My most unique Christmas, ever.

Most of the people with whom I spend a majority of my time left Musoma a couple weeks ago, either for furloughs or going home for the holidays. I knew that I would be spending a lot of time alone around the Christmas holiday and I was oddly fine with it. In the past I think that would have sent me into a pit of seemingly justifiable self-pity. You might have even felt pity for me, who knows? But, that didn't happen.

I was at peace completely. There were a few offers to come over on Christmas day since I was going to be alone, but there was no follow-up so I was fine with letting those potentials go.

What I expected from Christmas: A few skype chats, long quiet hours at home to listen to sermons, maybe seeing some of the other ex-pat families.

What I got:

• A 20-hour day, starting with a skype call at 3:30am.
• A 4-hour church service.

• The best gift ever from God (you know, other than Jesus).
• People going out of their way to come and pick me up so that I could spend time with them.

I didn't even ask God for anything for Christmas, I know that He cares for me and provides for all my needs, so it didn't even occur to me to ask Him to be with me or do anything specific on that day to meet my needs. Because He is a good and loving God, without me even asking, He ministered to me and cared for me all throughout the day and even gave me a gift that might be one of the best gifts that I've ever received.

"But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you." Matthew 6:33

Even as Christians I think we spend a lot of time caring for "all these things", making sure our needs are met, seeking the fruits of the spirit, seeking good and godly things, but not seeking first wholly and only God's kingdom and righteousness. He has promised that "all these things" will be given to us when we seek Him first. How much do we really trust that?

I'm learning to seek Him wholly first and I am seeing a marked increase in "all these things" in my life. The less I am focused and caring about "all these things" the more I have of them. I didn't care about ensuring that I would be with people all day during Christmas, I was excited about quiet times with God and ended up having the most people-full and packed Christmas of my life.

Here is the kicker, if I had been looking out for myself and had ensured that I had somewhere to spend Christmas day, I would have missed out on the great present that God had prepared for me and had set into motion 4 weeks ago.

What was that gift? I'll write about it in another blog post, this one is for singing God's praises. But, as a teaser, it started with a 19 or 20 year-old boy that I had never seen before showing up at my gate saying (in Swahili);  "I've come to fetch you."  My response; "???"

Merry Christmas to you all!

Go in the stomach of an elephant

A friend recently left for the States and I heard one of the Zanaki translators say to him as a good-bye "ogeende muunda ye enzugu". Which of course, naturally means "go in the stomach of an elephant".

This is a traditional way of saying 'safe travels' to someone you are close to and really care about!

The elephant can't be killed easily by any other animal so in this language group it is the ultimate symbol of safety and security. Telling someone to travel in its stomach, well, how incredibly secure and safe must that be!

This post won't be that long, I just want to wish you all a great Christmas week and hope that you will all 'go in the stomach of an elephant' wherever you may travel during this holiday season!

Christmas luncheon

On Saturday Sarah and I had our friend Paskaria and various members of her family over for a Christmas lunch. (Several months ago I wrote about Paskaria when she came to teach Sarah and me how to cook a duck.)

We had pilau (a rice & meat dish), kachumbari (tomato and onion salad) and sodas. Pilau is quite traditional for a Christmas meal here.

After lunch we had a gift exchange. Paskaria gave Sarah and me each a kanga (a Tanzanian sarong type cloth with a saying on it). Our kangas say 'tuvumiliane tusikosane kwa jambo dogo' which roughly translated means "let us bear with one another, let us not sin against one another for a little thing".

It is traditional when giving cloth to wrap it around the recipient.

Sarah and I gave them a solar lamp, some Western candy (I warned them not to worry when the pop rocks jump around in their mouth...that is what they are supposed to do), the book of Luke in Kwaya and a beautiful piece of art that Sarah made them.

Since my family traditionally reads the Christmas story on Christmas morning I asked if we could read Luke 2, but in Kwaya. One of the little girls read the first half and I read the second half. Thankfully, this is one of the languages that I work with so I was able to make my way through it and understand what I was reading for the most part.

We then had some ice cream. This was the first time for any of them to ever have ice cream! They said that it was very sweet and if they ate it they would definitely get fat. I think that that means they liked it.

