A Sunday at Ihemi

Today we went out to Ihemi for church.  We have wanted to go there for the past few weeks, but there have been pastor’s meetings, ordinations, etc. so that the pastors were not around.  Today however, we were finally able to go and visit.

The past few years we have been driving an old wreck affectionately known as “the beast.”  I think from the name you can guess what this car was like.  This year, however, we made arrangements to have a very nice car. Even a nice car needs to be serviced once in a while, and today was the day our car was in the shop.  Denis Ngede came to our rescue with a car to rent and a driver that came with it.  Peter Harrits, the Bega Kwa Bega director, went with us to Ihemi.  He hadn’t been there before so he was looking forward to going. 

Arriving at Ihemi we were met by many old friends.  There is Aloyce, the man who dug the first well at Ihemi; Immanuel who is the chairman of the Ihemi SACCOS; Mama Mbembe, the widow of the first pastor who welcomed the Christiania group in 2001; and many, many more.  It is good to see so many old friends and see how things have been going for them this past year.

Pastor Donald Kiwanga, the new Ihemi District Pastor, greeted us and told Tom that everyone was expecting him to preach today.  Tom has done this many times before, but usually he is asked ahead of time – but he agreed to do it. 

Pastor Kiwanga had arranged for the choir from Mlandege to visit and sing at Ihemi today.  We have always thought that the Ihemi choirs were great, but Pastor Kiwanga was at Mlandege before coming to Ihemi.  In addition, Pastor Mongolesa, the former district pastor at Ihemi is now at Mlandege.  Between them they thought it would be a good treat. 

The service lasted 2 ½ hours today.  Tom’s sermon was fairly short – about 20 minutes or so – but there were lots of announcements, singing, dancing, and several offerings.  A typical service at Ihemi lasts 2 hours so it was not really too short.

After service we went out to the steps for the auction of the “in kind” offerings.  Today there were two chickens and some corn brought in.  Ihemi always has a lively auction, they have a very good auctioneer.  It seems however that they have changed the rules of the auction.  It used to be the highest bidder won and paid the bid price for the item.  It now seems that bidders pay the amount of INCREASE that their bids represent whether or not they win the bid.  We do not know this so as the items are brought out we bid away, buying a chicken for the pastor (we actually bid on all of the items as gifts for the pastors, but since other people also wanted to buy for the pastors we let them win!).  When the tally was made, we had bought the chicken for $5 (it normally would sell for about $2.50) but we owed $8 because we had bid the other items up!  Oh well, it is always fun.

We went over to the pastor’s house and had lunch.  Pastor John Mhekwa was here today.  He had been in Minnesota last year and had come to our house for our fall dinner meetings.  He asked if he could go to Ugesa with us later on.  We said we were glad to have him!

After lunch we went over to Aloyce’s house to buy some avocados and arrange for this year’s Easter eggs (we have been having Easter eggs made for the children at Ihemi.  Aloyce raises chickens, maize, avocadoes, and a variety of other crops.  We normally have his wife cook and color the eggs for the Ihemi children on Easter.  We have been doing this for about 10 years now so the children have come to expect their eggs.  As always, Aloyce does not want to charge us for the eggs or the avocados, but we paid him anyway.  He has been suffering from various health problems for several years, but he looks much better now.

We said good bye and headed back to Iringa.  We will be back to visit the Ihemi SACCOS and talk about starting an AMCOS here.  We also would like to go back to another service but our schedule is pretty busy so we are not sure we will make it.

It is always good to be at Ihemi!

We were greeted by Mama Mbembe.  She is the widow of the pastor who greeted us on our first trip here in 2001.  She is a delightful woman who makes sure she is always around to greet us when we come.

Our friend Aloyce is the one who hand dug a 70 foot well for Ihemi.  It ultimately failed, but it was amazing how he went down a small hole and dug the well by hand.

Pastor John Mhekwa was there to greet us.  We know John from the Ugesa SACCOS.  He was in Minnesota last year and came to some dinners at our house.

Pastor Luci Fweni, the Ihemi Pastor, came over and greeted us.  Her father came over today to see us as well.

Immanuel, the SACCOS treasurer here, came over to see us and have chai before church.

The church was packed today.  As we walked into church people kept greeting us.  Finally we got to the alter where the choir was singing.  One of the choir members had to stop dancing and give Sandy a hug (Tom got one too).

The Mlandege chior was visiting today.  After church Pastor Donald Kiwanga, the new Ihemi District Pastor, insisted we all have our picture taken.  (He is in the red robe.  His wife is on his right).

The auction is always a lot of fun.  The congregation gathers outside while the choir sings, then the auction is held.  We bought a chicken for the Pastor.

On our way home we stopped at Aloyce's house to arrange for this year's Easter eggs.