Today was the last
day of National Retreat. I was unaware of the passage of time. We would stay
one more night here in Morogoro and come back Dodoma tomorrow. I felt sorry
that I could not join all of the sessions. I was busy with analyzing LiST from
early in the morning and skipped the breakfast. I was staying cooped up in my
room during whole morning. I will beat you, LiST! I began to exhausted, and
Denice texted me just in time.
“Good morning! I have not seen you today,
are you okay?”
Wow… Am I okay? It
was time to cool down my head. I went outside and sat way behind the session
for the whole group. National Director, Tim Andrews, is from the U.S. who has
stayed in Africa for 24 years. Counselor David also speaks in English, so there
was no problem to understand what was going on. People spoke in Swahili in the
zonal meeting, and I easily felt sleepy when I was sitting vacant look in that
group. I was wondering how long does it take that one certain language is
created. 1,000 years? A million years? Somebody must have created greeting
words, “Mambo!” “Poa!” And people around them might have started using Mambo and
Poa to say hello with each other. People have kept making new words and new
expressions to communicate. And many many years later, Tanzanians have heard
and learned this language naturally and by force, Swahili, even before they
were born, in their mom’s womb. Finally, right now, they discuss what lessons
they would bring to their own office from the National Retreat. It is always
amazing for me that almost every country and every tribe has their own
languages and speaks with each other.
 |
| Central Zone netball team honored with a trophy. |
An athletic
competition resumed after all today’s session. I did not join any sports game,
but my part was “make some noise” cheer leading for our Central Zone players!
Our team won the netball. Yasinta was awesome that she scored 15 out of 16
goals with fully using her tall figure. Running by wrapping legs with sack was
fun to watch, and Yasinta also won a triumph over enemies. We won pulling the rope
as well. Denice won the female running. We were intoxicated with many victories,
threw ourselves into each other’s arms. I was happy to hear a shout of triumph.
At night, there was
a “cultural night” time. Each zone showed off traditional clothes, music, and
dance to represent their regional tribe’s character. Our Central Zone prepared
the outfit of Gogo tribe. I did not practice our song and choreography, but I
came up to the stage with our group in a moment of bewilderment. It was a
little embarrassing for me to dance and lip sync with an unfamiliar song in
front of audience. On top of that, I was the only one who was not Black. I felt
like I was a dummy, but it was important to enjoy the very moment that I was
one member of the group. A strong sense of belonging has comforted me soon;
feeling an awkward emotion in the right middle of my group was going away
whenever I put my sugar cane up and down and shouted with ambiguous lyrics.
After cultural night, I got “best dresser” prize! Actually, I was dying of
hunger because the event had not been finished until 10:30pm (It was supposed
to be end at 9pm…) Some people who were crazily longing for dinner already started
eating, so I thought it was okay to get out from the event and have dinner.
However, there were still many people who attended the event to the end, probably bearing
hunger. During the prize time, I was startled to hear, “Best Dresser, Central Zone: Charles Park!” while I was eating a
chicken, and I could not run back to the event place with my oily hands. Our
central zone cluster leader as well as pastor, Licky delivered my gift to me. The gift for Best Dresser was a peanut
container without peanut. Well, other food or stuff would also be stored in
this pretty plastic box. I must have attracted people attention because Asian
man who was not black tried to become a Gogo tribe by wearing traditional cloth
and holding sugarcane. It was a fun and memorable night ever since I came to
Africa.
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