God is good!
It's been raining heavily for three hours with no signs of letting up! This will make a huge difference for us and our neighbors.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
I Think I Deserve Some Congratulations
Because I killed my first cobra this evening.
When I returned home from my office, Brother Soreng told me that he'd just seen a snake. We looked for it, but we couldn't find it. I went into our dining room and got some water and looked around the kitchen, thinking it might have slipped under the door but didn't see it.
When I came out of the kitchen I was met by mewing cats, Macho and Moshi. I told those creatures: "Go. Do your job and get that snake." (Did you know that cats do as well with snakes as with rats? Neither did I before moving here.) They preferred to mew some more and refused to do the job I gave them.
As I walked away, I spotted the snake -- and quickly dispatched it with a nearby broom!
It was only when our night guard arrived and I asked "nyoka gani?" -- what kind of snake? -- that I learned just what a hero I am!
Incidentally, I couldn't tell it was a cobra because it was so small (about a foot long) -- even so, the toxicity of the venom is the same regardless of the size or age.
When I returned home from my office, Brother Soreng told me that he'd just seen a snake. We looked for it, but we couldn't find it. I went into our dining room and got some water and looked around the kitchen, thinking it might have slipped under the door but didn't see it.
When I came out of the kitchen I was met by mewing cats, Macho and Moshi. I told those creatures: "Go. Do your job and get that snake." (Did you know that cats do as well with snakes as with rats? Neither did I before moving here.) They preferred to mew some more and refused to do the job I gave them.
As I walked away, I spotted the snake -- and quickly dispatched it with a nearby broom!
It was only when our night guard arrived and I asked "nyoka gani?" -- what kind of snake? -- that I learned just what a hero I am!
Incidentally, I couldn't tell it was a cobra because it was so small (about a foot long) -- even so, the toxicity of the venom is the same regardless of the size or age.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Throughout These 40 Days, O Lord
If you are looking for some Lenten inspiration, you just might find it in a series of videos produced by Loyola Productions in a cooperative venture with Loyola Press and my home province, the Jesuits of the Upper Midwest (Chicago-Detroit).
40: The Series.
Saturday, February 18, 2012
How Things Have Changed
You will recall my earlier posts about just how wonderful the rains were, how happy I was with how things had turned so green, how folks who've been around these parts since childhood stated our rains were the best in forty years.
Well, we haven't had rain for a month. In the last week things have really started to turn brown. My guess is that in another week some crops will be so burned that they won't be salvageable. This could mean dire straits for many subsistence farmers.
Well, we haven't had rain for a month. In the last week things have really started to turn brown. My guess is that in another week some crops will be so burned that they won't be salvageable. This could mean dire straits for many subsistence farmers.
Almighty God, we are in need of rain. We realize now, looking up into the clear, blue sky, what a marvel even the least drop of rain really is. To think that so much water can really fall out of the sky, which now is empty and clear! We place our trust in You. We are sure that You know our needs. But You want us to ask you anyway, to show You that we know we are dependent on you. Look to our dry hills and fields, dear God, and bless them with the living blessing of soft rain. Then the land will rejoice and rivers will sing Your praises, and the hearts of all will be made glad. Amen.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
These Poor Children!
These past days have been spent with some friends in an area just across the harbor from Dar es Salaam called Kigamboni. There are beautiful beaches along this coast south of the city (though I have to say there was more trash in the water than I've ever seen on previous visits -- this might just be a seasonal issue). I was supposed to be with my friends for a few days on Zanzibar, but I didn't bring my passport with me -- not realizing that I needed it to go to the island which is the ZAN of Tanzania. In any case, the days were delightful.
The days have given me an opportunity to reflect on a number of things, to do some reading, and even to do some writing. Sitting on the beach, I saw a number of children who should have been in school. I think the number of school-aged children not attending school is actually growing; it certainly seems to be the case. I am beginning to understand why so many children aren't in school. Let me explain.
One of the things I found myself thinking about is the work of Jerome Bruner, who stands among my great intellectual heroes. When he discusses the work of Lev Vygotsky and the zone of proximal development (am I boring you yet?), he writes of the adult providing a "loan of consciousness" to the child until the child develops his own consciousness. In turn, the child "lends" the adult his/her trust. Without some basic mutual understanding, respect, and trust, it is hard for a child to learn much. And there aren't a lot of adults to trust to be found in the schools here -- in many cases quite literally (for instance, in our local ward secondary school -- 15 kilometres from the nation's capital! where there is not a single science teacher!)
I myself was faced today with a very small indication of the difficulties families and dedicated educators face so often. This morning I left Kigamboni for the Tanzania Institute of Education to buy up-to-date syllabi (otherwise known as course curricula in the US). "The shop is closed today," the guard told me. "Litafunguliwa lini?" -- when will it open, I asked in my bad Kiswahili. "Maybe tomorrow, maybe the day after, maybe some other day." The incident brought to mind the cry of a friend when he found a drunken uncle passed out, bleeding profusely on his family's kitchen floor: "Does no one love this man enough to do something?" Does no one love these children enough to do something?
