TZ Recipe #4: Cabbage and Mchicha

Ingredients: 

• 4 bunches of mchicha (like spinach… but woodsier?) 
• 400 tsh worth of cabbage (they shred it so so finely at the market with just a knife. probably about 1/3 of a cabbage) 
• 2 onions 
• 3-4 pili pili 
• 2-3 green peppers 
• 3-5 tomatoes 
• 2 little packages of ground peanuts
• rice 

Steps: 

• Start by taking the stems of the mchicha. you can do this pole pole (slowly) by ripping the leaves off of each stem. or you can take my (lazy) route and just cut enough of the stems off. 
• rinse the mchicha very very very good. it is super dirty and gritty. rinse the rest of the vegetables too. 
• chop. 
• start with some oil and an onion in each pot. 
• for the mchicha, just add the mchicha and let it cook down. when it is all wilted, add the ground nuts. smash it up and put back on the heat for just a minute. done. 

• for the cabbage, add the green pepper, tomatoes, pili pili, and cabbage. cook down. 

• cook the rice and serve it up. its practically a buffet since you get to dig food out of three pots. 
• oh and don’t forget to check out the sky while all this cooking is going on

TZ Recipe #3: Rice and Beans

Ingredients: 

• onion 
• 3-4 pili pili 
• 2 green peppers 
• 5 tomatoes 
• 2-3 carrots (however many the lady at the market gives us) 
• beans

Steps: 

• either the night before or the morning of, sort through the beans and look for any obnoxious rocks that would crack your teeth. put them in a pot and cover with water. soak until you begin cooking. 

• warning: start cooking early! its a 1.5-2 hour process. 
• so throw the beans on and let them do their thing. go read your kindle, do your push-ups, take a shower… whatever 

• come back a good while later (maybe an hour) and start getting the rest of the ingredients together. go wash them. 
• chop. chop. chop. 
• add the onions first. 
• then the carrots whenever you feel like it. 
• and the green peppers a little later. 

• and the tomatoes and pili pili last. 
• go ahead and make some rice during all of this.
• sometime during the process, go outside and enjoy the views - the sky and the beautiful sunset. 

• cook until you are either satisfied with how soft the beans are or until you are too hungry to care. 

• dig in. (maybe with harry potter on in the background)

TZ Recipe #2: Spaghetti

*** see recipe for vegetable stew. do everything exactly the same (except we don't usually add potatoes). cook spaghetti instead of rice. the end **** 

p.s. get really excited when you have traveled over 4 hours away and found black pepper, mixed herbs, and garlic powder!

TZ Recipe #1: Vegetable Stew

Ingredients: 

• 10 tomatoes 
• 2 carrots 
• 2 green peppers 
• 1 onion 
• eggplant (1, 2, or 3 depending on the size) 
• 3-4 potatoes
• 4 pili pili (hot peppers) 

Steps: 

• remove vegetables from black plastic bags or 5 gallon bucket and put in the colander. 
• go wash all the vegetables 
• chop. chop. chop. (and wish you had a sharper knife the whole time) 
• add some oil in the pan and begin to sauté the onions. 
• add in the potatoes and cook for a while

• then the eggplant or the carrot. whichever you are feeling that day. cook for a little then add the other. 
• then throw in the green peppers and let cook for a little. 

• add in all the tomatoes and cook, cook, cook. let the tomatoes break down and get all juicy for you. 

• sometime during all of this, start the process for rice. hopefully, you have already sorted it. bring some water up to boil and let boil for 2 minutes. no need to tempt typhoid to enter back in this humble abode. oil another pot and add the rice. we use about 4 handfuls for the 3 of us. add an unspecified amount of water to the rice and let it cook. put the lid on (preferably warped so it doesn't really close) and stir occasionally. taste it until it’s done and then put the lid back on and wait for the stew. 

• eat up! its the first and last real meal of the day so eat your little heart out. 
• serve with your form of entertainment. 

3/3/14 - 3/7/14

3/3/14

today was my day of rest that mahumi gave me. it really was great. i got to type up some stuff for the blog. i did a baby baby workout. and then i even walked to my get-away place of the mountain. it was a great day that actually flew by. excited to get to school tomorrow. 

there are cows everywhere! 

