Fat German Lady Steals Coral Reef and Wreaks Havoc

The six of us left Arusha for Zanzibar via Dar es Salaam on July 16. After staying out all night at Maasai Camp just having fun (on a Tuesday?!), we were up at 4:30 so we could grab a cab to the Dar Express office. We had to report by 5:30 for our 6 AM bus. We're sitting forever on the bus, so Meg and Peery decided to run into a duka (shop) and get some snacks. Without warning, the bus starts driving away! Sana, Mara, Adam, and I all start yelling at the bus driver to stop. He does, but Meg and Peery have to sprint to catch us before he starts driving again.

After 10 hours on the bus (some sleeping, eating, bottles of soda (on the bus?!), and watching weird Nigerian love films before switching to one of our bootlegged DVDs), we arrive at the Dar port to Zanzibar. We are literally the last people to get on the 4 PM ferry (last one out for the day) and there are no seats. But we find a way upstairs and outside and lean on the deck, watching the land go by. We watch the sunset on the boat. The 1.5 hour ride is actually 3 hours, don't let them fool you. Then we have to go through a little immigration stand, but since we all have residence permits and are considered residents we didn't have to bother. Then we take a van to Bandari Lodge, where the rooms are huge but boiling out. The lodge is also in the slums of Stone Town, Zanzibar and it smells like fish and shit. Mara termed it Shitmaki (simaki means fish in Swahili).

For dinner we head to Mercury's. Supposed to be a great restaurant. It's not. We paid too much for too little food. And it wasn't even that good. The others smoked some hooka, I passed out on the table (a recurring theme for the rest of the week). Then we headed back to the lodge.

The next day, Thursday, we walked around Stone Town, saw some sights, did some shopping, followed some random rasta guy through the alley-like streets of Stone Town (it looks a lot like an old European city...). Then we get a van to take us up to the north end of the island. We had booked a room at Kendwa Rocks, on the Kendwa beach. We told them we would be coming late at night. Little did we know what kind of trip ours would turn into once we arrived at Kendwa...

We spent two hours arguing with reception. They tried to charge us more than they had originally said, tried to tell us they were out of rooms. Bullshit. They wouldn't let us all stay in one quad, so he gave us a "deal" and gave us two quads, one for the price of a double--we were supposed to only let two people in this room. That one of course turns out to be the ballin' room on the second floor of a bungalow: the one we had originally booked. Of course. We all snuck in that one and slept because the other quad was terrible.

The stress of the long day, the ride to the north, and the fight at reception meant, of course, that we must have then headed for the bar and proceeded to drink until I passed out on the table (see, recurring), Mara fell out of a hammock, and Peery was asleep who-knows-where on the beach. We may have spent a few hours chasing crabs and sitting in an old boat/restaurant that is now shipwrecked on the beach.

The next day, the breakfast took forever, but was surprising delicious. We got kicked out of our room at 10:30 (check-out was 10) because someone needed it. The guy said we were just sleeping in because we were tired (very patronizing) and I said, no, it took you an hour and a half to get us our breakfast. It's your fault. It's okay, we paid them back. We couldn't find the lock for one of the rooms. Turns up two days later in Peery's bag... Who knew?

We stayed the next night at Sunset Bungalows. Slightly more expensive but we got a fantastic bungalow on the beach (what we wanted in the first place) and we had our own bathroom and shower and the beds were actually big enough for two of us to sleep in (because of course we put 6 people in a room for 3).

We spent the day laying out on the beach, swimming in the Indian Ocean, and going on a rough snorkel trip. We got smoothies, food, cocktails, beers. Lovely day. At night we grabbed dinner, showered, and then met a huge group of mostly Europeans who are teaching English on Zanzibar. Awkward. When everyone had a party but us knows each other, it gets less fun. So instead we went skinny dipping in the ocean. Best idea ever.

Meg, Sana, Mara, Peery, Adam, and I left the next day. We had run into another part of our group, but they were staying longer. We had to get back to get Sana on her plane home. It was sad to start seeing everyone leave. We spent some time at Zanzibar Serena Inn (high class). The coffee there was fantastic and we got kicked out for laying by the pool. Peery, Mara, and Adam went to a Reggae party that night, but Meg and I were grandmas and went back to our hostel (Flamingo). We all had to come back separately anyway because the staff were sticklers for having too many people in the room and we were again doing 5 people in a triple.

The next day we sent Mara off with Carolyn. Also sad. Then Adam, Meg, Peery, and I spent the day walking around and watching the sunset at Tembo Hotel. We laid out on the beach then got some gelati. After we went to dinner outside of Africa House. There is a food market there and they have the best fresh seafood and Zanzibar pizzas. We went there every night we were in Stone Town and made friends with the locals.

Meg, Peery, and Adam left on Monday for Dar so they could catch their flights home. I spend the day with Sara and we walked around and did some shopping. We found the amazing coffee they have at Serena, so I bought tons. Duh. Mainly because I don't have room to carry it.

Hannah, Kara, and I hung out with some of the Maasai men that sell jewelry at the food market. They were hilarious. Melubo would randomly break out into Maasai singing and dancing while sitting next to me. Insane. We kept the night short, because Isaac started trying to get Hannah to come with him to the beach. Not down for that. It was a fun night, though.

