Sarah MaMa guest blogger

Sarah MaMa here:

Just to clarify....Joe wrote the last blogpost, not me.

Hi from Sumbawanga Tanzania! I can't believe this is the last day before we start the LONG journey back home. Starting tomorrow early we take a 6 - 10 hour jeep ride over the most unbelievably bumpy dirt road I have ever been on. Then overnight in Mbeya and a 12 to 14 hour bus ride (some very interesting experiences included) to Dar es Salem and then overnight and (hopefully) a flight to Amsterdam and then (hopefully) and flight to Minneapolis!!!!

I will not post a real detailed blog today, because there isn't time. But, when we get home, Sarah BaBa (Joe) and I will post a more detailed blog with pictures of our adventure.

And, that is exactly what this has been.....an adventure!!

The best part of this journey (of course) is seeing Sarah!! She is doing great and seems very comfortable here and has many friends. Her Swahili is very good. She has the perfect LAID BACK personality for this country.

The area where she is living is VERY REMOTE and hard to get to, but VERY BEAUTIFUL. There are wonderful mountains (not real high)and everything is very green. We timed this perfect...it is the end of the rainy season, so everything is very green (evidently it turns all brown after the rains ends). The weather has been perfect every day....sunny, cool at night, warm in the sun, cool in the shade and not humid....my favorite weather! It would have been very hard to be in an area with weather similar to Dar es Salem, which is very hot and humid and uncomfortable.

The people here are very friendly, happy, lively, music loving people. In spite of the hardships and difficulties of ordinary life they never complain.

I am the only was who has a little bit of stomach issues (nothing terrible though) and, of course, I have been the most careful about what I eat and drink. One day when my stomach was giving me problems we were visiting a convent and one of the nuns was an MD. She gave me some pills that work to stop the diarrhea (1 pill works for 24 hours) so I am just using that when I travel.

Yesterday we sent to Katavi National Park to see the animals. MaMa Sarah had some meltdowns as I only had 2 hours of sleep the night before and we weren't seeing that many animals, there was an invasion of tse-tse flies (which cause sleeping sickness) and the traveling was getting to me and I'm a spoiled, rotten, selfish American :)

Anyway, we did get to an area in the park where we got up really close to a bunch of animals....so it all turned out OK.

We have met some really nice people - our favorites are Sarah's good friends the brothers she got to know really well when she was recovering from getting sick. The are so nice and so fun. We are going to their house for the second time for dinner tonight, so it will be really fun.

Well, time is up for this computer....so I have to go. But, we will post a more detailed account of our trip when we get home (complete with pictures!)

Kwa heri!! (Good bye)

Love,
MaMa Sarah