Does anybody really know what time it is?

*Sorry such a long post, but stick around. It might be a good one!

One Sunday afternoon, I visited with my friend Neema. She attends a college of education that is a branch of UDSM. She wanted to show me the room where she stays and her college. So we met at UDSM and drove to her college. We spent some time in the room she rents from a family drinking sodas and talking. I had told her at the beginning of our day that I had another appointment at 3 pm. So at about 2:20 we started leaving her house.

As we left, she told me there was one other place she wanted to show me. We walked for about ten minutes and arrived at another little house. She wanted to introduce me to the family that she used to live with and show me her first room. We went in and sat down. I kept checking my watch and trying to give hints to Neema that I still had an appointment at 3. But we still just kept sitting there. After some time of sitting there and watching the TV without really talking, I finally looked at Neema and she asked if I needed to leave. So as we started to leave, the man of the house stopped us at the door. I was trying to follow the conversation with my limited Swahili, but I wasn’t too sure what was happening. Finally he looked at me and said, “You can’t leave. In our culture, if a guest comes, she must stay for food. So we have started to prepare food for you. Please stay with us longer.” I tried to explain to him that I had a friend who would be waiting for me at 3. We meet every Sunday at 3 and she is going to expect me. Well that didn’t seem to matter too much to him. He explained to me that Africans do not keep time like Americans do. He said he knows that time is money to me, but that I must stay. Well there wasn’t much I could do from that point. He had already pulled the “culture card” and I couldn’t offend the culture. So I told him that I needed to walk to my car and call my friend to inform her I would be late. He was very excited about my decision.

So Neema and I returned to the house and waited for the food. We sat around with several people and watched TV. There were only two chairs in the house. As the guest, I was given one and everyone else sat on the floor. We were finally served traditional African food – ugali (wet, tasteless, mushy bread), fish, and chicken. The servings are always more than I can handle and after already having lunch and a coke, it was a struggle to finish my food. Neema ate hers in a few minutes. It took me probably 20 to finish mine. They laughed and made jokes about how slow I was. And that if I was African I would never get enough food, because everyone else would finish all the food before I even started eating mine.

While we sat in the room, there wasn’t much talking between us. But there was a lot of trying to hand me the baby to hold. She wasn’t too fond of me though. Since I was the first white person she had ever seen in her life, she was actually quite terrified. The parents kept trying to convince her to like me, but they weren’t too successful. Each time she would kick and scream and I would feel terrible. They were torturing the poor child on my behalf. I finally learned that if I could keep some distance between us, she would be okay. She would wave at me and say hi, but if I came too close she would start to scream. Then we finally found our common bond, my car. She enjoyed climbing on my car and running around it. So we finally let her inside the car at the drivers seat. I told her in Swahili that she could drive if she wanted to. Everyone laughed and her parents quickly told me No. She was 18 months. Did they really think I was going to let her drive? So by the end of the day, we became friends because of my car and she even let me hold her for a minute.

After staying what I guess was the appropriate amount of time, we finally left the house. They welcomed me back as always and promised that the baby would like me more next time. As we left, Neema told me she wanted to take me to her college as well. At this point, it was already 4 and I was extremely late for my appointment. So I figured, what will a few more minutes hurt? So we toured Neema’s college and even met some of her friends. We spent some time sitting outside under trees and enjoying the breeze. The whole time I was thinking… Does she even care what time it is? Obviously it wasn’t an issue.

I finally left Neema and went to meet my other friend. I arrived to her room only 2 ½ hours late. I explained to her what happened and she laughed a lot. We spent a few minutes saying hi to each other and then I headed back home.

It was a long day, but a really wonderful one. My time with Neema was a blessing even if it did interfere with what I had planned for the day. I was reminded of the concept of time. According to my new friend, time is money to Americans. I’m not sure I want time to be the most valuable thing in my life. Is time really mine anyway? Or is it just another gift from God? I pray that my time will be God’s time, that my time will be in His hands, that my time will only be used to accomplish His work.

This day reminded me of an old Chicago song that I remember listening to with my Dad when I was a kid. “Does anybody really know what time it is? Does anybody really care?”