A trip to Isanzu

Thursday July 23rd The day started slowly, bibi was cooking rice for breakfast, and Michael catching up with his washing. As the house floors looked very dirty, with lots of puddles of wax and scraps from tea, I decided to do some sweeping - and for once, no one else had the grass broom! Once that was done, I found a twig one for outside, happy to relieve Michael of that chore to spare his sinuses, but it took ages, 1½ hours! Bruce was collecting & chopping up firewood for bibi, but as they don’t store it till it’s dry, the fires are terribly smoky and inefficient. Bibi reckons it’s the smoke that’s damaging her eyes, every so often they get very sore & weepy & she can’t see very far. Some passers-by were amazed to see us working, so bibi told them, “They’re the children of the household.”
One day she said if I was Michael’s mother, then I was her daughter & Bruce her farmer! She’s even offered us a piece of land to build a house on! Michael wants us to build a BIG house with four bedrooms so all our children can stay – but we said we like little houses, or could build a big one so he & his wife & children could live in it with us, but he didn’t seem so keen on that idea! Lots of people have asked bibi to sell them a piece of land but she’s keeping it for the family. If she dies, Mama Joyce will oversee it as oldest surviving child. Each member has their own portion to garden but any one of them can build a house there & live on the shamba, including us!
Whilst Bruce was away bathing, I took a photo of little Michael, Ibrahim, Jeremia and Michael outside the old house. Enock turned up just as Michael finished in the bafu. I sat in the back with the two Michaels and Jeremia, Bruce in the front. It's only about 1/2 hour to Isanzu by car, it's the other side of Nzega. I was glad that Enock was the only driver, the car seemed to slide a bit in the dust as he veered around the obstacles, tooting his horn to clear the way!
Isanzu is a tiny collection of dwellings and a small duka or two. Babu Mathias and Bibi Belta live on a shamba down a short track off the 'main' road. There are several traditional huts dating from the time all the family lived there. Babu is one of Michael's great-uncles.
Bibi was practically jumping up and down to see us, exclaiming, “It’s just like a dream!” over and over again. She was absolutely overjoyed to see Michael again, he is much loved by many people. We were taken inside a hut and sat together in one of the two rooms. The home-made wickerwork chairs only just squeezed through the doorway! After a nice chat with babu we ate lunch together.
They have five children: Rachel is Pastor Jonas Kulwa's wife, Musa is a carpenter, Zahabu is another son, Esther works in Dar and Neema is married. Bibi came from Mwanza originally, so Babu has been to the Sukuma-style Catholic cathedral there. After lunch, we talked about the Sukuma language. Michael found a hymn book and New Testament that had an extra portion including the Lord’s Prayer, the Apostle’s Creed and the Ten Commandments. He read them out & I copied - fun! Then he wrote the Lord’s Prayer on a piece of newspaper, I tried reading it out loud by myself apparently quite correctly - everyone was amazed, they find it terribly hard to read Kisukuma, they’re only used to speaking it, early schooling is done in Kiswahili.
Later on, we sat under a large mango tree chatting before going for a little walk through part of the shamba, which produces peanuts, maize and sisal. There are also mangoes & various palms, including dates & one with fruit resembling large coconuts that contain a large edible seed full of oil. The well was dry but Bruce thinks it just needs digging deeper. Nearby was a clump of straggly rosella plants.
Back at the mango tree, we were shown the long poles in its fork bearing maize cobs - a traditional method of storage. Nearby, sisal leaves and fibre were in various stages of preparation for weaving into rope or making other things.

Pics: left = Baba Enocki, Babu Matthias, Jeremia, Bibi Belta, Michael, little Michael, and Bruce outside one of the huts; right = Jeremia at Isanzu;
On the way back to bibi’s mid-afternoon, we stopped at the attractive-looking orphanage to meet the children plus another staff member. Unfortunately, little Michael didn’t want to get out of the car to play with them.
Back at bibi’s, we were given a large bag of peanuts to shell – I found it quite difficult, only doing one nut to Michael’s five, and my fingers got really sore! After a short break, Michael showed me how to do it properly & suddenly I could almost keep up and didn’t get sore at all!
L = ‘Michael in the bush’ (the bougainvilleas at bibi’s).
Eventually he decided he'd had enough, so after taking a photo of him 'in the bush', we walked up to the large rocky hill in the distance, where little Michael had had fun the day before sliding down the rocks.
It’s a little way from the shamba, down the Tabora road, and is quite impressive – the rocks rise up sharply off the plain behind a collection of a few huts and a couple of dukas.
It was a bit of a scramble to reach the top, but once there, there were lovely views over the surrounding countryside - bibi’s is way in the distance just past a dust cloud on the left of the road, top right!
As dusk was coming, we climbed back down an easier route, returning to the road via a different path to enter the shamba via the short driveway behind the new house, edged by attractive native trees that babu left when he cut down the rest that were growing in this part of the shamba; Michael says they look lovely when they flower in the wet season.
Shelling peanuts continued even after dark, sitting round on stools outside the porch of the old house, where bibi was preparing rice. Mama Lucia’s oldest girls turned up a bit later.
