Rain

Waterproof

The first shower

After a whole week of freely clouds and thunders,

at the end of a fearfully dark day of furious wind,

not without raising a whirl of dust and flying buckets,


Here she is! 

How long we waited for her!

One hears only her roaring. Like a waterfall. Everything else is still, and drinks her with wide eyes. How long it lasted? The world will start up again only after her leave.

And then there is who, amazed, sees her for the first time...

Water

– Maji ni uhai –

Water, the nectar of life

October. Water is desire. The ground is inflamed, red-hot and dusty. Long cracks open along the beaten track. The sun dries out your thoughts. Not a drop since April. The bare thorny trees sting your throat. Your breath is dry, desolated like the land you tread on.

The wind blows away your sweat, leaving you long salty strips on the skin. A cat meows in the distance. The chicken gasp, looking for a bit of shadow.

You close your eyes, and see a spring. You dream to drink in. Fresh and clean water, that invites to be touched, tasted, swallowed. Beautifully blue.

You open your eyes and it only remains the red dust. A snake is stuck between the scalding stones. Headache, drought, and in the lungs more dust again.

And then, from nowhere, it appears a minuscule leaf. The Spring begins like that: with a minuscule leaf from nowhere. One can't see a cloud, but magic, the leaf extinguishes the thirst in a vision. Young and tender, it sends in the air its perfume of hope.

And here, that's another one! And another, and another again. They bud from the thorns. They are painting green the mountain. The Sky suggests to them that the season is about to change, so they celebrate. They use all last resources for shining and rejoicing to the imminent regeneration of the world. Their last energies in a rain dance.

It's a promise. Soon we'll have water again. Soon we'll have again life.

Wild hen

Find the eggs...

Hunting hen

For those of you who didn't understand.. the thing in its beak is a mouse :-S

The village's bells

Le trois cloches

"Village au fond de la vallée, comme égaré, presqu'ignoré. Voici qu'en la nuit étoilée un nouveau-né nous est donné. Jean-François Nicot il se nomme. Il est joufflu, tendre et rosé, […]

Une cloche sonne, sonne […]

Village au fond de la vallée, loin des chemins, loin des humains. Voici qu'après dix-neuf années, cœur en émoi, le Jean-François prend pour femme la douce Elise, Blanche comme fleur de pommier. […]

Toutes les cloches sonnent, sonnent, [...]

Village au fond de la vallée, des jours, des nuits, le temps a fui. Voici qu'en la nuit étoilée, un cœur s'endort, […]

Une cloche sonne, sonne, [...]"

I wonder how the bells of the church look at us. They are always there, their time covers many of our generations. They see us when we come to the world, when we live, and then pass away. And again birth. And again life. And again the same dead. So quickly, like blink of an eye. As we look at the brief flight of a fly.

We believe we walk along a line, which is rather just a too short stroke of an immense circumference. The enough old ones know that everything repeats eternally. Day and night, summer and winter, everything circulate, what starts will finish, what lives will die, and then be alive again.

But I love to think that our life is a story. And a story can be new, while telling us about unmemorable times. It can be old, but not yet discovered. The past and the future are born with it. Everything is there since ever. In the story of our life every moment is forever.

The moment is everlasting.

Benvenuta

Con ogni bambino che nasce Dio fa sapere al mondo che ha ancora fiducia negli uomini...

Passion

“Human passions have mysterious ways,

in children as well as grown-ups. Those

affected by them can't explain them, and

those who haven't known them have no

understanding of them at all”.                

 MICHAEL ENDE, ‘The Neverending Story’

Human passions are something that acts beyond political boundaries and cultural differences. Human passions do not make distinctions of age, social status, or school grades. Human passions do not divide us on the basis of our virtues or defects. They wrap us all together in a huge hug.

You can run after a ball with soccer cleats or with shower slippers, it does not matter! What it does matter is what you can identically read in the eyes of all the playing children and adults: passion! A passion, which reflects in the shouts and songs of the fans. An old man observes a child small like a cork dodging a kind of gorilla-man. Suddenly he springs back in the past, and turns to be a primary school student again.

