This was my bed at "camp"We finally had a short day today. We went into town to visit a primary school which only admits kids who are HIV positive, and many are orphans. The facility was very nice, and of course the kids were super excited to have visitors. When we walked in, they all stood up and started "singing" songs for us, which mostly consisted of melodic yelling, and it was pretty funny. One of the songs was "If you're happy and you know it..." so we sang along with them for that one. Then we helped teach numbers and letters for a bit before speaking with the founder of the school. SHE was amazing. Her organization includes not only the school, but also a bunch of other staff who train community members to speak with their communities about HIV/AIDS so that they get all of the facts straight.
After lunch, we visited another facility which promotes "a positive life" for people who are HIV positive. They have a tailoring course so that people can develop some life skills to be self-sufficient, and they also provide interest-free loans for people who are HIV positive so that they can start up their own business. Once they have paid back their loan, they can get another one if need be. Many Tanzanians can live healthily with HIV for 30 or more years, so programs like this increase their quality of life infinitely. So far, we've seen several charity type organizations, and the ones which are started by Tanzanians seem to be the best. Outsiders just can't know all of the cultural challenges that Tanzanians face, and often times their ideas of success are different from a Tanzanian's.
The next three days we're going to be camping at a Maasai boma, so more on that later.
3 comments:
Liz,
Thanks for sharing this experience with us. We enjoyed reading it! Remember the sage advice I gave you! Dave
you are going to a place called maasai something or other, and you have been to a place called the ngorongoro crater? When are you going to actually do college stuff? never mind I don't actually want you to do college stuff. I love you, be safe.
Liz,
Sounds quite fun. Hope everything is going well and it sounds great so far, you haven't gotten sick yet so from mine and your mom it has been successful so far. Two things: One, I have to ask the obvious relative question if you have met and tanzanian studs there yet? I am sure a few Moen fam ears are eager to find out and it's prob not Kim. And two, I am wondering if you have dusted off the ol fris and taught them some ultimate. I am guessing it is going to be easier than explaining it to the Moen family even with the language barrier. A tip from Karen, it is very similar to Curling.
Best of luck,
Sam and stella
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