3/4/14 

its so good to be back at school! teachers and students were definitely glad to see me. i got so many welcomes and sorries. but also lots of welcome to tanzania or africa. i guess getting sick is some kind of initiation :) 

I walked into stream b and their wow’s just make me laugh. they way the pronounce it, it is more like ‘waow’. i also had lots of students start making some crazy noises. some of them were familiar… noises i have made before. others…. not so much. it was pretty hiilarious. 

lots and lots of math to catch up on. i felt so bad missing out on a week of my time but yolito. the students were also very quiet today. i think they were having to get used to my english again. besides my thumbs up/down measure, i asked them once to day how they were feeling. i of course meant this in regards to the problem we were doing. i got a good many fine’s (their favorite word here it seems) but i also got a clear ‘i am hungry madame’. it really is so sad. but im glad the rest of the class thought it was funny too because there was no way i couldn't laugh at that. 

kim is coming for her sight visit tomorrow! so excited to see her! since she was already in mwanza to check on amber she just moved it up a week. she is coming to observe my class on wednesday. so…. that means i just wrote my 4th lesson plan since being here. i wrote my first 3 on the first day at biashara. guess you see how tanzanian i’ve become. 

it cracks me up when the teachers horse around in the staff room. they really are still little kids at heart. they’ll throw punches or kick at each other, all in good humor. sometimes they’ll act like they are going to hit someone with a stick. something like that. 

i think i may have written about it on the blog before, but hand holding is so common here, especially among the men/boys. i always see students walking holding hands or men in town holding hands. it is totally normal and means nothing more than friendship. in fact, homosexuality is a HUGE no-no here so it definitely does not send that message. 

i think my hunger has come back and then some. its wanting to make up for lost time. its a good thing for now though! 

not that anyone is going to care, but we had fancier, softer, thicker chalk today. its the little things. 

there are also 2-3 new teachers. what the heck! monday, 24 teachers had signed the attendance book so that makes 25 with me. only 11 or 12 can teach at any given time to give you perspective. i love that they’re into it though. it really is a great sign. many of them are temporary teachers though. a headmaster is never going to say no to extra help. 

i found a new chapati place yesterday when i was coming home from my walk. some ladies get very feisty when you ask for chapati later in the day so i didn't dar go back to the last lady i asked. i stopped at a few places until i found a shop that had it. and they were so nice there (not atypical since they are getting to talk to a mzungu) and the chapati was spot on. granted i was starving but it wasn't too oily yet it was still elastic-y. i guess when you eat one everyday, you start to learn the ins and outs and rights and wrongs. 

i had a long talk with samuel richards late this morning. here are the highlights… 

• the two biggest problems 
• african people are not trustworthy 
• misallocation of funds and resources 
• he showed me a paycheck. he makes 590,000 a month. from that, 29,000 is withdrawn for retirement, 63,000 for income tax, and 17,000 for national healthcare fund. that makes his salary about 475,000 tsh a month
• he was very unhappy with the income tax. apparently the teachers union has tried to lower it. there is no such thing as filing taxes like we do 
• he was also mad at the healthcare fund because it is a ‘source of swindling’. you pay even if you do not use it. 
• i got the entire rundown  of the history of tanzania president by president. got a little sleepy during this phase. but i know that the current president kukwete is not good because he increased segregation of religion. he made muslims profit the most. the president before him was good because he convinced parents to send children back to school. 
• i also know that the presidents terms are 5 years and they can be reelected once. 
• the influx of american clothing was very good for tanzania. because it comes in bundles (lots at a time) and it was and still is very cheap. before people were walking around naked but now there are different materials to wear. 
• just like everyone else, he doesn't like bariadi
• no change is going on because of ignorance 
• the whole reason this conversation started was because he wanted me to try some of his sweet potato that he had gotten. i don't know where from but it was great. it was peeled and boiled whole and then maybe pan roasted over charcoal. sweet potato = viazi vitamu 
• also there are 120 tribes in tanzania and the sukuma (what pretty much everyone is in this area) is known for animal keeping and agriculture. 

