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Happy Spring to those of you all living in the parts of the world with 4 seasons! Things are going well in Tanzania, but we are sure keeping busy. You can read a little bit about what has been happening here in our Team Newsletter. Below is a picture of the front page along with a link to download the PDF for the document. We hope you all enjoy the pictures and reading about the latest happenings of our team. Blessings!
See this video to find out about greeting cards made by Makonde artists! We are selling the greeting cards for $4 each to support Downtown Church of Christ’s ‘Investing in the Journey’ Campaign!
Cards are $4 each, please post your name and the number of cards you would like to order on Heather Kellis’ Facebook wall. To pay, take or send a check to the Downtown Church of Christ’s office made out to ‘Downtown Church of Christ’ with ‘Investing in the Journey/Makonde Card Project’ in the memo line or pay online at downtownchurch.org.
One week ago today, the Mtwara chapter of La Leche League was born. We sat in a hot room together, all of us mothers: Mama Addy, Mama Gifti, Mama Reed, Mama Iabu, and Mama Kenny Rogers. Our back grounds are quite different, as are our lifestyles, our children’s names, and an endless number of other things. But in that room together, sweating and talking about the health of our children and families, we became something much more cohesive.
If you’re a La Leche League skeptic, I can relate. I have totally been there. Before I began attending meetings in Searcy, I referred to the group as “The Milk Maid Militia”. The only things I knew about the league was from people who had had particularly insulting encounters with members who said things like, “Women who don’t breast feed don’t really love their babies” or perhaps they fit into the extreme stereotype of a mother still nursing her six year old. I’m sure those women exist, but those stereotypes don’t reflect my experiences. I started attending the monthly meetings at Mona Lee Garner’s house when I became pregnant with Reed. As I worked through my mountain of books, it became clear to me that breastfeeding wasn’t as simple as I imagined. Many things could go wrong and often did, and then there were the mechanics of it all. What I found in these meetings was a wealth of information and women willing to share their valuable experiences with wide eyed, frightened soon-to-be-mom’s like myself. And of course, lots of helpful demonstrations.
When met with my own challenges to nurse, I found a great deal of support. Any woman who has had a baby relates to the complete exhaustion of those first weeks. A sacred roller coster. Without that group, I think I would have given up.
About a month ago, I began thinking about what it would be like to start a group in Mtwara. I had spoken with a good friend of ours who was working in a rural hospital who told me he saw a tremendous need for education and support for breastfeeding. I talked to another friend who mentioned the lack of good nutrition (or any) for new mothers staying in hospitals. It came up a few more times casually but was definitely something I imagined happening much later. Two weeks ago, our friend Adrian called. He volunteers at a local teachers college. He had been talking with one of the tutors who had apparently talked his ear off about breastfeeding and nutrition. Adrian thought we should get together and visit. The next day, I met with Neema and we had a surprising and exciting discussion. She shared with me her challenges to nurse after having to return to work soon after her son was born. She still nursed at night but didn’t know what to do for him during the day. She had read that the formula that makes it to Tanzania is often expired or a poor copy of a legitimate brand. Expressing milk wasn’t really an option. So instead, she opted for cows milk, which she began giving him when he was two months old. She went on to talk about how she knew other women who had struggled to nurse, or had to return to work early. Neema also mentioned that women in the more rural villages often have an even harder time, with fewer options available to them. Neema was very passionate and eager to start some kind of support group and asked my opinion. I hesitated to push La Leche League too hard, but it seemed to fit everything she was looking for. I suggested that we have an interest meeting to invite the women we knew and gauge their interests.
Neema came extremely prepared, with a list of objectives for our meeting. We introduced ourselves, mentioned what each of us would hope to get out of our time together, discussed the objectives of our group and how we would know we had met them. Then we threw out some ideas for naming our group. Oh, the name. The idea was to come up with something other than La Leche League, that would translate a little better with Tanzanians. The first suggestions were…..lacking in conciseness. The first idea, from Mama Kenny Rogers was, “Chama cha akinamama cha unyoneshaji na lishe bora kwa watoto” (The Women’s Group for Nursing and Excellent Nutrition for Children). I mentioned that this summed up our mission very well but was perhaps too long to say, “Hey pal, wanna come with me tomorrow to the Women’s Group for Nursing and Excellent Nutrition for Children?”. Then it was suggested that we use an acronym. “Write out the letter’s, Mama Reedi. Now, what does that say?” Neema asked. “Umm. CCACUNLBKW?” In the end, we decided on Chama Cha Unyonyeshaji na Lishe Bora or CCU for short. Neema was the obvious leader and appointed me her Vice President.
Our first meeting is to take place at our house this Saturday at saa kumi (4:00pm).
I don’t want to be too excited about something so young, but i’m failing at it a little. I’m anxious to get to know the other Mamas and work together on what’s most important to all of us, the health of our families. I’m especially grateful for Neema and confident in her skills and passion to lead this group. I’m extremely comforted by the fact that I’m not in charge of it.
