Harvest moon and spring time.

Harvest moon. Yes, it is faked.
The harvest moon's grandeur was overrated
so this moon has been manipulated.

Tourist guides seem to suggest that tropical countries don't have seasons, but this part of Tanzania certainly does. The July temperatures went down to 15ºC at night and to 22º during the day.
Now the heat is coming on, and day temperatures are around 28º, night around 17º.
The most obvious thing, though is the gathering of birds, the greening up of the trees, and new flowers. There is new growth all around. There hasn't been any rain since May, the harvest moon has passed by, it's mid October, and the vegetation has roots deep enough to find the moisture that will bring it out in bloom.
The ginkgo has tiny florets, the frangipani is covered in flowers with hardly a leaf in sight, the flamboyants are beginning to show signs of buds, and the unnamed trees around the cottage are full of new shoots. It isn't the spectacular springtime of Europe where colour saturates the landscape. The plants here seem almost nervous. 
Preparation for planting begins.The roads are covered in fine dust, and every day since July the easterly wind has rolled it up in to the air and left the horizons grey as a winter sky. At night only a few stars can be seen beyond the dust. The rains may start this month, or next month. Or in December. A website explained that Tanzania and the other tropical countries are in the wind systems of the doldrums, and weather patterns over the land are destabilised by  the heating, the mountains and the terrain. Out in the oceans, there would be calms. As the earth's attitude to the sun changes through the year, so the doldrums move from one side of the equator to the other. At the moment the weather systems are moving away, and in their wake will come rain.
We have birds, buds, dust and digging.
We have asked a local tailor to make us clothing. We have four dresses and two shirts.

Soon we will do the rounds of students who have applied for sponsorship at the school to see their homes and make our judgements. This is not a task that sits comfortably in one's conscience: it is hardly for us to decide who is needy, but it seems that we must. Charity, said George Bernard Shaw, is a crime. Most people assume that this means that humanity fails when people are put in the position of needing charity. Charity is the evidence of the failure.
Anyway, the Mvumi village is noisy, busy and full of people. Most things can be obtained here, and the power cuts are occasional. The water supply is improving, and one of the great things at the moment is that there is absolutely no Christmas wind up. Maybe next year we could do it again.