Plumpton Zoo

Posin' at the alligator pit!

Christina checkin' out the camel

Friendliest donkey award goes to this guy...

Mom ("grammy") and Samantha

The Greatest Show on Earth!

A few weeks ago I went with some of my family to the Circus and it was great! I think I only went once before when I was little and it was still just as amazing as I remembered.

(My brother Trent & I)

Nephew Sam with mommy Angie

Take me back to Siberia or I'll bite your head off!

Brooke, Mom and me

Harvest Hands & Playa Guiones

I had a wonderful time visiting my friends Rodney & Cindy in Costa Rica where they do mission work, helping churches and other Christian organizations who minister to the poor & marginalized. I got to hang out and see what they do on a daily basis at "Harvest Hands", including visiting the neighborhood of Los Anonos where they live and have made many friendships among the local people.

Mountains over Los Anonos

Typical dwellings of the poor

The 2nd week we went to the beach! Here's some of the view along the way...

After 5 hours of driving we finally arrive....Playa Guiones

There were many interesting creatures to keep us company, like bats, crabs, howler monkeys, lizards, iguanas, etc.

Most days ended with the most beautiful sunsets....and Rodney took advantage of the great surf!

Costa Rica!!!

I've been in Costa Rica for almost 2 weeks and will be heading home tomorrow. I have enjoyed seeing a wide variety of the facets of life here, from beach to mountains and the rich living beside the poor. Stay tuned for more to come...

Home!!!

Mmmmm! Baking chocolate chip cookies!

A hunting we will go!! Handsome nephew Sam

Beautiful nieces: Christina, Samantha, & Haley

Just wanted to let you all know that I arrived safely in Maryland three weeks ago after a nice long 20 hour flight from Joburg. Thank you so much for all your prayers during my travel!

Who would've thought that being in ones home country could feel so strange? After 19 months away, I definitely sometimes feel like I've come to a foreign land, but I also have such a deep peace about being home for this season of my life! I have been spending lots of time with my family here and in PA. Yesterday, I started helping my mom prepare the garden for planting, which we'll do in the next month or so. In May I'll have the wonderful opportunity to visit some friends in Costa Rica, and in August I'll be off to Maine for a month to visit friends and church family there. In between, I'll just have lots of family time to share in beach trips, BBQ's, my niece's 1st b-day, going to the circus with my nephew and lots of other fun stuff. Yeah!!! Seems that when you've lived away from home for awhile, everyday family events can be as precious as gold & silver. I am so very thankful that the Lord has given me this time to be with my family!!!

Going Home!

Blessed by my family to move on in the Lord...

Good friends will be missed much!! I love you Rabia!

After almost 3 years of serving in Pemba , my time here is finally coming to an end. On February 12th, I will fly to Cape Town for a friend’s wedding and also visit a few other friends in SA, before heading back to the States on March 5th.

This past November during a night of teaching in the mission school, the Lord spoke to me and gave me a vision of doing different things with my family. I saw myself planting a garden with my mom, going to the beach with my family and being at my mom’s annual “Fall Harvest Party” in October, among other family outings and get-togethers. The Lord said to me that he wanted to give me a season of being a daughter and sister. I cried and cried, because it is something that I have really been wanting: some time to be a kid, but also because I thought of how much I will miss my precious family here, and all the great cultural stuff that has now become part of me. Pemba has become my home and the people my family, so it will be a bit sad to leave and a very BIG transition, yet I am very excited for the opportunity the Lord is giving me to love on and be loved by my family!

A few things I will really miss about life in Pemba……..
1. The babies and all the children at the center who have really wiggled themselves into my heart over the past years, especially Carlito and the girls in the room whom I help give extra love to on a regular basis.
2. Speaking Portuguese daily and trying to figure out what Marcelo (one of our older boys) is rattling off to me in Makua.
3. Church services African-style: 3-4 hours long, singing traditional Makua praise & worship songs, and dancing in worship till you drop! I love it!
4. Baptisms in the Indian Ocean .
5. Missionary friends who have been like moms, dads, brothers, & sisters for me here. I will miss them all dearly!
6. Amina & company!! She has become such a sweet Mozambican friend to me. Even though she started out cleaning our house, she’s feels like a sister now and her kids like nieces and nephews!
7. Hearing “Mana Tanya, Mana Tanya!” yelled out wherever I go. (Mana means big sister in Portuguese.) Even the kids in the village behind our center all seem to know who Mana Tanya is, as well as market and street vendors in town vying for a purchase.
8. Frog symphonies in rainy season and cricket symphonies during dry season.
9. Friendly critters, ie: bug eating lizards, toads, bush babies (little monkey looking animals that cry like babies at night)
10. 4:30AM sunrises and the most beautiful sunsets I’ve ever seen in my life. This is Africa !
11. Towering baobab trees with trunks even wider than a redwood tree. Beautiful!
12. Swimming in the warm and beautifully crystal clear water of the Indian Ocean .
13. If you are half an hour to an hour late you’re still right on time

