Yesterday was Ellie’s 11th birthday. For those of you who don’t know Ellie, it will help you understand the significance of this story to know that Ellie has always been a very typical Middle-Class American child. Beyond having always enjoyed a comfortable life, and never having been in need of anything, Ellie has historically been very attached to all her “stuff”. She has, in the past, expressed her desires in such ways as, “If I can just save enough money for such-and-such, then I’ll have everything I want.” Inevitably, after she has acquired whatever such-and-such it was, she starts the process over again, “Now, if I only had...” Scenes and songs from “Madame Blueberry” come to mind as I write this :-)
We’ve been living in Tanzania for one month now. We have been eating a very bland diet which consists mainly of rice, ugali, potatoes, sukuma wiki, beans, chapati, and white bread. We have a small budget for picking up a few pieces of fruit, some powdered milk, peanut butter, and a dozen eggs every week to supplement. We have been spending our time with people who are primarily from East Africa; people who don’t have a budget to purchase supplemental food items, or anything else for that matter. In fact, most of them are still praying about how they will come up with the rest of their school fees, to pay for this training by the time it is over.
In typical American fashion, we wanted to give Ellie a special birthday. We thought the thing Ellie would want most for her birthday was a new friend, so we invited another mzungu family that Jason had met a couple of weeks ago, the Carters, over for dinner. They live here in Tanzania, working for Christian Missionary Fellowship, and have three kids, two of whom are close in age to Ethan and Ellie. We “splurged” on dinner, and purchased items to make hamburgers and homemade french fries. Jason borrowed the oven of a neighbor to make two chocolate cakes, because we had invited some of our new friends (about 20 fellow students and staff) over after dinner to join us in celebrating. We had wanted to bless each of our friends with a small treat of chocolate cake (with real buttercream frosting!). We had no idea how richly they would bless us instead.
The Carters showed up with lovely African handicraft gifts, which we totally weren’t expecting. Daniel, a man with a wife and three children who just lost their land to the government and currently have no place to live, brought Ellie a beaded bracelet and made her a puzzle out of a piece of paper he had designed and colored. He also spoke a very special blessing over her and the rest of our family. Richard, who has not yet been able to pay his school fees, sang Ellie a special birthday song, then led the rest of us in celebrating Ellie’s life in songs. Ellie, who has never been serenaded in such a fashion before, wore the biggest grin I have ever seen adorn her freckly face. Mama Eunice and Mama Joyce, who speak very little English, managed to get into town to purchase pretty floral birthday cards for Ellie that she has used to create a garden in her bedroom. Annie, one of our mzungu friends, brought Ellie her first passion fruit. Ethan and Mei used the money they had collected from the tooth fairy to buy Ellie a small box of guava juice from the little store on base. Upendo, our Korean angel, brought some sculpting clay and cute pencils and erasers. Myrtlemay had crocheted an elephant pencil topper, a scarf, and also given Ellie a journal to record thoughts about her new life. Maureen, a creative new friend from Uganda, made Ellie a beautiful paper bead bracelet and earrings. Everyone offered prayers of blessing over Ellie before they left. It was an incredibly special evening.
Afterward, Ellie told us how special she felt because she knew the gifts people brought were a true sacrifice, made on her behalf. She told us, “Especially the little things mean so much. My cheeks hurt from smiling so much.” That blesses a mother and a father more than words can express.