We're trying to do what we can. We're starting a program to bring our own students into two local villages to tutor primary school children on Saturday mornings (one of them is the very village where there is no science teacher at the secondary school). My goal is to have in three year's time at least two children from these village schools prepared well enough to pass our entrance tests each year.
My dream regarding the teacher's college was to work with two entities often at odds with one another (the government and the advocacy network called Hakielimu [Haki = justice; elimu = education]) on common projects to improve the lot of children. (One of my ideas was to work with the government to provide free tuition to education students committed to teaching in remote villages for the three years following their graduation.) I write in the past tense ("dream was," "one of my ideas was"), I do still hold out hope that the teachers college will be a reality sooner than later and that I might return to assist in its founding -- prayers for this intention would be gladly accepted!
Back to Bruner. As I thought of him, I was reminded about all his writing on the importance of play. Imaginative play is woefully absent in schools here. Early education is an introduction to what might be called classroom corporal orthogony -- sitting up in a chair "properly". For three year olds! I don't know who the developmental psychologists are who are encouraging that children should be learning letters and numbers at this age, who are being taught to "sit still and listen," but the person should be submitted to a similar torture! We do the same now in the US at the level of kindergarten, of course. I was lucky to have had a proper kindergarten experience filled with exploration, imaginative play and practical lessons in sharing, resolving conflicts, etc. These experiences are the important bases for what comes later. (In many countries -- Sweden, which has a very high literacy rate, among them if I remember correctly -- the indication that a child is ready for primary education is the onset of the loss of baby teeth, about 6-7 years old).
Mind you it is mostly the middle class and wealthy here who go to these preparations for primary school. But even primary school in general is an absolutely alienating experience. I am constantly reminded of what a difference it would make if the educational system took Mwalimu Nyerere's Education for Self Reliance seriously. If schools were sensitive to the situation of children and the needs of the community and prepared children for that rather than some ideal location based on foreign standards and needs.
Why aren't children in school? Simple: They don't serve their needs or the needs of their families or villages.
A lot of thoughts are whirling in my head about things educational as they stand here and Bruner. One of my favourite lines from his writing has to do with his reflection on his own parenting. He wrote something like, "I spent a lot of time trying to arrange life so that they could live with what they had." This is what all children everywhere need. It isn't that children shouldn't be encouraged to dream and to imagine all possibilities; not at all. No, it is about the parent, the teacher, and others charged with their formation to create an environment for children to live -- to be fully alive -- with what they have, with what they have been given. And as St. Ireneus insisted so many years ago: The glory of God is the person fully alive.
Enough for now.
The days have given me an opportunity to reflect on a number of things, to do some reading, and even to do some writing. Sitting on the beach, I saw a number of children who should have been in school. I think the number of school-aged children not attending school is actually growing; it certainly seems to be the case. I am beginning to understand why so many children aren't in school. Let me explain.
One of the things I found myself thinking about is the work of Jerome Bruner, who stands among my great intellectual heroes. When he discusses the work of Lev Vygotsky and the zone of proximal development (am I boring you yet?), he writes of the adult providing a "loan of consciousness" to the child until the child develops his own consciousness. In turn, the child "lends" the adult his/her trust. Without some basic mutual understanding, respect, and trust, it is hard for a child to learn much. And there aren't a lot of adults to trust to be found in the schools here -- in many cases quite literally (for instance, in our local ward secondary school -- 15 kilometres from the nation's capital! where there is not a single science teacher!)
I myself was faced today with a very small indication of the difficulties families and dedicated educators face so often. This morning I left Kigamboni for the Tanzania Institute of Education to buy up-to-date syllabi (otherwise known as course curricula in the US). "The shop is closed today," the guard told me. "Litafunguliwa lini?" -- when will it open, I asked in my bad Kiswahili. "Maybe tomorrow, maybe the day after, maybe some other day." The incident brought to mind the cry of a friend when he found a drunken uncle passed out, bleeding profusely on his family's kitchen floor: "Does no one love this man enough to do something?" Does no one love these children enough to do something?
We're trying to do what we can. We're starting a program to bring our own students into two local villages to tutor primary school children on Saturday mornings (one of them is the very village where there is no science teacher at the secondary school). My goal is to have in three year's time at least two children from these village schools prepared well enough to pass our entrance tests each year.
My dream regarding the teacher's college was to work with two entities often at odds with one another (the government and the advocacy network called Hakielimu [Haki = justice; elimu = education]) on common projects to improve the lot of children. (One of my ideas was to work with the government to provide free tuition to education students committed to teaching in remote villages for the three years following their graduation.) I write in the past tense ("dream was," "one of my ideas was"), I do still hold out hope that the teachers college will be a reality sooner than later and that I might return to assist in its founding -- prayers for this intention would be gladly accepted!