We had quite an interesting and varied conversation – Michael said he’d tar-seal up to bibi’s house & put in pipes running with milk if he became an MP!!! Bibi said her 12-15 goats won’t be enough for the bride price for five grandsons, but I said there were only two really needing them: Michael and Jeremia as they have no parents. Also the other three are a lot younger, although the 3rd Michael (yes, another one!), Mama Regina’s oldest son, is in Form 4.
After a rather late tea with all mama Lucia's daughters, their mother, and a young Uncle John, we had a short time of fellowship together before going to bed around 10. However, I was kept awake by the guys shelling peanuts in the sitting room – still! I thought we’d finished them!

Harvesting rice

Wednesday 22nd June Michael swept the area around the houses today, and I’d never seen it so immaculate! Bibi said she only had a little work to do so didn't need my help, so I sat outside with Bruce who was working on a message for bibi’s church in Nzega – we’d been asked to go there in the afternoon as we hadn’t gone on Sunday. We were surprised to see some mamas going along on the path near the house, carrying small dishes of white stuff - Michael told us later that it was flour. Someone had died in the village and it was time for people to pay their respects. One lady came to get flour from bibi, then another one came by to invite bibi to accompany her. Breakfast was buns and chai today, then Michael and I looked at photos indoors, from when his grandfather was a young man to Michael's time in Bukoba at Harvest. It was interesting seeing more pictures of Michael as a baby, his baptism age 15, working in a store after he left school. There were a few from his time at Biharamulo Teacher Training College. Only three of the students were men, the rest women, who wore a uniform of pale blue skirt and white blouse; the men wore a blue & white striped shirt over whatever trousers they had. It was interesting seeing the dolls & Ludo boards they had made. There were some nice photos of Michael relaxing on a rock near the school, also one of his first class of five little students at Harvest, Bukoba. I recognised two of them who I'd taught on occasion – a very difficult job! Bibi came in, urging him to hurry up as he was needed to supervise Ibrahim and little Michael, who’d gone to the rice shamba. She looked surprised when I went with the men, perhaps she'd hoped I'd stay and help her or chat. On the other side of the Tabora road, a footpath wends towards the paddy field past a short path to the village pump. Rice is grown in small rectangular plots surrounded by thorny, weed-topped mud walls. Ibrahim had already cut a few bundles using a small sickle, but Michael took over. Little Michael was just messing around!Bruce had a brief turn at cutting the rice, but found the bending too much for his back. Once there was a big enough area cleared, we laid a large tarpaulin down, lining up the cut bundles along one side. Threshing is done by picking up small bundles and hitting the heads against the tarp or a stone to dislodge the dry grains. Ibrahim used another method, laying several bundles head to head on the tarpaulin, then beating them with a large stick. Once we’d finished the first bundles, Ibrahim was kept busy collecting them from Michael, bringing them over to us to thresh. Little Michael ran back off to the home shamba, although he could have made himself usefull carrying bundles or chasing the neighbour's straying calves away. 1½ hours later, we'd cleared two plots and needed to return to bibi's as we had a lunch engagement. Shaking the grains into the middle of the tarp, we skimmed off the rubbish before pushing the rice into a sack for Michael to carry on his back, it was about 15 kgs.Bruce went over to the pump to see if he could help the youngsters drawing water, he thought they weren’t pumping it very well – but soon found the seals were too worn to pump any other way. The mamas at the intersection greeted us, commenting about how tired we must have got from all our work in the fields - but I said it was very enjoyable! Bibi also thought we’d be tired, but really we were fine! We had got pretty hot though, so were glad to bathe before going to Paulo’s. I had to laugh, Michael trotted out just in his shorts looking slightly embarrassed – briefly! Paulo’s is only a short walk away. The big wrought-iron gate opens into a small courtyard between the house & other buildings. We had a lovely time there, good food and good conversation! Mama had made a very tasty mchuzi and a delicious side-dish of ground peanuts/tomatoes/salt. She'd prepared both ugali & spaghetti, perhaps fearing we wouldn't like ugali, but we quite like it!
Afterward, we chatted with Paulo, Michael chatting with his aunt. Paulo says if you put the two of them together, it’s hard to stop them talking!!! He used to clean and maintain the swimming pool at the Swedish school until it closed, working every day from 7 a.m.. Alternate days finished at 2 p.m., the other by midday. The one hundred students were taught in Swedish, but they picked up Kisukuma playing with the local kids - it’s a Sukuma area. The adults also picked it up instead of Kiswahili, causing a few problems for those working at the hospital - some of the other staff plus patients were from other tribes!