then about 12:45 he decided he was leaving and going to the bariadi/kidinda market (nyada). when he found out i had never been her told me to go ask the headmaster for permission to go with him. mahumi, being the nicest guy ever as always, was weary because of my condition (illness) but he allowed. so we walked into town and to the bank with toga. then a chairperson of bariadi gave us a lift to the market. it was great. it was basically a huge open space with tons of cows all around. and goats too. i see these animals making their trek on the way to school each and every tuesday so it was cool to see where they were ending up. there were tents set up here and there selling food but we just walked around the open area with all the animals. samuel would ask how much the cows were. about 400,000 -600,000 for a big cow (using big loosely. it is a full grown cow but still skin and bones). about 200,000-300,000 for a small cow. these small cows are what are used for the bride groom price. another thing interesting about the cows is that it is basically another form of tanzanian currency. it is a sign of wealth and an investment. he said that if a child gets sick or something, the family will sell the cow to have money for treatment. after leaving the animal section of the market, we walked down the street for a while and stopped at a little place for a drink. still throws them off that i wont drink soda. some things never change. after we sat there for a while, we walked on some more to a different market. at this part, there were tons of the little stalls/ sticks with tarps set up. they were selling little jewelry and tanzanian local medicine, heaps of sardines, kangas, shoes, second hand clothing, etc. the local medicine was great. it was actually really colorful. powder. and the reasons for using it were great! even samuel said once, ‘madame let me make you laugh’. i made him laugh earlier about ‘mzungu price’. i told him there is ‘africa price’ and mzungu price and i always get mzungu price. anyways, we walked through the sardines and everyone (even the sardines it felt like) had their eyes on me. not that its any different than normal but i was definitely quite the sight. we went to one place where they were selling kangas and kitanges and i left with one of each. i also ran into happiness there. she is so sweet. then we walked back to bariadi town where he helped me buy some tire shoes!!! so pumped. they have been on the tz bucket list for so long. they are so not comfortable but also so awesome. they fit them to my feet (a little too tightly for one pair) but it was so neat to watch them do it all. one guy was going to work on my shoes, taking the nail out, cutting off some of the strap, nailing it back in. another guy was taking a knife and slowly stripping away the outside of a huge tractor trailer tire. i started the journey on home and mahumi rescued me about half of the way back. 

kim stopped by to visit us later that night. it really was so great to see her. a little dar reunion. she brought me a special present from the mother! i got some pictures and two cards. so stinking sweet. didn't get into the cards yet though. saving them for a special day. kim gave me a sheet for me to reflect on my teaching since she will be observing me tomorrow. tiny tiny tiny bit nervous just to have someone else in the classroom. but it holds absolutely no weight compared to my other observations. 

the internet is still not working….. i think my lucky internet bundle has just finally given up on me. oh well! it was great!!!! while it lasted. 

i really need to buy my plane tickets and book my hostels for spring break. it just needs to be crossed off the list. i am so so excited to get traveling again. just need march to get on outta here! ill throw up an itinerary soon for spring break 

3/5/14 

today was ash wednesday. it was really neat this morning on the way to school. tons of students from bariadi were waling on the road toward town and mahumi said it was for church. biashara did nothing like that but they did out the sports award this morning. the forms had been competing against each other for the past few weeks and the winner was form 4. so they got …. GOATS! it was so amusing. they were presented at morning parade. i have to give some credit though because they did also receive a trophy. the whole form was presented the goats and they will have a big celebration and eat them soon. but individual awards were also give. the male and female player with the most goals and the best player all good 5,000. the best goal keeper also got they money. by far, the best morning parade. the students were so cute when they got the award. a couple guys got the trophy and kissed it and help it up. and the goats were always there, struggling to get away and such. 

kims coming today and theres seriously been like no prep for her. yolito for sure. no grade, no cares. no need to impress, just be me. 

oh! so amber let me use her internet this morning since mine is still not working and i finally got to see more pictures of katies little one!! so so so great

on a random note, there is no concept of littering here. i still get hives sometimes. but since there is no trash can basically everywhere is a trash can. with that said, there are places along the roads that people bring their trash too. it is just trash all spread out in the general. that is a favorite place for dogs, birds of arabia, and chickens/roosters. and i dont want to go stereotypical on you, but i have seen people going through the trash but only two or three times. 