Sara and I left for the Zanzibar airport on the 21st. Hannah and Kara headed for Dar the same day. We were the last people to leave, me the very last. The Zanzibar airport is also bootlegged. Precision Air gave us the sketchiest tickets ever. Don't worry, I kept it for memories. The flight to Dar was about 10 minutes long--biggest waste of fuel ever. I also thought I was going to die the whole time. Most people in TZ don't have driver's licenses but still are allowed to drive, so I was wondering about the pilots...

We made a transfer in the Dar airport for our flight to Kili. I had to put my bags about 10 rows away from my seat so had to wait for everyone to get off the plane before I could get them. Then my bag arrived and a strap was broken and I was missing the bungee that connected my two bags. Fantastic. All the experiences of the day made me really dislike Tanzania and I can't wait to get home. Because then Sara and I had to rush to say goodbye so I could catch the Precision Air shuttle to Arusha. It turned out to be full. WTF. Fortunately, I was able to get a taxi for 20,000 Tsh (about $15) instead of 50,000 Tsh.

I paid extra money to stay at a nice hotel last night--Impala Hotel. I needed a place to relax by myself and not stress about finding food. It was dark by the time I got to Arusha, so I couldn't really walk around with all my stuff and find the hostel I was originally planning to get. But I got a nice hot shower at Impala and some good buttered dal for dinner. Delicious. Then I turned on some BBC in my room so I could feel at home and not alone listening to Western folk talk again. Can't wait to get back home. Even Amsterdam will be nice, because they have things like customer service in Europe that they just don't have in Africa.

Today I head for Nairobi (because of course my 6AM flight on July 23 was cancelled so I couldn't make my 8:40 Nairobi-Amsterdam flight). I get in in the evening and have a shuttle going to a hostel that comes highly recommended by my organization. I'll be paying everything in dollars (including the $50 I now have to spend on a visa) because it's a waste to exchange to Kenyan shillings. Then I'll head to the airport on the morning of the 23rd and leave for Amsterdam. Everything will be wonderful once I am on that flight. I don't think I've ever looked forward to anything more.

Well, I'll do a final sign off for the summer once I arrive back in the good ol' United States. There've been good and bad things about this trip, but overall it's been fantastic. I'm lucky to have come here. Stay tuned for a few final entries!!

Today We Leave Our Homestays

Our last week in Babati went by so quickly. I can't even remember most of what we did. We had four days of teaching and Friday, Saturday, and Sunday were our community days. Our teaching was pretty normal. We went to our school on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. We tried to do our community teachings, but no one showed up to any of them. We actually had a lot more down time than expected.

The Ward Executive Officer for Maisaka B is named Ernest. He helped set up our community teachings. He's also very creepy. He's short and stout. He has really soft hands, which always creeps me out, especially when we're in Africa. Aren't you supposed to be doing some sort of physical work? Plus, he likes to hold my hand much longer than necessary. He doesn't do this with anyone else. He stares. All-around creep. I voiced my thoughts to Frank one day, who then decided to offer me to Ernest as his second wife. Last time I ever do that.

We also did some shopping this week. Got plenty of fabric to give away as gifts. Or keep for myself. Haven't quite decided yet. ;) I tried to get a dress fixed that I had made the first week. It was too big around the very top and around my stomach, but fit everywhere else. I told the tailor what I wanted and got the dress back a few days later. Still loose around the stomach, now too tight on my boobs. I can't even zip it up. Wonderful. So I didn't get anything else made. But we had a good time meeting up with other groups in town and buying fabrics and deciding what we were going to do with them.

Community days were long. We set up on a big field and had testing and volleyball and soccer tournaments. Each group taught for one hour if anyone had questions. We just hung out all day and answered questions and brought people to testing. Mara, Meg, Sana, Peery, and I were regulars at New First & Last Bar, where we ordered our favorite dish: chips mayai (a fry omelette). Don't you worry, I will be making those for everyone at home to try. We smother them in salt and ketchup and chili sauce. Delicious. On Sunday, Mara and I had to eat at home because our mama got offended that we weren't eating lunch. Boo. I got chips mayai anyway. Meg came for lunch that day and we had TONS of potatoes. She got to experience what Mara and I experience everyday. Then I went back to First & Last and got chips mayai.

We got about 300 people tested every day over the weekend. We almost beat the SIC record of 2400. We only needed about 100 more people and we were going to get that on Monday because we were going to test the prison. But then our counselors decided they didn't want to work, so we couldn't test the prison. This happens all the time. When my group did testing, our counselor just decided to stop working an hour before our testing day was over. Frustrating! Oh well. We still got tons of people tested and we are very satisfied with the work we did.

Monday we just did some packing. We cleaned up our room and gave our mama our empty water bottles and passed along some gifts. We had our last cassava night with everyone. Loads of fun. We had rice and beans--our favorite meal! We took pictures with our family and took pictures of the house. We tried to get our last chips mayai in the morning (mid-morning snack, see). Two hours later and still no chips mayai. So we left and went to lunch at our house. Then I went back later with Meg to eat some chips mayai. Best decision ever.

