"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.