kims observation was fine but definitely not uneventful. right before the class, madame eva told me that as the head matron of the school she had decided and announced yesterday that there would be a meeting for all the girls of the school to discuss things like behavior, uniform, relationships (a definite no-no in school), and early pregnancy (which you get kicked out for). so that meant that all girls would be taken out of my class that kim was observing. we were both fine with it and thought that was the end of it. well we went to class and i introduced her to the students. then kingi walked in and told me that they were combining streams… for just this second. haha. basically, they wanted more students in the class when kim was there so maybe about 25-30 students started filing in my class. they were from stream a so at least they were in my classes. so just carrying a chair and no notebook or pen, they filled up the room. the class was good, but rusty, since that was the first time i had seen them in a while. kim said that my slow, very enunciated english was natural, which is difficult for many volunteers. we had a good talk after about a little bit of everything. 

then kim caught a piki piki or boda boda to town. she was going to stop for lunch and then go to her hotel before coming over for dinner. i walked and bought an ear of corn (mahendi) along the way. i stopped in and grabbed a bottle of water while we talked a little more. when i got back to the house, i cut the pineapple i had brought from mwanza and went to town on that. it was a little old/ sour but still good. oh i also stopped at shops until i found the airtel vouchers on the way home so i could experiment with my internet problem. i got it to work so now i just need to buy enough vouchers tomorrow to buy the bundle. i got to facetime mom for a couple minutes before i ditched her to talk to katie! :) it had been way too long since i talked to her so it was awesome. Skype was failing again so she could hear and see me but i could only see her - not hear her. so i just talked the whole time. she would type in questions every now and then when our charades wouldn't get us there. this whole situation is hilarious considering not talking is her personal nightmare and having to talk forever is mine! either way it was great to see her! 

dinner was veggie stew with kim was we debated (and criticized) the education system in tanzania. 

3/6/14

slept so solidly last night. woke up in time for curiosity to get the best of me and for me to get into one of the cards mom sent. so awesome

the first conversation of the morning was a good natured talk about me staying in tanzania and finding a husband here. it started with finding a husband in tanzania and then one at biashara. we all know where it was going from there. anyways, i told them that my husband is not in tanzania. 

did 2 sudoku puzzles this morning and just journalled my little heart away. no periods this morning so lots of down time. 

i even tried to take a free period this afternoon and another teacher had already stolen it. im telling you, they are on top of it! 

the mother of a headmaster in the district died so mahumi filled up his car with teachers and went off to greet them and escort the body. they were gone all morning and returned to be sitting on the ground on the porch of the administrative building doing a crossword puzzle. they all thought it was hilarious and couldn't understand why i didn't have a chair. it was a nice day, i was bored, and i just needed a change of scenery. i just told mahumi that i was relaxing and he loved it. how many times would you tell you boss at home that you were just chilling out, enjoying the day, not doing any work? and how many times would he praise you for it and tell you to keep doing it until the end of the day? 

mahumi came back out a little bit later and said that he was leaving early. so i caught a ride with him into town. i went to many different stores in town until i could find the airtel vouchers for the internet. and still wasn't successful finding big bottles of water. walked the rest of the way home and had some drama loading the time for the internet but i finally got it to work! i got to see all the latest nursery stuff and i LOVE it! 

i also got to buy the rest of my flights. i seriously hate buying flights because its so stressful but i got it all done so that was nice. after shelving the internet, i got a good sweaty workout in and then a magical shower. 

spaghetti was dinner with kim again and then it was bedtime. i slept beyond terribly. felt simultaneously tired and wide awake. good thing the weekend is here. 

3/7/14 

it was really just a crazy day at school today. just general excitement. there was going to be a party after school to welcome the form 1 students into scouts. so of course the students were busy slaughtering goats on the rock. now that was not an experience i was going to miss out on! so as covertly as possible, i snuck out of the staff room with my camera to go check it out! due to the absence of goat squeals i knew i had made it past the killing. i walked past the academic master to go out there and i told him i was going to go see. and he said ah those students are doing sin. s - i - n. as he drew it in the dirt with a stick. hahaha. they were all so proud. posing for the camera. grabbing the goats head or leg for me to take the picture. it was certainly not their first rodeo. they knew what they were doing, using the rock to sharpen the knife every now and then. 

it was also a different day in class. after spending 30 - 40 minutes on one problem (graphing a step function, domain and range, evaluating at different x values - definitely not easy), i knew my class was quite split. i had some students that had it together and some that were beyond clueless. i explained explained explained but then i told them that i needed a student to come up and explain it to the class - in swahili. it took much much long than i thought but i loved it. it is so interesting to see how they talk to each other. one student started then i guess he got overthrown and another student came up and started all over. he was so sweet and he was trying so hard. he would come to me (a student had brought me a chair to sit in at the front) and ask me questions real quietly. he would look over at me and i would give him little encouraging nods along the way. 

