We drove out to Jennifer’s church on Sunday morning and waited on the stoop before the service. A steady brisk wind blew which reminded me of a sunny windy day in PEI.
The
service started with a number of songs and dance pieces either in Swahili or
the local language. After the music, offerings to the church were given
including money and produce which was placed at the front of the church. At
this point, one of the men stood up in the front and started auctioning off the
produce among the congregation. Basically, they sell the produce brought in and
the funds go towards the church. Also, the members of the church will buy items
and gift them to others. Once we found that out, we purchased a number of items
and asked Jennifer to help us to gift them to people that could us them. Along
with potatoes, carrots, bananas, sugar cane, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, and
cabbage there was also a chicken.
We
decided early in the auction that we wanted to buy the chicken and gift it to
someone that could really us it. The chicken was of course the last item to be
auctioned off and when the bidding started, Anika and I quickly started to bid.
It didn’t take long though for the number to increase above out bid and so I
called out a higher bid but I was told no. I didn’t understand and was trying
to say I wanted to buy the chicken and wanted to bid which just made everyone
laugh. Between laughing breaths they told me that we were still buying the
chicken but that others were adding to the amount we had offered as a donation.
When
the sale ended, the auctioneer came to hand us our chicken when Jennifer told
them we were had bought it to give to a particular parishioner, a sweet older
woman names Miriam. This made everyone very happy and we were able to hand the
chicken to Miriam ourselves. Miriam was so grateful for the chicken it was beyond
heartwarming to experience. As I handed her the chicken, she took my hand and
spoke words of blessing that although I couldn’t understand the words
themselves, the message behind them was very clear. As we left the church and
made our way to the vehicle, she came up to me again and thanked us once more
as I in turn thanked her and offered her words of blessing. We may not have
understood the words each other used but really, words were not needed to feel
a heartfelt gratitude to have been able to make this elder so happy by simply
gifting her a chicken (simple to me, I know not so simple to her).
After
church we went to a school fundraiser but didn’t get to stay for the whole
event as they were running 1.5 hours behind when we arrived and after 2 hours
were now 3.5 hours behind. Such gatherings are the only time any of the local
politicians get a chance to speak to the people or “get their names out there”
and so the speeches are very numerous and are almost all long winded. We did
not in the end get to actually see what locals do to fundraise for schools but
we did leave a contribution.
The view from the church steps
The auctioneer
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