I got up bright and early to start walking at 7:30 to the MS-TCDC campus. About 20 years ago, Eric took a course on microfinance and microenterprise development there. It is a very well-regarded program that was started with Danish international aid money. Also today, I remember Eric, as this is his birthday. Happy birthday, Eric!
It is a lovely campus. I had never been there before, so I wanted to give plenty of time. All went well with an early arrival. There were marabou storks, a greater hornbill, and colobus monkeys on campus, in addition to a large and luscious campus that has their own farm-to-table vegetable garden. This includes a coffee shamba (garden), and they produced their own coffee there. The pictures below identify the challenges of coffee harvesting, as there is not a one-time harvest. Beans need to be picked when they are red and ripe. But you can see flowering coffee, green, and red fruit, which is why coffee is very labor intensive.
Coffee flowers
Some ripe and red are ready to pick, while green ones need more time.
The “cherry” with the green beans inside.
The amazing and Providential gift of the day is that I am the only student in the beginner course! There is a teacher and another assistant teacher, who becomes my conversation partner! As I have some Kiswahili, but not good enough to get into an intermediate course and bad grammar due to the absence of formal lessons like this when we were ELCA volunteers, I am not a low beginner, but my teacher, Joyce, at the end of the day said that I was a high beginner. So, I don’t have to be bored waiting for new beginners to learn the basic greetings and how to count to 10, instead, I get tailored conversations to my capacity and questions. What a HUGE blessing.
Joyce is on a break as part of her PhD program in teaching Kiswahili. So, I have an expert in pedagogy of this language. This makes a big difference for me who needs to be able to understand the grammar. So perfect!
My classroom
When discussing my research over a break, we discovered that we three are all women of faith. I also learned at the end of the day that Joyce is also a widow. The challenges of being a single mom raising 3 kids in Tanzania is unbelievable. Somehow, she is not only surviving but has thrived.
Mungu akubariki! (God bless you!)
What a huge gift to be one on one for your lessons!! Our first class in Morogoro had 30 students; one instructor and then practice in groups of 2 with assistant. My intermediate course there at Usa River had about 10, all of whom were better than I. . . at least I thought so. Yup, wish I had more practice with the grammar, especially inserting the object and prepositional endings. Nouns and verbs can be memorized, but using them in sentences, etc. becomes the challenge. You’ll be great. . . needs the same diligence that you give to everything.
How wonderful that your class can be tailored and focused! May you be blessed with this time.