Student Stories

It is difficult to describe what my experience has been like in Tanzania. There has been so much that I have gone through and so many emotions and senses that I have felt over the past four and half months that I don’t know if a book could describe it all. Every day has brought new experiences and feelings to me. It’s crazy to think about all that we have done in the past semester. Some days were incredibly interesting and some fascinating and others were very slow and difficult. The spectrum of emotional feelings has been a roller coaster with extreme highs and extreme lows. Being able to look back at it all is extremely helpful.

Starting with my favorite aspects, traveling was a definite highlight and taught me things that I previously did not know. The mid-semester independent travel break made it possible to add sites and experiences to the East African perspective. Traveling to Kenya and other parts of Tanzania independently or as part of program excursions was very interesting and provided me with a lot of knowledge that I would not have learned in a classroom. Traveling to Mbundya Marine reserve, Bagamoyo, Zanzibar, Bongoyo Island, Moshi, Arusha, Kilimanjaro, Tarangire National Park, Ruaha National Park, and Nairobi are experiences that I will never forget.

The tough experiences such as the heat, and enduring long bus rides have also taught me lessons. These experience have been good in structuring my world perspective as seen in Tanzania. This semester has gone by extremely fast and it will be difficult to head home and leave this land of many emotional feelings. But, however long it takes, I hope to return to Tanzania.

— Alex Clark, Luther College