i still didn't get to see stream a all week! so now thats two weeks with math! ugh! i feel awful but i didn't have a period and couldn't get to them. 

they take titles here so so seriously. because of this, their approaches to many conversations or proposals are so formal. ‘madame eliza, as the teacher on duty this week, i was hoping you could give us teachers a message…’. they like chairperson, teacher on duty (tod), head matron, academic master, disciple master, department head, etc. 

speak of tod, samual called me over this afternoon and told me that i was going to be tod with him starting on the 24th - the week after need. mmmmmkay. i know i will probably disappoint but im still not going to use the stick. the tod is responsible for ensuring that students get to school on time, stay quiet during the day, they do the morning parade, students have to get excused from the tod to leave, complete the daily report for the headmaster, and i dont know what else. all i know is that samuel is going to have to do a lot of work! i also know that that sentence was a mess but dont really care. 

my last random note is that there are tons of funny t shirts here. and i would say that 97% of the time, the person wearing the shirt has no clue what the shirt says or means… which only makes it better. 

2/23/14 - 3/3/14

full disclaimer: do not feel obliged to read the following blog entry. i am just putting it on here because it happened but now its over. and theres certainly lots of tmi below! it was definitely not a fun week but now i feel great. anddddd i even got to have a great weekend in mwanza! moral or the story: i was sick but am completely fine now. 

felt fine most of the day sunday. had a great facetime with mom in the afternoon. talked about the cruise and decided it would be best to do it another time. pretty pumped! that means i get to come home earlier. home. sweet. sweet. home. as soon as i hung up with her i went in to help prepare dinner. it hit me out of the middle of nowhere but i was cutting the peppers and realized that i felt horrendous. so i left the rest of the cooking to nick and went to lay in bed. my whole body starting aching. it hurt to lie in bed. it hurt to do anything. and i had the chills. eventually, a little after 8, i got up with indigestion and quickly found myself vomitting out the back gate in the courtyard. after two good hurls, i was still far from feeling good. the indigestion and constant burping and frequent attempts to throw up continued for over 3 hours. i was only successful 3 more times but man my stomach was tore up! and i was completely wiped out. amber was so so nice. unbelievably so. she staying outside with me pretty much the whole time, praying for me and humming songs for me. at one point we had to move the party into the shower because it started raining pretty good. to try to put a little something back into my stomach and hopefully neutralize some of the acid, i ate half a banana and 3 shortbread cookies that i had brought home from the Serengeti. sleep that night was rough as the burping wouldn't leave me alone for too long. 

amber texted mahumi monday morning and told him i was ill and would not be going to school that day. i definitely needed the day to rest. and thats pretty much what i tried to do all day. food still sounded pretty repulsive. in fact, i made them put up the dinner (spaghetti) because it smelled so awful to me last night. i tried to eat what i could. bananas are the easiest thing to get down and peanut butter actually sounds disgusting for once in my life. i thought i was doing better until dinner time came again. it was beans tonight and i managed to put a relatively good portion down the pipe. overall, i was still just really not feeling well. just very tired and sore. indigestion was still there and the stomach was not happy. also the intake of water was down, though i still suffered through. i was also pooping what was pretty much just a black/ dark green liquid. 

