Market Day

Every Thursday is a big market day in the village of Idiwili. Merchants from town bring used and new merchandise to spread on plastic mats on the ground or hang on fences.

Heaps of shoes, clothing, tools and hardware items fill the market area. Fabric pieces are draped on home-made hangers on fences and sewn into wraps or clothing by "tailors" who have brought their treadle machines. Local farmers bring home-made brooms and produce, as well as dried fish.


Livestock is sold on the village football (soccer) field. Today was raining (it seems to often rain on Thursday), so we didn't take too many good pictures; we'll do another update on this later.



What we'd like to share today is what always happens when we go to market: we are joined by one or more students. On this day, Giliam and Peter met us on the road and accompanied us the entire trip, carrying our purchases and conversing, both in English and Swahili. We asked them where we'd find the best restaurant in the village.




We like to bless our students in Jesus' name, so we treated them to everyone's favorite: chipsi mayai, French fries cooked in egg.



A couple of tables set end to end with a common bench on either side the length of the room will accommodate all the customers in a boarding house style.





Bon appétit!

Your Hands & Feet,

Gary & Joanne

Eat Mor Chikin !

How would you feel if you were treated to a chicken dinner...on the "hoof?" Joanne had made Sefania the shirt he is wearing in this photo, and his mother sent this chicken to school with him as a gift. It was a "Welcome back to Tanzania" gift we appreciated very much.

In His service,

Gary and Joanne

(special nod to Chik-fil-A for “borrowing” their marketing slogan for the title)

Comforting a suffering child . . .

To our family, friends, supporters, brothers & sisters in Christ . . .

Walking home from class today, I found a girl huddled against the side of a building sobbing. I asked her what was wrong and she told me she'd just learned that her mother had died. She'd been suffering for months.

I walked the girl to the office to meet with our vice headmaster about getting transport home. Along the way, we talked about her mother's faith and involvement in church. It makes it so much easier to comfort a suffering child when you know the parent is in the arms of Jesus.

We've lost a couple of students and a number of family members of students this year. Do be in prayer for them, as this can often times cause real disturbances to their opportunity for an education. Many times an older girl is expected to return home and pick up the mother's duties to younger siblings. A boy is expected to return home to do the husband's work. In all cases, change in the financial picture adds a lot of stress to the student.

We are grateful for your support that allows us to use a portion of our stipend to help in these emergency situations: transport to funerals, funds during transition, etc.

May God bless you as you tender your heart to the will of God.

Love,

Gary (and Joanne)

Tanzy

Many of you are familiar with Tanzy, the cat that came to us as a kitten in 2009 and immediately stole our affections when she caught a rat her second night. Sad to say, she died recently, leaving five orphans just 5 weeks old.


Thanks to our finding a local dairy farmer, the kittens are doing well. We plan to keep one (the calico) and give the rest away to good homes.

Your Hands & Feet (and paws),

Gary & Joanne