Friday, November 7, 2008

End of First Village Experience

I can't believe it, but we're done with our work in the first two villages. Leaving the homestay this morning was very strange. We have a long weekend off then will move into 3 villages for the final weeks in Tanzania.
The final weeks there we spent doing a lot of community teachings. On Sunday our group split up and taught during 4 services at 3 churches in the village! The Friday before, a few of us were allowed to teach after a service at the local mosque. We were forgiven for showing up with our heads uncovered (oops!! - an oversight I realized halfway there, a 30min walk w/ no way to correct at that point.) Anyway, the men and women were split up and we taught the men outside while other volunteers taught the women in a nursery school building - we weren't disrespectful enough to attempt to enter the mosque. We taught for the better part of 2 hours answering many questions. The sher and other leaders wanted me to pass on the message that Muslims love peace, aren't terrorists, don't hate America, and want the Democrats to have a chance in power for awhile, since they believe this will hopefully lead to greater world peace. Yes We Can.
All of Tanzania was thrilled with election results. After listening to morning news broadcasts on radio, we were delivered copies of Obama's and McCain's speeches by our staff. We all especially loved the line about people in forgotten corners of the world huddled around radios - Yes We Were!

Running out of time but promise to get back on (maybe Tues) and give lots of details about joys and frustrations with testing, teaching, peer educators.
miss you all!

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