tuesday morning, i woke up to get ready for school. i was exhausted and had head and ear aches. so when mahumi subtly offered another day of rest, i couldn’t deny it. he offered to take me to the hospital, but feeling like i was almost over it, i declined. by now, amber was also not feeling well. all along, i thought it was just food poisoning from our saturday adventure of eating out or maybe the apples we got. it was another relaxing day, i guess. i laid in bed and planned what all i want to do in victoria falls and cape town. i listened to les mis. and read a book. amber and i had a little spurt of productivity which involved organizing the kitchen area. and i also looked and found some recipes we want to try… if we can get nick on board. we must change up the meals some. mahumi stopped by the house on the way home from school, about 5:00. so very nice of him. so i thought i was feeling much better until again i went to help cut up some vegetables for dinner. i cut the peppers and immediately felt awful again. my arms, my wrists, my whole body hurt. i got in bed. and then i called mahumi. i asked him if he could take me to the hospital. to clear the mind, i wanted to get tested for malaria since i had had most of the symptoms and had been going up and down and up and down in regards to how i felt. well amber decided she would go to the doctor too and so we had a nice little adventure at about 6:45. and. what. an. adventure. if i didn't feel so terribly, i would have enjoyed it more. but anyways, we walk in and mahumi wanders around for a while to find someone. then we sit on these benches outside a door and wait for a few minutes. no concept of line + white privilege meant that we went in before the other guy that was already there. so we talked to the doctor, claire. she gave us a registration card with a number and took down our names, ages, and symptoms. she decided to check for malaria and also to check out urine. there were no basic tests- no blood pressure, no temperature. the three of us just sat at a desk together and talked. she commented on how young we were. and she told us to come visit her at her home. i say ‘okay’. and she said, ‘no not okay’. basically she was telling us we had too. anyways, we then went to the lab. the lab tech, if you can call him that, was sitting out on the front porch with jeans and a chelsea jersey on. he came in with us and did the quick little test for malaria, a finger prick, and then gave us these tiny little jars to collect urine in. they were maybe 1.5 or 2 inches tall and had, if i am being generous, a 1/2 inch opening to collect urine. well he showed us to the bathroom and discovered that there was no electricity working in there. then he got mahumi’s phone to show us the flashlight. so i took out my handy dandy nokia phone, turned on the flashlight, grabbed my tiny jar, and prayed for some success. interesting to say the least. inafurahisha. they tested that and told me the malaria was negative and the macro and micro for the urine was nil. so test wise, everything was okay. so we went back to claire and she basically asked us what we wanted to do/ what medicine we wanted. i ended up with 4 prescriptions. basically, a kind of cure all antibiotic that might get anything we have and also antimalarials just in case some of the tylenol or advil was masking it. so we went to the pharmacy and she gave us three of the four prescriptions for 2,300tsh. then we drove into somanda where we got the other prescription, the main antibiotic, for 6,000tsh. we came home and tried to eat some of the little bit of mchicha and rice that nick left for us before going to bed so we could take the assortment of medicine we got. so back to my symptoms, food is disgusting to me. as is water. because my stomach hurts. it is constantly bloated even though i have eaten very little food. but every time i do eat or drink water i have to burp for a while. it was rough to go to sleep but once i did (aka after i burped all i could and tried to ignore the constant stomach pains) i slept pretty well. 

wednesday morning, i woke up pretty late. i heard mahumi say hodi and make his way into the house. i got up and got all my meds and ate some oatmeal. still stuffed and bloated and burping at the little bit of food that i put in me. body is not aching like it did last night. just mainly the stomach right now. still pretty nauseous, especially when i get a whiff of some food. i still get the urge to throw up occasionally but i try to keep it in. i don't want to lose the food or the medication i was able to get down. really hoping that by tonight i will be feeling better and especially by thursday night. there is no denying it, the sickness is definitely taking a toll on the emotions. we have a long month ahead of us in march and just need it to hurry up and pass. never have i wanted time to go by so quickly. never have i wanted to feel better so badly. it is just not comforting not to know what is wrong with you, not to have the comforts of mom and knowledgeable doctors, not to have access to plain food or easy access to any food for that matter. i will definitely have a renewed appreciation for health after this. 

** above was written on the 26th…. mid sickness. I will now detail the next few days on 3/3- almost certainly with a much more positive outlook since I am feeling soooo much better now. 

wednesday continued the up and down pattern of my illness. i thought i had been doing better but dinner was still tortuous. i asked nick to get me basically a ramen noodle packet from the corner supermarket so i forced some of that down. not fun. and still like a baby.. i basically burped myself to sleep. sitting up, laying down, rolling up, sitting up, … 

