After five years of anticipation and preparation, on the morning of January 13th we finally touched down at Dar es Salaam International Airport to begin the next stage of our work supporting Bible translation. We are happy to have safely arrived in Tanzania where we are working with SIL International, an organisation devoted to serving minority language communities as they write down their languages and translate the Bible and other materials.

A friendly tarantula welcomes us on our first night

We are currently staying at the main SIL office in Dar es Salaam, where we are in the middle of three weeks of orientation. We’ve been learning about a wide range of things, from food preparation to cultural differences, from organisational governance to how to stay healthy and not get malaria.

Us outside the office

At the end of next week we plan to travel to Iringa, where we’ll spend a month at a language school for Laura to learn Swahili. She has made an excellent start already, and is learning more and more each day! But we hope that the four weeks of dedicated time will give her a good foundation that she can continue to build on when we move out to Mpanda (in Katavi Region) at the beginning of March.

Preparing a red snapper for dinner

Thanks for all your prayers and support for us! We are extremely excited to have finally arrived in Tanzania, and grateful for all the supporters who are joining with us in this new stage of our life and work. We are looking forward to continue to partner with you as we prepare to head out west in the coming weeks, finally meeting the church leaders you and we have been praying for, and seeing our friends and colleagues again!

Laura studying hard

Related posts:

• Our flights are booked… to Tanzania!
• Orientation and preparing for the next stage…
• Kujifunza Kiswahili – Learning Swahili
• A Day in the Village