Blogs from Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States, North America

The Educate Tanzania Team - "Team ETI" heads to Tanzania in just one week. The team met last evening with Jody at Borton Overseas in Minneapolis to meet each other and catch up on final details. Nine of us will head to the KARUCO Inauguration and Dedication Ceremonies which will take place on October 29, 2017. We can hardly wait. Follow along with Team ETI. Here is our itinerary for the trip: OCT 25 - Depart MSP for Amsterdam / OCT 26 - Arrive Amsterdam. Depart for Kigali (touchdown) then Entebbe, Uganda. Overnight in Entebbe / OCT 27 - Ground transport to Mutukula via Ben's Rentals and our friend, Ben. Meet KAD Partners at the Uganda/Tanzania border and ground transport to Karagwe. Reception in Kayanga. Overnight in Kayanga / OCT 28 - Tour of KARUCO - ... read more

Today marks the first month since tour has officially started. We have traveled to two different states, had pizza 12 times, and the kids are still praying to see snow! :) That time will come but hopefully more later on. The kids are starting to become more comfortable with our culture, foods, and the American busy lifestyle. See for me, I like being on African time. Sometimes it may get me into trouble but the kids don't seem to mind it :) They're favorite foods so far are pizza, hamburgers, and French fries..... Haha welcome to America. They are going to do just fine here. With my schedule being so busy I never have time to catch up on news or anything going on in the outside world because it is like I'm living in a ... read more

GATE G6 - MSP to AMS Pedro Bidegaray, Jay Bell and I (from MN) are meeting Daniel Sherrard (from Costa Rica) in Tanzania. Our trip begins today. Our good friend and colleague, Brighton Katabaro emailed to wish us safe travels and to assure us that this will be a precious time. The purpose of this trip to Karagwe, Tanzania is to co-create curriculum with the KARUCO Curriculum Development Team made up of professors and leaders from Minnesota, Costa Rica, and of course, Tanzania. We will interview all kinds of people connected to Agriculture - which is the focus of the university. We want to build a curriculum that doesn't just sit on a shelf. We don't want to waste people's time by creating something they memorize but don't implement. Instead we want a curriculum that is ... read more

Monday February 6 – Day 4 Today the plan was to go to the Cathedral of St Paul and then go to the Mall of America. I caught the #21 bus over to the Cathedral of St Paul. There is a bus stop right next to the cathedral where I got off. It was a very impressive Cathedral and patterned after the one in Rome. After touring the Cathedral I got on a very crowded #21 bus and headed towards the Lake Street Midtown station where I intended to catch the #55 Hiawatha Light Rail train south to the Mall of America. I would have done better if I had gone back into St Paul and caught the #94 express to the Nicollet Mall Station in Minneapolis and then went south from there on the ... read more

February 4 – Saturday – morning Drinking my coffee and thinking things over in St Paul, Minnesota. I flew 1500 miles for this. The Ice Sculptures are melting. I've seen more snow in Texas in February before....sigh. Guess I should have just went to Colorado again. I heard they had a little snow there. I guess I will change my focus on this trip from attending the Winter Carnival to touring St Paul and Minneapolis. Quite frankly I’ve seen more going on at County Fairs….no wonder Ron is lonesome. They only had one Snow sculpture and there was a sign next to it thanking some organization for hauling in the snow for it….sad. I guess I will finish getting dressed and go down to the 10th floor for the continental breakfast, then go to The Mall ... read more