May 4, 2009
Sometimes, when life is rough, I meditate on myself becoming a Baobab Tree. I picture having a strong trunk with roots deeply attached into the African soil and spindly branches that reach for the blue sky, searching and grabbing to hold onto something real. It is a calming picture of strength in a world where the next few minutes is unknown. Now, after about a year in Tanzania, I realize that I walk a lonely road. I have chosen a path that no one understands very well. I am not sure very many people relate to my daily experience. Yet today, as never before, I look out on the Baobab Trees flying passed on the Tanzanian landscape and I take a deep breath of African air, and I realize that I am home. Never before have I known so strongly that this of all corners of the earth is where I belong at this moment in my life. I have gone back and forth with the issue: Do I really belong in Tanzania? Now I am sure of the answer. Yes. And as the Baobab Tree reaches toward the savanna's sun and stands strong against the dusty wind, I too, reach and stand for more.
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2 comments:
hi Brie,
its Peter from high school and I found your blog the other day and so impressed with all the amazing things you are doing. I think it is so admirable what you are doing and hope and pray that it will continue to go well for you. I also read about wanting to find loans for people, and one of colleagues is getting his PhD in African development, so he was a perfect resource. Here are a few websites, each of which have additional links on them.
http://www.pride-tz.org/pinner.asp?cat=otherlinks
and:
http://www.bot-tz.org/MFI/Default.asp?Menu=LINKS
the second one is the bank of Tanzania so I don't know if they might be able to help. Well, I wish you good luck in all your endeavors!
Peter Sherman
Under grasping wooden shadows the sunset weighs
The same as mothers' tongues over savannah grass
Calling for their children to come and eat.
We all have wise rings, that understand the wash
Of freedom and time and motion; the warmth of
the earth through deep, thick roots
The seasons over branches made of iron.
Heaven knows of winters when even the sky
Turns brittle. We, forever willful, are gnarled;
Within the strongest parts of us, our knots,
Once dissonant, buckle under the lungs.
And boldly, they sing.
Good wishes for your journey from another corner of the world. Thank you for sharing it with us.
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