Our Safari

The only word to describe it: WOW! I felt like I was in the movie Jurrasic Park as one of the first tourists. I must bring my family back with me to witness the glory of God’s creation. It brings a tear and a lump in my throat just thinking about it. The first 2 ½ hours in the park were just amazing! In that time span, we were surrounded by zebra and wildebeest as far as the eye can see. We had to almost hit them to get down the dirt road. We saw more baboons alongside the road than I’ve ever seen in any documentary on Animal Planet®. We saw many impala running about. On our way to our lunch stop, we were practically run over by a herd of wild elephants crashing through the bush. We were “challenged” by two large male elephants (posturing as if they were going to charge our mini-bus), as the herd marched by, big and small baby elephant. I can’t wait to show my video of this event! Then, at our lunch stop we saw many hippo and a few crocodiles in the creek next to our lunch site. This was all in the first 2 hours or so.

We have been so blessed. We saw more elephants the following day, cheetahs, lions (many), and a leopard in a tree right next to the road. A rare and lucky occurrence!
We were also extremely lucky to see lions right next to the road twice! Yesterday we saw a male lion guarding a wildebeest carcass along with 2 females and a young male, not more than 10 feet from the dirt road and pulled right up to them! It was as if we were invisible and they let us shoot lots of media. Can’t wait to show the family and others the video! There was so much to see and so many animals! There were too many to mention.

Asante sanna!
Dave Bogumil

Building the Nyakato Health Center

Well, the results are in and here are the final numbers:

Number of friends made: Many.
Number of lives touched: Many.
Number of building worked on : 3
Number of buildings readied for opening: 1 – Patricia Ward (Isolation ward)
Number of new stud walls built in BBC : 6-8
Number of ceilings installed in BBC: 2
Number of new ceilings in progress (BBC): 3
Number of book shelves built: 3
Number of tool shelves built: 1 (Thanks Avery – You rock!)

Value of our efforts here at Nyakato: Priceless.

We had a great crew working tirelessly this week and with a lot of heart. I want to thank all of those from One Community Spiritual center for the relationship we formed and the work that was done. Yes we had a few minor injuries and yes we might have gotten a bit tired. All the work was done with joy knowing that we were doing the work of God.
I will come back once the building is complete (the BBC) and help with the “Grand Opening”. It will be grand indeed.

Dave Bogumil.

Life in Tanzania

It certainly is not life as we know it. Poverty is everywhere. Very little in the way of an economy. It’s not much like the “bubble world” we live in. In America we take it for granted that we can go to the grocery store and buy whatever we want, whenever we want. Hey, we even have 24 hour grocery access. Most people in Tanzania would faint at the very thought of this. We have our Tivo, our Blackberries, our microwaves, our expensive Lexus or BMW, our constant electricity, our gas heat, our prebuilt insulated homes. We live in a very insulated world…our “bubble world”. To most the outside world almost doesn’t exist. It doesn’t matter to many. I once had an attorney friend ask me: “It does not affect you directly in your own life, so why do you care?” That attitude is the exact opposite of what Jesus taught. He taught us to love our neighbors as ourselves and to lend aid to those in need. I reject the attitude of my attorney (friend?) and other like him. What we are doing here in Tanzania is only like an ice cube that is being chipped off the top of an iceberg... but it's a start.

Ok, you might say: “You’re complaining about the problem, now present me with a solution”. Well, here goes nothing… It starts at the top of Tanzania and other countries like it and rolls on down to the local government and grassroots levels. There is wealth at the top of every national government. It is up to that government to choose how to use it.
The Tanzanian government could choose to use that wealth to focus on infrastructure development and through aid from the world bank do the same. The governments of these poorer countries could decide to inject capital into their economies and utilize their natural resources to build agriculture, mining and/or other industries. The sad reality is that many in power in these countries choose not to aggressively move down this path and instead seek only power, control and their own comfortable existence. They probably have the attitude of: “Hey, it doesn’t affect me directly, so why should I care?”. There is no easy solution to all of this. I can only try to follow Jesus and put into practice what he taught us to do to the best of my ability.

Imagine if all peoples of the world took the attitude of the missionary and not the attitude of the attorney mentioned above. What a wonderful world it would be.

Dave Bogumil