Happy Lutheran

After a long drive yesterday afternoon, we made it to Ketumbeini. No one minded the time in the land cruiser because of the beautiful scenery—including ostrich, giraffes, dik dik, and gazelle.

Our guest house is very nice: the food is good, the chai is wonderful, and the showers have (mostly) hot water. What more could we ask for?

We woke up early this morning for an early breakfast, to get ready for a busy day. Our first stop was Ketumbeini Primary School. The head teacher’s name is Juma Uyu, and he had just started in that position last week. It is common in Tanzania that the government can move you to a different school at any point. The school is well regarded, and has won several awards.

They assembled all of the students for us—the students are roughly the equivalent to grades 1 through 6 in a US system— and they sang several songs for us, including the Tanzanian national anthem. Then they posed with us for a group picture (Kurt has been our regular selfie-taker: long arms!)

We saw lots of hope at the school: in the students, who are enthusiastic and who work hard; in the dedication of the teachers; and in some new buildings. At the same time, we also saw challenges: there are around 1000 students (roughly half of whom board at the school) and only 13 teachers; the sleeping arrangements for the students are pretty rough, with three students sharing one thin mattress; and they don’t have enough desks for all of the students, either. They are doing the best they can, and making the best of difficult circumstances. The motto of the school is “Education is light”—E limu ni mwanga.

After our visit to the school, we went to visit the Ketumbeini Lutheran Church. Our hosts were Pastor Noah and Evangelist Raphael.

The parish consists of 23 worshiping congregations, served by 18 evangelists and one pastor. There are roughly 2500 to 3000 members in the whole parish. The evangelists share 10 motorcycles that they use to travel to the distant, smaller congregations, some of which are 70 km away.

In the afternoon, we had an amazing experience, visiting the women of the Naapok Women’s Beading Group.

This is an amazing group of Maasai women who came together with the support of missionary Bethany Friberg to form a cooperative, where they not only sell their traditional beadwork, but through which they also bought the land on which their cooperative meets (Maasai women traditionally don’t own land in Tanzania), and formed three small micro-loan groups that enable women to take out short-term small loans to buy goats or pay for school fees. It has been operational for 22 years, and in that time the group has grown to 53 women. All of them are Christian and their faith is built into all they do. They empower each other as they work and pray together, supporting each other through the struggles that they share as Maasai women. They have seen seismic changes in their community, but this is one way they are trying to adapt and create more opportunities for themselves and their families. Again, they experience lots of challenges in their lives, but we saw clearly the hope that this cooperative is bringing to them, their families, and their communities.

The final encounter we had today was a special one. We were able to have some time with Maria Laiser, the widow of Bishop Thomas Laiser, who studied at Warburg Seminary. Maria was there with him, as well as several of her children, and later she also went back and did a degree at Warburg College. It was so wonderful to meet her and hear some of her stories.

It was another amazing day; and we are humbled at all the ways we are experiencing the transformative work of God in Tanzania, and in us!