Hello from Mama in Canada!!

A Message from Mama . . .

I am sitting at my desk (in Ontario, Canada) and a chickadee (a small bird native to our area) has been trying desperately, AND I MEAN DESPERATELY, almost all day to break through the glass of my windows and join me . . . it is FREEZING outside today after some beautifully, warm and sunny weather . . .

Our Tumaini children are well for the most part except that we are now (having just had the mumps), taking our respective turns with chicken pox!  Angela brought it home about a month ago and most recently Liadi, Rashid and Said have had it.  I expect it too will run its course . . . and I had a 1:00 a.m. message to call Tumaini when Liadi split his eyebrow open.  He had been dancing with the children, fell and banged his forehead on the corner of our dining bench . . . butterfly bandage instructions over Skype with doctors Francis and Kelvin performing the procedure.  Poor Liadi . . . just getting over chicken pox on his WOOWOOWOO (bottom) (he even showed me his behind on Skype!) but is going to have a nasty scar to match the one he got under the other brow last year!!  Poor little guy . . . Oddo struggled with a case of malaria but is well now also.

And my absolute heartfelt thanks for your prayers, well wishes and continued to enquiries about my step daughter Amanda.  We almost lost her in February and she was sick for a lonnnng time, only having her pick line for intravenous antibiotics removed this past month.  She is regaining strength and is incredibly grateful, as is her mother, father and myself for your blessed prayers . . . Ahsante!!

My chickadee is going to chip a beak!

Before leaving Tumaini I was lucky enough to spend a weekend in Dar Es Salaam with Mary, Reward, Nelson and Kelvin together as a family and it was incredible.  You may remember that Kelvin’s sponsors brought him to Canada last year and he LEARNED HOW TO SWIM!  He spent the weekend teaching his siblings and now our entire Minja family are swimmers!  We enjoyed some beautiful family togetherness before I returned to Canada and each of us is extremely grateful.  Mary and Reward I hope, will visit us in Canada this fall after they graduate university. They are writing exams now and should return to Tumaini at the end of June.  My hope is to bring them back with me in September (at my family's personal expense) (I return to Tanzania July 29^th with fellow Simconian Tyra Swick-Blake who will be volunteering at Tumaini) for a three month visit where they might meet their sponsors and spend time with so many of our Canadian supporters, however, our own, and VERY dear Bryson applied for a visa and was rejected for reasons we are unclear of so please include us in your prayers.  Nelson, on the other hand is hard at work completing his second last year of advanced level secondary school after which we hope HE will join us in Canada to learn to fly!!  It is awe inspiring  as Mama to witness the thought processes of our Tumaini children change from hopeless existence, full of sickness and struggles - to hope - and then to dreams!!!  This process has taken a long time (we are entering our fourth year now) to develop in a child's psyche which has been, from birth, rife with sufferings of one kind or another.  There is TRULY not a better feeling in this world than to help facilitate the dream of a child, but YOU KNOW THAT!!

Before I left there was a violent robbery in our neighbourhood where thieves beat a security guard quite severely, splitting his head open.  Oddo raced the injured man to the hospital and exclaimed the next morning at work, “I have never seen so much blood”!  A head injury bleeds, doesn’t it . . . and just after I returned to Canada a terrorist threw a Molotov cocktail into a Catholic Church service celebrating the opening of a new parish.  Three people died but the parishioners would not succumb to the violence . . . they insisted on finishing the mass in order to send a message that terrorism will not make them flee.  It is a heartbreaking truth that terrorism exists in every part of the world . . .

As you know our precious Dada Margie recently gave birth to a beautiful little brother to Bryson.  Sadly, their father, we discover, not only abused Margie, but had a girlfriend throughout most of her pregnancy . . . she was heartbroken to learn of it and will need our love, respect and support as her maternity leave finishes and she comes back to work so include her in your prayers if you would and allow us to help her heal . . . she is a beautifully hearted young woman, undeserving of such a swine and will grow and heal and discover someone deserving of her one day . . .

The family out for ice cream and soda!!

While at Tumaini this last trip I often worked with Kelvin on homework (he is one of our kids who struggles with the Swahili/English transition because it happened for him at a later age . . . many of the younger children would often be confused as having English as their first language their vocabularies are SO good!) and one day he came home and asked me about . . . sperm . . .   He had been studying “health” in Science class and although I thought we’d covered those necessary but potentially awkward conversations I found myself sitting him down, face to face and had the “sex talk” again . . . Kelvin listened respectfully and attentively throughout my rather long winded, round about explanation after which he took both of my hands in his, looked me in the eye and said, “Yes Mama, I know all about that . . . but what is SPAM????  Oops . . .

Did you know that some people have remarkable abilities at retaining multitudinous dates in their heads?  Did you know that our very own Christina possesses just such a gift?  Not only does she retain almost all of the birthdates of everyone connected with Tumaini, BUT, she has this amazing ability to remember the DAY of someone’s birthdate!  Katy and Christina, my husband Steve and I and a couple others were in my office quizzing Christina about birthdates and she was able to rhyme off almost every one we asked.  Remember that we have 52 children at Tumaini . . . suddenly, Katy asked her what DAY my birthday had been on last year . . . she told, I checked and she was right!  We did it with Katy, with Baba Steve, with some others and she could remember MANY of the DAYS of a person’s birthday!  We would love to have Christina tested to see just what exactly IS going on in that precious little had of hers . . . let us remember that this is the very same child we thought learning challenged when she first arrived at Tumaini . . .

Enormous Ahsantes to the Kayak Foundation of Calgary, AB, here in Canada for their incredibly generous donation towards the continued support of our wonderful kids . . . your love and kindness is truly appreciated

THANK YOU KAYAK FOUNDATION!!!  

And did you know that a certain group of children went out to collect grasshoppers . . . great big juicy ones, JUST BEFORE I LEFT TUMAINI . . . to EAT???

Finally, we are this far from being granted 14 acres of land for Tumaini . . . for a permanent home, for a secondary school, for a football field!!!  I will keep you informed but please, PLEASE pray that all comes together as it should.  Our family deserves the stability of a permanent residence and the village (very near to Usa River) we are working with desperately needs our assistance . . . it could be a perfect fit!  FUNDRAISERS!!!

And speaking of fundraisers, we will be in touch shortly about our 2^nd Annual Tumaini Tournament of Hope . . . stay tuned!

As always and from the very bottom of a mother’s heart I thank each of you . . . for your continued love and support . . . for caring and for wanting to be a part of this very special if not “unique” family we lovingly refer to as Tumaini . . . be well!!