bright eyes + blue eyes

watching the tree removal

Back in the spring, the kids and I got to watch a tree removal.

The poor tree was dead. Since it was absolutely enormous, it was definitely a good idea to take it down.

The team worked SO quickly. They were really amazing to watch. Their motions were all so coordinated. Each one of them had a specific job, which he faithfully performed without ever saying a word. It was a bit like watching a ballet.

Here's one of the most dangerous jobs:

This photo doesn't really show you how amazing this man was. He was SO high up in the air. We were in shock as we watched him move around so nimbly. He had a chainsaw hanging from his belt the entire time. He cut off the huge limbs so speedily, all the time making sure that his position/location was safe and secure. 

Meanwhile, back on the ground, the team was catching limbs and transporting them over to the mulch-maker.

I wonder how regular people would ever be able to remove a tree like this. In other words, if you gathered a team of ten men (not professional tree removers) and asked them to remove an enormous tree, what would happen? Even if they had exactly the same equipment as the professionals, it would be TERRIBLE. They would have no idea where to begin, and I'm afraid there might be some injuries along the way. (If not worse.) 

All this to say, I'm thankful for the skilled tree removal professionals in our world.

Bravo, men. 

We really wanted to watch the entire tree come down.

But unfortunately we had a baseball game calling our names, so we had to leave before the job was complete.

When we came back, however, we got to marvel over the finished product. (We also marveled at the absence of mulch or stray bark! I was so impressed by the tree ballerinas' neatness factor!)

We explored the stump and counted the rings.

The middle of the tree had rotted out, so we don't know exactly how old the tree was. But we were able to count 80 rings before getting to the rotten middle. So, I'm guessing this tree was about 100-120 years old. 

The kids and I talked about what life was like 100 years ago. Recently in history class, the kids had studied about WWI, the Great Depression, and WWII.

As we looked at this tree trunk, we talked about how this tree was a tiny sapling in the years BEFORE World War I. 

It's really amazing to think about all that's happened in the lifespan of this tree. 

Trees are so awesome.

I love them. 

As someone once said, "Trees are the lungs of our planet." Isn't that a beautiful phase?

It's amazing that the Lord created such an amazing lifeform which is so critical to our existence---but also that He created such incredible variety and beauty in the types of trees which fill our world. Trees hold so much meaning for people. (Climbing a particular tree, having a picnic under a particular tree, gathering fruit from a particular tree, watching the leaves change each autumn on a particular tree, etc etc)

What a gift.

*edited to add*

I published this post a little while ago. I've been standing at the kitchen sink, doing dishes and thinking about trees. A sermon illustration from years ago came into my mind. It relates to this post, so I'll share it here. In the sermon, the minister was talking about the importance of caring for God's creation. He used the Orcs (from LOTR) as a metaphor for destroying creation. The Orcs didn't respect nature, nor did they create beauty themselves. The Orcs recklessly cut down entire forests. In contrast, the minister also talked about the Elves. The Elves were known for respecting their surroundings and living in harmony with the land. The elves were known for creating beautiful things. The beautiful city of Lothlorien comes to mind, the forest realm which epitomizes the Elves' "aesthetics of preservation".

Lord, please give me eyes to see the beauty you've put all around me. Please help me to honor you by creating beauty in the things I make, in the words I speak, and in the way I treat my family and friends each day.

Sounds: Nighttime in Tanzania

This is what it sounds like at night in Masasi:

Nighttime Sounds in Rural Tanzania

(click button above to play)

I took this clip when I was standing in our bedroom... so don't think I put the microphone up to some frog-filled pond just to get a better effect. It's not always this loud, but especially after it rains, we fall asleep to the serenade of thousands of bugs and critters.

Rainy Season Flowers

 

Dry Season into Rainy Season IV: Banana Plant & Termite Mound

Dry Season into Rainy Season III: Creek Bed

Dry Season into Rainy Season II: Hill & Valley

Dry Season into Rainy Season I: Kachuru Junction

Have you ever wondered what East Africa looks like throughout the year? If you have ever dreamed of seeing the transformation that this tropical landscapes undergoes, then you’re in luck.  This week, I am going to show you how our area looks at various months throughout the year. I think it’s pretty impressive to see how the scenery changes so quickly from parched to lush.

Shelter in the Storm

We had a mega storm last night.  I want to tell you about it.

Our power was out, and after finishing two episodes of The Unit, it was late enough to allow ourselves to go to sleep.  As I was laying in bed, I kept seeing flickers outside the windows and thought it was our outside lights coming on.  (We have fluorescent light fixtures, and they flicker a few times when turned on.)  After about ten times of “the power trying to come back”, I realized that the flickering was actually lightening. It’s been miserably hot, so I assumed it was heat lightening.

I drifted off and woke up a bit later to gigantic, powerful thunderclaps.  The rain started slowly and then became an absolute torrent with unrelenting thunder and lightening.  It was the kind of storm that allows no space for sleep.  We got up for a while to look out the windows.  After getting back in bed, I laid there and listened to the storm and thought about all the people here who live under palm-thatched or grass roofs. 