Thursday held another adventure for us. It marked the first day that I thought i was actually feeling better. however, still far from well and amber still pretty bad. we had been keeping kim informed and with her help we got mr sana involved. he brought over a doctor, the medical doctor in charge at the somanda hospital. I actually wanted to go to the private doctor in bariadi/ simiyu but i guess if we were going to go back to the somanda hospital we had the best case scenario with Dr. Diana. dr. diana actually made a house call for us. her and sana came over and we talked to her about what was going on. she went to our bathroom and told us how we needed to clean it. anyways, she thought we warranted another visit to the hospital for some more testing. again, amber was doing pretty bad and i was feeling better but i tried not to talk about that too much in case i was just having an up before another down. well she decided that she wanted to test us for malaria (again) and typhoid. these are both blood tests. the malaria test they did the first time was the short test and gives pretty much immediate results. this time she wanted to do a long one. also, at kims suggestion, i asked her if we could get tested for amoebas. So, we went to the lab, where it was packed! it was so sad to see so many people in there. ambers second headmaster mr mayuganya came with us this time and he was sure to get us seen and tested very quickly. all along i was saying that if i wasn't feeling so shitty i would really be enjoying these visits to the hospital just to see how everything is done. and so since i was feeling better today i did enjoy it a little more. i just really appreciate how basic their supplies and methods are but they get the job done just the same. now, with that said, you can be darn sure that i was watching for every single needle to be pulled out of a package. aint nobody got time for that shit. but anyways, back to the basics… they needed to draw blood. so to constrict the blood, in america you would get a blue rectangular rubber strip. in tanzania, i got a plastic glove. job well done. in america to draw blood, they would put the little port in your arm (at your elbow) and then screw the test tube container on to collect blood. in tanzania, they look for the best vein (amber has good ones in her elbow so they did hers there but mine are tiny so they use the top of my hand) and then they just use a syringe. after they get the blood in the syringe, they stick the needle into the test tube and squeeze it in there. again, different but job well done. then, comes the amoeba test. i guess i should mention that it requires a stool sample. so, i heard the lab techs and mr mayuganya talking and laughing and i knew it was about the stool sample. so smiling, he told us that they were out of containers for the specimens and that mayuganya would have to go get a match box for us to put it in. then the male lab tech said welcome to tanzania! hahaha. so mayuganya left and returned a minute later with two  matchboxes for us, each with two matches left in them - the pooper scoopers of course. the test for amoebas is a quick one. that is, if you are able to give them something to test. since i dont think i had pooped since monday, there was no way that i was going to be able to go on demand. so, thursday, i left without any results. we finally made it back to our house and it was the first time that i was hungry. actually pretty starving. i took that as great news! i had eaten 2 bananas for breakfast around 7 and by 2 i was wanting some food. so jonah came by and he offered to grab us some food. i wanted two chapati, craving them after not being at school all week, but he returned with one. amber was eating with me too and she also wanted more so she called felix and asked him to send a student to the house so we could send him to the market to get us some more food. now i know this sounds awful. i know. but amber said that the students love doing it. then, trying to make ourselves feel better we came up with a litany of reasons for why it was a good thing for him. he had to practice his english with us, and in the context of a transaction. he was on break so he wasn't missing any class (not that that would have really mattered). i was face timing mom when he returned so he got to talk to her and see the technology. and we even gave him a little thank you tip (not that that was necessary or expected). anyways, we got more food and it was great. amber was still doing poorly this afternoon so i called dr diana and she came back over to check on her. we had dinner, which was unfortunately another not fun experience. after dinenr, we decided, after much debate all afternoon of going tonight or in the morning, to go to the hospital for amber to get an iv drip of fluids. she was incredibly dehydrated. so after many more interesting experiences and some disgusting sheets that oscar and nick had to go home to change, amber and i spent the night in the hospital. we were in a room with one other person. i stayed up most all of the night. i was sitting in a chair reading a book. i would go out and walk around. i would check out the sky - it was absolutely beautiful that night. however, i was also burping ALL night long. it was pretty miserable. tonight was one of the times that it really hit me that we are living in a developing country. anyways, i finally climbed into bed with amber around 4 and slept until about 6. 