We finished our meal by playing and teaching the kids to throw a frisbee. They really enjoyed that part of the day, I even saw them getting fancy with their throws and incorporating upside-down throws as well as hammer throws. They are very talented.

It was a wonderful day of spending time with friends and blessing each other with food, company, frisbee, gifts, ice cream and friendship.

Caroling in Musoma

One of the missionary families here in Musoma carols to other ex-pats every Christmas. But, they are on furlough right now. So, a few months ago, Sarah and I realized that there was going to be a lack of caroling this year and we found this unacceptable. We decided to rectify the situation. We invited some local ex-pats to join us in caroling to the Musoma-area ex-pat families.

The band of nine carolers. 

Considering the fact that the family that is known to go a-caroling is out of town, we were able to surprise everyone when we started singing outside of their gate. We, however, were surprised when, at the second house, we walked up singing away and were greeted with the kids in tubs having an evening bath. The older kid hid himself throughout the songs while the younger sat like a king surveying his kingdom. Thankfully, their father offered to take a picture for us so that we could remember the hilarity.

We finished up the evening at Sarah's and my place with dinner, home-made eggnog and Elf.

December 2014 Newsletter

My October newsletter is uploaded and ready to be read!

You can also download a PDF of the newsletter here: Found in Translation 12/2014

How to do Thanksgiving substitutions

Cooking is one of my favorite things in Musoma. There is rarely a straight-forward recipe. Sometimes you have to plan months ahead to ensure that you have the ingredients for a particular dish. Sometimes the ingredient is simply unavailable so you have to come up with a substitution that works. Either way, I enjoy the challenge of making special dishes for various events. Thanksgiving was therefore a chance for some fun cooking and 'make-it-work' moments.

Pumpkin pie: One key step is ensuring that you have pumpkin. Pumpkins do in fact go out of season here. I used one pumpkin that a friend had saved from the previous month in case there were no pumpkins at the market. There happened to be pumpkins available though so we got a second pumpkin to ensure that we made enough pie.

Mr. Pumpkin on the left wasn't so sure about Ms. Pumpkin when they first met, but ultimately they worked together to make a delicious pumpkin pie.

Pecans that I randomly received in October were saved specially for the topping of the pie.

You can't necessarily tell from the picture above, but we don't have a pie pan, so a pyrex casserole dish was substituted and we ended up with a deep-deep-dish pumpkin pie.

Yep, that is how deep - at least the filling is the best part.

In lieu of a smoker, my friends cooked the turkey in an outdoor pizza oven and it turned out beautifully, not to mention deliciously.

Sweet potatoes here are chalky and white, so carrots were substituted. Its amazing, but it really doesn't harm the end result. We kept referring to the dish as having been sweet potatoes, that is how effective the carrots' deception was.
Green bean casserole takes more work because even the onion topping is made completely from scratch.
The "cranberry sauce" was made from boiled craisins with cabbage to fill it out and wine for color.

The final substitution was that instead of sharing the meal with my birth family, I shared it with my missionary family.

No substitutions were accepted when it came to being thankful, eating delicious food and enjoying each others' company. It was such a wonderful day and I am truly grateful for all the blessings that God has given me.

(I even got to skype with my birth family while they ate their thanksgiving meal!)

Not My Normal: Dagaa

Dagaa (dah-gaah) is a small fish (I think silverfish) that is ubiquitous in the Musoma area. It is one of the more common proteins for many of the people in this region. I, however, have avoided eating these fish for nearly 4 years. Something about eating the fish heads themselves is not exactly appealing to me. So, my primary interaction with these fish is to buy them in bulk and feed them to my dogs (they get mixed with a corn flour paste called ugali).

My nearly 4-year streak of not eating dagaa was broken a couple weeks ago. My neighbors, the Makwasas, gave us a little bowl of dagaa that they had fried in peanut oil. Mr. Makwasa is very generous and as a thank you to Sarah and me for listening to his request he gave us sugar cane and dagaa. 

Dagaa fried in peanut oil glistening in the afternoon sun.

Needless to say, we couldn't simply feed this generous gift to our dogs...so we had dagaa for dinner a couple nights later.