This morning we said goodbye to our family, to Frank and Jarrod's family. Then we have to run some errands and head to a meeting. Mara and I both got the Campus Development Coordinator positions at our respective schools for next year. This means we're in charge of getting SIC known on our campuses and recruiting people for next summer. Hopefully I am successful at this. I thought it would be a good thing to try. But we have a meeting before we leave on when to start recruiting people and such.

Then we head out for Arusha and closing dinner. A bunch of us are planning to get our legs waxed for Zanzibar. We're going to the Burger Stand for a last bite and then out to a Chinese restaurant for our closing dinner. It's sad that we're all going separate ways now. Some of us are leaving tomorrow morning for Zanzibar, so it's a quick goodbye. But it's been fun!

I'll update on the goings-on in Zanzibar when we get there. We're planning to get a bungalow on the beach for the first couple of nights while there are tons of people to split the cost. We are planning on snorkeling, visiting Stone Town, shopping for gifts, and more.

Just take the chapati and run!

It's been a difficult first week back from break. We've had some group issues and everyone is tense and stressed out.

On top of that, our mama has decided to cook us even worse food. We now eat oil and potatoes for lunch and dinner every other day. Not fun. Or even remotely delicious. I don't think she likes us anymore...

As I've said, our homestay has two cats. One pretty little orange thing. One disgusting inbred thing, which currently either has a tumor on its balls or is losing one of them. Not sure which. It's pretty gross. This second cat is the subject of my story. Our family is trying to kill him. Probably because of the growth or whatever it is. But I came out of the choo one day to find our baba holding a bag and this other random man in our house holding the cat (Inbreed, we call him) by the scruff of the neck and trying to put him in the back. They got him half-way in the bag, but Inbreed took off. Baba kicked him, trying to step on him to stop him. This is probably one of the most disturbing things I've seen. Then Mara said, "They're going to put a rock in that bag and drown him." This is probably 100% true. But it's very upsetting. Kind of makes me now want to live with my family. I mean, in the States, Inbreed probably wouldn't have that growth. It doesn't appear to hurt him or anything. But our family is going to kill him.

Now for some bright moments in the week! Since our mama makes us such bad food, we steal all the good food we can get. One day she made us chapati, avocado, beans, and greens for lunch. What a feast! I felt like we'd never seen such luxuries before! Mara and I stuffed our faces. Then we had some leftover chapati that we were going to take to our room and store in sandwich bags. Just as we're about to take them, our entire family comes into the living room. Damn. We're stuck. Can't run just yet. So we sit back down at the table to wait. Our mama starts coming over to clear the table. No!! So I grab for the chapati like I'm going to get more. She leaves. Phew! (Wipe sweat from brow.) I keep my hand on the chapati and watch out of the corner of my eye, over my shoulder, until she leaves the room. Then I take the chapati, grab Mara's water bottle, and run for it! I hide the chapati from our baba, who's sitting the room. I have to spin away from Leila, who currently has ring worm (we do our best to treat her like she has the plague; we're nice that way), jump over the half-wall in our courtyard and sprint to the room. Mara has decided I have no heat tolerance (since I can't drink or eat anything hot--temperature or otherwise), and I am currently burning my fingers on the chapati. We get in the room and finally toss the chapati in a ziploc. Then we proceed to eat nutella on the warm chapati so the nutella melts. We're stuffed already, but it's probably the best decision we've ever made. Then we lay back and pat our stomachs, satisfied with the day's work.

We also had our testing day on July 4. We set up in the market in the middle of one of our districts: Babati Mjini. Some problems with the group. Usual, not at all surprising. Throughout the day, we walked around and got people to come. In the end, we got 148 people! I hear that's a good number for in town, because there are always tests in town. In fact, the goverment had a test just a few days before. So we did awesome. We hit a rough patch when one of our counselors/doctors decided she wasn't going to work anymore (she was tired, see) and turned away about 10 people. Not okay. We had to get the higher-ups involved. In the end, it worked out well.

We also set up a party at Royal Beach (a restaurant on the lake). There was dancing, 4th of July cake, and fun! The Tanzanians and non-Americans actually spent more time at the party than we did! Crazy. We left about midnight, but I hear afterward, people started dancing and waving fish. I'm not entirely sure what happened; I've only heard bits and pieces of the story. But it sounds like it was a good time. Daniel, our VP coordinator, is from New Zealand or Australia (can't remember where he said), but he said he's going to celebrate America's independence day every year!

Like I said, it was a tense week for our group, but we managed to have a good time in the end. Today was our day off. Mara and I did laundry until one of our mamas took our clothes from us and did them herself. I'd like to say I felt bad about it but... I had a lot of clothes to wash. ;)

Okay, off to another cassava night and hopefully some delicious dinner. We had rice, beans, greens, and bananas for lunch (one of our favorite meals). Usually what we have for lunch is what we have for dinner, so cross your fingers!!

"Your momma's so fat, she made the Big Five the Big Six!"

The safari was an adventure.

We got up at 6:45 so we had time to grab breakfast. Everyone was supposed to meet at our hostel at 8:30 to get the safari cars. We were packed; excited. We split up into three cars: 6 in the first, 5 in the second, 6 in the third. I was in a car with Mara, Sara, Carolyn, Peery, and Rachel. Our driver's name was John.

