I know you’re tired of hearing how I slept so I’ll try to end this streak on a good note. I pretty much slept like a baby last night. I took a shower before bed and I think that did the trick of cooling me down and setting the tone for the night. Also, since I took a shower before bed that took my total number of showers for the day to...(drumroll please)... 2!! I was also a champ under the mosquito net. Whew! Done with that.
At breakfast, Kim said she was on board with getting us out to Bariadi a day earlier. A couple of things about this. We had to shuffle around a few things regarding swahili lessons and had to contact the district officials to make sure he/they could pick us up but we made it work. Yay! Now we will have two full days in Bariadi before our first day bring at the school. Notice I didn’t say the first day of school. That was actually this monday, the 6th. Apparently other things take precedence over teaching/learning for the first while of each semester. She told not to expect to teach next Monday either. On another hand, Bariadi is letter away from baridi which means cold and I certainly won’t complain about some cooler weather!
Swahili lessons were quite sad today. At the beginning of the class, Mai told Amber that she was sizuri (not good). While that may not sound like an odd answer to ‘How are you?’, it is extremely rare for Tanzanians to say that. Honestly, the only answer that question for this is nzuri (good). We learned that both of her children live with her mom and that the youngest one was sick. He apparently has henia (sp? - Mai said we have it in the US? But she also said there are 26 states and Denver is one :)), which is a disease that only males get in the cold and that it attacks the liver. While I don’t know anything about the disease, her youngest son was having surgery today and she wasn’t able to be with them. Over half way into class, she received a call from her mom and immediately I knew things were not good. Her mom told her to get there immediately. Immediate is not possible when Ingringa, where her mom and children are, is 8 hours away. She was understandably upset but insisted on hiding her emotions and charging through. While she called another teacher to come, she continued to teach until our time was up while he just set behind us. Amber was extremely sweet and comforting to Mai. While terrible and definitely not unsympathetic, Kim said, “This is the life here.”
The session today was on corporal punishment, which we had discussed throughout the week, and critical thinking. Lot’s of interesting discussions there. I’ll try to get up a separate post about the highlights from our sessions. Also, lunch was by myself at the YWCA today. I had beans and greens for 1000 tsh. crazy cheap. Observation: servings here are huge, especially the rice. I also haven’t tried ugali and really have no desire to.
Our big outing of the day was terrific. Kim called her bajaj driver, Omi, and he came to take us to buy our ticket for the bus ride to Mwanza. (So, we will travel about 16 hours to Mwanza on Thursday where the District Official will pick us up and take us to a hotel. Then, the next morning they will take us to our home in Bariadi, about a 4 hour drive.) Anyways, this little journey was so neat because it got us out of the city center and let us see so much more. The bajaj was quite the experience by itself. Traffic is crazy to say the least. There hardly seem to be any traffic laws besides ‘survival of the fittest’... Darwin would be proud. Also, everyone drives so close. So imagine cars in traffic without traffic lines and with fast 3 wheeled golf carts and motorcycles weaving around, riding between cars, and on the sidewalks and thats the picture of my ride. I loved it. Omi was so funny. He got out of the bajaj once to go ask a large truck to move forward so he could cut between the traffic. Also, on a random note, we get called ‘sister’ a lot by the Tanzanian men. Like “hello, sister. hey sister. how are you?” Anyways, on the way back to the YWCA, we stopped at a pharmacy. We tried three different pharmacies yesterday and none of them had the doxycycline, the antimalarial I am taking. Actually, one pharmacy did have 50 but they would only give 7 at a time because they were also using them for treatment. We suspected there was a shortage but Kim called this pharmacy and was able to find some. So I got 200 (many more than I actually need) for 20,000tsh. Thats like 12 dollars. A little perspective... I paid 35 dollars in the states for 30. Also, regarding malaria, none of the volunteers had gotten it this year until maybe sunday when Kim got a call that one had just been diagnosed. The blood test is super simple (a finger prick) and super cheap (about 3 cents, US). She has been on the medicine since then and is already feeling good.
Dinner was at the YWCA with a few friends of Kim who work in some capacity with the Tanzanian education system. It was great to meet them and be able to pick their brains. A little swahili homework, a nice shower (nice is all relative, isn’t it?), and bed.
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