We knew our sense of not belonging in Australia would increase with each home assignment, and after almost 7 years in Tanzania, we are definitely feeling it. One big change is that people in Adelaide don’t see us as “one of them” anymore. We are outsiders. We no longer have […]
After almost a year living in our new place, we thought maybe we should tie up some admin-y things, like telling our bank what our new address is. We tried to think about what we’d need to bring to do that, e.g. identity documents such as a passport, something to […]
What Bible verse would you choose to share when visiting a family whose child has just died? Perhaps something about God comforting his people? Or something about the hope of the resurrection? (Maybe not.) What about Philippians 4:8? Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is […]
Story 1: Msikwao is a young girl, early high school age who is seen at a river breastfeeding a child. The boy who sees her tells his father who gathers the village elders to interview her. She says she’s looking for her grandfather, and they question her about her past. […]
In the English dictionary, ustawi (ooh-STAH-wee) is prosperity or welfare; mafanikio (ma-fa-nee-KEE-oh) is accomplishment or success. The latter is a very popular topic for teaching in Tanzania. The former does not feature as much, but a long-time missionary suggested it to us as an alternative to mafanikio to distinguish prosperity […]
Kufa kwa wengi ni harusi means ‘For many, (a) death is a wedding,’ where wedding is representative of a big party. When I first heard this proverb, I assumed it was about people who die, that for them death is a happy thing or a release. It’s not that. The […]
I feel like the longer we are here, the more I see how much we have to learn. If we spent our first three years trying to get our heads around prosperity gospel, I have spent the last few years trying to get inside Tanzanian understandings of hierarchy, and it […]