First thing John says to us: "Do you like gospel music?" There's a resounding "No!" We're all in the mood for something a little more fun.

Everything is paid for in the safari fee except for beer. So we plan on stopping for crates of beer. John takes us to ShopRite. Apparently crates of beer turned into really expensive individual cans of beer. We grab some cans and start paying for them, when another one of the drivers tells us we're stopping somewhere else for actual crates. Oh, great. The woman has already rung us up for all the beer and we wait for about 10 minutes for her manager to come and void everything. They have to do each can individually. Pole (sorry). We just get some snacks and some cider and climb back into the safari car. I have managed to cut my leg on something--not sure what. This happens a lot during the safari.

We stop for crates of beer. We're told it will be 27,000 TSh (about 23US$) for 25 beers. Not too bad; we get some money back when we return the bottles. But then, the man inside tells us we have to bay 72,000 TSh. WTF?! Serious confusion there. After a period of time, where we all decide the beer is not worth it, we get two crates for the price of 27,000 TSh each. Finally we get on the road.

The drive is long and we're having fun until the radio goes out and John puts in his gospel music. None of us said anything on the drive, but when we finally reached the park and John said, "We must turn the music off here," we all sighed with relief.

We got to see tons of animals. Giraffes were 5 feet from our car and we got fantastic pictures of them. Zebras, water buffalo, wildabeest, warthogs, hippos, giraffes, all of it. We even saw two giraffes mating. And, yes, we took pictures. What else would college students such as ourselves do in that situation?

On the first day, I somehow managed to burn the skin off my elbow. I guess it was from putting my elbow on the roof of our safari car, but I definitely did not feel that happening. It was pretty disgusting. When I was finally able to clean it that night, it stung so bad. It was so dirty.

At night, we went to a campsite not far from the first park (Lake Manyara) we went to. We had the pop-up style tents we use in the States for camping. But there were legitimate twin beds inside the tents. I ended up in a tent on my own at the edge of the campsite, facing away from everyone. Not happening. After dinner, Meg and I moved my mattresss into the tent she shared with Peery.

We had a delicious dinner, but I wasn't feeling too well or hungry again. I at least ate some potatoes. After, we sat around a campfire and just hung out. There was a creepy Maasai man hanging around in the dark behind us. I THINK he worked at the campsite, because he would sometimes come by and stoke the fire. But he usually only threw one tiny stick in. We're not sure he knew what he was doing. After, he would disappear into the darkness on the edge of the campsite. Creepy.

Meg, Peery, and I went to bed. Some had already gone to sleep (since we had to be up at 6 AM for breakfast) and some hadn't. We passed out. I'd been dead asleep for about an hour when someone shook our tent. Sana, Michael, Adam, and Jena were running around the campsite scaring people. The three of us were so pissed because we'd been out and couldn't get back to sleep. But it was really funny to listen to them scaring other people. We finally fell back asleep and woke up about 30 minutes after our alarm actually went off. Even so, we were still the first people at breakfast.

We all climbed back into the safari cars and headed for Ngorongoro Crater. It was amazingly beautiful. We say lions, elephants, gazelles, black rhinos (only from afar), hippos, hyenas, zebras, water buffalo, wildabeast, and more. It was so awesome. Two lions were two feet from our car. I could almost touch them. We saw all of the Big Five (elephants, lions, water buffalo, rhinos, and leopards) except for the leopards.

The second day is when our "your momma" joke was developed. We had a good time with it.

The second day was also when our car got a surprise from Meg, Michael, Jena, Sana, and Adam's car. They kept telling us they had this wonderful surprise for us. I guessed mooning/flashing. I was right. But only one of us actually saw Michael mooning us as their car drove past. They thought it was so hilarious so we all pretended like we didn't know anything had happened. All day they were sad we hadn't seen it. We had a good time with that. We told them the truth later and it was great to watch their reactions.

We got back from the safari at about 1830. We showered, got dressed for dinner. There was a rugby team from Dar staying at our hostel and they were already drunk when we got home. They were going out to Maasai Camp (a club popular with mzungu) and wanted us to go along in their 60-person bus. They were fun but we wanted to eat and the fun doesn't start at MC until about 11 PM. It was only 7 PM. We told them we might meet them.

We went to a couple places for dinner. Mara, Rachel Peery, Sara, and I ate at our hostel. The food is good and cheap. After, we waited for the others to get back. By the time they did, none of us were feeling like going out. But finally, about 5 of us decided we were going to go out.

Maasai Club was bumping. We ran into the rugby players. They were too drunk to bother with. So we hung out with each other and danced. We went outside to get away from all the grabby Tanzanians. One named Zebra followed us out. I told him our names were Simba, Rafiki, Zazu, and Nala. We also told him we were all married. He still wouldn't leave us alone. So Jena pulled this random Brit over and told him to pretend he was married to all of us. It was hilarious. John (the Brit) even went into a detailed explanation of Mormonism to Zebra. Zebra still wouldn't leave. Finally, John just told him to buzz off.

