Leaving Tanzania | Amy Medina

Two Years Back

On March 16, 2022

I had never seen so many pets at the airport.

On March 25, 2020, no one was panicking at the Dar es Salaam airport. But all those pets, restless in their hard plastic crates, added to the air of foreboding. People traveling for business or tourism don’t take their pets on international flights. But they do when running away.

Ironically, it was also the first time I had been at that airport. For two decades, we had flown out of the tiny Dar airport – only six gates, despite the thousands who passed through it every week. The new, large, modern airport had opened in late 2019, complete with towering, echoing ceilings, a Pizza Hut, and a polite British voice that announced every five minutes, Attention travelers: It is not permissible to bring plastic bags into Tanzania.

We stood in line in that shiny new airport in the quiet, tense air and wondered if our plane was even there and if the airport in Qatar was even open and if they were even going to let Johnny on that flight. And when they let us through, I was relieved but also devastated because part of my heart hoped that they would turn us away and we would be forced to stay in Tanzania, even though we had already sold our beds.

The memories are vivid: the pets at the airport. How Johnny almost couldn’t board until the woman from the embassy just happened to be in line next to us and advocated on our behalf. How our kids were excited to get soft-serve ice cream at Pizza Hut, but I was nauseous and everything tasted like dust in my mouth. How it felt like we were running away from home.

Five days after we arrived in California, I wrote my account of that experience. I don’t need to read it to remember the details forever lodged in my brain. But two years later, different things stand out. Mostly, I think of the people who loved us that week.

Homesick

By Amy Medina

On December 7, 2021

In Eternity, Leaving Tanzania, Re-Entry to America

I volunteer weekly at an after-school program for disadvantaged kids, and I went to the banquet that celebrated this ministry’s 20 year anniversary.

We watched a video montage of how the ministry has expanded over the years. We listened to young people, now grown up, whose lives were changed because of the investment in them.

It was a lovely evening. But when I got to my car afterwards, I wept. I enjoy being a part of this ministry, but the banquet reminded me that I am a newcomer; I know nothing of the history of two decades. And all I could think about was how I had left behind 20 years of history in Tanzania.

I did not anticipate the lostness that comes with starting life over again.

Rewriting the Ending

By Amy Medina

On June 25, 2021

In Leaving Tanzania, Re-Entry to America

There’s an old-fashioned bell on the wall in Haven of Peace Academy’s office building. We would ring it on special occasions, like when we recruited a new teacher or got a batch of approved work permits, or when Zawadi was finally adopted.

The moment I walked into that building on Monday afternoon, June 7th, after fourteen months of being away, my friend Trudie saw me and ran over and rang that bell. The faces of old friends appeared out of office doors and some clapped and some cheered and all of them surrounded me at once. They engulfed me with love and I held onto them for dear life, and I broke down with joy and sorrow and relief and a whole lot of jetlag. For fourteen months I had longed for this moment and not known if it would ever come. But it did.

What was it like to go back? It felt like Lucy going through the wardrobe, like Harry passing through Platform 9 ¾. I got off the plane and was in a different universe, one that instantly felt very familiar, like no time at all had passed.

June in Dar es Salaam is technically winter, but my face was abruptly shiny again from the humidity. My ankles were perpetually itchy from mosquito bites. Monkeys danced on the roof in the mornings, I ate rice and beans for lunch, I haggled over taxi prices, and I hollered for the house guard when the water pump stopped working. My duffle bag arrived with a large rip, and I fretted over finding a needle and thread until it dawned on me, Duh, I’m in Dar. I can walk out the gate and find a tailor who will fix it up good as new, licketly split. And so I did.

I have spent the last fourteen months trying to force my soul into ill-fitting clothes, so being back felt ordinary and effortless and right.

Johnny Can’t Travel With Us: A Lament Over U.S. Immigration

By Amy Medina

On May 14, 2021

In Adoption, Leaving Tanzania

All year, we’ve been planning a family trip back to Tanzania in June–the precise window of time when our kids’ new school would be finished and Haven of Peace Academy would still be in session. We had such a traumatic ending last March. All year, our family has talked about going back and finishing better.

But U.S. immigration won’t let us leave the country with Johnny. So that means Grace, Lily, and I will still go to Tanzania this June–only half of us. I’m excited to go, but this is not what I wanted. So I lament.

Yet this isn’t my first struggle with U.S. immigration. It’s been going on for fifteen years.

I think part of the reason why I have compassion for immigrants is because I have four of them in my family. Maybe this is news to some, but children adopted internationally by Americans don’t automatically become U.S. citizens. In the fifteen years I’ve had my children, I’ve often been prevented from bringing them into the United States. And now I’m being prevented from taking one out.

This has been a theme of our lives. Here’s one example (of many that could be told):

I still remember the day so clearly: Josiah was two years old. By this time, he had been in our home since he was nine months old and had just been officially adopted. In order to start his U.S. citizenship process, he had to be in our custody for two years. Since we hadn’t met that mark yet, if we wanted to visit the States, we needed to get him a tourist visa.

One Year Ago March

By Amy Medina

On March 7, 2021

In Leaving Tanzania, Re-Entry to America

March 2020: Corona virus comes to Tanzania

Grace, who is 15, told me about a conversation she had with an old friend. “She asked me how my year had been going,” Grace said. “And I told her about all the new things in my life and the things that have changed.” Suddenly her face crumpled. “And I realized, I’ve been through a lot, haven’t I?”

Yes, my girl, you have been through a lot.

The earth has made its way around the entirety of the sun since last March, which means we are headed towards all the anniversaries. March 13–the last day I was on campus with my students. March 19–the day we were told we had to leave. March 25–the day we left Tanzania. The emotional impact of each of those days left a yawning hole that has yet to be filled.

I don’t like remembering it. I’ve related the story of March 2020 to friends several times; I’ve re-read the account I wrote. It doesn’t take much to pull me back into the grief and bewilderment and shock all over again. I wonder how long it will take before I can think about it without feeling it.

Category: Leaving Tanzania Page 2 of 5

Two Years Back

Homesick

Rewriting the Ending

Johnny Can’t Travel With Us: A Lament Over U.S. Immigration

One Year Ago March