I'm home

I step off the plane at Mbeya’s airport and immediately I know I’m home. The air feels different, Mbeya’s beautiful mountains welcome me and there are those
things that would just never happen in England that leave me in no doubt that I have returned. Like from the window of the plane I could see a class of primary school children standing excitedly in front of the terminal, obviously on a school outing to see the plane and staring at the passengers as we alighted. And there’s the warm greeting from an airport shuttle driver who I regularly use and the long wait until there are no more potential customers left before the shuttle will leave, but then finding a couple more people waiting at the end of the airport’s entrance road and haggling over the price (even though it is supposed to be fixed) until eventually they come to an agreement and they get in.

As we make the journey to Mbeya town (for the airport is on the outskirts, about a 30-40 minute drive from home), the senses are assaulted by the vibrant life all around. People are everywhere, on foot, working, shopping, waiting for transport – so different from the quiet roads of my parents’ village or even the roads of an English town. It’s a bit more like an English town on a sunny public holiday, when everyone is out. And there’s the colours – people wearing brightly patterned fabrics, ice-cream sellers with their orange cool bags and shirts, houses and shops painted in white or bright green or pale pink or any other colour you may not expect, with corrugated iron roofing that can now be bought in blue or red or green; and something about the light makes the colours seem warmer.

Truly, it’s a vibrant scene, bustling with life, a far cry from a street in England, where people avert their gaze to avoid catching your eye as they walk past, everyone busy about their own business. But as always, there is more to life than meets the eye. Talking later to my neighbour I hear how people are stealing maize from the fields, because there isn’t enough food. The rains were late this year and crops have struggled. And in Mbeya we are fortunate; in other parts of the country there was hardly any rain at all. Prices are rising, both due to the poor harvest and due to global issues that we all know about. My neighbour also shared how hard it is for graduates to get work, and how her husband’s hope, before he was tragically killed in a road accident this year, was for his children to gain degrees in England, as this would give them a much better chance of getting a job back in Tanzania.

So I’m home. There is much that I love about England, not least precious times with family, seeing friends and the lush green countryside with so many opportunities to walk, run and cycle. But somehow this time, more than any time before, arriving back in Mbeya really felt like I was coming home. I went to visit my neighbours on one side, who warmly welcomed me, shooing the children watching TV out of the living room, so that they could chat properly with me. They were delighted by the tea towel I gave them with a picture of a deer on (as I’d just been on holiday to Scotland) and the kids loved the balloon with a Union Jack on. Then I visited the neighbours on the other side (the ones who were recently bereaved). To be honest, I have never really spent much time talking to these neighbours, but this time I went inside and ended up eating with them! Their typical Tanzanian hospitality meant that as they were about to eat, so must I, and so I joined them for ugali and fried meat, which I have to say was very tasty.

It would’ve been easy for the warm glow I felt on being home to be stifled as I walked to the market and my white skin made me an obvious target for stares and comments. I can’t go anywhere without hearing at least a few people talking about me (not in an unfriendly way, perhaps commenting on the way I walk fast so they think I am always busy), probably not realising that I can understand what they are saying. And there’s bound to be some children greeting me, often trying out their English. Sometimes I hear them discussing together what they should say, what the right greeting is, and even crossing over the road so they can speak to me, but then walking by silently, presumably losing confidence at the last minute, until they are back with their friends where they suddenly start calling out loud greetings now that I am already well past them! Unfortunately, there’s likely to also be some youths calling out greetings too, in a silly voice and saying stupid things. Thankfully, on this particular walk to the market, these things didn’t bother me. It always depends what mood I am in as to how well I can handle sticking out like a sore thumb everywhere I go!

So it’s good to be home. Even if there was a nearly two hour power cut on Sunday evening, so that I had to cook and eat by solar light and candle light. And even if my trainers have been stolen from the porch (having left them out to dry after getting wet on a run through dew-covered grasses on the mountain). And even if I keep waking up in the night, probably due to the cockerel and hens next door. And even if the music was so loud at church that I had to put my fingers in my ears during the songs. And even if the Sunday school teacher who was supposed to be teaching didn’t turn up because of a funeral, so I had to spontaneously teach with no book or preparation.

I may not feel the same way in a few days, when the ‘coming home’ feeling wears off and it’s just life as normal, when I’m hit with the usual challenges in work, when the daily niggles of life wear me down and when if I hear ‘mzungu’* just one more time I want to scream. But for now I am thankful that this place does feel like home, and that my new permit means that, God willing, this place can continue to be my home for nearly two more years (and maybe longer, who knows). Best of all, God is with me, He has brought me here, He will sustain me, provide for me, enable me and love me through all the ups and downs. And when there are those days when this place feels far from home, when I feel like a fish out of water, culturally clumsy and unable to communicate my thoughts clearly in Swahili, I remember that my true home is yet to come and that Jesus has gone ahead and is preparing a place there for me.

*Mzungu: This term generally refers to white foreigners. It is not a derogatory term, but nevertheless it’s a regular stark reminder that we’re different. Coming from a culture where any kind of label like that is offensive and considered discriminatory, it is hard for me not to hear it in that way, even when the speaker did not intend to offend.

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Postscript – It’s Tuesday

Less than a week has passed since I arrived back in Mbeya and already the rougher edges of life here have started to get under my skin – there’s the
problems with my new email system due to the slower internet speed here, shops not stocking what you’d hoped to find, friends who had borrowed my 4WD car return it and I find a long crack on the windscreen (not their fault) and the car is covered in dust (inevitable in dry season, but still annoying) and, compared to the nice little car I borrowed in England, it’s just harder work to drive around (it’s big, old, noisy and guzzles diesel, but is just what I need to get me along the rough roads) and once again the clucking hens woke me early and prevented me from getting back to sleep. But this is still home. Colleagues at the office came to greet me, my housemate returned and it was wonderful to be reunited and I was able to cook us a tasty dinner followed by some coconut and lime drizzle cake I’d also made, and most importantly that truth remains that my true home, which will be wonderfully niggle-free and so much better than even the best of Tanzania and England combined, is yet there to look forward to.

(Photos: Old photos I've taken around Mbeya in previous years)