Traveling to Arusha

Mt. Meru, from just outside of Arusha

One of our recent visits took us to the city of Arusha, in northern Tanzania.  Arusha is located near Mt. Meru, one of the highest mountains in Africa. (On our drive to the city, we also got an incredible view of Mt. Kilimanjaro—THE highest mountain in Africa.)   Arusha is also a stopping point for many on safari.  Within just a few hours of the city are many of the best game parks in the country.  And, being that it is at a much higher elevation than Dar, the weather was so much cooler…what a refreshing break from the summer heat!

One of our highlights was visiting the Cultural Heritage Center.  The main part of the center is shops that sell many African crafts and different types of art work.  There is also a bookstore, a glass store, a clothing store and a restaurant.  However, the bulk of the business is in the sale of tanzanite.  The owner gave us an interesting education on the gem and showed us many different sizes and colorations of the stones.  I have never seen so many tanzanite stones!

Next to the center is a museum/gallery that showcases African artists.  Just as impressive as the artwork was the building itself.  It reminded me of the Guggeheim museum in that you followed a spiral path around the building, gradually moving higher (or lower) throughout the displays. 

While we were there, we were able to visit with Gary and Diane Eberts who pastor one of the local churches in town.  They were so gracious to take their time to show us around the city and we were blessed to be able to worship their church on Sunday. 

Mt. Kilimanjaro, in the morning.  It was a beautiful drive with the mountain on one side and the sun rise on the other.

A Little Bit of History

We have done some traveling over the last few weeks and have been blessed to visit some interesting parts of Tanzania. 

About an hour north of Dar es Salaam, is a small city—Bagamoyo.  It sits right on the coast and offers an amazing glimpse at some of the history of this area.

On our first day there, we visited this spot.  Obviously, they are doing some work here at the moment.  But this cross sits on the coast and commemorates the missionaries that “redeemed” the slaves from the slave markets in Zanzibar in 1868.  From Zanzibar, the slaves were brought back here to a settlement.

 

From there, we visited a museum that displayed through old photographs, maps, articles and artifacts, the history of slave trade in the area. 

Also on the grounds of the museum is a Catholic church and a large cemetery.

There is also this tower, where David Livingstone’s body brought before it was returned to England.  Livingstone played a huge role in attempting to abolish the slave trade that was happening throughout eastern Africa.  Over 500 slaves that he had “redeemed” carried him here as a tribute.

The next day, we visited an old fort that at one time served as the place to house the slaves before they were chained and put on ships and sent to other countries to be sold.  The conditions there were unbelievable as our tour guide described that 25 people were put into one small room for days at a time.  There was only a small window for light and air.  This was after they had been captured and walked for miles and months carrying heavy loads.  It is amazing to me that anyone survived long enough to even make it on the ships to be sold. 

At one point the building also served as a prison and you could almost feel the sadness of the place. 

We stayed at a small inn, the Traveller’s Lodge, which was also right on the beach.  The grounds were green and lush and so peaceful!  It was a wonderful retreat.  It also had a great play structure for the kids.



We definitely had a great trip!  Wish you were here!

In the Time of Crisis, Choose Grace

Many of you read our last blog on decisions and have been standing in the gap for us and praying. Thank you!! We hope to be able to let you know our next steps soon.

In a previous blog, Carolyn shared the overwhelming feeling of driving in Dar. Our friends experienced a crisis a few days ago as they were driving at night here in Dar es Salaam. This incredible story is not just about what happened to them, but more importantly, how they chose to respond to the crisis  We appreciate them (thank you, Dan!) for allowing us to share this guest post with you.  Please read--and let us know, what would you have done?

Tonight we were in a car accident. First let me say everyone is fine, our whole family was in the car and we're all ok, no harm done. We went to a couple's house on the peninsula for dinner and left to drive home at about 8:30. That means it had been dark for about an hour and a half or so. I dislike driving in the dark. I really have no problems with it during the day, but night is a whole different experience and one that I don't generally enjoy.

We were driving home and I came to a red light. This doesn't always mean what you think it would. In Dar (and Tanzania in general from what I've seen of it) a red light is a suggestion that you should stop if there is no traffic crossing or the car in front of you has stopped. In tonight's case I stopped at the red light because there were cars turning directly in front of me and to run through it was to invite destruction. So I was being careful and I stopped. ( For those who know the area it was the light before Mwenge market going north.) I came to a full and complete stop and about five seconds later a taxi slammed into the back of our car. There was a loud boom and we were all pressed firmly back into our seats. It was startling and unexpected.