We hung out the rest of the night and had a good time. We got home at about 3:30 in the morning. Bad, seeing as how we had to get up at 6:30 to get breakfast before our bus ride back to Babati. But we got it, came back to our homestay, showered, ate, went to sleep.

And that was our week in Arusha.

"Pour one out for Etta" Part 2

Back to the fun we had during our week off...

WEDNESDAY

The five of us woke up (Meg, Sana, Mara, Peery, and I) and went to grab breakfast at this place called Chocolate Temptations in the Western-style strip mall of little restaurants by ShopRite. We had little pieces of tea cake and either coffee or tea. We had woken up late and just relaxed in the morning. Then we went back to the hostel in order to get our stuff together and to allow Mara to check for a package from her parents she's been waiting on for awhile.

At about 12:30, we got a bus to Moshi. The central bus stand in Arusha is CRAZY. We tried to gather ourselves and then we just dove in. Everything we read in the guide book happened. People were hassling us left and right to use their travel company to get on this bus to buy this pack of biscuits. It was insane. We got to the middle and turned around to find the first guy that told us he was going to Moshi. We paid about 2US$ to get the bus. We got seats in the last row, I took one by the window in the second to last row.

The ride was really nice. The scenery was beautiful. I kept the window open, even though it was super windy, because it began to smell like BO in the bus. But my hair was getting tangled, so I wrapped my head in my scarf. I felt like I looked really cool. Definitely like a traveler. :)

After we got to Moshi, we headed for the Coffee Shop. This is supposed to be one of the best places for coffee in the country. It was way to hot to have coffee, so I got some iced tea with lemon (which turned out to be lime with dirt on it) and some people got iced coffee (which comes with ice cream--how wonderful!). Grace and Frank met up with us briefly, but we had things we wanted to do so we didn't hang out too much.

We got a room in the Kilimanjaro Backpackers Hotel (the equivalent of the Arusha Backpackers Hotel). The set-up with the 4 beds was much nicer than Arusha. I was feeling a little ill so I took a nap and the others walked around for about half an hour. At 1730, we went to the rooftop restaurant of the Kindoroko Hotel. We were told this was a good place to see Kili. The clouds mostly clear out around 1800 so we could actually see the top. We got some pictures; not fantastic since it was pretty hazy, but still awesome. We sat up there and watched the sunset and had some beers.

I had been feeling pretty ill all day and hadn't eaten much of anything. But on the way into the Kindoroko, we had noticed an Indian restaurant next door that was cooking the most delicious looking and smelling things on grills outside. We checked it out on the way out. They were cooking things called Zanzibar Pizzas and we were told we had to try them. We all ordered one. They are cooked with something that looks like won-ton (however that's spelled) dough. There is a mixture of beef, peppers, onions and who knows that other delicious substances that is put in the middle of the flattened dough. Then an egg is cracked over it and the dough is folded over and placed on the flat grill. When it's done, you have the most amazing food you will ever eat. The outside is crispy, the inside amazing. The egg has been fried. It was the best thing we've had since being in Tanzania, no lie. Outside the restaurant, they were also cooking beef kabobs and chickens, so I decided to order a plate of all of it. Best decision I've ever made. The chicken was tender and delicious and had a hint of cinammon--not what I was expecting it to taste like, but I was definitely not disappointed. Meg tried some and we decided that this was not the "walking chicken" we see everywhere. The walking chicken is the chicken that just hangs out on the street and forages for food--most chickens in TZ are walking chickens. The chicken at this restaurant (called the Taj Mahal, by the way) was definitely raised to be eaten. It was amazing. The beef kabobs were also fantastic. The beef was super tender and had been spiced amazingly. I loved it all so much, I ordered a second plate. We got pictures.

After I finished eating, and everyone else finished watching me eat, we headed to the restaurant at Kili Backpackers. We got some drinks and ordered more food (of course). All we do is eat and drink when we have some free time. It's amazing. We had a nice relaxing night, which we don't have often.

We finished our evening and then headed to bed, where we proceeded to journal and read. Apparently, I finished journaling, turned over, and passed out. I didn't remember doing that in the morning, but it happened.

For breakfast, we headed up the restaurant at Kili Backpackers, since it's free. But at Arusha Backpackers, we got free eggs. At Kili Backpackers, we only got free bread. Lame. So we headed up to the Coffee Shop. Most people just got coffee. Sana and I ordered a cheese and tomato omellette and a cappuccino each. The most delicious omellette ever. It helped that salt was available (we are quite salt deprived in our homestays). Then we hung out and read and journaled until about 10, when we went to the bus station.

We got a bus right away. It was empty. Bad idea. They drove around looking for people to fill up the bus. We started helping them out by yelling "Arusha!" out the window. I think we made it worse. Finally we left Moshi, but we stopped about every 10 minutes to pick up people. A 1 hour bus ride turned into 3 hours. We were not happy. At one point, they put 6 people in my row for 5. I was so pissed. Some guy was practically sitting on top of me for an hour. When we finally reached the bus station in Arusha, we just all got off the bus and took off in a straight, angry line for our hostel.

