Things are picking up in the village. But first, my garden. It's unbelievable to have such a flourishing garden in your backyard. The way things grow here in the this area of Tanzania, with all the rain we've had, is awesome. Corn is ripe and harvestable. The giant ears of corn I pull out of my back courtyard are the size of my upper arm. Tanzanians like to roast corn, but I prefer like many Americans to boil it- fresh, tasty, I have to cut it in half to fit in my cooking pot (sufuria).

I also have lima beans. My good friend Patrione pointed this out when he visited my village. The amount is staggering. Also delicious to cook, along with the spinach or mchicha as they say here. So anyway, this sunday is the international day for remembrance of victims of HIV/AIDS, celebrated by a candlelight memorial. We are planning a candlelight walk here in my village to raise awareness of the problem and to decrease the stigma associated with HIV/AIDS, as well as to remember family and loved ones who have passed because of.

But the big event will be the national environmental day June 5th. Tomorrow I'm having a meeting with village officials, environmental officials, teachers and others to plan activities. The schoolkids will have fun singing songs, playing games, and drawing pictures; I'm planning about teaching and showing the permagarden, compost pile, and other activities like education and collecting seeds.

So it finally feels like projects are starting to come together. I'm continuing to teach one class a day at the Primary School, on environment. Yesterday I taught the students how to make drinking water without having to boil- because boiling usually requires firewood and excessive use of wood degrades the environment- so you take water collecting from the bomba (waterpipe in the ground), rainwater from the roof, or from the river. You filter it with a piece of cloth, then put it in a clear water bottle and put in on your roof (which must be metal) let's say for two days. Afterwords, it is safe to drink.

The previous groups of health and environmental volunteers is leaving the country soon- those who aren't extending. Time goes by very fast.

In East Africa, there is a country. It is called Tanzania. And in Tanzania there is a city. It is called Dar Es Salaam (which incidentally means Harbour of Peace). And in that city there is a shopping mall. It is called The Third Ring of Hell. Or it should be. And this is where our hero finds himself, waiting. Waiting for the camera repair guy to show up. Our man got up early, with his act together. Found a new and frightening bus stand, got on the right bus, got off at the right stop (I know, these are rather minor accomplishments. But it’s a city of 8 million people (only 3 million officially, but good luck counting), and there are no road signs. You try it). Was at the mall by 8:45 on Monday morning. Of course, the store wasn’t open. Would not be open, in point of fact, until 11, this despite repeated reassurances from each and every passerby that the proprietor was “njiani” (on the way) or that the would “fika sasa hivi” (arrive right now). But he wasn’t, and he didn’t. So I waited, fumed, read “The Guernsey Literaryand Potato Peel Pie Society” (...all my masculine books are finished. So it’s getting a little “Bridges of Madison County”-ish these days), listened to the Muzak version of “Kiss from a Rose” (I hate you, Seal), and wondered what I had done to deserve this. Long story short, this was my two hour and fifteen minute window into the modern world. Things looked dark. Except when they looked bleak. My days in the simpler life are numbered.

I was in Dar for a week for my Close of Service (COS) Conference. It’s always weird going to Dar, because I get into a bus in the middle of a rural African village, stuck in a seemingly endless struggle to pull itself out of poverty, and at the end of the day I’m standing in a supermarket, wondering if I got into a bus or a time machine. But the US government doesn’t really care about my delicate sensibilities, so the COS was in Dar. Which all in all ain’t so bad. A week in the sun, with my original group of volunteers, where we got information on how to retire as Peace Corps Volunteers, find jobs, and readjust to American life (which apparently involves weeping in front of tomato soup cans). There was a lot of dancing, a bunch of midnight pool parties, some rough mornings, and a fantastic awards show called The Tanzos. Awards given out included “Best Hair” (she thanked her parents), “Closet Genius” (she thanked Nietzsche), and “Greatest Poop Story” (Not sure who she thanked. Those stories tend to accumulate when you combine foreign food and a paucity of toilets). I received the award for “Greatest Tanzo Award Acceptance Speech”. No pressure.

I’ll spare you the run-up and just hit the highlights. “I look at all of you tonight, and I know I’m looking at all of the people that I will one day meet again...in hell.” I proudly and publicly announced my engagement to Stephen DiOrio (once you’ll meet him, you’ll understand my choice). And I talked about how I’m not sure I can believe in governments, or in organizations, anymore. Even Peace Corps. How all of these things succeed or fail because people make them succeed or fail. And that is what I will miss: the people. I won’t look back fondly on Peace Corps the bureaucracy: the forms, the dates, the flash drives. I’ll remember the volunteers, the staff, the villagers, my friends. My closing lines were: “I don’t miss America. I miss Americans. I will not miss Tanzania. I will miss Tanzanians. And I will not miss the United States Peace Corps. I will miss all of you.”

On with the blog.

The woman running the conference was truly wonderful (not least in that she put up with us. What we lack in manners and calm we make up for in volume). We talked about resumes, RPCV (Returned Peace Corps Volunteer) networks, interviewing, reverse culture shock, and a lot more. But I was really truly grateful that she shared with us some rather personal aspects of her life as a PCV, her work after Peace Corps in Haiti and Africa, and life as an American living overseas. Many of her stories are wonderful, and made me want to…well, to stay. But one of them struck me, and stuck with me. She was talking about a relative of hers who is always wondering when she and her husband (who is also an RPCV) will stop playing around in Africa and come home. How when he thinks of Africa he just thinks of naked children with distended bellies, crying in front of a camera, surrounded by flies, waiting for your dollar a day.