Allegedly, palm thatching is pretty good at keeping the rain out, but I have no first-hand experience to support that idea.  I’m skeptical that it would keep things dry in a downpour.

The worst must be grass roofs.  The grass roofs are pretty much made by bundling dried grass and stacking the bundles on a roof frame made of sticks.  I’d say about 50% of my neighbors have grass roofs.  And we live in town. Villages are poorer, so there’s a greater proportion of grass roofs there.  A house with a grass roof gets completely soaked during a rain like we had last night. It’s many families’ ambition to save enough money to buy corrugated metal for a roof, but the metal sheets are relatively expensive, so it becomes an intergenerational family goal.  In the intervening years, people and their meager possessions get drenched in every storm.

I am left with a lot of complicated thoughts and feelings when I consider how many kind, generous, hardworking people have such inferior roofs over their heads.  I really don’t think that their homes give a real sense of providing shelter from the storm.

Spend a minute today to thank God for the shelter you have. And pray for wisdom about how to help those who have inadequate shelter.

puff adder

 

Abbie mentioned that we have a snake story to tell.

The Background: I was never really that frightened by snakes before moving to Tanzania.  I mean, I never particularly liked them, but snakes weren’t really something I worried about.  There are poisonous snakes in the American South, so meeting a cottonmouth or water moccasin could have been a reasonable fear.  But it wasn’t really something I thought of.  I guess the snakes in Africa seem more exotic and scarier to me.  I also heard some frightening stories from friends in M. and neighboring towns.  One guy startled a spitting cobra in the garden.  He thought smart and covered his eyes quickly.  Spitting cobras’ venom results in blindness, and he had venom all over the forearm he had thrust in front of his eyes.  Another set of friends established their strategy of how to kill a snake, while they stood safely (they thought) to the side of him.  After they had killed the snake, they went to identify it and found out that the snake was poisonous and his strike position is to the side of its victims.  Those are just two of out of several stories that have prompted me to develop a true fear of snakes.

I now try to wear only sturdy shoes when I walk around outside (no flip-flops), and I am always looking at the ground when I walk.  Our guards have noticed my fear of snakes by my reaction when snakes are mentioned.  They’re also a bit amused when they point out harmless snakes, and I am terrified and totally curious at the same time.

The Story:  I went to the market one day with Neema.  We returned, and I began to ask the guard, Daniel, a question.  He started saying something about nyoka, snakes, and I stopped to hear what he had to say.  Another of the guards, Victor, and a friend of his had been clearing out some of the overgrowth in the yard behind the house.  The friend pulled back a section of grass and saw a snake curled up.  He backed away, and Victor came to see what the matter was.  When Victor saw the snake, he took his hoe and bashed the head of the snake.  Once he saw that it was an adder, he was glad he acted so fast.  He had saved the snake to show to me.  It was molting, so it was a little bit tricky to identify, but we are sure it was a puff adder.  The snake was shorter than I would have imagined, but it was really thick and stocky, if you can say that about a snake.  We joked around about who was going to make soup out of it.  Then someone told me that the snakes have so much venom that you can get hurt just from touching a dead puff adder.  I don’t know if that’s true, but I’m not going to test the theory.  The adder carcass was put into a pile of yard trash and burned up in a big bonfire last night.

I am really glad that Victor wasn’t hurt by the snake!  Victor is a great guy, and this event raises my estimation of him even further.  He’s about 5’2” and 61 years old.  He is cheerful and hardworking.  He was one of the first people to start talking to us as real people, not just as Wazungus.  When he was young, he went into the forest for several months to hunt elephants.  Victor was proud of himself with the snake incident, so I took some pictures of him with the snake.  I'm definitely going to get this printed and give Victor a copy.

it’d make kermit proud

I didn’t know what to expect with the onset of the rainy season.  I thought there would be a major rain at least once a day, but it’s been less frequent than that… maybe a big rain once week.  Even though it hasn’t rained as often as I expected, the scale of some of the storms has been very impressive.  When it really pours, it seems like the raindrops are the size of golf balls, and they fall urgently and violently.  We have a very nice house for sitting out a thunderstorm.  Our screened porch is light and pleasant, even when there is no electricity and the house is darkened from the black clouds.  I really like the sound of the rain on the tin roof.  My husband says it sounds like driving through a car wash. 

I tend to feel cleansed and refreshed after a big rain.  The rains are a mixed blessing for many people, though.  Your average Tanzanian in this area grows as much of his food as he can, and the rains are indispensible to good crop growth.  Additionally, rains bring lots of water to use at home, which gives folks some relief from having to pay for and carry water for household use.  On the flip side, so many people in the region live in mud huts with straw roofs.  Strong rains can really ransack such a house.  They can also do major damage to crops, and they can be quite dangerous, wiping out streets and bridges.

There are two things that I really like following a big rain.  The first is how electric and alive all the plants look.  The dust is washed away, and the vegetation glows an intensely vibrant green.  I also love hearing the frogs.  They start up their constant chorus after a big rain and stay vocal only as long as the ground is wet.  The frogs really do croak out a perfect soundtrack for the ambiance.