The ball is made of plastic bags, pressed together with scotch-tape. The shirt got ripped in more than one point, so large to cover the knees. But it has the colors of Barcelona printed on it! The field is full of insects and thorn. Nobody seems to care...

Very less is needed: a rope and two supports… and that’s it! A high spring competition is ready! An iron ring attached to a pole… and that’s a basket field. Somebody is playing with a long skirt, somebody barefoot, somebody else while running is holding with a hand the too large trousers borrowed from the big brother.

It is music to hear them laugh. Every child has the right to a marvelous life.

Everyday life

 





Daily marathon to go to school...

African toilet... complete with banana's leaves!

African winter

Goodmorning fall

 

Here the autumn in which is immersed my school... :-)

The golf car

Wonderful gift for our NGO! It was packed no less than in the US of America, and after having covered seas and mountains the new mean of transport for the workers of Ilula reached yesterday its destination! The old golf-car that you can see in the picture will be used to increase the effective work efficiency, by accelerating the transfers between the different headquarters of our organization. Not bad these Americans...

The carpenter is already ruminating how to create a similar one, with four boards and an old generator... the driver would like to add some front and back seats, some special seats on the hood, and that's it, we have a new daladala! The mechanic is already convinced to be able to transform it in a Mercedes... with a hammer and some nails, adding side mirrows, doors and windows, this can be easier done! Than a coat of paint, a knick-knack with three tips “made in china”... Ok, let's try to power it up... Sure, fill the tank... The break is the left or right one??... Ok, I've got it... But... Hell's bells! There is no horn!!!

CMSI

Extraordinary news!

The summer camp 2013 of the Swiss-Italian missionary conference (CMSI) is going to take place in Lugalo, Iringa region, Tanzania (Africa)!

What does it mean? Well, sometimes life looks to be a fairy tale..

The fact is that due to an almost unbelievable coincidence twenty-five Swiss-Italians are going to stay in Lugalo from July, 13 up to August, 3! In addition to a guitar and a pinch of “Ticino”-flavor, the group will bring an important support for the development of new projects!

Yes, it is true! It was asked them to choose between all continents, between all countries of the world, they had at their disposal all villages of Tanzania... but they decided to come exactly HERE, in Lugalo, to us!

We are looking forward to meet you! KARIBUNI SANA!

Lugalo Ujasiri Academy

-LUGALO PRESCHOOL-

* Once upon a time...
there was a little frog, with an injured leg.

To save its life the frog drew close to the light of a candle,

such that its shadow could be projected enlarged on the wall of the room.

                   The snake, the hyena, the elephant, and even the lion by seeing
                   the giant shadow of the little frog run away terrorized,

                   thinking to have to do with an invincible beast.

And that's how its injured leg found the time to recover,

and the little frog serenely hopped away. *

Never underestimate the courage of the small ones,

Never forget the strength of the newborns.

Our future is growing with them,

The development of their creativity is in our hands.

About chicks and other nonsense...

Like mother... like chick!

                                            



                                         Nice fresh air ...

Snail, snail, put out your horns...

                                     Lattuce and papaia

A flower

A little flower, to take care of it.

A little flower, surrounded by its mother earth, that already knows how to look after it.

A little flower, to nourish with water and warmth day after day.

It will grow up. Stronger and independent, colorful and perfumed.

And we will always be here, to follow its growth.

The owl

The owl is a messenger. The night before somebody passes away, it flies to the houses of his loved ones, and it sings. It sings its unmistakable song, it sings without getting tired, it sings up to when it is sure it has been recognized. And then it disappears again in the dark.

The ones who have heard its song woke up restless. They know, soon they will say goodbye to someone they love.

The other day the owl flew on our roof. It sang the whole night.

