Off To Njombe

Yesterday we traveled to Njombe to visit with the Southern Diocese.  Njombe is about a 4 hour drive southwest of Iringa.  Traveling with us are Itiweni and Peter (Peter will do most of the traveling to Njombe for SACCOS) and Randy Matson from the Agricultural Institute.  The purpose of our visit is to get to know some of the people here and take a look at where Peter might be working.

The drive from Iringa is actually pretty easy.  There are no dirt roads, only a long paved “highway.”  Most of the time we were able to cruise along at 90 KPM (about 55 mph).  We drove past fields and woods, climbing all the way.  We pass large tea fields, forests, crops, and scrub. 

When we arrived in Njombe it was about 12:30.  Our meeting with the Bishop and his office staff was scheduled for 2:00 so we stopped for lunch.  The service was slow so we were about 10 minutes late for the meeting.

As we walked into the meeting we were surprised at the size of the group assembled.  We had expected to meet with the Bishop and a few of the staff; instead there were 36 of us.  The Bishop invited the heads of various departments, schools, etc. to have a more general meeting first and then talk with us.  Following introductions Tom explained about Iringa Hope and our SACCOS, then Sandy and Peter handed out pens.  Since we hadn’t expected such a large group we didn’t have enough pens with us.  After giving up our own pens we managed to gather enough for all but one of the people there.

Peter and Randy introduced themselves and then Itiweni talked a little more about our program.  It seemed that everyone here has heard about Iringa Hope and is very excited about having us work in their Diocese. 

Following our talk the Bishop thanked us, a few others rose to give us their thanks for coming and then they invited us to lunch.  A second lunch within an hour and a half of our earlier lunch was another surprise, but we helped ourselves to small portions of food and enjoyed their hospitality.  We invited the Bishop to our summary presentation on the 21^st and to our surprise he told us he would be there.

Then we were off to take a quick look at the University building here.  It was raining very hard as we left so we only took a brief look at the facilities.  Assuming that all goes well we will be using an office here as our base for our work in this Diocese.

Since we had plans for the next day we spent the night in a hotel in Njombe.

 After breakfast this morning we headed for the village of Lupembe, a 2 hour drive from Njombe down a rough road that is very slippery from the rains.  Starting out bright and early we slipped and slid our way down the road, up the hills, and over to Lupembe.  The town is an old German town.  The Germans were here because of the tea plantations that were established here.  When they left, a tea company took over many of the fields and the tea processing plant.  All of the farmers in this area that grow tea sell to this one factory.  As a result, with no competition, the farmers get a very low price.

We drove up to the Southern Diocese’s Agricultural Development building where we were met by a member of the staff.  We had a brief tour of this facility, their farm, and demonstration program.  We looked around a bit before our meeting.  The church here was built over 100 years ago by the Germans and is very different from any other churches we’ve seen in Tanzania.

After a brief meeting in the office of the director, we went to see their livestock project.  From there we went over to look at their farm.  They are currently farming 46 acres here and another plot of 54 acres a little ways away.  They hope to be able to earn enough from these two plots to pay for their program.  Back at the office we sat and talked a little about this area and its agriculture.  We wanted to understand a little more about the economics of the farmers in this area.  

We talked awhile and then noticed that it was almost noon.  Since we had to drive 2 hours back to Njombe and then 4 hours to Iringa before a 6:30 dinner meeting we couldn’t stay long.  They wanted us to stay for lunch, which we did, before heading back to Iringa.  On the way back we drove through a lot of mud and rain, but we managed to make it to our dinner meeting with visitors from King of Kings Church. 

It is a 4 hour drive to Njombe.  The road is pretty good but it is raining all the way.

Tom has to stop and get out and walk around every  hour or so.

We passed by some very large tea fields.

This is the city of Njombe.

We are staying overnight here.

When we got to our meeting with the Southern Diocese there were over 30 people waiting to talk with us.

The Bishop is planning to join us at the University for our Iringa Hope update session.

Itiweni met the former Pastor from Kidugala.  He was the Pastor there when she 

helped them start a SACCOS.

We had a good visit with the Bishop.

After the meeting we went to look at the University of Iringa's facilities here in Njombe.

The next morning we headed off to a meeting at Lupembe.  It is a two hour drive down roads made slippery by all of the rain.

We were greeted at the Agricultural Development building by one of the staff.

The ELCT church here is very pretty.  It is over 100 years old.

The cemetery caught our eye.  It has some lovely flowers growing in it and overlooks the valley below.

We went to see the livestock project.

We also took a look at the farm.

Here is the group that we met with.

Driving home it was not quite so slippery.  Still, it was 2 hours back to Njombe then 4 hours to Iringa.  We had to hurry, we had a 6:30 meeting!