I can't believe how fast time is flying by here! I only have a little over a week left. And I have such mixed emotions about it. I'm excited to get home because I'm at a point in my life where I have a lot of decisions to make and it's really exciting to make them! I also decided I'm going to leave the airport during my 10.5 hour layover in London! I printed off some maps to follow for when I get there. I'm excited. :) Buuuut as for when I get home..I'm an alternate for the Physical Therapist Assisting program, and I still haven't found out if I got in or not. If I don't I could go on a mission, apply somewhere else, or finish the few classes I need to take to get my Associates, and/or work..It's awesome that Heavenly Father could have made a perfect plan for each person but instead He lets us have free agency to make our own decisions! It's really the only way we can learn from our mistakes, by making our own decisions.
I've come to this conclusion because I had an amazing experience since I last wrote a blog post that changed my attitude. We were walking to Michael's orphanage and I was overly stressed with all of the decision making I had to do in my personal life. So I put my music in and tuned the world out. I started crying because I felt so overwhelmed..and then this adorable little African boy comes out of nowhere and looks at me and grabs my hand and started walking with me. He didn't say anything, he just grabbed my hand and smiled. So I took a deep breath, wiped my tears away, and smiled back. We didn't say anything to each other, we just walked. But every once in a while he would look up at me, smile, and squeeze my hand. And as soon as he grabbed my hand, I knew it was Heavenly Father holding my hand, comforting me, and telling me everything is going to work out, all without words. It's things like this that make me KNOW God lives. And loves me. And is helping me through my hard times. I'm never alone. :) I think this one experience alone will help me get through every hard time for the rest of my life.
Anyways! Africa! I'm in love with Africa. I've decided if I had a hot water heater, a washing machine, a drier, and my family and friends here I would stay forever! It's just such a good lifestyle. In America everybody is always on the go and in a hurry, but here it's like people take their time in life and enjoy it more. That's how I want my life to be! Everywhere we go people say "hakuna matata" because they know we know that phrase! And that's exactly how they live. With no worries. It's the coolest. So I bought a shirt that says hakuna matata so I can remember to keep my life that way! Also, the real Swahili version of Hakuna Matata is Hamna Shida! It means no problems. :) aaand I'll probably be saying it all the time when I get home. :)
Projects are going good! The video we're making for Your Sisters orphanage is coming along. We interviewed each of the staff members here and the girls in the orphanage. It was cute. We asked them what they wanted to be when they're older and a lot of them want to be pastors, a few want to be doctors, and one wants to be a pilot! They have really big dreams. :) We finished teaching them We Are the World by Michael Jackson, and we recorded it on Yesterday! And we also finished editing it yesterday as well! We'll post it to YouTube soon so you guys can see! The girls are so cute :) it's kind of hard teaching them the song because of their accents. But I think it's even cuter hearing their little mistakes and knowing they're trying! It gives it character. :) lately we've been really into playing games with them too. We've played duck duck goose, red rover, red light green light..They are SO CUTE! Myyy goodness. :)
Our English teaching went well. They've learned so much! I'm proud of them. And of me! It was a lot of work! haha we're done teaching though because we wanted to have time to create a six month English plan for the teacher to have so she can continue teaching the students when we're gone. We'll give it to her next week and say bye to the kids!
We also made a kitchen for a school in a town outside of ours called Namanga. It's the same school where I taught the water sanitation class to a lot of the adults in that community, and about hand washing to the kids. HELP actually built the school two years ago, and now they have a kitchen! They give their students lunch, just like we do in America. And before we built the kitchen, they were cooking outside in the dirt. We figured that wasn't very sanitary and we want these kids to be clean and healthy, so we began! It's a LOT of work. We took a lot of trips getting sand from a sand pit a ways away. It gets really tiring after a while. Then we sifted that sand and mixed it with cement and water, and that's what holds the bricks together! So we helped put the building together, plastered the walls, made a solid floor, bought some iron sheets for the roof, put in a door and window..and walah! A kitchen was built!
Funny story, we were sitting in a daladala waiting for it to fill up with people so we could leave to go home from Namanga, and the trunk door was open. So this random African guy named James comes up to us and says "I want to marry one of you!" and Ellen, our country director, was like "5,000 cows for each of us! That's 20,000 cows all together!" and he pointed to me and was like "Her! 20,000 cows for her! What's your name?" and Ellen told him! haha and he had overheard that we were coming back the next week, so he was like "I'll be waiting for you, Emilee! Just ask for James!" So yeah! 20,000 cows! That's a LOT of cows. haha It's cool seeing how different the culture is here.
The kids at Michael's orphanage get cuter every time we go there! They love singing, and we've recently found out they love dancing! So we have random little dance parties when we go over there now :) I've taught them a few dances! It's been really fun :) they are the cutest. If I were to ever come back to Tanzania, Africa..they would be the reason why!
Now we're working with a group of African albinos called The African Albino Peacemakers. We're setting up an eye camp for albinos in the area to get their eyes checked. :) we're thinking of doing that next week sometime! it's so cool working with them! They're inspiring. They also have a pig pen that needed roofing, so we bought some iron sheets for the roof and put a roof on the pig pen! Pretty sure that was the first time I had seen pigs in person, too! Their snouts are so cute. And their curly tails. I took lots of pictures. :)
In our free time, we like to go to Njiro, what we like to call "Mzungu (white person) Heaven". I like to think of it as an African "mall". haha it has a grocery store, free wifi, American food, a movie theatre, places to shop, ice cream..It's got it all! So we like to eat dinner there on the weekends, even if it's kind of expensive. It's worth it! We've also seen three movies! Man of Steel, Despicable Me 2, and Monsters University! Definitely something I didn't think I would be doing in Africa, but I love it! Oh, and we watched Lion King the other night with the kids in Michael's orphanage! In Africa! Checking that off my bucket list!
This blog post is long..haha I'm sorry! I just have so much to say! I'll write another one soon on what I've learned through coming here. It will probably be a long one too. haha I love you guys! And I'll see you in a little over a week!! Hakuna matata/hamna shida!
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