Village Life

Hello friends! We are in Tanga! We spent our first week in the village taking turns living with our team members Heather & Mary. They did an amazing job introducing us to friends and showing us the ropes of how to survive in rural Africa. We have cooked, cleaned, burned trash, and learned to sport a kanga and long skirt whilst riding a bike (an essential to life in the village). The rest of our team consists of a couple, Wayne and Joyce, and the pastor of the church, Matinya, and his wife Mama Sara. Matinya also runs the primary school, so both Emily and I will get to work with him closely. We are so blessed to have received such a warm welcome, and we have made many friends. Our second week in the village consisted of our home stay! Emily and I both lived with village families and learned the ins and outs of authentic life in the bush. We were both ‘adopted’ and well taken care of, though it was challenging and humbling to feel helpless in so many situations. It was a good test of patience and humility. Our language skills are coming along and we both look forward to our language workshop with Mary in Tanga next week. She is going to give us some important language learning tools and tips to apply to our time with our language helpers. We have had tea with both of our language helpers and we are eager to start our work together and build strong relationships with these women. I will start teaching in the beginning of August and Emily will do assessments on the kiddos at the school to track their health. She also plans to regularly visit families with children with special needs. She hopes to connect families with a disabled children’s clinic in town and help them to do exercises and physical therapy with some kiddos. She is eager to get started, and I am eager to get back in the classroom after visiting some classes and helping Heather teach English our first week here. Though we are still adjusting to life here while recognizing the beauty of the D people, there are so many needs and areas of the community to pour into. The Lord is active in this place, and we are excited to reach people for Him. There will be trials and struggles, but both Emily and I are so encouraged and humbled to be here in this place and at this time we know God is going to work mightily. We are doing a study with our team on Colossians and I will leave you with a little nugget that pretty much sums up our vision and hope for what God is going to do with our time here. Col. 2:6-8 So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than Christ. Whether is be through teaching, nursing, or just spending time visiting and encouraging, we hope to build life-long relationships that have an eternal impact. Thank you so much for your love and prayers, and we will report back soon! Be patient with us as our Internet access is somewhat unpredictable! We miss ya and love ya!

Grace and peace,

Sarah Majino

Side note: I thought of home yesterday while I sat huddled and crammed on the bus with my home stay mama, Mama Bakari. We were packed like sardines with people shoving trays of anything under the sun in our faces asking us if we want to buy stuff... we were surrounded by chaos, and then I heard the faint, calming music of Kenny G. Yes that’s right. In the middle of the bus station, someone was serenading me with the musical talents of Mr. Kenny G himself. Oh how I love Africa. (Shania Twain’s “From this Moment On” followed it up and yes I did sing along because it was the only English I’d heard in a while).