Tanzania

***This post will include my epidemiology research along with some scripture references from my perspective as a Christian. However, it is not meant to proselytize or be ‘preachy’. It’s just my perspective at times. I know many of you come from different faiths or no faith at all. And, to you I say ‘yes’! Thanks for being my friend on this one big earth we have together as neighbors. Solidarity regardless of faith!***

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Hi everyone, I got back from a fantastic trip to Tanzania - which is why you haven’t received an email from me last week. It is also why you’re getting this early morning in your inbox because…jet lag. I went to Tanzania to start a project I’m doing on identifying barriers to care for children with cancer in the Northern region - with the next step of figuring out how to overcome those barriers. I’ve been trying for 4 years to get this project funded - so, to say I’m excited to finally start is an understatement. Bonus points since my husband tagged along with me.

Side note: I got LOTS of comments about us wearing masks on the plane. We wore them the whole time in the airport or on the plane (except when eating, obviously). Even though we are vaccinated fully and boosted with the updated booster, there is still a risk of getting COVID-19 and then transmitting it. Especially on planes during take-off and landing where the air circulation is not near as good as when you are in the air. Especially now with the higher-transmissible variants of Omicron. Over 90% of flights had COVID-19 in their wastewater (yikes! and yuk!). And, why be sick during your travel? Or risk giving it to family when you get home? Or risk long COVID? Nope, didn’t want to do either. So, we wore a mask just fine. Also, please look at the Alps with me - This was my first time seeing them which is why I have approximately 349 pictures of them on my phone. And, why I woke my hubs up to look at them too. =)

Here’s a fun pic of me enjoying my morning coffee the first morning we arrived. We arrived really late the night before, so I wasn’t sure where Mt. Kilimanjaro was that morning. Then I walked outside to look for it and, welp, it was right there. Whoa.

I am working with some incredible people at the hospital there on my project. One day after we finished working, I sat outside here at the cancer center and just watched and noticed.

I saw the families and noticed the flowers. I heard the children and smelled the food being cooked. I wanted to click the picture and smells and sounds in my mind. I have thousands of thoughts about this time (well, and the rest of the trip), but I’m tucking most of them away for now. Here’s the thing I want to share though. There’s a sacredness in holding people’s stories or even witnessing people’s stories in suffering.

That day made me think about the Beatitudes in Matthew 5 and how Jesus would call these families I was noticing ‘blessed’. Not because they were free from suffering. But, because they were in it.

”Blessed are you who mourn,

who hunger for things to be right,

who try to make peace,

who are poor in spirit.”

Blessedness is not the American way of prosperity or great health or finding a great parking spot at Target. It’s really easy to say #blessed when you’re well fed, have good money, or don’t have too many worries. When no one is sick or life seems to be going ok. Sure, we can say thank you for those things and say we are blessed. I’m not discounting that we shouldn’t recognize these as thanksgivings and/or blessings. We indeed should because they certainly are thanksgivings.

I just wonder if we should also recognize who Jesus called ‘blessed’. Maybe he defines it differently for us?

Blessedness to Jesus are those in the sacredness of suffering and want. Of need and hunger. ‘Blessed are you when you are poor in spirit…when you hunger for things to be right…when you try to make peace when there isn’t any…’.

In others words, Jesus seems to call those who are suffering or lack or hurt or are sad ‘blessed’. Perhaps we should too.

And, also. I love this next part of the Beatitudes when it switches from those in need to those ‘doing’. Jesus calls people blessed when they are full of care for others. I love how the Message version tells this in Matthew 5.

You’re blessed when you care. At the moment of being ‘care-full’, you find yourselves cared for.

Sounds like the Good Samaritan story, doesn’t it? Caring for others is the way to being blessed. I want that type of blessing. The Jesus-definition-type of blessing, rather than the American-prosperity-way. (BTW, the Good Samaritan story seems to keep finding me wherever I go. The place I was working at in Tanzania was established by the Good Samaritan Foundation. I had to chuckle when I realized that during my trip. I’m not a big believer in coincidental stuff, especially in religious ways. But, this made me laugh and say ‘thank you’.)

There’s a sacredness in sharing in others’ sufferings, isn’t there? There’s a holiness in the depth of empathy required to enter in it with them. Or perhaps the other way around if we are the ones suffering and friends enter ours. Either way, it reminded me of being on holy ground. A ground where I was reminded to take my shoes off and recognize the holy in the ordinary of that day. Or better yet, recognizing that in the people.

So, I have a thousand thoughts about the trip, but most will stay tucked away for a while. For now, I hope we can all see the holiness in today and the people around us. And call it ‘blessed’ when we find ourselves full-of-care for others or cared-for by others.

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I’ll leave you with a few more pictures from the trip. I told you my hubs came along and we had the best time. We will celebrate 20 years of marriage in September and, boy oh boy, am I grateful for this guy. We prayed about doing this since college, so it was an extra special trip for us. And, we laughed and walked and talked and laughed even more. I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to do this trip because of my health this past year. In fact, I had tried to go once and had to cancel because I got sick. So, the fact that I made it shows up in the smiles. I’ve had a few friends say that I looked like I was glowing in these pictures. And they are right! I was just so happy to actually be there after the past few hard years. And, can we take a moment to check out the mountain!! Hello Kilimanjaro! Of course, we had to zoom the kiddos back home with my parents (thanks, Neena and Granddad!) to show them the mountain too. They will come with us this summer for a month or two.

As always, I’m really grateful for all of you here. It’s nice to have this neighborhood.

In solidarity,

Emily