Dagaa stewed with lots of veggies and seasonings to mask the bitter undertones of the fish.

So, I can now confidently assert that I don't prefer dagaa. Not just because I don't want to eat fish heads but because I don't like their flavor. But I've now eaten them, so at least it is an informed opinion.

My Normal: Maombi

Maombi (mah-ohm-bee) = Requests

One of the biggest adjustments to life here in Musoma has been figuring out how to handle requests for money.

Depending on one another financially is a cultural norm and being indebted to one another actually can build relationships. It is completely opposite from how we, in the West, tend to view money and relationships. It is exceptionally challenging for me to navigate this particular area of my life, especially when the Bible enters into the picture.

This has been challenging me recently: "Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you." (Matthew 5:42)

There are many worldly wisdoms that say I shouldn't follow through on what Jesus says in Matthew 5:42, especially considering that I live somewhere where people actually do ask me for things all the time! But, Jesus didn't qualify this statement/command...so should I?

I recently started being particularly convicted not to qualify Jesus' commands, this one in particular. Because of this desire to do as people have asked of me, please finish reading this blog...or simply stop here if you have appreciated this cultural point and that has been enough.

A few weeks ago I introduced my neighbors, the Makwasas, to you.

Sarah, the three Makwasa boys and me.

Last week Mr. Makwasa came to Sarah and me with a request. He had been very sick several months ago and had to go to India for treatment (he even showed us his endoscopy photos, yay!!!). This has put him in a financial bind and he doesn't have the money to pay school fees, about $1,300, so that his kids can finish the school year.

He asked Sarah and me to ask our friends if any of them wanted to help him...so we are both doing exactly that. We are sharing his need with our friends and if anyone feels led to help him out I can give you information on how to go about that. Please email me at ronitodom@gmail.com by the end of Thanksgiving weekend (when the school fees are due) if you are feeling led to give something toward's the kids' school fees.

My Normal: Top-Up Cards

In the first two hours, on my very first day in Tanzania, nearly four years ago, I was told about top-up cards. I had no idea what this guy was talking about except that it related to phones and being able to call people. It honestly took me longer than I generally like to admit to understand how top-up cards work and that they are AWESOME!

So, basically you buy a certain amount of credit, say 10,000TZS (Tanzanian shillings), a little over $6. You enter the code that is on the card into your phone and then you have that much credit for texting, calling and internet (if your phone can do that). 10,000TZS usually lasts me about a month.

But the top-up cards don't stop there! That is how I purchase internet too. I get top-up cards for 25,000TZS and buy 6GB of internet and add it onto my dongle. 6GB usually lasts me a month.

This is the best one though: electricity. Yes, I pre-pay for my electricity, get a top-up receipt and when the power goes out (or before if I happen to think of it), I simply punch in the code and voila! I have power again. Granted, some times the power goes out because of a power cut...top-up cards can't help me in that circumstance. But otherwise, voila!

It definitely takes some getting used to and you have to be able to plan ahead a bit to ensure that you have phone, internet, or electricity credit, but hey! no hassles from these companies!

(Unlike the water company that has come and shut off my water twice in the last two months...)

Musoma = Earthsea (kind of)

"Earthsea Trilogy" by Self-scan. Licensed under Fair use via Wikipedia.

I read the Earthsea Trilogy in high-school and really enjoyed the books. They are about a world where magic is conducted by knowing the true name of things. Anyone can work this magic if they just learn the true names. When a true name is used the one who uses it has power and authority over the object or person. So, everyone guards their name and goes by nicknames only telling their true name to people they really trust.

How is Musoma like Earthsea? Well, pretty much every time I leave my house people call out to me...but they don't often know my true name and so I know when I do and do not need to respond. If a man passes me and calls out 'Mzungu' (white-person), or 'Mrembo' (beautiful), or 'Nyangeta' (night), or 'Nyafulu' (a type of little fish), or 'Mwanamke' (woman) I know that I can just walk on and ignore him because I don't know him.

There are a number of names that I will respond to though and when I hear one of them I look around trying to figure out who knows me so that I can greet them properly.

