Safari

So, if you ever have the opportunity to safari in Africa, please jump on it. I believe that this is one of the best trips we ever took as a family. Great time during the day and playing cards and journeling every night. We thought after 2 days that we would be bored with looking at animals after 6 days but no, on the last day in Ngorogoro Crater the end of the light of the day basically forced us to leave. The location of the lodges where we stayed was magnificent and again, please let us know if you are ever interested and we can point you in the right direction and share advice.

We probably saw several hundred giraffes and baboons, but more like thousands of zebra and definitely tens of thousands of wildebeests, who were in the process of their migration across the Serengeti plain. We saw close to a hundred hippos (the most dangerous animal to humans in Africa, able to reach speeds up to 40 km per hour…don’t ever get between these animals and their water source or else!). Also 25 lions, 5 hyenas and then 4 black rhinos in Ngorogoro crater (our guide boasts that the most he has ever seen has been 5 in his 8 years of doing a safari and there are only 23 in the 260 sq km park). To see the tougher animals requires concentration looking out into the wilderness or plains but it is so much fun when you “find” a tough to spot animal. But, the best part had to be seeing the huge herds, that stretch for miles across the savannah, and seem endless. We got to see a herd of about 50+ giraffe, a herd of no less than 10,000 wildebeest and at least3,000 zebra. We jokefully called these zebra "the ghandi of the savannah," because you would see them hangin' out with everything from buffalo to giraffe to impala. We got to see newborn baby warthogs, a baby elephant, baby monkeys, baby zebra, pregnant zebra, baby impala, baby hippo and baby lions. The guide let us get so close to the animals it was unbelievable! I don't know how we will ever be able to go to a zoo again, and get as much out of it as we used to, because nothing could compare to this.

House for Sale!

Our house is for sale in Evergreen, Colorado so that we can move to a house up the street...note that it normally looks NOTHING like these pictures:
http://www.obeo.com/509542

First Week – Happy Thanksgiving!

Dear friends and family,

So we settled in quite well during our first week. Most importantly the little ailments that my family experienced seemed to go away with the exception of Stephen’s cold which doesn’t appear to bother him very much.

NORMAL DAY FOR MY WIFE AND CHILDREN
FYI - The lizard is on Jessica, hard to tell it's her from this angle.

Kathleen wakes up early, as usual, to get in her yoga and perhaps a run. When she runs the kids will sprint along side her and everyone shares a greeting. And when I say everyone I mean about 30-40 people every kilometer. The neighborhood outside our walls is typical Africa, tons of Africans walking, the women carrying impossibly large loads on their heads and all of the children so excited to see a “Munzungo” (white person).

She went for her first run and said she would be back in 45 minutes. After an hour and a half I got on the bike to try and find her (she, as usual, had told me where she was going). But after riding for 30 minutes and then turning around I found her about 200 yards from our house sitting on the ground. I thought she was hurt but no, she just couldn’t find her way back to the house (her only real leftover issue from her “accident” is that she sometimes can’t find her way around). She was not upset at all, she knew that we would come find her after some time so everything was OK.

After a little time for herself each morning the kids wake up and she starts home schooling, which is totally new for her but she brought lots of materials. She is very good at it as anyone who knows her would expect. Zoe, our 5 year old, for some weird reason, like her older sister, can’t get enough of her homework and pushes herself on her own. Constantly. The boys don’t need much encouragement so we are very lucky in that sense. After a couple of hours of homework they make their way to the pool at the hotel in our community which is very nice. They spend the rest of the day there typically. Zoe could do that for the rest of her life if necessary.

We live with Mount Meru in our backyard. The mountain is 15,000 feet tall and rises from our elevation of 3000 feet so is the largest mountain that we have ever seen. It is amazingly beautiful.

The children are learning Swahili and love Africa, but miss their friends very much. We got faster Internet and started calling everyone the day after Thanksgiving. If you have Skype, our Skype name is BenAllenFamily.