Stacy called for Adah and she made a babbling noise that didn't sound particularly injurious so then she yelled for Micah to see if he was ok. He didn't respond and I was immediately terrified and yelled a bit louder and more forcefully for him to respond and he said he was ok. I think he was just scared and startled at first. Bernadette was also with us and she was fine too. Once this was all determined I put on my hazard lights and we looked around out the windows. It is not always good to get out of your vehicle at an accident scene as there is often a mob. It was similar in this case as a group of men were walking around the cars. Within half a minute we saw a police officer (Mr. Mensa) walk over and I went to talk to him. He was speaking to the driver of the taxi and I told him that was my car and pointed at the one with the big dent in the back of it. He nodded and said, “Please move it over there,” pointing to the corner out of the center of the road.

I moved the car and he got in the taxi and they parked nearby. As all of this was going on there was a steady and heavy stream of traffic driving around us. The police officer got out of the car and was physically holding a young guy and moving him around towards another car. Apparently there had been another accident at the same time where this young guy hat hit another car behind me somewhere. I didn't know the details and the driver who was hit was pretty mad and yelling in Swahili, none of which I understood. After a few minutes they settled something and the cop looked at me. I said that's my car over there and that I was stopped at the red light and the taxi ran into me. I said we should go look at the damage.

We stood there looking at the large dent in the back of my car as he talked to the taxi driver. The man was obviously poor and had three children standing next to him. I doubt they were his, I think they were just borrowed from the crowd, but who's to know? The police officer made his report, I wish I had taken a picture of it but I was too hyped up on adrenaline to think to do it. Basically he had a clipboard with a blank sheet of white paper, upon which he drew the road with arrows for the direction of traffic and a rectangle for my car and one for the guy behind me with an x at the back of mine where the damage was. He then asked me what happened and I told him I had stopped at the light, which was red and there was traffic crossing in front of me so I couldn't go forward and I was hit from behind. He nodded and noted some things down in swahili on his paper. He then took some of my information including my name, phone number, job ( missionary), religion (he guessed Christian correctly) and a few other things that escape my memory.

The police officer said, “This man is obviously poor, he has no money, what do you want me to do?”

I said, “I have no idea, what can I do?”

He said, “You can take him to court and I can take him to jail or not.”

I said, “One moment please,” and I went and got the keys and unlocked the back of the van to try to open it. It of course was caved in over the locking mechanism and did not open. This made it so that it really does have to be repaired. Just a dent I could live with but I need to be able to get into the back of the van. I then went and told Stacy what he had said and she wisely said I should call Dwight. Dwight is awesome, he knows a lot has lived here for a long time and has a lot of experience on how things work here, so I took her advice and gave him a call. He told me my options and I thanked him and went back to the cop. I told the cop I thought it would cost almost 200,000 shillings to fix the car and if the driver could do that then I'd be fine with it and we could let it go. He told me that the man didn't have the money that he couldn't pay but that I could take him to court if I wanted to. I considered my options and went and talked to Stacy again.

I said, “This guy is poor and the hassle of going to court and trying to get money out of him doesn't seem like a good idea. I say we just eat the cost of repairs and go home.”

She agreed and I went back tot he police officer. I told him, “Here's what I would like to do. I would like for you to tell the man to drive more carefully. Then please tell him I will be praying for him and that I wish him well. We are done here as far as I'm concerned.”

The police man was very kind and offered his phone number and name so that if I have any other problems I can call him and he would do his best to help. I thanked him and we drove the way home. As we were pulling back into traffic Micah asked, ”Did the policeman ask you for supper?” I grinned and said, “No man, not this time,” and we drove the rest of the way home uneventfully.

I hate to say it but I think this was inevitable. Driving in Dar is inherently dangerous and driving at night is more so. In this case there was nothing I could have done to have been more careful beyond not being on the road at all. Hopefully I will be able to get the car fixed this week. We have insurance but there is a deductible we'll have to meet first which it would have been nice to have gotten from the other driver but wasn't really realistic given that I wanted to get home before tomorrow. Hopefully this won't ever happen again, but if it does I can only pray that it is as minor as this.