The day of many vistors

I woke up around 9am and sat outside basking in the glorious sunshine until around 10am when Kayla came to join me. Our day started off with the usual chat and coffee. I had a chance to read Kayla my past blog posts and she added-in a few good points here and there. Very much appreciated. After we had been sitting outside for a while we got our first visitor, Kayla’s laundry lady, Mama Emani. The reason why she is called this is that Mama is the term given to a mother and her first name, Emani, is after her first child. Interestingly enough, the daughter’s birthday is not celebrated on her actual day of birth but rather on when she has been baptized. 

Our next visitor was Rosie. Rosie is part of the family that we met yesterday when we were walking to the main road to get into town. The family was very welcoming and outside we saw the mother and grandmother tending to the land. Rosie stayed with us for about 2 hours and she practiced her English while I attempted to practice my Swahili. She asked a lot of questions about the US. She was very interested to know what we ate, what my job was, and just general questions about life. Rosie just recently found out that she did not pass the past to get into secondary school. In Tanzania students are taught in Swahili from Primary grade 1 until 7 then they must take a test to get into secondary school. In Primary School it is taught in Swahili but supplemented with English classes to help them prepare for the entrance exam into Secondary school. This exam is given all in English as Secondary School is taught all in English. It’s very tricky because most of the students pail, about 70%, and the teachers who are teaching the students are generally the ones that have failed the test to get into Secondary School themselves. A very messed up system. Rosie is currently taking a computer typing course at the local church to help her get a job as a secretary or cashier.

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Our final visitor of the day was, Kayla’s banana delivery man, Tm. He also used to be Kayla’s watchman. Tm mentioned to Kayla that he wanted to meet me. We have a very basic conversation which thankfully Kayla helped to translate a lot of it for me. 

Kayla began to finish her gardening and I snapped a few photos of Mama Emani doing laundry by hand. (Wasn't able to upload them before posting - check for an update to this blog post later with those photos.) After several hours of basking in the sunlight and enjoying the calm before the storm, the afternoon rain finally came. We took a nice relaxing break before our evening hike. 

Just down the street from where Kayla lives are beautiful rolling hills. We took our soon to be nightly stroll down the hills and back up again. Interestingly enough Kayla had never been to this part of town before I came. Luckily we had a chance to experience it together. Take a look at the stunning pictures below.