as the voices drifted past my windows and headed to the baby home. And then I knew what was going on. I had slept in, accidentally missing out on my first visit to a Tanzanian church. Panicked, I grasped at my watch and held it close to my face to see the numbers. 1:22. I groaned and flopped back onto my bed. How in the world had I slept so soundly that I'd missed my watch alarm? I usually woke up with the first beep, if not a few minutes before the alarm went off. Confused, frustrated and still drowsy, I closed my eyes to think the situation through. Yesterday I had talked to the Cradle of Love volunteers and we had unofficially agreed to eat lunch together. Now that they were back from church they would probably come knock on my door to see if I was awake yet. Although I did want to eat lunch with the girls and get to know them better, I decided that if I was tired enough to miss my alarm by almost five hours, I probably needed more sleep. I set my watch beside my pillow, turned over and drifted back to sleep.

Beep, beep, beep! My eyes popped back open. What in the world was wrong with my watch? I couldn't have been sleeping for more than five minutes. I picked up my watch, turning off the alarm as I examined the face. 8:30. Now I was even more confused. After further examination I had to laugh. Earlier I must have accidentally pushed the timer as I tried to read the time and mistaken 1.22 seconds for 1:22 p.m. And the voices and footsteps I'd heard must have just been the morning nannies coming to replace the night nannies at the baby home, not the volunteers leaving for church. Relief flooded my body as I realized I would get to go to church with everyone after all.

An hour and 45 minutes later I was showered, dressed and ready to go. The other girls passed my door just before I opened it and Danielle, walking at the end of the line, turned and greeted me with a cheery “Happy Sabbath” and a broad grin. I returned both the words and the grin and we hurried to the car where Davona was already belted into the drivers seat. She told us that Max had caught a cold yesterday, probably from their little girls who had been sick this week, so he and the girls were staying home this Sabbath. We drove about 20 minutes up into higher land until we got to the University of Arusha, an Adventist university campus that also included a primarily and secondary school and Havilah Orphanage (two Southern girls, Jordan and Ruth, are student missionaries at Havilah this year and got to Tanzania about three weeks ago). After parking, Davona led the six of us volunteers to the cement church. We waited outside the front door for a few minutes while SS wrapped up and found seats in the second-to-the-front row.

Church was really interesting and I was quite glad I hadn't missed it. Just after the announcements a whole group of kids walked in right to the very front and found seats. These were Havilah Orphanage kids and several of them walked right to the line of us volunteers and clambered onto comfy laps. They weren't shy or afraid of us at all, even though they'd never seen us before in their lives. The children seemed to play a big part in the church service and no one seemed to mind when a couple kids, at different times during the service, came to sit right on the edge of the stage for a bit. Everything was translated from Swahili into English, which was nice for us, although I'm not sure if the German girls were able to pick out all the English. This Sabbath was about protecting women and girls from violence and speaking out against such acts. The GC put together the sermon and a lady presented it. I thought she did an amazing job of relaying the message and I enjoyed the PowerPoint presentation, too. (See,  http://www.enditnow.org  for more info.) There were at least three special songs sung, one by a ladies quintet, another by the Women's Ministries members (both of those in Swahili), and then one as we were walking out of church where six young boys sang “Peace Like a River” in English. Once church was out we returned to our spot outside the front doors and talked to Jordan and a lady who was just here for a week break between Camp Wawona summer camp (which I think is near Yosemite) and going back to the States to work there during this year. Finally we said good-bye and piled back in the car for the bumpy ride back to the main road that took us to our campus.

As we climbed out of the car, Davona asked if we wanted to go for a walk later on in the afternoon and, since all us newcomers have been anxious to look around, we readily agreed and decided to meet back at her house at 4 p.m. I went to my cottage to change and then grabbed some of my dwindling supply of food items and headed over to the apartment over the orphanage where the girls said I could join them for lunch. We had a really great meal of rice, peanut sauce and fried carrots, peppers and onions. It was the best meal I've had since camping at Metallak Island last week. Well, except for the pesto penne I ate for lunch at the restaurant in Arusha on Wednesday. After lunch we talked for a bit and I told the German girls they'd have to teach me German during this year so I could get better acquainted with my German heritage. They thought it was a great idea, especially Becky and Jackie who have a harder time at speaking English than Anika. I learned “How are you doing?” (wie geths es, I think) and socks (zochen). I'd say I'm well on my way to becoming truly German, haha.

Later on, after having a bit of a break in our own separate rooms, we met at the Churchs’ house and ventured out of the campus walls to experience some of the rustic beauty of the area. As we walked, Davona told us that her son had seen several types of poisonous snakes, spitting cobras were one type she mentioned, around the area in the years that they have lived here. She also told us about a visitor to their house a few years ago who had grown up in that house. The visitor said that in the years they had lived there they had had to kill more than 40 snakes, all of them poisonous and many of them cobras. That kind of scared us all, but she said to just stamp our feet while we walked and the snakes would take off. But she also told us nice things too, about the area and Mt. Meru, which is right near the ADRA campus. By the time we had to turn around and hike back, we were starting on a small trail that lead up into the mountain's foothills.

When we got back to the campus, Danielle asked me if I wanted to come into town with her and Shae in a few minutes. Shae was going to go switch out with Ashley to look after baby Emmy and Danielle was going with her to get some shillings from an ATM and then eat supper and get some groceries since she hadn't had time to get much of anything since she got here on Thursday. I readily agreed since I'm in dire need of groceries. We stopped at the apartment and picked up Ashely and Emmy then went to the cinema where there are four ATM's. We all got out money and then went to the food court where we were suddenly descended upon by a flock of servers piling menus on our table. It was almost shocking how fast they gathered around our table. We looked over the various menus for Italian, Indian and American food and finally made our decisions.  Then we ordered food, talked, held Emmy, ate food, talked, held Emmy, paid for food and left. Ashely took Danielle and I into the grocery store next to the food court, while our taxi driver (who is friends with the volunteers at Cradle of Love) and Shae took Emmy back to the car to wait for us. We stocked up on food and then dropped off Shae and Emmy at the apartment and drove back to the campus. All in all, a good Sabbath (minus the news about deadly snakes nearby).