That is why sometimes I feel like I live in Earthsea, when someone knows my name, I respond to them and they have a degree of authority and power over me. If they, however, don't know my name, they have no power or authority over me (generally) and I can just walk on by.

Thrive Retreat

This is how I picture women’s retreats:

I walk into a room with women strewn about the floor, weeping, processing, maybe a few even wailing. There are emotions everywhere. I look to my left and I see mascara running, I look to my right and there is snot running, I look straight ahead (there happens to be a mirror) and I see myself, with wide eyes, nearing someone to awkwardly pat them on the shoulder (that’s comforting right?).

That is the primary reason that I had never been to a women’s retreat. But for various other reasons I found myself going to the Thrive Ministry retreat that was conveniently being held in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania. Thankfully the amount of tears did not live up to my expectations and in most other ways the retreat exceeded them.

Most importantly I was focused on God’s presence and had a lot of concentrated time on Him. What more could I ask for? Oh yeah, a haircut. I also wanted a haircut, and I got that as well!

Thirty, flirty and thriving with my friend Kelly!

I was asked to write a brief blog post for Thrive Ministries about my experience and you can read it here on this link: http://thriveconnection.com/2014/10/25/2014-fall-tanzania-retreat-good-perfect-gifts/

My Normal: Oodles of Keys

I have never had a key to my parents' house. This was completely due to the fact that the door was never locked. Seriously! Ask any of the youth group kids. Did we lock our house? No! I literally got used to locking and unlocking doors for the first time in my life when I was in college. Sadly, it wasn't as natural or intuitive a task at it should have been.

I have now swung to the opposite side of security lifestyles and can't leave the house without a handful of keys. I have 3 house keys: one for the door, one for the metal grate on the door, and one for the gate to leave the property. I have 4 office keys: one for the door, one for the metal grate on the door, and two for my desk.

Thankfully, college taught me how to use a key, so now I can actually leave my house and enter my office!!!

Currently, I am backing up the finance office. This means that my key count has recently DOUBLED. Yes, there are 7 keys associated with the finance office and I use at least 5 of them each time I work over there.

So, this is my new normal: oodles of keys...that I actually know how to use!!!

Meet the neighbors

Over the past couple months I've had opportunities to get to know my neighbors a bit better. Sarah and I even got to go over for dinner last month!

So, meet my neighbors: the Makwasa family!!!

Deborah and her father Makwasa

Makwasa has adopted Sarah and me as neighbor-daughters and says that we can call on him anytime we have an issue or are worried about something at the house.

Makwasa's three sons, Sarah and me.

The boys have come over simply to say 'hi' a few times since we had dinner at their house. Its great that they are really warming up to us! When I returned from the Kara/Kerewe survey the two on the left greeted my by my Zinza name 'Nyakahoza' and the younger one grabbed my hand, escorting me to my gate while the older one rode beside us on a bike catching up with me.

It is such a blessing to have a good relationship with my neighbors and to be increasingly accepted into my local community here.

A faith analogy

One of the essential elements of life is potable water. If you read my post from a couple months ago about the process of getting potable water at my house then you know that it is not as simple as just turning on the tap.

On the Kara/Kerewe survey a couple weeks ago we brought along a portable Katadyn filter so that we wouldn't have to spend money on bottled water. While I drink Katadyn filtered water on a daily basis, I hadn't ever used a portable one and it gave me a bit of an insight regarding how faith works.

The first couple of nights the water looked like this before being filtered:

It wasn't hard for me to feel confident that this water, going through the Katadyn, would come out clean and free of disease. The water looked pretty clean already, I just had to have faith that the Katadyn would do its job, and it wasn't hard to have faith for that.

When what we can perceive with our five senses doesn't contradict what we know about God, it is easy to have faith.

Now, due to having a dark nalgene (covered in stickers), once the water was in the bottle, I couldn't really see the quality of the water. So, when the water started looking like this (before being filtered)...

