Steve and Barnabas in Tanzania

Some of you who follow my Facebook postings know I suffered a bit the other weekend with stomach issues that also hit me this last weekend.  I am going to use that as a convenient excuse why I did not get to this posting earlier, but in reality I have just struggled with what to say about these last two weeks so I am doing another clearing house of interesting (to me at least) tidbits.  I promise there should be something in here for everyone. Zachariah is the second from the left Family members of the guest of honor wear a flower necklace Let's start with Birthday Parties.  Young Zachariah (the doctor's son who follows me around) had a birthday a couple of trips ago and I have been planning to tell you about that.  I was invited to the celebration mainly because the photographer only had one roll of film.  (For those only born in the digital age we used to have to buy rolls of film and put them in our cameras that normally only took...

Just finished a month of activity trying to get a post office box in Singida-well almost finished.  This is a pretty good example concerning some of the difficulties in doing business here.  So I wanted to get a post office box here in town.  The first thing I checked was if I could use the Hotel's post office box to receive packages or mail but it turns out they don't have a mailing address or post office box.  I guess I should note there is no home mail delivery here. So I enlisted William's help to get the box because many times my visa does not entitle me to do things of that nature (like I cannot cash a check at a bank using my visa).  Between traveling attempts were made to get the forms for the post office box and get a price.  Every time the person in charge of the boxes was not in the office and no one had the forms to give us.  They all offered prices but every time we got a different price like 11,800 TSH, 28,000 TSH, 32,000...

Before I get started on this week's blog entry, let me thank everyone who helped make the first Barnabas Bear Newsletter a huge success.  I am hearing stories of a Chick-Fil-A in New York that printed the newsletter at their cost and gave it to customers purchasing a kid's meal.  Another story from California is a church kindergarten that sent printed copies home with all the kids.  Thanks to all the folks who sent encouraging words concerning the newsletter.  We will continue to do them and I will look at doing them more frequently if we continue to get such great feedback.  Those events happened because you, my friends, shared the newsletter with others and shared it with others, but it started with you. Now to this week's blog.  Yes Communication and Banking do go hand in hand here in Tanzania.  You see while there are real banks here, they charge for everything.  The reason is that unlike more developed countries, where people get loans for ...