When we were preparing to come to Tanzania, we said we’d do 10 years, and we purposely put a time limit on it. We are not ‘career missionaries’: our goal has been to build up Tanzanian believers and movements, such that our input is no longer needed. In the development sector […]
One of the striking things about women in Tanzania for us as Aussies has been the number of women who work, and how this is largely uncontroversial. Tanzanian household structures provide for this. So does the cultural concept of the ‘strong woman‘. And the way they access cultural paradigms around […]
When we moved to Tanzania I was told that we would need house help. So Mama Velo did our cleaning. (I cooked. I enjoy the creativity of it, and it gives me some headspace – like how some people do their best thinking in the shower.) And she was great, and we kept […]
When you parent cross-culturally, you lose any sense of what is ‘normal’ at what age. Elliot is different to his Australian peers and to his Tanzanian peers, but I don’t even have a good sense of what Aussie mums would think is ‘normal’, and we don’t have many opportunities to hang […]
Elliot has started preschool at an English-medium school where there seems to be a whole lot of Swahili going on. We’re not sure of the exact balance or how much he’ll pick up of what. Since he started 2 or 3 weeks ago, we have been puzzling over the words […]
Arthur and I are not the only ones simultaneously re-entering Tanzania and adjusting to a new place in it. Elliot is too, and I suspect it’s even bigger for him because the ratios of his life are more dramatic. When we returned to Australia last year, he’s lived 85% of his […]
I don’t know if there are stages, but after my initial impressions our real re-orientation began, and learning about a new place too. It’s all mixed in together. Here are ten observations 5 weeks in. We are not as tired this time. During our first year in Tanzania, we were pretty […]
Meet Jesus at uni 