Sadly it had to come to an end :

 My time in Tanzania has now officially come to an end and it was with sadness that I had to say goodbye to friends who became like family to me over the 3 months that I was in Bulima.  On Wednesday I let the morning chapel service and I briefly spoke on doing the will of God my topic was "Here I am Lord sent me" and the bible reading came from Genesis 46:2 and 1 Samuel 10:3 I ended off by reading the words of a song called "Here I am Lord" by Daniel L Schutte.

 The words of the chorus is Chorus

Here I am, Lord. Is it I, Lord?

I have heard you calling in the night.

I will go, Lord, if you lead me.

I will hold your people in my heart. 

Those 2 verses and song were constantly on my mind during the last 3 weeks I was in Tanzania.  My time in Bulima started like it ended with 2 weeks of constant power outages, fortunately everything I set out to do was accomplish with the exception of 1 practical training which I had to do but because of the power failures I never got around to do that hopefully with the instruction I left the student librarians will be able to work out what needs to be done in this regard.  The last week was basically spend doing almost next to nothing because of the power failures which basically gave my body a change to relax after almost 3 months off slaving away in front of the computer.

 On Thursday we had a semi sent for me with the girls as they were leaving for Mwanza the next day to show M sister around town and it would be the last time we were all together to socialize with 1 another, Friday we had a staff party for me as I was leaving that Sunday by bus to travel to Nairobi.  The ride down in the bus to Nairobi was uneventful although it seems that bus drivers are in competition with 1 another to see who could get to their destination the quickest.  The road in Kenya is much better than in Tanzania except for 1 stretch of road where the bus driver had to avoid holes in the road basically every 2 meters. I arrived in Nairobi at 03h30 and at Mayfield guest house at 05h15 where I slept for 2 hours before heading to breakfast even though I was not hungry.

The week that was in Bulima, Tanzania and Power failures

This past week has gone rather quickly and went great until Friday when the inevitable power failures happened. On Monday I went to Mwanza to sort out the work permit, we arrived at the AIC compound and spoke to the person in charge of the process, after this was done we left to go and buy some books which are needed by the students. We were then called back to the AIC compound as they neglected to give me the necessary papers to fill in for a renewal of my work permit, this done we headed back into town to catch up with the rest of the group for lunch before I went in search of some items for the library.

It was a pretty hot day and during our time in Mwanza I had about 4 sodas which I drank like water. The person with me just could not understand how I was able to do this. Work this week had gone well in the library up to and including Friday when the power went out for most of the day, up till then we had about 1900 books on the system which meant I missed out on the target of having 2000 books on the system.  The advantage of the power failure personally is that the body could have a well deserved break from sitting behind a computer all day.

I am planning to put in long hours from Monday to Wednesday as the student will be having time off to study on Thursday and Friday most staff will disappear over the weekend I will be heading into Mwanza for a few days of rest myself with some other missionaries. Last night we watched movies with some other friends and whiles we were watching the movie on the big screen the power went out again, after having been on for a few hours, we were supposed to watch the movie on Saturday night but because there were no electricity, we watched it yesterday instead of going for our weekly Sunday evening walk. Actually I am glad the power was off on Saturday evening as I was also invited for supper with the neighbours Had the power been on I would have had to decline the invitation as I had already accepted the invitation to watch movies.

I don’t know how for how long the power was out on Sunday as I was out for the afternoon having lunch at the "Serengeti rest stop" with my host and another missionary. As this week is a short work week the plan is to spent long hours in the library doing as much as I can "electricity availability" permitting. We have also been blessed with some much needed rain this weekend as it is desperately needed by the farmers to help their crops grow. Walking back home last night in the rain was fun as we were slipping and sliding our way home in the mud puddles which reminded me of the hike I did at the Sipi Falls in Uganda last year.

Prayer Request:

Please pray for

My work permit to come through this week.

Maja who has not been feeling well.

The students who are getting ready for exams etc

Student finances are a problem, as many off them can’t afford to pay their school fees.

Myself as I consider and pray about what God has in store for me, once I return to RSA

My friends and family back home