Thoughts on Life here

I have to start by saying that I feel quite exposed now – somehow the working and the stress of all the car problems, not speaking the language, not really understanding the culture and so on, have all been getting to me slowly. This means that I can be affected by things that I have previously been impervious to, and it also means that it is time that I had a break.

Yesterday, the man who was helping move chairs at the clinic was wearing a shirt that had a check pattern – the weave of the cotton went across and up & down in squares. When I looked at his shirt I realised that he had worn through the up & down red stripes and you could now only see the sideways blue stripes. How interesting, I thought. Then it dawned on me that I have never seen that in the UK – we would have thrown the shirt away at the first fray on the collar – this was major wear and tear – and still he was still wearing it. It was all I could do to hold back the tears.

It is the same in so many areas; we see, people with so little, and often with many problems, yet they continue without making a fuss. I feel very humble.

I have also experienced more of the wonderful support that people offer you when you’re in trouble. In the car we must have hit a stone and when we dropped Lorraine off a man came up to the car telling us “madam, you have a problem”. It seemed that the fuel tank was leaking petrol. Immediately one of his friends got down in the dust and tried to stem the flow with his fingers – which he did fairly well. But of course this was not a long term solution! then another man came, mixing some glue, and tried to fix the hole!! This is an astoundingly resourceful country.

Unfortunately his attempt was only partially successful so we had to speed off to the garage before we ran out of fuel, each one of us fearing the massive expense of fixing the problem. [This is a 4x4 vehicle and fuel tanks come expensive!] The man in the garage now knows us well now, you could almost say that we are family. So, once again, we bowled up with a car in trouble and explained the problem, emphasising that we are only volunteers with limited finances. He must have seen the anxiety in our every feature and leaned back, smiling, before telling us not to worry as we questioned him about price. Can you believe that he fixed it in a couple of hours and only charged £16!!!!

I came home early and again tried to get a bus, but without luck. However once more an Angel bus stopped and picked me up – that is, one that turns up when I need it, offers me a lift and has Jesus Saves, or similar on the front. Again, the driver did not expect or want any money for this.

So, to sum up, there have been amazing experiences here, both good and challenging, but it has been worth it. Very, very worth it.

As I said in the last homeopathy posting, we have had to stop working, and have decided to go to Zanzibar. However Zanzibar is part of Tanzania, so I plan to continue to write odd snippets - hopefully in a less stressed manner - in case you're interested.

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