...its safe to say that my faith in the Katadyn was tested. This is a trusted product that I have used for years and it has a reputation worldwide for filtering water...but how much did I really trust it? What I was seeing (and smelling) made me question my faith in the Katadyn and I couldn't simply look at the final product before drinking it to ensure that it at least looked clean. I had to drink in faith, trusting that the faithful Katadyn had done its job. I could decide to run out and spend money on bottled water, or I could step out, in faith, and drink the filtered water, trusting in what I know about Katadyn, having faith that despite what my senses were telling me, it was safe to drink the water.

I drank the filtered water and I'm not sick! So, my faith in Katadyn was proven to be well placed, but my faith couldn't have been proven had I not stepped out and drunk the water first.

Maybe this will challenge your faith as it has mine:
In what ways am I relying on my five sense and having more faith in them than I do in God?
Do I really only have faith in God when my senses agree with my faith, or does that faith still hold just as strong when everything tells me to question it or doubt it?
Are there times that I need to be stepping out in more faith despite what reason, logic and worldly wisdom are telling me?

Stay tuned for the answers, they may come up in future blog posts, we'll see.

For faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. (Hebrews 11:1 NASB)

October 2014 Newsletter

My October newsletter is uploaded and ready to be read!

You can also download a PDF of the newsletter here: Found in Translation 10/2014

How to celebrate a postponed birthday

I finally celebrated turning 30 this past weekend. If you didn't already know I postponed my birthday by a week so that I could celebrate with some close friends.

So, how does one go about celebrating a postponed decade changing birthday?

Hm, this way:

Have coffee with a good friend (sadly, no picture of this part of the process).

Make dinner for some friends.
We had vegetable stir-fry with peanut sauce...delicious.

Also, make a weird coffee drink that you've never tried before for those friends.
It is called "European Coffee" and includes whipped egg whites. That is not whipped cream on top...

Have 'Happy Birthday' candles on top of a cake. Thanks Mom and Dad for the candles!!!

Ah yes, the picture of some of the friends that came over for dinner.

Have your housemate make yogurt and strain it as a substitute for cream cheese. That process has to be planned out because it can take up to a week to get enough. This is serious from scratch baking.
Then make a delicious mango cheesecake.

See a tree like this, hugging a rock, reaching desperately for more sun.

Enjoy a beautiful hike through some Tanzanian countryside and pick a hilltop to try and reach.

I will say it was kind of odd having a week where I was no longer in my 20s, but not quite 30. I would say postponing your birthday is a fun activity if you want to mix it up a bit, but shouldn't be a regular occurence.

I'm 30...sort of

This past Friday I turned 30. I have been looking forward to turning 30 this whole year and it finally has happened!!!

Well...actually I am writing this post the Saturday before I turn 30. It will go live after my birthday, but for now (at the time of writing) I am 29.

Ok, why am I writing this so early?

Because I spent my birthday on the largest island in the largest lake in Africa: Kerewe.

This is no island-get-away vacation. No leis greeted me as I disembarked from the ferry.

I've been working with a team of surveyors. We are looking at incorporating the Kara and Kerewe language communities into our translation work at the office, but before we can do that we have to have an official survey of these languages and then report back regarding our findings. So, I am part of a team of 4 who are spending 9 days on the Kara and Kerewe islands surveying these languages.

I don't know if I will have internet access while I am out there, but wanted to be faithful to posting a blog on Monday. So, if you sent me a birthday message and didn't hear back from me, don't worry, I haven't seen the message yet. Hopefully, I'll be able to respond later this week.

Officially, I postponed my birthday to the 26th of this month (check facebook, you'll see), so if you didn't send me message, you still have a few days ;).

My normal: Ants

Three years ago, when I was attending my first Bible study in Musoma, someone brought out cookies to share. What a wonderful treat! We opened the container to find the cookies covered in ants. One would think that this would dissuade consumption, but it didn't. We blew ants off the cookies and just thanked God for the additional protein we were ingesting.

It is not all of my food that gets overrun by the cohabiting ants (currently it is just the Blue Band and peanut butter).

Some ants want water, some want food, some want the cement that makes up my walls, others simply like to exist in my house. Sometimes they just walk along the wall or across the hallway and I look at them thinking "I wish you weren't here, but I'm also used to you and haven't figured out how to be rid of you...hm."

