The last few weeks have been full of excitement as we have been busy sharing our story with many people in the community.
We were very excited and felt incredibly privileged to visit our children's school and be a part of their spirit day assembly. The entire school (K-8) sat in on the assembly and it was really amazing to see so many familiar faces in the audience. The children were wonderfully supportive as they listened attentively to us give a brief overview of what Mom2Mom Africa is doing in Tanzania and how we are preparing to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. It was fun to teach and listen to the kids trying out a couple new words in Kiswahili. Voices filled the gymnasium as the children repeated in unison the words "Jambo" (hello), "pole pole" (slow slow) and "Asante sana" (thank you very much). It was an amazing feeling to stand before the children as models of social and global responsibility.
We were able to go into further detail when we presented to the grade 6,7, and 8 classes a few days earlier. We shared the details of our nutritional and physical training, our goal setting strategies and our overall feelings as we steadily progress and get closer to reaching our goal. Alison joined us and shared the incredible work of Mom2Mom Africa and shared some heartfelt stories of the families and children that are involved in the Mom2Mom Africa programs. The personal stories had a huge emotional impact on Joanne and I and we felt an overwhelming sense of excitement, love, compassion and empathy as we suddenly realized the date of our trip is fast approaching. To see the spark of interest and the inquisitive nature of the children's questions, I couldn't help but feel that many of them will go on in their own lives making huge differences in bettering this world each in their own way.