Battling the elements (aka rain)

Thursday 20th February

Was it just last year I vowed never to plan a village-based workshop in the middle of the rainy season? And yet here I find myself in the big village of Ilembo, in the Malila language area, training Sunday school teachers for two days. When the pastor of a large Baptist church there asked my former Malila colleague, Majaliwa, to invite me to come and teach, I felt strangely compelled to agree. The pastor is someone I have interacted with a number of times in the past, an enthusiastic man who really cares about God’s Word being faithfully studied and taught and who is a strong advocate for using Malila, so I wanted to encourage him by responding in the affirmative! So against my better judgement, and persuaded by my Malila colleague that there’s usually a break in the rains in February, I agreed to go.

As forecast, a week or so into February the weather dried up, so I lived in hope that the weather wouldn’t interrupt our plans, but when I left at 7am to drive to the Malila area, the rain began falling. The skies were grey and there was nothing to suggest it was just a passing shower; it rained all the way to Ilembo, a journey of about 1¾ hours. Thankfully the dirt road was mostly in good shape, so I didn’t have any problems en-route, but the rain refused to let up, and I felt sorry for the children walking by the side of the road on their way to school, with no coats or umbrellas, though some were using plastic sheets or banana leaves for shelter and most of them looked surprisingly cheerful despite the weather!

Majaliwa was waiting for me in the centre of Ilembo, he’d come by motorbike from his home a few miles away, and we headed to the church. The pastor welcomed us into his office, but no-one else was to be seen. And the rain continued, though not heavily. It was about a couple of hours after we were supposed to start that we finally began with the few participants who had arrived – Majaliwa did a Malila literacy lesson with them as more participants trickled in and the rain finally stopped. A lot more time on literacy was needed than we had space for in our schedule, but it was a good start, and by the time Majaliwa had gone through all the things that are different in the Malila orthography (writing system) to Swahili and given everyone a chance to try reading a sentence or two out loud, about 20 Sunday school teachers had arrived.

Majaliwa officially opened the workshop and welcomed me and then it was my turn to teach, so after getting them moving with a good game of fruit bowl, I launched into the content I had prepared. Lunch was somewhat late (about 2.30pm), but no-one complained. I find the commitment, resilience and uncomplaining nature of people here to be a real challenge to my comfort-loving, schedule-keeping outlook on life! Some of the participants had come long distances (apparently over 20km) on foot and in the rain and some of them would sleep in a couple of rooms provided by the church probably on mats on the floor. And yet all these discomforts and inconveniences were accepted with fortitude.

In the evening the pastor had arranged for local school children to come so that I could teach them in front of the teachers to provide an example of live teaching. About 80 children turned up and they were amazing! They engaged so well, which was super to see as when I’ve done this in some places it’s been really hard to get them to respond because they are so shy of this strange visitor!

We finished about 5.45pm. I played with some little children for a while and then chatted with the pastor about funerals – it’s a fascinating topic of conversation as our traditions are so different. I discovered that the Malila used to bury their dead with a mattress and blankets because they believed they should be buried with their possessions otherwise they’d come back for them. There was just time for me to take a short walk before it got completely dark and I settled into my guest house room for the night.

I was back in the same room I was in last time I was in Ilembo! It’s one of my least favourite guest houses to stay in – it smells mouldy, paint is peeling off the walls, there is still no bulb in the little en-suite bathroom, and the blanket doesn’t smell good. Annoyingly I forgot to bring the inner-sheet I sometimes carry for trips where I’m not sure what my sleeping conditions will be, as I can snuggle inside that and know that I am clean, whatever the provided bedding might be like!

Friday 21st February

That wasn’t the most restful of nights. There was a mosquito in the room and as I was its only food supply you can guess what happened. There was no mosquito net because Ilembo is in the hills, about 2030 metres  (6660 feet) above sea level, so malaria isn’t a problem and mosquitoes are scarce. After being woken up by its buzzing and the itching of its bites, I covered my face and hands with my scarf and sleep was restored.

Looking towards Ilembo on a short morning walk

We were able to start the workshop more promptly today, and lunch (rice with fish in a tomato sauce) was ready at a good time. When I say fish, I mean whole fish, about 15cm long. Previous encounters with such fish and watching how Tanzanians eat them has taught me that you can, and in fact should, eat the head. They consider it to be one of the best parts, full of goodness. It took me a while to be convinced of that, but I’ve discovered that the head really is okay, if the fish isn’t too big.

Looking out from the church
as the rain poured down

Everything came to an abrupt halt in the afternoon when the heavens opened and the wind blew and it became impossible to make oneself heard over the sound of rain pounding on the tin roof. I loved the teachers’ response to this – they started singing! Despite the painfully loud sound of the rain, their voices could still be heard praising God. However, after a while, even they grew tired of fighting against the sound of the rain, and so we sat and waited until, after about 20 minutes, it eased and we could carry on where we left of, which was doing a quiz and learning how to compose questions that follow the flow of the Bible story and using creative ways of scoring.

When I asked at the end what new things they had learnt, the overwhelming response was ‘actions’ – the idea of using actions when telling the story and for memory verses, and engaging the children in all kinds of other ways, was new to most of them. Two days is very short, but I pray that they will all have learnt something that will help them teach children better and make learning the truths of the Bible fun, and that the simple curriculum they all bought based on Mark’s gospel (which I wrote a few years ago, and sold at half-price so they could all afford it, at about 15p) will help them prepare and teach faithfully through the life of Jesus over the coming months.

Practising learning memory verses using actions

Remarkably, the church covered all the workshop costs, even paying for my room at the guest house and generously giving me a sack of potatoes, and Majaliwa a long bar of laundry soap, to thank us for coming. They would love for us to do this three times a year, but with my other work commitments, I’m not sure that’s possible. This is a shame as it’s so encouraging when a church takes the initiative and shows a real concern for children’s ministry.

Group pic! Sitting on chairs (L-R): Sunday school coordinator, pastor, me, Overseer of Baptist churches in the area, Majaliwa

The drive home was uneventful, except that the road had worsened after the rains, and once I reached tarmac I got stuck behind lorries crawling up the hills all the way back home, so that I rarely got above 20 mph for those final 8 miles. I finally arrived home in the dark after 7.30pm and I suddenly felt very tired. Early night needed. I don’t know if the workshop was ‘successful’; how does one measure success? Though I went to teach, I had so much to learn, lessons which I have to continually relearn, about trusting God (whatever the weather) and wholehearted service (whatever the circumstances). May God help me to be even half as willing as those teachers to bear discomfort for the sake of serving my Saviour!