Everyone was back from rafting earlier in the week, but we didn't feel like dealing with them. It was a bad day because we were so frustrated with our bus ride. But we relaxed for awhile and then met up with people for dinner at our hostel (though almost everyone from rafting was staying at Arusha Backpackers). It ended up being a decent night. We wanted to get to bed early because we had to prepare for safari-ing the next day.

Now, to explain the "Pour one out for Etta." Mara purchased a shirt at the second hand market that is a family reunion shirt for two families: one on the front, one on the back. Both reunions are in memory of some dead person. Etta is the dead person on the front. She was 101 years old. So, somehow, we now always say "Pour one out for Etta" when we drink. Don't remember how it started, but it did. So we poured one out for Etta during our week in Arusha.

"Pour one out for Etta!"

Our week off has been the best week so far in Tanzania. We've been in and around Arusha. I'll try to give you the fun details without making you all wish you were here.

Mara and I left our homestay on Saturday morning at 0730. We met Peery, Sara, and Sana at the bus stand and waited for everyone else. One of our coordinators, Gerald, spotted us and led us to the bus. We got to choose the first seats, which is always nice. Mara and I are bus partners so we sat next to each other in the front of the bus. Then we just hung out and waited for everyone else to show up. It took us about an hour to leave--that's normal.

The bus ride was about three bumpy hours. At one point, we pulled the bus over for a bathroom stop. Then we were told we all had to get off the bus. The message was, "Fire! Off!" I'm not sure where the fire was, but we all got off. The bus was leaking gas, I think. It was leaking some sort of liquid, anyway. In a few minutes, we were told everything was okay, even though I saw the driver and the two bus workers sitting on the side of the road and doing nothing to the bus...

The SIC truck also broke down and we had to pick them up. We passed them and the bus couldn't stop on the hill so we went up the other side and had to turn around and come back. So funny. Then we picked the others up. There weren't enough seats for them, but we were only about 40 minutes from our destination, so it wasn't too bad.

When we got to Arusha, we pulled up outside of Arusha Backpackers. We were supposed to be staying at Meru House. Okay. Then we were told that where Meru costs aprroximately 5US$/night, Backpackers costs 10US$. We were all PISSED. It's not much money and Backpackers is really nice (breakfast included) but a lot of this not telling us what we're paying for until we get there shit has been happening. For example, I was told I HAD to arrive the day before the program started. So I did. Then I was told I had to pay for my stay in the hostel that night!! WTF? If I'd known that, I'd have come the next day, like some people did. Apparently we didn't have to be there the night before. And then we are told about 3 days before our vacation week that we have to pay for our bus ride back to Arusha from Babati AND for all of our food and hostel fees. Again, WTF?! I didn't bring money for this!! I was told living expenses were paid for. SIC won't even pay for our water this week! My response from Claire (not my favorite person, by the way) when I asked if she could put our water in the truck for us was, "You bring what you can carry, the rest you have to buy." Bull shit. That is not what I was told I'd be given. I was told my living expenses and my bottled water would be paid for. Not okay that I'm told differently when I get to the country and only two days before I have to pay for it all!! Right now, a lot of us are having trouble getting money out of the banks and stuff. Who knows why. So I currently do not have enough money to pay for another night in my hostel. The ATM told me my bank wouldn't let me get money out. I checked and there didn't seem to be any problem with withdrawing here; I've done it before. But I got less out last time, so I will try getting less out again later. I can always go into the bank. Not too big of a deal. Sorry for the rant, but it is very frustrating to have about $75 worth of living expenses thrown at you at the last minute. And that $75 is with us only eating 1.5 meals a day and surviving on day-old dollar bread the rest of the time. Such bull shit. Okay, done ranting and on to the really exciting parts of our week off.

We got into Arusha at about 1 PM. After we dropped our stuff off at Backpackers, some of us went to grab lunch at the hamburger stand we'd been hearing a lot about. It really is just a stand; a cart on the side of the road. It's also called "Wraps." But it is the BEST hamburger I've had in this country. I can't say best food because I had even better food later on in the week. But they ground the beef up with fresh herbs and spices. It comes with tomato sauce (sort of like ketchup, but not), onions, cabbage, tomatoes and cucumbers. Weird, yes, but it makes a great combination. I take the cucumbers off because I hate them, but everything else is delicious.

After the burger stand, we went to the SIC office to pick up some books. Of course, I forgot to bring the one I meant to exchange, but that's fine. We paid our deposit for the safari (we leave tomorrow morning). Then we checked out a few things and headed to the hostel to hang out. Backpackers has this great restaurant and bar on the roof, so we went up to read and such. Then we got ready to go out to the group dinner (not paid for, of course) at Maasai Camp. Apparently this is a restaurant/bar/club where all the wazungu (foreigners) hang out. The pizza was amazing. The beer was a decent price but the other drinks were ridiculous. It costs 3,000 Tsh for a double shot of Captain Morgan. Granted this is only about 2.5US$, but still. You get really cheap when you're used to paying nothing. A coke was 1000 Tsh, which is usually about 500 Tsh. So that was expensive. We hung out, danced, drank, played pool. There was some drama in the group, which was pretty irritating when you're trying to have a fun time out. But overall my friends and I had a good time. We're definitely trying to go there again before we leave Arusha. We also ran into our guide from our bonding waterfall hike at the beginning of the trip.

