Sponsors can expect reports about their students soon since we have recently returned from our 2011 student interview trip.  We were able to conduct face-to-face interviews with over 120 of our 125 students who are currently in school.   

        The photo at left shows Kristin Westermann, G4TZ administrator, conducting the interview with our student, Paskalina  Elias Qamara, in July. Kristin is reading the greeting card sent to Paskalina by her sponsors, Kathy and Steve Arle of Roanoke, VA.                                           

       Many of our students are now ready or will soon be ready to continue their education on the college  level.  We have already graduated three M.D.'s, two clinical officers, three wildlife managers and six teachers.  Fifteen others are currently in college.  Please see the article below about the urgent need for additional college sponsors.

    Turn left off the hard surface road just a few kilometers north of Karatu, Tanzania onto a deeply rutted and dusty road and you enter the village of Bashay. Winding your way through the village, you see homes of many descriptions with their small shambas (gardens) growing maize and beans. Some houses are simple stick and mud shelters with grass roofs and other are more substantial block houses. Many people, young and old, are walking along both sides of the road, some carrying heavy loads of firewood or grass for cows on their heads. Small children are ubiquitous and they wave and smile as you pass, your car kicking up the red dust that covers everything, including them.  Eventually, you come to a modest block house with a burnt red, plastered exterior surrounded by bougainvillea which blossoms year round. Pull into the car park, walk the path under the arch replete with flowers and before you get to the door you are met by a man whose sparkling white smile outshines the vivid colors of the bougainvillea and makes you feel welcome before his first words touch your ears. "Karibu sana!" ("You are very welcome!").

       Welcome to the home and office of Pastor Yotham Baha, the Tanzania Program Coordinator for Godparents for Tanzania. Since his retirement from his position as a diocese officer with the Northern Diocese of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania, Pastor Baha has coordinated all G4TZ activities on his side of "The Pond." He is a very busy man who keeps up with 125 primary, secondary and university students each of whom he knows very well. Although they go to schools all over northern Tanzania, and some as far away as Tanga and Dar es Salaam, he can tell you where they are, what they are studying, how they are performing in school and what their family situation is. Pastor Baha knows our G4TZ students very well, but what really distinguishes him is that he loves and cares for each of them, especially those who

Pastor Baha with student Paulina Daniel Safari

come from the poorest families. And he is loved and respected in return by our students and their parents. Perhaps the best description of Pastor Baha comes from the Swahili word for "pastor" which is "mchungaji" and means shepherd. He is the shepherd of our G4TZ students. He is the Shepherd of Bashay.

       Before he was ordained a Lutheran pastor, Mchungaji Baha was a teacher at Bashay Primary School and later its headmaster. This primary school, not far from his home, gathers over 800 children every school day to be taught by seven teachers and seven student teachers in three classrooms. He and wife, Mama Victoria, sent each of their own seven children to Bashay Primary School. It, too, is a place of welcome when we visit there, but eyes light up and faces break into wide grins the minute Pastor Baha comes walking 'round the corner!

       The respect he elicits is never more obvious than when he suspects one of our students is not working up to his or her ability. The smile wanes and his tone becomes serious when he says to them, "These sponsors in America have given you a chance to go to school that many children in Tanzania never have and yet it seems you are not performing very well. What is the problem?" And, then he listens carefully because the problems of Tanzanian students can be many and often not their fault. Malaria. Asthma. Poor nutrition. Problems at home. No light to do homework at night.  Finally he says sternly, "Okay, but you will have to pull up your socks and do better this next term!"  His admonition is always accompanied with the return of his big smile and a hug and a promise to help fix those problems that can be fixed.  He buys school uniforms and shoes, takes kids to the doctor, buys medicine, counsels with parents and finds good schools for each of our students.  He is indefatigable in his efforts on behalf of our students! 

       Pastor Baha speaks kiSwahili, Iraqw (his tribal language), German and excellent English, but his actions speak louder than words. His work in shepherding our G4TZ students is of inestimable value and makes possible and effective G4TZ's mission in Tanzania. 

       We could not do it without the Shepherd of Bashay.