Twende! Let's go!

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Last night our traveling group got together to pack some gifts we're carrying this year, and to go over final plans, schedules and questions. Now I'm ready to go.

This year's journey (itinerary details here) is both the same as previous year's trips, and very different. 

In early July, a small group of travelers will visit the three parishes we call our companions: Usolanga, Tungamalenga and Makifu.  During these visits we'll be asked to go from village to village, meet new people every day, observe and monitor parish projects, celebrate all that has been done in the coming year, sing and pray together, dance, and together with the partnership committees, plan for the coming year. 

On the day that group heads back to Dar for the long journey home, a second group will arrive in Iringa for a very different experience. A twenty member choir, with people representing six different metro area congregations, will be based in Iringa for rehearsals and concerts with a Tanzanian choir. We'll be teaching and learning from one another, sharing our cultures and making a joyful noise to the Lord. We'll spend three mornings in rehearsal, and explore Iringa in the afternoons. Then we'll travel to four areas of the diocese for concerts, learning more local and tribal songs, and sightseeing. At the end of the singing, the group will enjoy a couple days on safari before heading home.

One group will meet new people every day while participating in a relationship that's eighteen years in the making. The other group will spend a week deeply engaged with the same people, taking our shared music on the road to Kihesa, Ihemi, Image, and Tungamalenga.

The small group will drive around in a Land Cruiser, the choir will share a couple coaster buses. 

One group will celebrate projects completed after years of work together, and the other group will show us all a new thing in this companionship. 

Both groups will experience the warm and gracious hospitality of our Tanzanian hosts. We'll all know the love of the Lord that crosses all boundaries of nationality, race, language and culture. In the words of one of the songs the choirs will sing together, we'll know that "there is no one like my Jesus, forever and ever it will be - sing hallelujah!"

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