Gogo Tribe and Corner Stone

Today was a special day for all of us. We visited Innocent's village and his house. Innocent is coordinating our visit at UDOM.
When we got out of the car, we were greeted by a group of Gogo dancers. Tanzania has many tribes (more than 100) and Gogo is the prime tribe around dodoma region. A group of women dressed in traditional dresses were playing drums with their hands, blowing whistle, dancing to the tunes of bells tied to their feet and singing folk songs. The whole town turned out to welcome us. It was quite a scene. We stand still near our cars, surrounded by children who were curious at everything we had. Cameras were their favorites.
So, the dances went on for some time. This ceremony was followed by a short lecture (in English and Swahili or Gogoii ?) by the pastor of local church. Then he called each one of us and asked us to introduce. And we go again.. our trademark introduction like I am Sandip and I am from India. Every sentence we said was translated by pastor in swahili and local group cheered to show their recognition. Beth, Dan and Sean were greeted with short songs like mama .. , kaka .. and baba... In swahili mama means mother, kaka mean brother and baba is father.
Then Innocent came in and said that his village would like to do something to make our visit memorable. He had planned tree plantation from each one of us. So, we planted 10 trees (1 per person) around his proposed house. It was quite a fun and honor. But best is not over yet. He took us to another corner where we were supposed to lay corner stone of his new house. Huh .. it had never happened to me before. We saw a memorial plate with our names and country names. It was unbelievable to see our names on a golden plate.

The dances continued for some time. We talked to some people. There were so many children and they were so eager to get pictured. We kept clicking. A few games of hi 5. Some cheers. A lot of swahili practice. We were all over. A great experience in all. Million thanks to Innocent for arranging this.