Last Sunday we visited the community church which is attended mostly by ex-pats and had a picnic after service which about 100 people attended. We met many wonderful people and started some relationships that should prosper throughout our visit. Two people, Jessie and Ben, are missionaries in sub-saharan Africa. They aren’t true missionaries, which require extensive schooling, but rather pseudo-missionairies, meaning they have all the right intentions but for lack of education had to pay their own way to get to Africa and be able to “prove” that, if necessary, they could return back to America. They teach English at a school about 3 hours from Arusha. They came for a year but found that it took them a year to just learn the language. After a second year they found that they were really enjoying themselves. Now in their third year they are contemplating a 4th. Like me 6 year ago, they have obviously got the African “bug.” They are the only white people, they believe, in about a 50 kilometer circumference. They are apparently looked down upon because they are not married and do not have children but that doesn’t affect their love for what they do.

My children are in love with Africa, as I had always hoped they would be. They are so inquisitive and have such respect for the culture that it makes Kathleen and I very proud. We went to Thanksgiving at Mark and Linda Jacobson’s house (the Dr who runs the 2 hospitals and the clinic) with approximately 70 other people from the USA. Garrison Keeler was quoted prior to our prayer, having mentioned that since the election visitors from the US in other countries no longer have to say they’re Canadian to be in the good graces of the country they are visiting. If you don’t understand this, let’s just say that for various reasons the USA is not considered as highly as it should be by many cultures…but this has changed where we live since the election. Kenya and Tanzania think extremely highly of the US since the election of Obama and it is with utmost pride that we share where we are from.

In Tanzania Kathleen is referred to as Mama Stephen and I am Baba Stephen, we take the name from our first born male. If we had no boys then we would be Mama Jessica and Baba Jessica. The children are learning Swahili but we all feel that we are not learning it fast enough, it is apparently a simple language but we do not understand many of the nuances. What we do know is that it is important to greet everyone, and many things influence those greetings. For example, when any of us greet someone older than ourselves it is important to greet them with the phrase “chakamu.” If they are the same age or younger we can simply say “jambo.” What is most important is that everyone, and I mean everyone, deserves a greeting. If you do not acknowledge a person that you are passing on the street than it is considered rude. And almost everyone you pass greets you with a smile. What is better is that because we are married and have children, we are held in higher esteem then Jessie and Ben mentioned above(sorry guys, but you know how you can fix the situation ;). Kathleen, and her children, were stopped by a man today and the man inquired of Kathleen if all of the children were hers. When she replied yes, he honored her with a handshake and a mention of the word, “congratulations.” Very unusual in our culture, but oh so wonderful.

I shared an article in the local newspaper with Jessica regarding the Masai relationships and how to curb the AIDS epidemic. It “recommended” that the Masai need to consider having relationships only with their “wives” but not with the wives of their friends who are the same age, which is typical in their culture. Interesting difference in our culture versus theirs. Jessica is going to bring the article back with her so this is the warning to her middle school.

On Monday the 1st we will be leaving for Safari using the itinerary previously published, please keep us in your prayers.

NORMAL DAY FOR BEN
I have been so fortunate to work with such amazing people at the new hospital. My boss is named Moye and he got a degree in computer science in Dar Es Salem, a big town in Tanzania, a couple of years ago. I have extremely high respect for him because he cares so much about what he does which I think is rare…Tanzanians hold their relationships much higher that their work but Moye does not have a girlfriend and so he is putting all his energy into what he does. He cares very much about security and getting everything to work well. We have had many conversations about standardization and have come up with some good goals for the new hospital that is due to open up by the 11th of December.

We are on track for the deployment of computers by the 11th and it is the hope that our hospital will become a example for the other 19 Lutheran hospitals in Tanzania. The reason this whole project has come about is due to Rotary in Evergreen. Rotary is known for having Group Study Exchange programs where people from one culture visit another culture to share their experience. That is exactly what is happening during this trip. For example, the head of the most successful ISP in this part of Tanzania is going to work with me where I will share experience on networking with his employees in exchange for him to share his experience with Linux and security, which is what the hospital standardizes upon, with Moye and myself. I am looking forward to finding ways to setup standards at this hospital which can be shared with other hospitals eventually.

