Loss

Whistles blow regularly here. It is the community method to announce a death—a person is appointed to walk through the neighborhood, blowing a loud whistle, then yelling the name of the person who died and when the funeral will happen. Many people will meet this person on the path, and give money towards the funeral.

The longer you live here, the more personal these announcements become. A repairman who worked on your house. A neighbor. A friend’s child.

This week, however, it was news from home. David has been part of our lives for about 6 years. Though they chose to not get married, my mother and he functioned as though they were, and they had planned to grow old and retire together. They were inseparable.

Cancer, however, blunted that reality. The prognosis looked good, and the cancer seemed manageable, until the cancer unexpectedly roared back, taking over the liver, and shutting down his body before the doctors discovered that the presenting issue—pneumonia—was actually a symptom that was drawing attention away from the core issue. By the time they knew, it was too late.

We had been sending text messages back and forth with my sister as events unfolded, and finally got the phone call 3 am Friday morning. My sister tearfully reported that David had just passed away.

I had begun making travel plans when my sister conveyed my mom’s preference that I instead wait and maybe I, along with Charity and the boys, could come for Christmas, when losses are most deeply felt. We hope to honor her wishes by doing so.

David Hunter was a good man with a tender heart, an amazing cook, an avid reader, a lover of sports (especially tennis, F1 car racing, and women’s hoops), playful with children (Josiah has lot’s of great memories of him), servant-hearted, and always a joy to be around—assuming he had had his coffee or chocolate.

He is greatly missed.

Birthday gift of faith

Josiah already knew too much. We had interrupted his birthday dinner in town after receiving a frightful message from Uwezo, our gardener. His two-year old daughter was missing.

The sun was setting, and Uwezo, like ¾’s of the population here, lives on a rocky hillside, surrounded by cliffs that become even more dangerous in the night. There are no phone lines, no water pipes, and most critically, no electricity to illuminate the countless paths that traverse the rocky landscape. The neighborhood had been searching for two hours in daylight with no success.

On the way to drop the family off at home, Josiah peppered us with questions that we could not answer. But, finally relenting from his questions, our young theologian instead began offering his words of hope from the back seat:

“God can see Teresia. We can’t see God, but he can see all of us. He will take care of her.”

Charity’s heart and mine sank even lower. We both wanted to cry—while we affirmed everything Josiah said—“he is taking care of her.”—we feared and were preparing for the worst. And how would we explain this to our four-year old?

Thankfully, when I was on my way to try to help, Uwezo called me with the good news we had been praying for. Teresia was found, a couple miles from home. I drove to find Uwezo’s father, to share the good news, Then I returned home to catch the end of the ad-libbed birthday meal—hot dogs, carrots, and brownies—and share the good news with everyone, especially Josiah.

Josiah will learn—as we all have—that things do not always turn out so well. But we also need to learn—in spite of past hurts and hardships—that God is watching, and listening to our every prayer.

A child saved, a child’s faith preserved. Childlike faith rediscovered again.


Another unrelated theological observation from Josiah: God keeps scabs in a drawer. All sizes. He looks to see what size you need, then he gets one out, and gives it to Jesus to put on.

Umeme!!!

(Kiswahili for electricity!)

On a day when I was returning from town, wishing that I lived anywhere else on earth than Tanzania, I pulled up to find three workers installing a power meter at our house.

I tried to play it cool—“it’s about time you guys came!”, but went into a hidden part of the house and danced a jig. It’s been 11 months since we applied, and over two months since we moved in, and finally, we have power!

Well… it didn’t work, of course. We had to wait an extra day for an electrician to come and get it to actually work. But we actually go out and look at the meter, admire the numbers—pitiful, but true.

This is a new kind of meter, a prepaid meter. We buy units, enter a code onto a keypad, then get that much electricity until the meter cuts the electricity off. No meter reader necessary (one position that is prone to corruption here), no unpaid power bills bankrupting the power utility.

Hopefully, the power company will have us in their system soon: we have been trying to buy more units (the meter came with 50kWh as a starter), but have not yet been able to. So, we may be in the dark again sometime soon.

We are retraining ourselves. Initially, we would walk around at night in the dark, looking for and using a flashlight, until one of us would get the bright idea to flip a light switch.

Seriously, we feel much more secure now that we can run some exterior lights at night, safer without kerosene lanterns burning, cleaner as we aren’t pouring kerosene into lamps and petrol into a generator all the time, plus more regular hot showers. The virtues of Umeme!