First off, thank you for all the prayers surrounding our health - the kids are doing much better after ridiculously high fevers and weird fungal rashes and other bodily issues. Melissa and I have remained surprisingly healthy and we attribute that soley to God's grace.
We also now have a regular access to the internet which will allow us better communication and hopefully news access. for those that know us, we are somewhat news junkies and newspapers in Dar function a lot like your local high school or small college paper. Needless to say, the BBC, NyTimes, WP, NPR, etc have been receiving some hits from a Dar based server recently!
We resumed our Friday night bible study where we do Swahili/English and each week it seems someone new is always coming. Something we need to consider shortly is a place to meet that can accomodate all the kids and a large room for adults. There is this awesome Bollywood Cinema just south of us and we're going to see if there is any time throughout the week we can meet in their theatres - it's always empty. We're encouraged by those attending, it's just frustrating that our language is still quite limited. By no means could we teach or be taught scripture in Swahili, so we end up singing swahili/english worship and then teaching mostly in English. This obviously limits those that will come first, but we hope by the end of 6 months there could be two groups and by then our swahili should be much improved.
Recently we connected with this organization called Son Int'l. They are manufacturing and distributing the bio-sand water filters in rural areas around Dar. The couple that founded the organization have been in Dar 4 years and they have the whole operation down and have trained installers and employ like 8-10 people. It's very cool. We've been visiting them and "shadowing" the operation since the New Year and they've been completely open to our presence. We've actually arranged for us to visit any afternoon of the week, so we can continue to learn about the operation and practice our swahili with the workers. We're really excited b/c all the logistics and planning for a clean water project has been ironed-out by this organization. It also seems providential b/c they're based in Dar (10 miniutes from our house), but their focus is on rural areas - they don't know of anyone targeting the urban clean water needs through filter distribution. As we continue to learn and assess the needs here in Dar, we are so thankful that we can witness a successful project with clear ministry aims and we have complete access to learn and critique what we experience. There is another source of information, an organization called Wateraid (UK gov't based n-p) and the director of their Dar office has agreed to meet with us and explain all the local projects they're connected to. It will be really helpful to speak with her b/c she is a Tanzanian and WaterAid has been in Dar for almost 25 years. So as we move forward, we really want to have a good understanding of the needs in Dar, which communities are most vulnerable, do those communities line up with our efforts to plant a church and do outreach, what other needs exist in those communities and who is addressing them.
Life marches on and we take it a day at a time - TIA baby.
