Village Life

I did it! I left Arusha!

It wasn’t quite on the Monday as I had planned – I have the Ministry of Home Affairs (Immigration) to thank for that – but it happened. Bright and early on the Tuesday morning, I hopped in the cab of Paulo’s friend, stopped at MOHA to pick up my now twice-stamped passport, and made the drive out to Ngongongare.

The painfully slow drive out to Ngongongare.

They’re expanding the road two a dual-carriageway between the border all the way to Moshi – and Paulo thinks this is all going to be done by February, he has much more faith in Tanzanian work ethic than I do! – and they’re just east of Arusha at the moment. With no lines on the road – HA! When are there ever lines? – and big chunks of pavement missing, driving along the road was a bit of a free-for-all.

Plus, it had started raining on Monday night and while it had abated after the initial onslaught, it didn’t stop until shortly after 8am Tuesday morning.

When it rains this hard, you take shelter where you can.
Even a gas station.

I think I’m cursed when it comes to travel weather. My first time in Switzerland in 1999, they had the worst flooding in years, and my train into Interlaken was the last one in or out via Thun for two days due to flooding on the track. My last time in Switzerland in 2013, they had horribly raining weather and it even snowed ON MAY 24^TH! Last time I was in Tanzania, the locals complained about how wet the dry season was and that they still had to mow grass that should have been brown by then. This time? It has rained almost every day and the locals are complaining about how wet the dry season is.

I’m sorry, Tanzania.

But the northern part of the country has also been in semi-drought status for a number of years so you’re also welcome.

Two things have happened since I was last here. 1) The library moved to a larger location in the next village over. 2) There is now a volunteer house to stay at on the same plot of land as the library. My previous trips have all been driving to Deb’s and then walking to Imbaseni from there. The road to Deb’s is rough. The road to the Jifundishe library… well, first off, let’s stop calling it a road. Calling it a road is giving it airs. It’s exposed rock face occasionally filled in with dirt. How we made it to the library in a car will forever be a source of mystery for me.

This is the flattest part of the road.

It took less than a minute of being here to undo all the stress and frustration of my week in Arusha. I wouldn’t call my days lazy, but definitely chill. Jifundishe recently got RACHEL-PI which is a small data hub (like a server) that contains Wikipedia for Schools, a bunch of Khan Academy resources, Farming and Husbandry documents created by a Kenyan company (so transferable to here), and many other resources which will be a definite benefit to Jifundishe as a whole. The best part is you don’t need the internet to access these resources, you just need to connect to the hub. The hub itself can be plugged in or run off of its own chargeable battery. Just in case it’s not abundantly clear, I’m pretty jazzed about this thing.

What I’m not jazzed about? It’s a lot of information but it’s not exactly user friendly. Hmm, I wonder what I, with a background as a Technical Writer and Instructional Designer, could possibly be working on while I’m here?

Not ‘toning down my sarcasm’, that’s for sure.

Because of the short duration of my stay – I’m back to Arusha on Saturday – I opted to have Frida (Free-da) cook for me instead of having to deal with getting my own food sorted. She undercooks the vegetables and overcooks the pasta and rice, but the meals are amazing. At first I was on the fence about having someone cook for me because I know that I can handle doing it myself, but that first bite of the first lunch was heavenly. She always cooks too much and it takes every ounce of restraint I have not to gorge myself on her cooking.

Lunch time!

She doesn’t speak much English but she’s very patient with my Swahili. I think she was pleasantly surprised on the first day to realise she doesn’t have to shake the coffee and tea at me when she asks “Kahawa au chai?” I also make sure that even thought it’s technically my space she is cooking in and I can just enter, I call out “Hodi” when I arrive and I wait for her to respond. This might not be her house, but she’s been here longer than I have and will continue to cook in the kitchen and clean the living space long after I’m gone. The least I can do, is show respect in our interactions.