I want to add here that having ants in the house is not necessarily a sign if uncleanliness...it just happens sometimes. Trust me, I keep on top of my kitchen in particular.

Anyway, I've come to be used to them. I make sure to use the peanut butter that has the most ants in it for my smoothies (that way they get blended well and I don't have to think about it). This leaves the cleaner peanut butter for other uses.

If I see a particularly indicative trail of ants, I attack with vehemence and ruin their nest.

This mass of ants lead me to a nest in the cement.

A small pile of defeated ants.

Other times I just look at them and think, "I'm tired, I don't want to go hunting today."

My normal: Ziplock bags

Ziplock bags aren't available here in Musoma. Knowing this I brought some ziplock bags with me when I first came to Tanzania. I am STILL using those same bags. Not because I haven't needed to use them. Rather, because here in Musoma, we wash them out and reuse them.

It is really nifty that we have floor to ceiling tile in my kitchen because the wet bags stick to the tiles. They can hang there until all dry and ready to be used again.

Notice the variegated color of some of these bags...they've been used a few times.

Not washing out ziplock bags was one of the things I had to think through while in the States. I remember standing there holding a ziplock bag for a couple minutes before finally convincing myself that I was allowed to throw it away.

Actually, I didn't convince myself now that I think of it. I asked my older sister to tell me that I was allowed to throw it away. I'm pretty sure she looked at me with a bit of confusion before giving me permission.

My Normal: The House

I've been wanting to do this since returning to Musoma and now I've finally gotten around to it.

Here is a tour of my house!

How to Cook a Duck

My house-mate, Sarah, has a friend, Paskaria, that came over this past weekend to teach us how to cook duck. Due to a Oklahoma-worthy thunder and lighting storm in the morning, Paskaria wasn't able to arrive until 1:30pm, which is when we started the cooking lesson.

The first thing to do is meet your lunch.

Next, one must slaughter it. Thankfully our day-guard was on hand to handle that part.

Then you douse the fowl in boiling water. This allows you to easily pull all the feathers out. Paskaria's hands are very adept at pulling feathers out and quite adapted to handling boiling water. She showed us the callouses on her hands to testify to the fact that she is very used to this type of work.

Next the duck is charred over the coals until the fat starts running. That is when Paskaria quickly disassembled the duck. I was feeling quite confident that I could prepare duck until this step. She was so fast and sure of her work that I got lost and honestly quite concerned that she was going to cut herself. Have no fears, she didn't nick herself once.

After the duck was in pieces she put it in the pot to cook in its own fat.

We added some onions, tomatoes, and salt and just let the thing cook itself. 

Did you know that duck is extremely fatty?

After it had cooked for a bit Paskaria poured off some of the broth and a piece of meat for us. I was lucky enough to get the liver. Honestly, I don't like liver, I really don't. I've had it enough times in the past few years to know this for sure. But I ate it.

For all of you out there who have quite the refined palate and find duck liver patte exceptional - maybe you should move to Tanzania. Pure duck liver was the appetizer to my lunch on Saturday.

At about 3pm we finally sat down for lunch with the duck, some rice, a tomato sauce that Sarah made, and some greens. We had lunch under the banana trees in the yard.

It was a beautiful day, full of laughter and lessons. I am very impressed with Paskaria's skills and grateful that I got to learn how to cook duck from her.

Musoma Soccer

Soccer, while not a huge sport in the States, is a huge sport in many other parts of the world. I have thoroughly enjoyed playing soccer every Sunday for the past few years. I'm not good yet, but I'm way better than I used to be.

Every so often we have an office soccer game. We leave work around 3pm on a Friday, head to the field and all play together for a couple hours. It is great for building teamwork and relationships.

My Dutch colleagues are returning to the Netherlands for a few months, so we had an office soccer game this past Friday to say goodbye to them. Go orange & black!!!

It is always nice to have others from the office on the sidelines cheering us on, or heckling as the case may be. I was reminded by one of my Tanzanian colleagues that I scored on my own team during my final soccer game before returning to the States. I'm not going to live that down.

In conclusion, soccer is a wonderful and fun sport. It builds unity and teamwork, offers opportunities for heckling, and is all around a great way to spend a couple hours of your day.