Hello hello! I apologize to my family, as this is a big repeat of the massive email you've all recently received, but I figured this was the most efficient way to update everyone. As I haven't written for a while, there's a lot to catch up on, and I also apologize about the length.
We finished our Kiswahili course on the 30th of August. After that, I sort of dropped off the face of the earth, as far as blog entries and emails go – sorry about that. We had all sort of mutually decided that we would take the first part of September and travel around the country before classes started on the 15th. Well, it is the 29th today, and I haven’t seen any classes yet! But the traveling was amazing.
Chris Waters from St. Olaf and Bryanna Plog from Pacific Lutheran traveled with me up into the northwestern corner of Tanzania (see attached map). Chris has lived here in Tanzania 4 times now, with his family. He still has a lot of family friends living, here, and they invited him up north, and we decided to come along.
Our first stop was Mwanza (on the shores of Lake Victoria), where we received an incredible amount of hospitality from a little 68 year old woman. We stayed in Mwanza for a few days, and then moved on to Ngara. (Sorry if these comments seem brief, I’ve got a lot to say but don’t want to bore you!! There will be blog posts elaborating)
Ngara is so small even today that it does not appear on most maps and certainly does not appear in any of our guide books. Yet it is an amazing and important place of East Africans. Chris’s father was hired to work here, in the Rwandan refugee camps from 1994 until 1996. Chris was about 7 years old, and lived in Ngara, a beautiful little village that help maintain the largest refugee camps in the nation. As we bumped along the road up and down hills, Chris could barely take his eyes away from the landscape. The hills that used to house millions of refugees are now green and flourishing. The camps he remembers from his childhood are all but gone, only 2 very small ones remaining out of the dozen that used to blanket the hills. Once we arrived in Ngara, we were taken to a guest house that is in the same neighborhood as where Chris used to live. Lo and behold, the home we were taken to IS his old house! It was fantastic. This 6 foot tall, 200 pound guy was scampering about, finding all the little things that he remembered. He was thrilled beyond belief. After calming down a bit, he brought me and Bryanna to the back of the property, where we could see huge hills in the distance. “That’s Rwanda,” he pointed to our right, “and that’s Burindi, to the left. And that...” squinting into the mist that covered the hills, we could just make out a layer of mountain behind the hills of Burindi, “that on a clear day would be the Congo.”
From Ngara we moved to Kibondo, where I was able to sample the nation’s fine regional hospital. That’s right, I can’t even go across the world without causing some medical mishap. Let me tell you, my mother was thrilled that I still needed her on the other side of the world. Long story short: I had my wisdom teeth out in June. A little piece o tooth was still in my socket on my lower right side, and for some odd reason, it caused no trouble until I was in the remotest corner of Tanzania. Brilliant. My whole right side of my face went numb and swelled up with infection, and of course, I freaked. Through calls home and a wonderful dental technician, I managed to get what I needed in Kibondo to keep everything under control. Amoxicillin, salt water, and a syringe with a little tube attached, to squirt water in the hole where in infection lay. When I went to pay for the syringe, I was told it was not necessary. “This is Africa,” he said. “We have plenty of syringes. Karibu tena, dada.” (Welcome again, sister).
We moved on to Kigoma(on the shores of Lake Tanganyka) ) the next day, and I visited another hospital, got a head xray to try to find the tooth fragment and determined that yes indeed, Papa, I have rocks in my head. (again, see attached photos). No tooth was found, but I got to keep the x-ray! The technician apologized eloquently for the high cost, and seemed embarrassed when I had to pay my bill. Cost of the x-ray? 5,000/= Tanzania shillings. That converts to about $4.42.
After I finished with my hospital fun, we bought our train tickets back to Dar and found that we had two days to wait before the train left. Se we investigated how much it would cost to go to Ngombe Stream, the National Park where Jane Goodall did her chimp research. For foreigners, the cost is $300. Expats pay $40 and citizens pay about $12. We, being students with residency permits, managed to land the expat fee, which was fantastic. The chimps were incredible, but it was a terrifying experience. We managed to pick the one day of the month that the entire chimp family (40 full grown, about 15 immature) were together, hunting. Let me say that again...they were hunting little red monkeys, flying through the trees, charging at us until the realized we were MUCH bigger than they are, and all around making an intensely loud racket. They got so close I could have kissed them, not that I would want to!