Sunday, many people left to go rafting in Uganda on the Nile. Peery, Mara, and I moved into Meru House with the remaining people. We got a triple and one wall of our room was windows. We looked like we were in an observation room. Nice for lighting, but everyone would walk by and look in. We, along with Meg and Sana who also stayed behind, decided to start a blog all about hostel experiences. We're working on putting it up as soon as we get a few entries compiled. Quick tip for Meru: every single staff worker, male and female, is creepy. But the food is good and cheap.

We also checked out some markets and hung out. We heard about a movie theatre in town. Can't remember if we did much else; mostly we hung out and relaxed. We got some food at ShopRite, the most amazing supermarket in all of the universe.

Monday was a fantastic day. We woke up early and had eggs and toast at Meru. Toast is the best thing EVER. Then we went to the Rwanda War Crimes Tribunal. Arusha is the capital of East Africa (Rwanda, Tanzania, and other east African countries like to consider themselves one state) and so the trials were held at the Arusha International Conference Center. They were supposed to finish last summer, but they are going on until fall of this year. So, we decided to check it out. We went through security, where they took our passports as collateral and gave us United Nations visitors' passes. Awesome. We walked around looking for a good trial to watch and found one. But the guard told us there was a judgment taking place upstairs, so we went to that. There are windows from the observation room into the courtroom and visitors can listen to the case through headphones. They'd run out of headphones, so one of the staff members took us into an Authorized Only area and to another room, where we could watch on a screen and listen. We listened to the judge read out the charges on a man named Kilimanziro. It took a while. Then we watched him be sentenced to 30 years in prison (though they took out time for the 3 years, 7 months, and 14 days he's already served). He was charged with inciting the public to kill Tutsis, for bringing Tutsis to the football field and then bringing armed Hutus to kill them, and for beating a Tutsi. He never actually killed a Tutsi, but he incited the Hutus to kill Tutsi.

It was crazy to watch something like this happen. And everything he did happened so long ago. It was awesome to see the UN in action on a case like this. It's hard to believe we actually saw someone get sentenced for war crimes.

After the tribunal, we went to the second-hand market. We see some people walking around with crazy American t-shirts that they've picked up there, so we decided to get some ourselves. I got one weird one with serious gibberish on the back. Mara got one for a family reunion that is in memory of Etta something or other. Hilarious. Meg got one for the Bucktrout Funeral Home.

We also went to the craft market and got gifts for people. There was a lot of cool stuff, but we're all getting really cheap so it was hard to spend money. Peery, Mara, and I also took Meg and Sana to the hamburger stand so they could try it out.

We found a Western strip mall by the ShopRite. I got some real milk-based ice cream. Amazing. Then we all sat in a coffee shop and had some coffee and cake. We got some cheddar cheese slices at ShopRite and had cheese sandwiches for dinner in our room.

TUESDAY

Tuesday we went to visit one of the teaching partner's home. Saningo is Maasai, so we took a dalladalla (minibus) to a Maasai area. There was a huge market happening that day. There was also a cattle market happening. It was really awesome. Saningo's dad has four wives (not something we new so it was unexpected news). Sangino's mom is his first wife. Saningo and his sister look just like her and she is very pretty. We also met the third wife, who is pretty and super nice. Saningo's dad creeped me out a little at first (mostly he's very large and I think anyone with more than one wife would creep me out) but he's pretty cool. He bought us some sodas and then paid for us to visit the Snake Park and the Maasai Cultural Museum. We got to see some HUGE snakes and we held some little ones. We saw some baby crocodiles. I climbed into the bit to take pictures of them. AWESOME. The Maasai museum was hilariously bad. It showed scenes from Maasai life, but the statues were not at all like you see in the States. I wish I could have taken some pictures.

After this, we rode CAMELS! It was so cool. I was sitting on the first camel with Saningo's sister. The camel in the back wasn't having a good day. As soon as the camels stood up, the back camel's nose was right by my butt. He decided to take a chunk out of my ass. The way he did it, I'm pretty sure he was plotting it for a while. It didn't hurt but it was hilarious. I got some lovely pictures of him.

Saningo's dad and moms provided us with lunch after. It was the first meat I've had in the country (aside from the trusty burgers). I'm always hesitant for local meat. It was tough and hard to chew but actually quite delicious and up to American standards.

We had to head back into town soon after this so we could get home before dark. Then we decided to check out the cinema. We wanted to see Confessions of a Shopaholic but we got there too late. A ton of us had already seen Angels & Demons, so we didn't see that. Instead, we got a bagel and some coffee at a coffee shop. It was good, but I wasn't feeling well. Then we went to another food place and sat outside. All the waiters for all the restaurants in the cinema/mall brought us menus and we just chose what we wanted.

I'm going to have to write about Wednesday/Thursday in Moshi and about the safari at a later date. No time now. Been on here WAY too long and have to get more money out!

Check back in a few days! Unless I get eat by lions on our safari, of course!

Daily Life in the Homestay

The long awaited description of what we do on a daily basis:

0720 (this is 1:20 AM in Swahili time): Alarm goes off. Mara and I lie in bed and stare up at the mosquito net. No, we do not want to get up.

