My Service Trip to Tanzania

Hangin with the best students!!!!

There are some trips that start as passport stamps and, by the end, come to change your life, your perspective, the way you move through the world. I was lucky enough to collect this particular stamp at 18 years old when I packed my bags and flew over 24 hours for a service trip in the small village of Morogoro, Tanzania.

The idea for this trip started at the beginning of my senior year of high school. I was going off to college the following fall and felt the urge to do something that was in service of something bigger than myself, before 4 years of focusing on me me me. I found a youth group who partnered with a primary school in Morogoro, Tanzania - assisting with school fundraising, building projects, and education sponsorships. I applied for the mission trip, and once accepted, began the fundraising process in my community. A few vaccinations shots, a Tanzanian visa, and I was on my way!

It took 3 flights and over 24 hours to arrive in Dar Es Salaam (Tanzania’s busiest airport), with stops in Colorado, Switzerland, and finally Tanzania. Once we arrived, our group took a small yellow schoolbus to Morogoro, the small village where we would be working. Driving the Tanzanian streets with the windows down was something I will never forget. I watched in awe as women walked through the road balancing gigantic baskets of fruit on their heads. I listened as motor bikes went whizzing through the lanes around us and street vendors yelled funny jingles to catch our attention. I took in the smells of the earth, the dirt roads, the big trees, and the mountains that looked on from a distance.

In Morogoro, we were met with the warmest hospitality from our hosts, the directors of the school we would soon be working on, as well as a delicious traditional dinner of rice, beans, and stew that was so flavorful it reminded me of my grandmother’s pot roast. 

Early the next morning, we were off to work! Our first task was to construct a safety wall around the school campus, as the campus was previously open to the surrounding woods with no barrier to entry. We began stacking cement blocks and layering them with wet cement to keep them in place. Block by block we watched as the wall grew in size, and before we knew it, surrounded the entire campus! Seeing the teacher and student reactions was priceless and I couldn't wait to continue working on the rest of our projects. We spent the next two weeks flip flopping between working on projects and building relationships with the students and teachers - playing soccer in the field, learning dances, songs, and how to make traditional meals, and mostly just talking - about our lives, our families, what brings us joy. These were my favorite conversations; While the circumstances of our lives were vastly different, the things that brought us all joy were the same - family, friends, good food, and the beautiful natural world around us. 

This trip was a true turning point in my life, A catalyst to the spark of adventure that soon lit a wildfire in my soul. A hunger to see and understand parts of the world that I knew nothing about. A realization that travelling is about connecting with others and finding similarities, rather than differences between us. Tanzania is a breathtakingly beautiful country with some of the kindest and most joyful people I've ever met and I can't wait for the day I go back (fingers crossed!).