Back to Bruner. As I thought of him, I was reminded about all his writing on the importance of play. Imaginative play is woefully absent in schools here. Early education is an introduction to what might be called classroom corporal orthogony -- sitting up in a chair "properly". For three year olds! I don't know who the developmental psychologists are who are encouraging that children should be learning letters and numbers at this age, who are being taught to "sit still and listen," but the person should be submitted to a similar torture! We do the same now in the US at the level of kindergarten, of course. I was lucky to have had a proper kindergarten experience filled with exploration, imaginative play and practical lessons in sharing, resolving conflicts, etc. These experiences are the important bases for what comes later. (In many countries -- Sweden, which has a very high literacy rate, among them if I remember correctly -- the indication that a child is ready for primary education is the onset of the loss of baby teeth, about 6-7 years old).
Mind you it is mostly the middle class and wealthy here who go to these preparations for primary school. But even primary school in general is an absolutely alienating experience. I am constantly reminded of what a difference it would make if the educational system took Mwalimu Nyerere's Education for Self Reliance seriously. If schools were sensitive to the situation of children and the needs of the community and prepared children for that rather than some ideal location based on foreign standards and needs.
Why aren't children in school? Simple: They don't serve their needs or the needs of their families or villages.
A lot of thoughts are whirling in my head about things educational as they stand here and Bruner. One of my favourite lines from his writing has to do with his reflection on his own parenting. He wrote something like, "I spent a lot of time trying to arrange life so that they could live with what they had." This is what all children everywhere need. It isn't that children shouldn't be encouraged to dream and to imagine all possibilities; not at all. No, it is about the parent, the teacher, and others charged with their formation to create an environment for children to live -- to be fully alive -- with what they have, with what they have been given. And as St. Ireneus insisted so many years ago: The glory of God is the person fully alive.
Enough for now.
Monday, February 6, 2012
My Latest Affliction
I tried to watch the Superbowl last night (anticipating sleeping in a bit today, which I thought was a holiday -- more about that in a moment). I didn't set my alarm, but when I woke up at 2 a.m., I went over to our television room and searched the sports channels and found the pre-game show. I watched the coin toss and found myself dozing so went to bed.
I slept soundly for about an hour, and then I started feeling very uncomfortable around my neck. I felt it
and realized there was a welt-like condition on my skin from the base of my neck almost to my shoulder. I must have had a Nairobi fly on my pillow. I didn't manage to get back to sleep, so I have been dragging all day long.
Now about the holiday. I had put Maulid Day (the prophet's birthday) on the calendar for the 4th of February. My policy is that the school does not wait to hear which day the lunar-based holidays will be celebrated, I choose one and we go with it, and if it is another day than the one specified, Muslim employees can take that day off but show up for work on the holiday.
Soooo, because I expected Maulid to be on a Saturday, I had to move our monthly examinations to Wednesday - Friday (from the customary Thursday - Saturday). And then I discovered that I'd chosen the date for the festival as celebrated by whichever is the minority here -- Suni or Shiite, I can't remember which. So, I moved the holiday to Monday and explained that we would celebrate it on that day even if it was to fall on Tuesday. Well, it ended up falling on Sunday! And that means, we lost two class days, because we could have had examinations on Saturday and I didn't have to grant today's holiday. Argh!
I slept soundly for about an hour, and then I started feeling very uncomfortable around my neck. I felt it
and realized there was a welt-like condition on my skin from the base of my neck almost to my shoulder. I must have had a Nairobi fly on my pillow. I didn't manage to get back to sleep, so I have been dragging all day long.Now about the holiday. I had put Maulid Day (the prophet's birthday) on the calendar for the 4th of February. My policy is that the school does not wait to hear which day the lunar-based holidays will be celebrated, I choose one and we go with it, and if it is another day than the one specified, Muslim employees can take that day off but show up for work on the holiday.
Soooo, because I expected Maulid to be on a Saturday, I had to move our monthly examinations to Wednesday - Friday (from the customary Thursday - Saturday). And then I discovered that I'd chosen the date for the festival as celebrated by whichever is the minority here -- Suni or Shiite, I can't remember which. So, I moved the holiday to Monday and explained that we would celebrate it on that day even if it was to fall on Tuesday. Well, it ended up falling on Sunday! And that means, we lost two class days, because we could have had examinations on Saturday and I didn't have to grant today's holiday. Argh!
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Catty News
Regular readers will recall my posts about Chui the wonder cat -- the friendliest, most capable mouser/ratter in all of Dodoma. Well, he's been gone for over a month now with no sightings. It was very upsetting to me when I discovered he'd gone missing while I was in Nairobi.
Well, my friend Andrea brought two replacements -- macho and moshi. Macho is the Swahili word for eyes -- and he has two lines that come from his eyes that look like frames. Moshi means smoke -- and this is the second cat with the same name (Chui had a sister who ran away as soon as arriving). Macho has become socialized to us (at least me), but Moshi continues to keep his distance. He desperately wants to be friendly, but just can't seem to manage to take the step.
Well, my friend Andrea brought two replacements -- macho and moshi. Macho is the Swahili word for eyes -- and he has two lines that come from his eyes that look like frames. Moshi means smoke -- and this is the second cat with the same name (Chui had a sister who ran away as soon as arriving). Macho has become socialized to us (at least me), but Moshi continues to keep his distance. He desperately wants to be friendly, but just can't seem to manage to take the step.
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