         '*' We miss you already so much '*'

Sweet bug

Bank

The bank of Lugalo

The mobile phones are threatening the future of the banks of Tanzania. The banks... few, only in the big cities, with shining tiles and people wearing a suit... The villagers enter afraid of making dirty not only the floor, but also the shirt of the employee. The banks... where you don't understand so much well what they are doing with your paper money... they take it, they put it inside a strange machine, they make them flutter about. Then they give you a paper to sign, showing you with the finger where to write your name, and that's all.

No... ordinary people have never entered into a bank. But that's not the end. Indeed nowadays to open a village bank it is enough to have a mobile phone. The Vodacom agent has got a microchip, on which is registered the amount of money he has deposited cash in the main Vodacom branch of Iringa. The money transition are done from phone to phone, from the son to the grandmother, from the mother to the son, who is studying in the boarding school of Lugalo. The boy receive his shillings from the mother directly on his phone. To get then the amount in the hands he turns to the vodacom agent, who asks the boy to transfer the money on his own chip and give then him the amount cash in the hands, with minimal transfer expenses. Finish. That's it. Quickly and easy. Convenient. A bank moving with a phone. Inaugurated just yesterday in Lugalo :-)

Shamba

Tanzania is a farmer. The Earth is the element. They touch it, sense it, they walk through it bare feet, letting it pass between their toes. That nice soil, dense of rain, teeming with life. By hearing the first drops of rain the population activate. Before the singing of the cock everybody is already on the field: kerchief, maize seeds and hoe, one child hold onto the back, another helping aside. The men come back from the work at the sunset. They show up orange feet, coloured with that land that is now a part of them. They eat four plates of ugali and fall on the bed, worn out... they snore up to half past three, when, after other four plates of ugali, they leave in the darkness with the hoe on the shoulder. Even the old Bibi forgets her thousands aches disturbing her back, stomach and teeth. In the morning without fail she is there, one bang after the another. She is not going to overlook even a single centimetre square of her acre of the land she loves more than the own children. In secret, hidden from indiscreet eyes, she plants a cap of coke... well, why not?

Domus

        “Salvete in mundo domi vostrae estis”

A spot of world. Round, just for us. We put in it a patchwork quilt, a cherry, and a kiss. That's it: The serenity. Our cutting, a place to nestle with everything we love. Where all the dimensions of our being are satisfied. To build up in any point of the nothing.

Daladala

10 THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT THE DALADALA (:= local bus)

(i) If you think the daladala is full... well, it is longer not! This never happens...

(ii) If you are told the journey will take 20 minutes, it is meant in a very lucky case. You need to take into account the eventuality of unpredicted breaks:

    - The oil can suddenly finish

    - Parts of the daladala (meaning tyre, engine, stealing wheel, doors, windows, etc.) can get broken

    - The police traffic can stop you for some inspections (request of some strange permits, checking security measures, counting the passengers in excess, etc.). The discussion about the price to pay can take particularly long.

    - Break to fight with the driver of another daladala, about who have stolen to whom some opportunities of business (more passengers, transports of deals, etc.).

(iii) Look at the top! Attention, something can always fall down on you (tomatoes, chickens, charcoal, but even other more potentially painful objects like a saw or a hammer).

(iv) If you see pipes, mattresses, boards, etc. don't worry! It is still your daladala, and not a vehicle for transporting loads.

(v) Don't wear white clothes. People can walk on you, the Fanta of the neighbor can spill on your shirt in a sudden breaking, children can be interested in touching you, ... without calculating dust of the road, smoke of the engine, and so on.

(vi) If it rains, be sure you have an umbrella with you. You never know...

(vii) On the daladala you can find all the kinds of smells of Tanzania: mad, fertilizers, and sweat of the farm, local maize and/or bamboo alcohol, intensive fragrance of whom goes to the city to meet the new girlfriend...

(viii) The company is guarantee!

(ix) At some point, whatever can happen, whenever it takes, you will arrive at your destination! The daladala staff are extremely expert in fixing any kind of problem!

(x) The daladala is a true African adventure experience!

Holidays

Dreaming the beach...