The last week or so was fairly uneventful, but here are a few highlights before I get to my trip to Moshi: The students finished their final exams from last semester and were on vacation from school last week, so the campus was pretty dead. The night when they finished (last Thursday), we had a little party in our dorm to celebrate them being finally done. Later, I ended up going to this local club with two of my Tanzanian friends (all of the other UF girls were tired and being party poopers), where I was absolutely the only mzungu there. Not sure the last time any mzungu ever went there, but they didn’t play one American rap song (like they usually do at the clubs here) and everything was in Kiswahili. I must say I was a little nervous at first, but Eunice and Maggie took care of me and I ended up having a blast.
That Saturday, Tacy, Adrienne, Mary, a European friend of ours Yaanita, and I went to a big party at Anna’s volunteer house. Not sure if I’ve explained this before, but Anna and Tacy grew up together in the US and the Anna moved backed to Finland where she is from, but they stayed in touch and decided to study abroad together. Anna just moved into the dorm a few days ago because she will start classes on the new UDSM class schedule, but before that she was living at a volunteer house about 30 minutes away by daladala. Anyways, we went to her volunteer house for a big music festival/party. I ended up having a dance off with a random Tanzanian guy… and I won. It was hilarious to say the least haha.
On Tuesday we didn’t have class because it was a Tanzanian holiday, Karume Day. That was the day when the first president of Zanzibar, Karume, was assassinated. Kinda depressing holiday… but we got off from classes so I’m not complaining haha. I went to Kariakoo for most of the day (the big market in town) with Ivan, my Tanzanian friend who took me to the orphan center a few times, and Mary and Tacy.
On Wednesday night I got sick with a fever, headaches, aching bones, etc… the sure signs of malaria. I went to the clinic first thing in the morning on Thursday (instead of going to class), and got tested for malaria. I did have it after all, so I got the medicine, started it right away, and felt almost completely better by the end of the day. Honestly, malaria isn’t that bad! I don’t know what all the fuss is about… as long as you catch it early and take the meds it’s completely fine. I’m just becoming truly African and building up my immunity to it, that’s all.
On Thursday I took the bus to Moshi for the weekend, regardless of my (minor) health issues. I actually almost got left at the rest stop in the middle of the trip since I wasn’t paying attention to the time and was chatting with a friend I made… but after freaking out and boarding 3 other wrong buses in search of mine, someone finally yelled “mzungu” (meaning “white person” if you forget) and pointed out to the exit of the stop. The bus was waiting for me on the road and the attendant was outside with her hands on her hips looking angry…. Oops haha. At least there was one Tanzanian girl who was even later than me, so that made me feel a little less stupid.
When I got into town in the evening, we all had dinner at Ibrah’s house and then Ryan and I went out to this bar in town. The bar is a fairly expensive, all wazungu bar (for the most part), which isn’t really my cup of tea but it was where Ryan wanted to go to meet his friends so I agreed. There I met four of the CCS volunteers that Ryan knows who are living right now in the house that I lived in this past summer. After talking for a little, I came to find out that me and one of the four volunteers, this girl Kate, are literally the same person. First we figured out that she lives right near me in Jersey and she knows a lot of people who went to private schools around Summit and others who now go to Lehigh. Then, I find out that she also has a lake house at the northern end of Lake George!! For those of you who know, she lives in Hague and is working at the Firehouse this summer and knows EVERYONE from the Hague crowd. For those of you who don’t know, it’s a tiny area in the middle of nowhere and everyone knows everyone and it’s such a bizarre coincidence. Then I find out she is also in DG (my sorority) AND wants to go into NGO work for clean water access in Africa. We are the same person. It’s ridiculous. Anyways, I had a great time just talking to Kate and we kind of hid in the corner half the night haha, but it was exciting. What a small world.
