Hi Everyone! We survived the Serengeti (wild elephant "attack" and all) and have moved onto Zanzibar. Totally different here: more touristy, like Panama City or Destin. Hot, Hot, Hot. Humidity like down south - unlike other parts of Tanzania which were hotish days and colder nights. And they call this Winter! We flew over here today using two small planes (about 10 passengers). Even though it is so hot here, we must dress modestly due to culture and Islam influence. We are both well - no major sickness thankfully, however, it is easy to get dehydrated. Kind of like Israel in [View Full Entry]

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After 6 days on safari, I have moved on to the beach for a little relaxation. The safari was great! We started at Lake Manyara were we saw many elephants, hippos, zebra.... The next day we set off for Ngorongoro Crater which amazed us with how close some of the animals were including a male lion that walked down the road in front of us! Then we headed to the Serengeti for a couple of days. The animals were much harder to spot here but we still managed to see a number of lions even close up and a couple of [View Full Entry]

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Today was Saba Saba . Saba Saba translates as "Seven Seven," saba being the Kiswahili word for seven. Saba Saba (July 7th, get it?) is a national holiday here in Tanzania that celebrates...farmers? Something like that. All I know is that it meant that we had no class today. Barak (the program director here in Mwanza) was kind enough to tell us that Saba Saba is really just a big market for tractor parts. But when we went to the market today (a few of us, at least) we did not see any tractor parts but did see a lot of [View Full Entry]

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On Saturday, we took a trip to the Sukuma Cultural Museum. Our tour guide may have been one of the most unenthusiastic people I have ever met. I thought that he would have had Sukuma pride; however, he was just giving us the facts as if reading them out of a book. Boring. It was strange to see the different reactions when people realized that all of the things we were seeing could easily be seen in the United States - Angela compared a lot to Hawaii and I compared a lot to the Algonquins. It makes me wonder what makes [View Full Entry]

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The Richardson Family Report July 6, 2008 We hope and pray that this report finds each of you healthy and happy in service to our Lord. After what was a great month of June, with all of the activities and the many visitors that we were blessed to have this summer, we quickly find ourselves already into July. We would be amiss, if we failed to thank each one of you who came this summer, as well as all of those back home that made it possible for you all to be here. All of our guest are special, but one [View Full Entry]

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Sunday is a resting day, so all we did is went to the central market to grab some fruit and stuffs, it's a pretty huge market, lots of stuffs, apparently, lots of thieves as well, people seems pretty nice, everywhere you go, people greet you by different languages, English/Swahili/Japanese/Chinese, first time, you thought people just being nice, after a few times, you'll figure out they just want to sell you stuffs, get the money out of your pocket, then it becomes a bit annoying. We have the whole afternoon off, I played the soccer with a bunch of kids, oh man, [View Full Entry]

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First full day in Arusha, Tanzania, didn't really sleep much last night, for whatever reasons, doesn't really feels like jet lag though, got up pretty early but fresh. Pretty chilly and cloudy out in the morning, Alphance told me it'll be sunny in the afternoon, weather here is like that, guess b/c of close to the mountains. Day was pretty relaxing, more orientation on safety, etc, went on a city tour, went to the clock tower, torch of freedom, market, it's a small town compare to other cities I've been to, but pretty crowded though, people on the street everywhere. felt [View Full Entry]

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No har vi vore i Mbulu sidan tirsdag og har siste dag med seminar i dag. Det har vore innhaldsrike dagar med mykje leik og moro. Teamet har hangla med ymse subjektive helseplager. Verst har det nok vore for Vikelsdal Dalan som vart slapp etter kun faa timar paa Tanzaniansk jord. Vi bur finfint, og et ok mat, sjoelv om den er den same stort sett til alle maaltid. Mbulu er ein liten og roleg by med passeleg mange menneske og mange engasjerte ungdomar! Eg tykkje alltid det er vanskeleg aa forklare storlieken paa ein by. Likevel er det alltid nokre [View Full Entry]

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This week has gone so fast. We have fallen into the routine of life over here so naturally and I feel like I've been here forever. I can't believe that 15 days ago we were in London. It's the end of the minimum two week stay here so we have been saying bye to a few people yesterday and today - I'm most sad to see Lori & Jennifer go - they are a mother and daughter from Hawaii and California and they were great fun. I would have loved to have found out more about Jenny's late teens and twenties..... [View Full Entry]

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Hello everyone! Today is July 4th -- happy holiday to everyone. Since we left the last blog, we have traveled south into several national parks. We went to Tarangeri park which is famous for giraffes and lots of wildlife. Very beautiful ... and the tented camp we stayed at was first class. We sleep in tents that zip up, they had a pool and a great view. Next we went to Lake Manyara and drove through another park. Elephants and monkeys were everywhere! Lots of excitement when a very large elephant decided to walk down the jeep path -- first was [View Full Entry]

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