And a few things I definitely, well, probably won’t miss…….
1. People begging for something everywhere you go, because of your skin color. Here “white” equals rich. Even if you are poor in America , you would be looked at as rich here.
2. Unending need for maintenance on everything! Everything you can buy here seems to break within 6 months to a year.
3. Not-so-friendly critters, ie: big flying cockroaches, tukwehs (Makua for biting ants) that find their way into your clothes, centipedes (yuck!), scorpions, poisonous snakes, etc.
4. Feeling like you could just melt into a puddle on the ground because of the intense heat (100-120 F) and humidity (90-100%) during rainy season (Dec.-March)!
5. Witchdoctors beating on their drums and chanting through the wee hours of the morning. Talk about intense spiritual warfare!
6. Being "proposed" to more times than you can count by men who just want a “rich” white woman to take them to America!
7. Always looking over your shoulder or across the street for possible “banditos” (thieves) every time you walk down the road from our older, smaller base to the newer, bigger one.
8. Malaria, cholera, worms and other ‘known to Mozambique ’ illnesses….

But, after all is said and done, I will miss this place and people very much! Whether I get the opportunity to come back or not is up to the Lord, but the community of Pemba-Iris will certainly remain in my heart forever!!! Please pray that my transition will not be too difficult and that miraculously I won’t have reverse culture shock, but that I will really be able to enjoy my time back in the States. Pray for traveling safety and favor with luggage, etc. I will be traveling on these dates: Feb. 12th from Pemba to Cape Town , SA, 18th & 26th within SA, & March 5th & 6th back to the States.

I am so very grateful for all your support and prayers over these past few years, and look forward to partnering with you once again when the Lord shows me my next step to the nations! Many blessings to you all and please continue to keep in touch!

Email: tanybo@yahoo.co.uk

Carlito (almost 3!)

More of my family in Pemba

Preschool buddies with teachers Ancha(L) & Olivia(R)

My girls & Carlito... (back L-R) Zelinha, Bina, Luisa, me, Carlito, & Fausia....(front L-R) Lila, Atija, Paulina, Catarina, Mariamo

Missionary mom and dad (Jacques & Mary)

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Dear Friends & Family!!!!!

This Christmas at Arco-Iris Village of Joy was definitely the most joyful and amazingly blessed out of all three years that I have been here to celebrate the birth of Jesus with my Mozambican family. We had two teams of visitors and one family who came especially to celebrate with us, bringing with them many gifts for the children and missionaries, including over 100 soccer balls for the boys and many beautiful skirts and sundresses for the girls.

Holiday festivities began with the traditional room decorating and candlelight service on Christmas Eve. The children danced and sang their hearts out, worshipping the one who was born to die for them. Then they each received a lit candle and humbled their hearts before the King of Kings during a time of adoration. Afterwards we all enjoyed a special treat of ice cream and popcorn, which a previous visitor had donated finances for. The children were so excited to have ice cream and sat patiently waiting while mission school students, visitors, missionaries and tias (“aunties” who care for the children on a daily basis) dished up and handed out the treat. We had so much ice cream that every child got a second cup, and everyone finally went to bed around 10:30PM very happy and excited for the coming day.

On Christmas morning all of our almost 200 children received brand new blue Iris t-shirts and got themselves ready for the day. At 10AM the same groups of adults that helped the previous night to decorate each of the children’s rooms also handed out Christmas presents to those children. Everyone was so excited and joyful at how the Lord had provided beautiful new clothes and toys for them. The older boys each received a soccer ball, and the younger boys also received different kinds of balls and cars. So there were about 100 balls being kicked around all at the same time! The girls were delighted with the new skirts, tops and dolls that they received and were soon doing fashion shows for us and each other. There certainly was not a sad face in the center yesterday morning. All were rejoicing!

At noon we all joined in for the annual Christmas chicken dinner family style with just our kids and center family first. At around 1:15PM the doors to the center were opened, and about 800 to 1000 children, women, and men came to share in the joy of filling their bellies. The community children also received little bags of candy and cookies along with either a tennis ball or stuffed toy. Smiles were abounding!

Thank you to all who have poured out your hearts in prayer and your pockets in giving so that we are able to bless abundantly these treasures that the Lord has put into our care! You are a great Christmas present to us through the love you so generously pour out. I also want to thank those of you who have specifically lifted me up to the Father on a daily or weekly basis or have given financially so that I too can keep giving. Without you I could not continue being His hands and feet in this place.

Blessings to you as you celebrate the love and joy of our Savior during this holiday season. And may the Lord pour out an abundance of His Holy Spirit and provision on you in this New Year!!!

Love,
Tanya

Holiday Festivities!

Making Christmas cake

Dancing up a storm!

Silent night, holy night....

Adoration to the King!

You scream, I scream, we all scream for ice cream!

Dishin' it up

Yum! Yum!

Serious business!!!