My grand-daughter, a senior in high school in San Jose, California along with a group of girls from her Catholic school spent the last two weeks helping build a school for girls in a remote part of Tanzania. Here is their end-of-camp report: From: "Aroni Anirban" <[email protected]> Date: Jun 20, 2017 12:21 PM Subject: FW: TANZANIA - EF Notre Dame Update
Jambo! We hope this email finds you well and that all is well back home. We have had quite the last couple of days here in Tanzania that we can't wait to share with all of you. On Monday (June 19th) we were greeted at camp by a mama who welcomed us to her home to help fortify her home. This is a process called Boma Smearing and it involves mixing cow dung, mud, and water and smearing this mixture on the existing walls of her house. This repairs the walls as well as protects the inside of the home from weather damage. This is one of the household activities that mamas are traditionally in charge of and participating in this process was vital in understanding the daily lives of mamas in Tanzania. We all enjoyed this activity so much and nearly completed her home repairs! We then spent the rest of our day at our build site in Orbomba. We have made so much progress and have displayed a great deal of teamwork. We are so proud of the impact we have made on these schools and in this community. Today (June 20th) we spent our morning at the build site for our final building session! We have so many pictures to share of our hard work but for now we want you all to know that we have completed our goal we set at the beginning of our trip!! The community was so moved by the impact we have made for them that they came together to have a community goodbye ceremony for us in the afternoon. This was very emotional for many of us as it was a chance to reflect on the deep impact we have had on a community across the world. Community elders, government representatives, mamas, and students came to celebrate. They sang songs of thanks, taught us a traditional song and dance (please ask us all to show you when we get home), and spoke about the impact of our work and friendship as well. We spent the second part of our afternoon at weapons training with our guides Lebahati and Lovoi. They taught us all about two of the traditional weapons that the Maasai use, the rungu and the bow and arrow. We then got a lesson on how to use them and were able to give it a go! It was so much fun and we loved learning even more about Masaai culture from our Maasai Warrior Guides :) As today was our last day at camp, we had a very special final dinner celebration with all of our camp staff. This was our chance to share a meal and spend our last moments with our new friends. Hope you are all doing well and we are excited to see you soon. Lots of love, Rachel Cairns East Africa Trips Facilitator, Leadership Regards, GL