We feel so fortunate to be part of this culture, assisting in any way that we can.

We thank you for your prayers and blessings, please keep them coming.

Love,
Ben's little family

The Journey

Taking 4 children to the other side of the world is no easy task. I had purchased plane tickets that required only 1 plane change in Heathrow but we only had 1 hour in between flights. Unfortunately our plane left late from Denver and it was clear that we would not have enough time to make our second flight on time. But what I thought was wonderful was that our plane, which had several hundred passengers, announced that anyone going to Nairobi would be met by an agent outside the plane. What could have been a difficult issue turned into a blessing. We were escorted to the ticket counter, booked on a different flight later that afternoon, given plenty of credit to purchase food and offered insight as to how to enjoy our day in London. As a result we had a wonderful experience taking the Underground to Picadilly Circus, visited Buckingham Palace and the parks by the palace and then returned with plenty of time to get on our other flight. The children, armed with two digital cameras and a video camera, took plenty of pictures of our experience. That flight landed with just enough time Saturday for us to be whisked away to our shuttle from Nairobi to Arusha (we also picked up several boxes of exotic fruits and other foods to fill our famished family).

Most of the family slept on the bus ride from Kenya to Tanzania which was very surprising considering the state of the road. There was about 40 to 50 kilometers of very rough dirt roads while the primary road is being replaced. Once we arrived we were met by both Dr Mark Jacobson and his wife, armed with bananas and cheese pizza, who took us to our new home for the next 7 weeks.

Our surprise at the accommodations we were placed in has not yet ended. A little history is in order to give you an idea of how surprised we were. We went to the Dominican Republic in 2004 to share a hand washing program with approximately 1500 children across 9 different schools and were provided housing by our church, Lookout Mountain. The housing consisted of a 2 bedroom upstairs apartment for my wife, 4 children and my cousin. It was next to a disco that went until 2 AM most nights and the windows were really shutters that only partially closed. The primary mode of transportation consisted of mopeds with the mufflers removed for gas and performance reasons. There was a speed bump outside our apartment so that the mopeds would slow and then gun their engines once they were over the speed bump. The night quieted at 2 when the bars closed but the roosters (everyone had one) started at about 3 in the morning. We slept on air mattresses that deflated down to the concrete floor every night about at the same time that the roosters started.

So back to my surprise at the Arusha accommodations. Let’s start with pictures of the beautiful flat yard (we live on the side of a mountain back in Evergreen) that is about the size of a half a soccer field. We have never seen flowers as beautiful as the gorgeous assortment planted around the house and maintained regularly Monday through Friday from 8-4 by Elle. There are several banana trees that will have ripened fruit in the next two weeks. The house itself has a fridge, heated water and two bathrooms. There are 4 bedrooms and an office and a great room for entertaining. Christina is our cook who came highly recommended. The property is surrounded by a 2 meter wall of plants that have grown around a strong fence. We have a Masai guard who stays in his guard shack every night (we bring him dinner and a big thermos of coffee) and a gigantic 20 lb Star Tortoise that Jessica likes to feed salad. It isn't nice, it’s amazing! Kathleen loves it. Jessica has already stated that she doesn't want to ever leave! Although this may be because she has her own room in Africa unlike at home…HOWEVER did you know that our house in Evergreen will be listed for sale in the next couple days? We are planning on moving to the next house up the street.

We thank God for all of our good fortunes and for the relationships we will be forming while in Africa.

So that's it for now but we will be updating more shortly. There are lots of health rules that we need to obey in Africa which includes sterilizing vegetables and fruits, lots of hand washing, no touching pets, etc that I feel we have been observing well. But still Zoe has gotten a little tummy bug yesterday and got sick to her stomach but seems better today and Stephen got a little bug as well last night and Kathleen feels a cold coming on. So please pray for our health! But also know we are working for the best hospital in this part of the world and have neighbors all around us from different parts of the world that are experienced in pediatrics, ICU, surgery, etc.

