My First Weekend Visitor

Mama Rose


 

Cook in training

 

Mama Rose cooks every day for the SMA priests who live in our compound. She is very friendly and has agreed to help me, not only with cooking but with my Kiswahili. She is so patient with me with both the language and cooking. She talks slowly so I'm able to pick up what she's saying, which is most helpful! This past Friday, Mama Rose helped me create a tomato based gravy with cooked beef to serve over boiled potatoes. It was fortunate that we chose that day because my friend, Laurent Mwakakonyole called Friday morning and asked if he could come from Dadoma to Bwiru for a visit. I was so grateful that I would have a decent meal to serve Laurent when he arrived. One of the charisms of the Tanzanian people is their hospitality. I didn't want to disappoint my friend and not have a nice meal prepared. I knew Laurent had left Dadoma about 2pm, so I asked Mama Angela, the cleaning lady for the priests, what time she thought Laurent might arrive, given the amount of time it takes to travel that distance. She told me he should arrive about 6pm. I forgot that the Tanzanian people use a different way of reading time. When I talked to Fr. Tony that evening about 7pm, and explained that I was waiting for Laurent, he said he thought the arrival time would be much later than I was anticipating. You see, the Tanzanian people start counting the hours for the day when the sun comes up, so when the sun rises at 6am, it's 12am. So when Mama Angela said 6pm, she meant midnight in Tanzanian time! That had been explained to me a long time ago but I had forgotten. The meal that I had been keeping warm was transferred to the refrigerator to serve later. Laurent did arrive safely around midnight, after his 10 hour bus ride, and I was able to heat his dinner without causing too much damage.

 

The next day we climbed up the mountain behind my house to see "Jiwe Kuu". Laurent had only visited Mwanza once before so he didn't know much about the area. It was nice that I was able to be the one to show Laurent some of the sights in his country that he hadn't experienced yet.

 

 

 

After our visit to Jiwe Kuu, we took a dala-dala into the city. We visited a really nice Chinese restaurant named Yun Long. Laurent's favorite dish is fish. He said he could eat fish morning, noon and night, and preferred fish to Chinese food, so he ordered tilapia and "chips". I had sweet and sour chicken.

 

 

 



 

         View of Bismarck Rock from restaurant

Bismarck Rock

 

After lunch we did a little shopping and then back to the house. We watched a couple of movies and had a real nice visit. It was nice to be able to entertain one of my dear Tanzanian friends in my African home. In previous years, when I had met with Laurent in Tanzania, we were never able to spend much time together because of other commitments. This was a welcome treat! I look forward to future visits with other local friends.