So, thursday night and friday morning was spent plotting with the help of kim how we can get a ride to mwanza to see another doctor. that morning, i was also finally able to get a stool sample for the amoeba test. so i took that to the lab, and without any orders in sight, i convinced them to do the test for me and do it then. so i waited for the results and he came back to tell me they were negative. but he did tell me that a nurse had already picked up our test results from yesterday but he remembered that i had typhoid with a ratio of 1:160 where 1:80 is the borderline. so he said, i had it bad. it was a while more of waiting, of doctors coming in and out and questioning why we wanted to go to mwanza, before we finally were able to get out of there. leaving with two guys from the district education office, dr diana, and a car full of other people that we picked up and dropped of along the way, we headed to mwanza. the driver dropped us off at a doctor that kim had picked and just like that we were at a nice doctors office and alone. we were in awe of the nice facilities and the treatment we got. now, folks, its all relative but by tanzanian standards it was great. they redid all of our tests and confirmed that i did have typhoid. so medicine in hand and confidence that it was indeed the correct diagnosis we left. now, all day friday i had been feeling completely fine. so it was a little odd to just get diagnosed with something when i was just feeling fine for the first time in 5 days. i also hate that i had to be diagnosed with such a scary name - typhoid. HATE! i have looked up some of the symptoms and don't feel like i even had all of them and i promise it wasn't terrible. but i hate the name for it being so scary to the mother and all the family and friends at home. anyways, we called a taxi driver abel, and he took us to our hostel and then to kuleana pizzeria. we got a delicious pizza, maybe a questionable first real food for the digestive system, and it was great. it had spinach, tomatoes, garlic, oregano, basil, and the ever elusive cheese! we also sat at a table with two other gentlemen and they were fun. we went back to the hostel and i caught up with mom, katie, and sam! it was so fun to be able to talk to them all at once. then i tried to get some sleep. after not sleeping the night before, i thought it would be a piece of cake. but i swear tanzania is the country of people who never sleep and staying in the city center of the 3rd largest city in tanzania didn’t have the same plan for me. the music was turned off about 4:30 but the talking and moving around was constant. either way, i was still grateful to still be feeling normal and lying in a bed. 

saturday morning, i finally got up and got some breakfast. the highlights were the pineapple (so sweet!), hard boiled eggs, and potatoes from a meat soup. i stayed down there for a while, just enjoying the morning, reading my book, and listening to the funny hodgepodge of stuff that came on the tv. then, i came back upstairs and talked to mom for over an hour - in the middle of the night for her. and eventually i made it out on the streets. i just wanted to walk around mwanza and get a feel for the city. i made countless ‘friends’ along the way and bought a few tiny souvenirs. oh and i found garlic powder and mixed herbs!!! so so excited!! then i called abel and had him take me to the bus stand to buy a ticket to return to bariadi on sunday and then to hotel tilapia. im telling you…. hotel tilapia = paradise. it was ridiculous. i had to sit there for a while just to take it all in. it sat overlooking lake victoria, with 3 different places to eat, a bar, a swimming pool, and a refreshing breeze. i ordered vegetable pasta. it had broccoli!!! in it and cheese!!! on top. it was a pretty large plate and slowly but surely i conquered the whole thing! i got to use my phone for the first time in two months. using viber, i talked with my mom for over an hour. i still think i have only charged it 3 times since i have left. then i got to facetime a few people. first i talked to craig, kathy, and tanner. and then goober. it was so great to talk to all of them! it had been way too long! i was also able to get the video chat on google to work to talked to dad too. before i knew it, it was getting dark and over 4 hours had passed. such. a. good. day. unfortunately, sleep was just as rough saturday night. they were nice enough to turn the music off at 6:15 in the morning. oh well, nothing could have put a damper on my saturday. 

sunday morning was just a repeat of saturday. breakfast and reading. then, abel came and picked me up and took me again to the bus stand. i was there nearly 45 minutes early and the bus left an hour ad 15 minutes left. yolito. while waiting, i bought a pineapple, a pear, and a handful of bananas to bring back with me. and i refused countless offers from everyone walking around wanting me to buy something from them. it really is customer service at its finest… if it wasn't so annoying. just sit there and people will come by the window and onto the bus with everything imaginable. the ride was uneventful and the bus was nicer than the one we took from dar. at one stop, i bought two ears of corn so that was exciting. i worked on one ear on the way home, pulling off one kernel at a time. the second, i just finished while typing this up. i straightened up my room when i got back to the house and took a well overdue shower. mom called verizon and got her phone to work so that she could call my tanzanian phone so we chatted on that for a little. pretty awesome. i sent a sms to mahumi telling him i was back in bariadi and ready to go to school tomorrow but he told me he thought that i needed another day of rest and he would pick me up Tuesday. welllll, okay. mahumi is such a gem. i am beyond thankful to have him as my headmaster. i couldn't ever stress that enough! nick and i had leftover spaghetti for dinner - with garlic powder and herbs!!!! then, i crawled in bed to read and call it a night… in my own bed for the first time in 3 restless nights!