The Cooking School and Lunch at Peter's

Cooking School

Sister Seraphina welcomed us during a busy class session with the students busy making delectable items. They were making cakes or biscuits, which we would call cookies and some sweet rolls with jelly centers, on order from some lucky person.

We were able to buy pasta and ragu (spaghetti sauce) for our dinner tomorrow evening at the Bega kwa Bega apartments. More later.

At the cooking school, Sister Seraphina teaches young women life skills and English. She teaches housekeeping skills and, of course, Italian cooking. She immigrated to Tanzania 48 years ago and has stayed all these years, having taught thousands of girls. They come to the school under contract. That is, in return for her two-year training course, they work for their sponsors for two years (or longer by choice).

We bought some samosas, the real thing, and a jelly roll as well as the pasta and ragu. We thought they might taste good for lunch at Peter and Grace’s home. We bought some of the cookies as well for the party tomorrow evening.

Lunch at Peter’s

Peter is our bus driver. He has been with us every day but one, when he was needed to work on repairing something on the bus. His wife’s name is Grace and daughter is Clara. Grace’s niece Joyce lives with them too because her father died and they have taken her in since Grace’s sister cannot afford to raise her. Clara is seven; I’d guess Joyce is 12 or 13. Both are quite shy.

Judy has been sitting in the front seat next to Peter to reduce bus sickness, a step beyond car sickness. This has alleviated it well and has given her a chance to visit with Peter. She found out about Peter’s family, so we have all been pestering him to meet them. We weren’t wangling for an invitation, just an intro, but Grace graciously invited us for lunch. She herself is quite shy; she is also a great cook! We had tasty rice, potatoes, beef and peas in a delicious sauce, so good I ate peas! She brought out the samosas we had bought, which we all tried. Our treat was the jelly roll, which was also delicious.



Ken