0730: Mara and I get up. Tie up the mosquito net. I check to see how many bites I received during the night and the day before. The probability of me getting malaria has increased exponentially since arriving in the homestay. I don't know why the mosquitos like me so much more here.

0735: Greet our family. "Shikamoo, mama." Get our hot water for bathing. We alternate who goes first. I usually receive a few more mosquito bites here. There's nothing I can do about it since I'm washing all the bug spray off. I wash my hair with shampoo every other Sunday or Monday. I occasionally get it wet in between to make it curlier and to get the dust out. Mara and I often drop our soap on the ground and have to go back later with our knives and dig it out. Without fail, someone in our family will use the choo to do #2 while we are showering. Yes, we can hear it. Yes, we can smell it. (The choo and the bathing room are in the same area and share a wall.)

0800: Breakfast. The first day in our homestay this seemed like a positive experience because we had chapati and delicious chai. We still have delicious chai, but now our mama gives us ever increasing amounts of what is called vitumbua (or however it's spelled). Loosely translated, these are saucer-shaped fried dough things that are so greasy we can feel our insides wince when our eyes see them. At first we hated the flavor. They grow on you. They have to since it's all we eat for breakfast. The burned ones are the best. We've slowly been eating fewer and fewer so our mama gives us less. It's hard because that's all we have to eat for breakfast. But we're trying.

0830-1230: What we do here depends on the day. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, we now teach at an English Medium school. So we leave at 0830 and walk for about thirty minutes to a school way out of our districts and split up into groups of two and teach about HIV in English. It's actually nice to teach in English instead of translating into Swahili. On days when we don't have teachings in the morning, we usually hang out and read or go to the market/tailor or come to the internet cafe. Sometimes we schedule other teachings. We had one scheduled today but then Raymundi canceled. Both Mara and I are not at all sad he canceled (this is the guy who treats us like we don't exist).

1230-1300: We usually have lunch around here. The meal varies. If we get speans, we usually know we're having that for dinner. The same goes if we get potatoes or the potato/banana mixture in the lovely pink sauce. We don't mind for those. We mind for the speans.

1300-1330/1500: We do different things depending on the day. On Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays, we have a teaching at 1400. So we rest for a bit then head over at 1330. Other days we don't teach until 1500, right by our house. Rachel and Frank and Jarrod have lunch later than we do, so Mara and I often nap. I think we get the most sleep out of our entire group. Sometimes we read, but mostly we've eaten too much to do anything but go comatose. We're also working on getting our mama to feed us less food. I was losing weight when we got here, and now I'm gaining weight. Plus we eat a lot of carbs, which hold onto all the water we're drinking. Not a fun feeling. So we sleep it off.

1400-1700: We are teaching during these times. Sometimes teachings are good. Sometimes not so good. By the end of the week we are all really tired and burnt out. But we try to have good lessons.

1700-2000: We do a variety of things during this time. Sometimes we stop at the market to pick up ingredients for guacamole. Other times we stop at the tailor. We often meet up with people at the internet cafe. Once it starts getting dark, we usually head to Frank and Jarrod's for cassava. Their mama makes it outside to sell to people, so we buy a bunch, put some pilipili (pepper/sauce) on it, and eat and hang out. You can always find us there at that time of day. It's loads of fun. We play with the kids and just have a good time. Last night was so fantastic because many of the SIC employees were there and a few different groups came to hang out. There were tons of us and we were all having a good time. Frank and Jarrod's baba said he was really happy that we were all there; he really enjoys having us over. At about 1940, Mara and I head home for dinner.

2000: We usually eat dinner around this time. We have chai again (it's super sugary and delicious, but pretty sure we're all getting cavities drinking it). I have to limit myself to one cup anymore because it's too much liquid to have in your system. We hang out with our family for a little bit. We made the mistake of teaching them the thumb war the other day and now the kids always want to play when they see us! Leila is the friendliest and always excited to see us. She likes to teach us to read Swahili in the evenings and show us what she did in school.

2030: Mara and I head to our room. We've said goodnight to our family because we rarely do anything after this point. We hang in our room and read for a bit while our stomachs settle all the food and chai.

2130: We get ready for bed: go to the choo, brush our teeth, etc. Then we pull down the mosquito net and call it a night. This is also when the house comes alive and people are filling buckets with water from the tap outside our room. The random cousins and nephews that live with us do their laundry.

0200: The house is silent for a few hours. This is usually when Mara wakes up and has to pee really badly. Today, I woke up then and had to pee really badly. We try not to use the choo in the middle of the night. But sometimes you can't help but go. The nice thing about going at this time of night is that we don't have to cover our knees or our shoulders (both scandalous parts of the body). Usually we have to put in t-shirts and wrap khongas around us when we get up to go to the choo. But at night, no one's awake to see. It's a really liberating feeling to look at your knees anymore. You look down and say, "Who is this person?"

0430: The house wakes up again. If we're lucky, we don't hear it and we can sleep peacefully until 0730. If we're not, it wakes us up and we have to pull out our iPods to cover the noise.

0730: Start the day over again.