So I know this is really random... a post about our trip to africa 5 years ago. But like I said. I want to document it since I didn't do a good job of doing it while I was there. Luckily I do have some journal entries to help me get things as accurate as possible.
This post is about our trip to Kigamboni. Its a little "resort" we went to for an afternoon on the beach. But first lets start with the important things...
Meet Melkiory...
I literally can't even look at pics of him without getting teary eyed. He was our parents gardener.... but quickly became our best friend. His english was pretty poor but not nearly as poor as our swahili but it didn't even slow him down. He was so excited for anything and everything we could show him or teach him. He made exactly 30 dollars a month which was really good considering he only worked 3 or 4 days a week. Most of his pay check went to other family members like his sister or his uncle. Melkiory was baptized soon after we came home, he had gotten his own apartment and was doing really well for a while but a year or two later was got news that he wasn't doing so good.
Some background. Melkiory was born in Arusha which is a village not far from Mount Kilimanjaro. When he was just a boy his parents sent him to live with his Uncle in Dar Es Salam. When we met him he was about 25 and had been with his Uncle for most of his life.
Back to the bad news... We received word that he had stopped attending Church meetings and that no one had seen him in quite some time. Then out of the blue he showed up, looking like he had been beat up and saying crazy things about people chasing him and how he wasn't safe. The Elders there tried to talk him through it but with there lack of speaking his language fluently and him struggling with english all they really got out of the conversation was that his Uncle was abusive and always had been. Im not sure in what way or to what level but most of his life he had spent with a man who was severely mistreating him....
Thats the last we heard. I would give just about anything to go back and find him.
We miss him like crazy and worry about him all the time.
Got a little side tracked there... that actually had nothing to do with this post, other than I wanted to explain that we adored him.
Although he had spent most of his life in Dar (which is located on the coast) He had never been to the beach. So when we decided to take a trip to the beach for the day, we had to take him with us.
He. Was. A. Blast. He was so excited about everything! At first we really had to coax him in to the water (which is literally like 80 degrees. its crazy warm) but once he was in... we couldn't get him out. There were quite a few jellyfish in the water so we explained to him that they could really hurt him. We thought that would scare him out. Nope. Other than a few yelps of terror, it really did effect his fun. He dug in the sand, picked up seashells and played and played in the water. When my mom handed him what was equal to about $10 U.S. to go buy some seashells a man was selling on the beach and told him he could pick whatever ones he wanted... I though his eyes were going to pop out of his head! And then the panic hit... he was SO scared he wouldn't pick the right ones. Fortunately for him we didn't care as much as he thought we would :)
It was such a fun day. We built sand castles and swam and sat on a beach that trumped any beach I have ever seen... even in magazines... and to top it off... we were the only ones there.
uh... Andrew with an odd looking fruit? I have no idea what it was but Im pretty sure it was edible.
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