The pool now only gets used by visiting Wazungu, Africans don’t normally like to swim – probably a modesty issue re togs, although the men seem quite happy to bathe in a river in a secluded spot! Woman aren’t allowed to show the thigh or midriff though. Paulo picked up Swedish so well that visitors often ask him when he’d visited Sweden! He now works as a Bible College watchman, having on a rotating shift: Day 1: 7 p.m.-7 a.m.; Day 2: 7 a.m.-3 p.m., Day 3: 3 p.m.-10 p.m. He also sells phone vouchers from home and at the bus stand, making about 20% profit. His children help, he says it’s good training for them to take part in a small business; too many young people are becoming lazy, sitting on benches drinking & smoking, saying there’s no work! In the old days, that’s what the old men did. He says the young ones are drinking their strength away, so if they do find work, they can’t do it anyway! He says there’s plenty of work if you go out & look for it.They only have two children, Happy (Form 2) & Matthew (S6). Happy didn’t want to go to Nzega Day School, so they found her a place at Umoja Sec, 100 kilometres away in the bush. She didn’t want to go there as she’d heard tales of lions, snakes & hyenas!
She phoned up after just a week there, wanting to come home: there were wild animals, and she had no friends. But she’d never actually seen any wild animals, just heard a hyena one night! She agreed to finish the term.
They discussed it again in the holidays – by which time she loved it – great teachers and great friends! However, her brother wants to go to Nzega Day, he thinks they study too hard at Umoja! Paulo wanted to know if we’d like to use the sauna - they all laughed when I said I thought it could be dangerous, one could get too dehydrated, and also I don't like the idea of dripping with sweat! It might be one way of keeping warm in a cold climate though, but Africa is too hot!
We had to be back to bibi’s by 3 so that we'd be in time for church at 4. We were met by another visitor, Michael's younger brother, Jeremia, who gave us both big hugs. He’d come on the bus from Igunga where he lives with Aunty Joyce. Aunty Lucia there too, telling us Uncle Enock would take us to Isanzu tomorrow.
After getting our Bibles for church, we waited outside for bibi, who came dressed in a fancy blouse. I must say I was a bit shocked to see Jeremia start to unbutton it, especially as she had nothing on underneath - but he was only trying to help, she hadn’t done them up properly!!
We got to church on time, but of course it left no opportunity to go to the net. Poor Bruce had got overheated AGAIN, so Michael went off to buy water while we waited in the church office for the service to begin. Some of the elders greeted us and we signed the visitors’ book; the pastor was away visiting a bereaved family in another village.
The service started 40 minutes late as no-one turned up apart from the elders till then, so we could have gone to the net after all! The elders quipped that they should only wait ½ hour then lock up & go home - that’d really confuse the latecomers!
The new church is really large but isn't finished yet. They say it is full on a Sunday. The old one is only used for Sunday School now. However, only about 20 turned up for the mid-week service. Naturally it’s hard for workers to get there, so most were elderly like bibi.
The teaching on prayer was excellent, given by one of the elders, a school teacher, as part of a series. He translated the odd phrase for us, I quietly did the rest for Bruce. At one point, he used Jeremia in an example of the believer’s close relationship with Christ, walking arm in arm around the front of the church - Jeremiah (Jesus) even stroked his face and shoulders! It was quite funny!
Bruce was given a short opportunity to share, I tried translating, but the teacher chipped in to hurry things along, going away like a rocket! I would have preferred him to have done it all really!
We greeted everyone afterwards, including a blind evangelist, whose prayer isn’t to receive his sight, but rather to be used more by God.
It took an hour to return via the dirt roads; the dust upset Michael’s sinuses so he had a rather disturbed night. Little Michael got into big trouble from bibi for something later on, I think he'd been playing with the candle indoors.
Once it got dark, we were asked to wait indoors while Michael went to Mama Lucia’s to see how much Baba Enocki would charge to go to Isanzu, but the shrieks and laughter from the girls outside made me wonder just what was going on, and I think he was a little late leaving - although of course it could have been Jeremiah that was causing all the commotion! I wasn’t sure if we should go out to join the fun or stay in, it was pretty boring inside!
Michael was just back in time for our late dinner, saying we’ll only have to pay for seven litres of petrol, half the cost of a taxi. He said we could all take turns driving as we all could drive!
Michael of course had done a one-month course last year, and Jeremia a six-month one some time ago. I must say I didn't really want to – but driving on rough roads veering round potholes, livestock, cyclists, pedestrians and the occasional car, bus or truck – no way!
We were a bit shocked to find out that you can get a licence just by paying a fee, without having ever driven, had lessons or studied the road code! No wonder there are so many accidents! Jeremia would like to get a commercial licence but it costs 100,000Tsh and Michael thinks it’s too dangerous being a taxi driver anyway, lots die every year especially in Dar from hijacking – I was thinking they just died in accidents!
We found out that Michael hadn’t started primary school till he was nine, which is why he finished so late aged 16. In the year 2000, the government developed a new scheme of special schools for such late starters, so that they could complete an abridged syllabus in just two years, instead of the normal seven.
We were interested to hear that Jeremia can play the piano & loves classical music, he plays keyboard at church but of course has no instrument at home to practise on. He'd like to find his own place in Igunga. At present he's at Aunty Joyce's, where he’s started a chicken farm with 100 hens (local & European) that are laying well. He started it there rather than Tazengwa because there are more opportunities to sell eggs. We were all disappointed that we didn't have an opportunity to visit it.