THANKSGIVING HALF A WORLD AWAY

I started out my day with breakfast- fried dough (doughnuts without the sugar) and a hard boiled egg. There were leftovers so I grabbed three doughnuts, went to my room and picked up my nine 50 Tanzanian Shilling coins (3 ½ cents U.S. each) which I’ve been saving from day one for Thanksgiving. I headed out the door at 8 am, took my first Dolla Dolla to town, got off and walked to the next D.D. stop. On my way I gave each beggar a doughnut and three 50 Shilling coins saying, “Happy Thanksgiving” even though they had no idea what I just said. It worked out perfectly, I had three doughnuts and three sets of coins and I ran into 3 beggars. I got teary-eyed each time I said, “Happy Thanksgiving” but it felt so good to start off my holiday giving this way.

The day before I took the $100 bill Acorn Learning Center raised in their bikeathon back home down to the Exchange Bureau, exchanged it for 147,000 Shillings and bought crayons for all the kids to share, made copies of a peacock from a coloring book, bought pencils for everyone (which are in high demand at Glorious), three rulers, four pencil sharpeners, three colors of pens for us teachers and chalk.

These items are all very needed here at Glorious! My first day teaching I couldn’t start teaching the lesson because there was no chalk to write with until a student ran and found some. The kids never had enough pencils and their sharpener went missing my second day teaching.

We write the day and date by hand in 50 student’s assignment books every day (which takes a while) and they insist on using a ruler which we share between the three of us. We correct each assignment with a red pen and never seem to have one. The supplies are bare minimum!

The kids had no crayons for coloring and I thought they should have a little color in their lives. I had the baby class color the peacocks however they wanted. I joined in and made my peacock into a turkey for a little holiday spirit. The older class had to follow the color by number instructions which turned out to be a good assignment for them because they had to read the color in English and find the right crayon. It turned out beautifully! The teachers said it was a great assignment and said they need more papers like this again. I was simply proud.

After school I went to Alice who, with her husband, owns, runs and lives at Glorious. I told her I wanted to buy food for two student’s families for Thanksgiving. She told me which two families were in most need and after school we went to a little shop to buy food. Katie, a new volunteer from Boston wanted to join in on the Thanksgiving gift as well so, together, we chose four families to buy food for; Jackline, family of five, Neema family of five, Angellah family of 7 and Wazir , a family of ten.

For each family we bought:

5 kilograms of rice

5 kilograms of beans

5 kilograms of maize flour

½ liter of cooking oil

1 package of laundry soap bars

4 packages of salt

10 eggs

This food is enough to feed all four families for almost a week. Katie and I each paid 42,000 Shillings (about $30.00 U.S.) Thank you Acorn!! I’m so proud of you and thanks to your help we got so much food for each of the families who are really in need.

I cannot tell you how proud I was in these moments, thinking about the families. At first we started with rice and beans, and then added more items until we ran out of choices at the store. Alice helped us carry the HEAVY bags of food, taking them to two families at a time. We walked quite a ways to the house of the first family – Jackline’s. We weaved through many houses, beautiful jungle and came across a bridge that was made from sticks, very far apart, and with an 8 foot drop below us. Alice made it across fine with a heavy bag in her hand and one on her head. A woman and her son came up and the lady took my 10 kilo bag of beans , grabbed my arm, helped me across, turned around and left… it was fun and I was so thankful to this happy, laughing lady. It was a moment I don’t ever want to forget!

Once we got to Jackline’s house, we said hello and asked if Jackline was feeling better because she’d missed school that day. Her belly was protruding and she had a tear in her eye, but she was smiling at us, yet a little shy because two of her teachers were all of a sudden in her house. They invited us inside and Alice displayed the food out on their table for us to take a photo. Kate and I felt a little uncomfortable about that. We took a picture of the food and one of the family, but didn’t want to do that with the other families. We just wanted to meet them and tell them that today was Thanksgiving at home and we share food with family back home but today we wanted to share with them. They thanked us many times and then insisted on carrying the food for the next family so we wouldn’t have to.

I was so proud; I had a permanent grin on my face the whole evening! When you think of others you get so much back and I cried many times from all the happiness I felt. I never felt more proud of myself and of my students back home at Acorn!

We dropped off all of the food at the rest of the houses then took the Dolla Dolla home. The whole time I was soaking in the feelings and I felt so fulfilled and peaceful.

This was my most favorite Thanksgiving ever! I was never stressed about anything, I didn’t miss home and this is what Thanksgiving should be about… giving and sharing with people in need. It changed my life forever!

We at home have absolutely no need for stress. We are so taken care of and have EVERYTHING we need to live and more. There is a freedom back in the states that is lost and trampled on. We have never gone days and days without food or water, never had to deal with major illnesses without a doctor or live in a world without any luxuries like showers, TV, a stove, A HOUSE, toilet paper, crayons for our kids or soap to wash our clothes. Instead we worry about showering every day, buying the biggest TV (one for the bedroom, one for the kid’s room) the fluffiest toilet paper, the biggest house we can afford, the nicest scent in our laundry soap…

A life with luxuries is nice, but what about thinking of those with very little every now and then. There is something we aren’t getting in a world of wants that is in abundance in a life with little and a life of giving.

Thank you Acorn for your contribution to a very great Thanksgiving… together we’ve filled the lives of many and fed the bellies of many too! Asante Sana!!

Talia