On Friday morning I went into town to meet up with Nie, the head of TAFCOM (the HIV/AIDS group that I sponsor a family through). Unfortunately, Asia and her children (the ones who I support) were out of town again so I didn’t get to see them… but that is kind of my fault for not planning my trip enough ahead of time and asking Nie if they were there. Nonetheless, I had a great lunch in town with Nie and got to hear all about the new children’s center that TAFCOM just opened. After lunch, I caught the daladala out of town to visit Kilimahewa, the school that I had taught at when I was in Moshi. The students weren’t around because it was Good Friday (all of the school are on break until the 20th or so), but Mussawe (the head teacher) and his wife Susan and all of their kids were around. They were so excited to see me, it was wonderful! Not only were they excited that I could now actually speak with them in Kiswahili, but they kept saying how rarely volunteers actually come back after they leave. They took out the log book of volunteers they have and looked up when I had signed it last year, took me to meet Mussawe’s older brother and his family, and spent the whole afternoon chatting with me. It was so exciting to see them again, Mussawe is a wonderful man (he basically runs the whole school out of his pocket and doesn’t charge the children anything since most are very poor and/or are orphans). After finally heading back to Ibrah’s house, I got changed quickly and met Ryan and all of the CCS people that I had met the night before for dinner at El Rancho, a nice Indian restaurant in town (yea I know, “El Rancho” should be Mexican… but people here are weird, I don’t know).
On Saturday morning I walked from Ibrah’s house to the CCS house where I lived last year. Being back at the house was a really fun blast from the past, and even better since everyone on the staff remembered me! All of the lady’s who clean and help cook, the head cook, Mama Fatuma (one of the heads of the program)… they all recognized me immediately. It was great to catch up with all of them, and especially Peter who had been the driver who took me around last time. We got to talk for a while, so that was great. I spent some more time hanging out with the CCS people that I had met the two days before, and then left them to finish packing because it was the last day in the country for most of them! So sad… I remember balling my eyes out on the day I left… I completely knew what they were going through. After leaving CCS, I just hung out in downtown Moshi for a while and did some shopping before heading back to Ibrah’s for the night.
Sunday was Easter… but I did nothing remotely Easter related. In the morning I went to town to buy my bus ticket for the next day, and when I was in town I got to visit and catch up with Reagan, one of my friends who sells art downtown, for a while. The rest of the afternoon I just hung out at the house with Ryan and Ibrah, and helped Ibrah out a lot on making the brochure for his new volunteer company, AfriShare Solutions.
On Monday I took the bus home from Moshi… very long and painful as always. Got into town at around 5 and then, after quickly throwing my stuff back in the dorm, went straight to the woodcarvers to teach; however, since it was Easter Monday, there was no one there! The market was basically empty and only about 5 carvers who I’m friends with were left there, so instead of teaching Mary and I just hung out with the guys and helped them inventory their shop.
This week is actually the first annual Julius Nyrere Intellectual Festival Week at the university, which is in honor of “Mwalimu Nyrere” (mwalimu means teacher) who was the first president of Tanzania and completely united the country. He’s a national hero and did a lot of great things for the country, so everyone is pretty excited about the week. There are speakers all week and most classes are cancelled because everyone is attending the special ceremonies. Yesterday, I went to the second part of a talk on New Imperialism by the week’s keynote speaker, Wole Soyinka (this crazy old guy who looks exactly like a black version of Einstein… he literally has crazy white hair that sticks up everywhere… google it if you doubt me haha). Then last night we went to see a really great documentary on Nyrere’s life and all of his work before and after being president. It had interviews with other previous president’s of Tanzania, his wife, his children, and some other amazing people… it was a pretty impressive compilation. Oh and just a fun fact: Mwalimu Nyrere’s father had 22 wives. 22!!!! They showed a family photo with all the wives and children, it was nuts.
Yesterday I also went out lunch with this girl Anna who is a family friend of a family friend (a different Anna than the Finnish one who is Tacy’s friend). Anyways, our family friend randomly put us in contact since we are both in Tanzania and she didn’t know where either of us was geographically… but it turns out that she literally lives less than five minutes outside of the university. Plus, now she’ll be coming to the university all the time to take Kiswahili lessons from a friend, so we’ll be able to meet up fairly often. Yet again, it really is a small world.
That’s all for now, but hope all is well at home. I’m headed to Dodoma this weekend to do some preliminary research for what I’ll be doing this summer (aka visit the town council, some private drilling companies, etc). I’ll write again next week with either stories of success from the weekend, or nervous twitches about where the hell to go next haha… so let’s hope for the latter. Love you all
-Lisa
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