Love,

The Little Allen Family

Our Safari and Other Fun Plans

While we will be volunteering in Africa we also intend to have lots of fun! We will be living on a hill in Arusha near Dr Mark Jacobson and his wife. This is apparently where the Tanzanian olympic team trains. The elevation is similar to Denver, about 1 mile high, and we will be visiting during the summertime so the temperature will be around 80 or so degrees each day. We plan on getting a monthly pass to the nearby hotel that has a pool so that the kids can have fun during the day and still are formulating our plans to visit the beautiful blue beaches of Zanizibar which is not more than a day away.

We are confirmed to go on Safari and here is our agenda. If you ever want to go on Safari in Tanzania feel free to contact our friend Mbogo at g_mbogo@hotmail.com and his web site at http://www.mbogoexpeditions.com who has a whole team of drivers who are thought of extremely highly by many of my friends who have visited.

• Dec 1.After breakfast drive to Tarangire national park lunch at Tarangire safari lodge after noon game drive overnight Tarangire Safari lodge.
• Dec2.After breakfast drive to Lake Manyara national park with picnic lunch game drive later afternoon drive to Bougainvillea lodge for Dinner and overnight.
• Dec3.After breakfast drive to Serengeti via Olduvai Gorge game as you head to the lodge for dinner and overnight Lobo Wildlife lodge.
• Dec 4. Full day game drive, meals and overnight at the same lodge.
• Dec5. After breakfast, drive to Southern Serengeti game drive around dinner and overnight Ndutu Safari lodge.
• Dec 6.After breakfast drive to the Crater game drive with picnic lunch dinner and overnight Ngorongoro Wildlife lodges.
• Dec 7.After breakfast drive back to Arusha

Allen Technology While in Africa

For years I've been trying to make this dream of Africa work out for our family and the biggest obstacle has been trying to build a business that will not only sustain itself in my absence, I want it to grow.

This simple concept has been extremely difficult to attain and only through the amazing assistance and persistence of my team members has the dream finally appeared to be possible.

We have made amazing strides within Allen Technology Advising. We used to be a break fix computer company and now have almost completed the transition to become a managed service provider, providing partial and full outsourced IT services to small and medium sized businesses. Our new web site, http://www.allenit.com , is setup to help explain the changes that our business has gone through.

There are now 10 staff members, including Kathleen and myself, working on the Allen Technology Advising team and we are focused more than ever on customer service, customer appreciation and technical prowess.

While I've setup my business to hopefully grow in my absence I do intend to communicate weekly with staff hopefully using Skype and to monitor africa@allenit.com (my e-mail while in Africa) while I am gone (ATA staff will be reviewing my business e-mail in my absence).

Communicating with Our Childrens Schools

We are working with our schools to get homework assignments scanned and e-mailed to us while we are gone. While in Africa we will be home schooling our children with those materials.

Jessica may have an opportunity to attend some of the schools that Africaid helps support. She would probably be a huge distraction to the girls who attend these schools, who are usually brought in from different regions of Tanzania supported by scholarships that are provided by westernized nations.

We also will be visiting the International School of Arusha where, if we were to come for an extended period of 6 months or more in the future, we would probably have our children attend. There are 250 kids from 45 countries when I last visited in 2002.

We will be setting up both Wilmot, where Mackie and Zoe attend, and Evergreen Country Day School , where Stephen and Jessica go to school, with video conference capabilities so that we can visit our schools virtually from Africa. We will be using Skype software for this purpose. We've been warned that the bandwidth is nowhere near sufficient for this purpose but we can hope!

While Evergreen Country Day is fine with the older kids leaving the public school has an interesting way of tracking attendence for us. As long as we e-mail every weekday that will count as attendence...pretty cool!