"There and Back Again" -- Mwaji Secondary School Update

3 days ago

5 min read

by Michele Torrey, OA Volunteer Secretary and Co-Founder

I’ll be honest. I was dreading my return to Tanzania. Eleven years had passed since the last time I was there. Everyone kept telling me how much better things were than before, but it was hard for me to believe them.

After all, conditions there had always been difficult. Extremely rustic with an evil sense of humor. Like the time I had literal “ants in my pants,” ants crawling on me from scalp to toe, all happily biting while I slapped myself silly and did the crazy dance. Or having to take a cold bucket shower in the dark while standing in mud.

I remember once arriving at the mountainous village of Bujela. It was already nighttime. I was tired and sweaty, having traveled for the last sixteen hours across the country in a hot, ramshackle bus at break-neck speed. At the village, our host graciously gave over his bedroom so that my husband Carl and I could have a private room. The room was pitch dark. We donned our headlamps. I was careful not to shine the headlamp onto the bumpy mud-brick walls, as you never knew when you’d spotlight one of those horribly flat gargantuan spiders that looked like they’d already had the bejesus stomped out of them. Except they could move. Fast. Best not to look, I told myself.

Carl and I set about making our bed. First we sprayed our mattress with Permethrin, a bug spray that would kill just about any spider or bug that wanted to eat us. After unrolling our sleeping bags, our next task was to set up the mosquito net. When I looked up into the rafters to see where we could hang the net, I was relieved to see a net already hanging from a rafter. Yay, I thought, one less thing I have to do. The net was folded over on itself to keep it up out of the way. Because the net was a little out of my reach, I jumped up and grabbed the corner of the net to yank it down. Big mistake. A shower of rat poo sprayed across the bedding and into my sleeping bag. Poo pellets peppered my face, landing in my open mouth and down my throat. I couldn’t help but shriek and gag. This remains a hilarious moment for everyone else, a top-notch story in the annals of Orphans Africa lore,, but I still get the heebie-jeebies thinking about the night I choked on rat poo. And now I was going back. . . .

Fast forward to this last September. After arriving in Tanzania and resting a few days, we flew across the country (yes, flew! Flights didn’t exist “back in the day.”) We took a taxi to a nice hotel where we spent the night. The next day, after a shower and lovely breakfast buffet, we arrived at the Mwaji Secondary School in the school’s new-but-used 4WD Mitsubishi SUV. As we drove onto the high school campus, excitement pressed against my breastbone. Everything looked so lush—banana and avocado trees laden with fruit, shrubs bursting with bloom. My sense of awe grew. Such a huge campus. So many buildings. It’s gorgeous! We pulled up and stopped in front of the “OA House.” (In the intervening years since I’d been there, OA had built a small house specifically for volunteers. No more staying at host homes, where conditions were uncontrollable and rattily suspect.) I got out of the car, stiff from the three hour drive, admiring the view down into the valley and across to the other hillside. Not far from the OA House stood the boys’ dormitory. A group of boys stood in front of the dorm, watching us. I didn’t know them. They didn’t know me. I waved tentatively. Immediately, they all waved back. On impulse, I blew them a kiss with both hands. Again, they immediately responded. A dozen kisses came my way, floating on the gentle, mountain breeze. I couldn’t help the giddy laughter that came over me. This is amazing!

Over the next week, this giddy happiness stayed with me as I interacted with the students, teachers, and administrators. We played together, took photos and video, we talked, we hugged, we cheered them in their soccer game, and we were there when they graduated. These children embraced us just as they embrace one another—with their whole being, nothing left hidden.

Mid-way through the week it struck me. Yes, the living conditions had improved tremendously, but it was more than that. Staying on the campus, I was experiencing community. These people love each other, I realized. Orphans, non-orphans, teachers, administrators—they had built community. They had built home. This sense of home, of pride in their community and in their school, shone from their hearts. It surrounded me and moved me to joy, to tears, to basking in their shy waves and their hugs.

It has been sixteen years since we first began work on the Mwaji Secondary School when it was nothing but a bamboo shack. Today it’s a thriving community where children not only receive an education, but call the school their home, and classmates their brothers and sisters.

But the Mwaji Secondary School is not our only project. During the three weeks we were there, Carl and I visited our farm (“Shamba”), our Mbozi Nursery School, our Chimbuya Nursery School, our Marilynn Nursery and Primary Schools, and our Isandula Vocational-Technical College. Wow! Each has a story. Each moved me in its own way.

Now I invite you to look through the project updates, or “report cards,” as I like to call them. Over and over, I told students about you. I told them that you cared for them, that you had helped to build their schools. Their eyes shone with wonder and gratitude. So, as Carl says in his President’s Corner, take a moment to savor this experience with us, to now receive of the abundance that you have so graciously given.

As for myself, I’m so glad I risked going back. My heart is full. It has truly been a miraculous journey, the gifts of which I am still unpacking.

Photos: 1) School mural painted on the brick fence which surrounds part of the campus which includes four classrooms, two laboratories, library, and an administration hall; 2) Classroom with Pre-Form 1 students on their first day of school.

Photos (L to R): 1) Kitchen and Dining Hall 2) OA House; 3) Chemistry students in the new lab.

Photos (L to R): 1) Teacher duplex housing, allowing for up to four teachers and their families; 2) Carl cooking dinner at the OA House; 3) New computers for the Mwaji Secondary School.