We survived the chimp experience, and made our way back to Dar by train, which was a really interesting ride. There was a young nun traveling in the compartment with Bryanna and I, and although she is a Tanzania, she speak fluent Spanish!! It was incredible – we chatted in Spanish for almost the whole 3 day ride, which severely annoyed one of the women in the compartment. She came in on the second day, rearranged everyone so that she had the most comfortable spot, gave her little baby to me to take care of, and liked asking us complicated question is Kiswahili that obviously we could not answer. As soon as we did manage to answer one, she’d ask another and another until we exhausted our limited language skills. So to be having fun speaking another language? Totally not allowed.
The rest of the trip went well until Chris’s backpack was stolen out of this compartment as he slept. He literally used one bag for a pillow, and slept curled around the other, but the thief was able to get the smaller one which contained glasses, cell phone, money, passport, visa, academic journal, and malaria medication. To top it all off, it was Chris’s 20th birthday that day. He was in good spirits though, but the rest of the trip did seem very long.
Once we were back in Dar on the 11th, we found out that classes would not be starting until the 29th – my birthday. Wahoo. I actually was really bummed, as I cannot wait to start classes here. So we contacted another family friend of Chris’s who had offered to let us come join her in the mountains for a week. Mama Macha is a 60 year old woman (from Seattle!) who married a Chaga man (the tribe the lives on and around Kilimanjaro) and has lived in Tanzania since she was 25. She lives just off campus, but has a home where her late husband grew up, outside of Moshi, in a small village called Morri, that has the most amazing view of both Mount Meru and Mount Kilimanjaro. By the 12th, all 10 of us had returned to Dar, and we began planning to go up to Morri for the week.
From the 16th until the 22nd, we stayed up in the mountains. It was incredible. I’ve seen friendliness and kindness all throughout Tanzania, but it was nothing like was I experienced in Morri. The women helped up cook and carry water and wash without laughing (usually kindly) at us like the women here in Dar so love to do. Everyday we hiked around to a different side of the hills hat Morri is nestled between, and on the 18th we drove to the gates of the National Park , the entrance through which the climber pass through to go up Kili. We, needless to say, did not climb, though some in my group dearly wish to. I....well, knowing me and my bad luck, I think that climbing ....well, knowing me and my bad luck, I think that climbing any mountain would be inviting too much trouble to come and settle itself around me like a rain cloud. I was more that satisfied just by looking at the peak, which was breathtaking. (pictures included)
We left Morri and traveled back to Dar, and have sort of been hanging around lately. I chatted with a philosophy professor that I have gotten to know, and he let me know that lecturers and professors might be striking this semesters. Yes, that’s right. Classes might not start at all. If that is the case, I think I might cry, but at least I will have a lot of time to travel.
I’ll try to answer a few questions that I’ve received about the university and life living on campus. The university is about the size of the UMD campus and is situated on a hill (which means we get a fantastic breeze on stiflingly hot days). There are about 10,000 students here, only about 2,000 of which are women. This ratio is uncomfortable for us a lot of the time, because not only do we attract attention because we are white, but then the 9 women in my group get extra attention simply because there aren’t a lot of women here at all. I live in the only female dorm, Hall III, which has four sections. There are 6 other dorm buildings, all obviously occupied by men.
The food here is interesting, mostly rice with beans, chicken, peas, meat, or local variation of spinach...or in Kiswahili, that would be wali na maharage, kuku, njegere, nyama, ou mchicha. I can switch the rice with ugali (think really think cream of wheat that you eat with your fingers) or viazi (boiled potatoes). My favorite meal for lunch is viazi na kokoto, which is a beef stew with carrots, tomatoes, local spinach, and peppers, sometimes with onions, all poured over potatoes. There is a lot of fresh fruit, machungas, parachichi, matango, na ndizi (oranges, avocado, cucumbers, and bananas). Breakfast usually consists of a banana and chapati, thin fried bread that is really good with a sliced banana or a little peanut butter. Chai (Tea) is served al day, and Tanzanians drink it very very hot. This never makes sense to me, since it is so humid and hot out already.
I think that is about it for now! Today classes were supposed to start, but I really don't think anyone has any classes today. We have been hearing rumors that professors ma be striking (great) and that classes never really get going until the middle of October or even November. Yeah...it could be interesting. There might be a lot more traveling stories and not very many school stories in my blog entries.
I hope you are all doing well!!
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