At our first meeting, I was struck, maybe for the first time since living in Tanzania, that we truly have more in common than not. People might still think i’m really weird and goodness knows I find Tanzanians weird sometimes. But nothing is more universal or powerful than the daily tasks of mothering and I know I am privileged to share in that with these, my new neighbors.
A view of Zanzibar
It’s fascinating to me how our minds work and how each person has their own learning style that works best for them. For example: Flash cards are really good for me (Kristina Meeks), Caleb on the other hand, can do flash cards, but there is not enough difference between flashcards to create a memory with the words so they don’t stick as well for him. We’re all different. Therefore, this February, there were two of us families on the team who felt that taking a crash course at a school would really benefit our language because of our learning styles. So the Meeks and the Trulls went off to Zanzibar for a three-week course at the State University of Zanzibar.
I think all of us had a similar experience in those three weeks, but I will just represent my own experience for this blog’s sake. One of the reasons Caleb and I really wanted to go to this course was to not only for the idea of a refresher course, but also because we know we have this baby coming in June and knowing what it is like with one child, I could imagine how full my hands will be with two. We wanted me to have somewhat of a boost before baby #2 arrives. I have always appreciated the structure of a classroom and have been frustrated in my own studies as I try to create my own plan, but life happens and plans change. However, in this particular situation we were blessed to be living with a Tanzanian family. Meaning: all of our meals we taken care of, I didn’t have to worry about cleaning my home, and on top of all that, we constantly had opportunity for Swahili conversation. Our host mother, in particular, had been a Swahili language teacher for about 35 years and so she was ready for teaching and conversation. We spent many a night staying up late listening to her tell funny and moving stories of her life in Swahili.
Class time
Overall, our day consisted of the Trulls and I going to class Monday through Friday from 8am to 12pm. We had a class for just the three of us. Caleb would stay at the house with Aletheia (we knew there was no way I would be able to focus on a teacher if I was watching her) and he had a personal teacher come to the house for a couple of hours of teaching and constant one-on-one conversation. Mondays and Fridays he would watch Aletheia and be “in session” and then the other days he would meet in the afternoon so I would be there to watch her while Caleb met with his teacher. In the afternoons we were free to do whatever. During the week we filled this time mostly with studying, running errands, and a little bit of resting (Zanzibar is particularly hot this time of year and I knew I needed to be careful with the pregnancy). We found some breezey spots to sit and study and maybe find a yummy treat.
Aletheia enjoying a yummy treat.
Our teacher was quite the character and he did his job well. He covered some grammar and many different sayings or proverbs. We would always start off our day with our “Habari moto moto” meaning, any new happenings that were going on. It was a great way for us to talk. Class was taught in Swahili using English only for complicated explanations. He emphasized an important part of language to be conversation so he would instigate some talk by asking us simple questions like: Why are there poor people? and Who is to blame for the drug/alcohol problems in Tanzania? Suffice it to say, the questions themselves often challenged us as much as the Swahili. Of course, our teacher was one to go off on his own tangents, but this allowed us a lot of exposure and listening time and we could always stop him if we didn’t understand something or if we had a question.
Travis, Lauren, Kristina, & Mwalimu Farouq
There were many other international students there as well. In fact, we were lumped into a group with other American students to go on a couple of field trips. For one trip we went to a museum to learn about some history from Zanzibar to the Jumba la Ajabu (House of Wonder). The name was a little misleading, but we saw some neat history artifacts and tried focusing on reading the Swahili translations of the displays. Another day we went to one of the only forests in the world that houses the Red Colobus Monkey. We got little Swahili practice that morning, but Aletheia sure enjoyed looking at the monkeys.
A Red Colobus Monkey
We reached the end of our three weeks with a feeling of satisfaction. I felt like I had been able to review some grammar concepts that were helpful to hear from a teacher and I also received plenty more vocabulary to work on. I was thankful for the patience and the willingness of all of the teachers of the school in their encouraging correction when I was speaking. It is most likely culturally usually inappropriate to correct someone, but it makes sense for teachers. Now I need to find someone in Mtwara who will be willing to do that for me so that I can improve even more.
Caleb studying with his teacher
I must admit that I am a little nervous how my language level will be affected once Baby Meeks #2 comes around. However, I have been given opportunities and Caleb and I have a renewed motivation for the next couple of months to get in as much language as I can. With anthropological research questions to ask and knowing how flexible Aletheia is at her age, we are looking forward to the long conversations and village visits we will have with old friends and new ones. We were thankful for this opportunity of school and now we are ready to jump back into the swing of things at home.
The Meeks Family
Thank you God for providing these opportunities and for providing supporters who financially make these opportunities possible.
To read a quick update on what we have been up to the last few months, click here: Makonde Team Quarterly Report.