I guess congratulations are owed to all of you. If any of you felt like this, either when I began this journey or at any point along the way, you have been wise enough not to share said feelings with me. In a lot of ways the purpose of this blog is to make it clear that Africa isn’t about poverty (though poverty exists), or charity (though that is helpful, if done properly), or development work. It is about life and nature and belief and beauty. There are talented people and beautiful people and awful people and lost people. Which makes it different from...nowhere. The difference, I guess, is history. But that’s not my point either. I don’t think you need me to show you how different we can be. There are plenty of people making that point (though fewer and fewer every year, I hope. I wish). I wanted to show how all the things we know and treasure and value exist here as well, just in different packages. I’m not making sense...

...let’s try a metaphor! The kids in my village do a really fun thing. When I show up at a house, particularly if it’s the first few times I’ve been there, the little children will all scurry away around back (I am, in case you’ve forgotten, pretty horrifying). But if I stay long enough, they’ll start to peak their heads around the edge of the house, to have a good look at the scary pale giant. From time to time I’ll catch them looking, and just look back, frankly, into their eyes. The shyer ones turn and flee, but the braver ones will return my stare for a few seconds. Then the game gets too hairy, my eyes get too scary, and they pull their little heads back, just enough so that the wall once again blocks out the sight of me. Once they’re assured that they won’t be turned to stone, they peak back out, and the game resumes. I love that so much, that ability as a child to make something vanish and truly believe that it’s vanished; to be able to close your eyes and make the world go away.

I can’t do that any more, not even if I wanted to. And that’s good. I’m an adult, and I live in a varied and scary world that needs people to confront its problems, not pretend they don’t exist. The Third Goal of Peace Corps is “Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.” That’s what this blog is. It’s one small piece of tape holding eyelids open, or perhaps less shit-eatingly, it’s a flashlight pointed at a part of the world that might otherwise remain unseen. But I suspect, in my heart, that all of you already knew all of this. My students are going to make it to Ruaha. They aren’t standing in the desert with their mouths open and bellies bulging. They are fun, and devilishly clever, and they like to run with me when I’m out for a jog. They are not charity cases, but they also do not have much, and they live tantalizingly close to breathtaking animals that they might never see. But now they will. They are going to see some animals. And it is all because of people who didn’t close their eyes, who cared, and who helped make a small, important difference. It’s all because of you.

Congratulations.

The other day I walked back from town. I’ve gotten sick of waiting for the lorrie (open-topped truck) to be an hour late and packed to capacity, so I was looking forward to the hour and a half walk. Sure, I’d have to greet people along the way, but at least I had a destination and could keep walking. About 20 minutes into the walk, a guy already walking in the same direction asked me where I was going. I said the name of my village and he somehow decided he’d like to walk with me. Now, I wasn’t really in the mood to make Kiswahili small talk, and made it a point to slow down or speed up to try to lose him. If I stopped to pretend to rifle through my backpack, he’d shuffle along, clearly waiting for me; if I tried to pass him, he’d walk at a very un-Tanzanian fast pace to try to keep up with me. Needless to say, it was very frustrating. So, I’m about to turn down the path to my house and I say, “have a nice day” to be polite. He looks at me and says, “Where’s my money? I walked you here, and I’m tired.” I was stunned. I spent over an hour trying my hardest to lost this guy in transit, and he wants money?! I looked at him, and repeated three times each with more surprise and disgust, “You want money? You want money?! You want MONEY?!” I laughed, said a very sarcastic (which is lost on all Tanzanians), “Sorry mister,” and walked away.

The very next day, I went to the little market in my village. I was so excited to see bananas! I had just bought a few, and I hadnt even left the table and a guy comes up to me and asks me if he can have a banana. I thought, how rude. So, I, probably still annoyed from the day before, told him very politely that we were still at the table, so he could buy his own.

Also in the same day, I heard the name of the previous volunteer being shouted at me multiple times in a row. I stopped, turned around, and saw a mama coming toward me. I immediately recognized her as the mama that has, more often than not, usually been drinking. She didn’t even greet me and immediately patted her stomach and asked me for money for chai. This was the third time in two days that I’ve been tracked down and asked for money in my village. This, more likely than not, only happens in town. Now, first of all, I’ve told this mama my name at least five times, and she can’t even try to remember. Second of all, don’t scream my name across the whole village. And lastly, I don’t get a salary, you can’t have my bananas, and I can walk by myself!!!!!

So my grandpa George died over the weekend. Which is sad, but everyone who was around him recently says that he was ready, and he was 92, which is plenty old, and that makes things less sad. I'm not entirely sure I have all the details right, but I think he slipped and fell and broke a vertebrae, and they had him intubated in the hospital, and he would have been paralyzed if he lived, so there was no reason to keep him on life support. Also, he couldn't talk. So they took the tube out and he died a little bit later. My mom called me on skype from his hospital room, and I got to talk to him about an hour or so before her died, which is kind of weird, but also something I was glad to be able to do. It's a really weird feeling talking to someone for the last time, knowing that they can hear you but can't talk back. So I told him what I was doing here, and mom, who was there with him, said that he was proud of me. Which was nice. Grandpa didn't ever really talk much, but that made it even specialer when he did say something like that. I remember this particularly clearly from after he saw me play Lear. Anyways, my mom was with him when he died, and I think that was good, and she said he just slowly stopped breathing. I think everyone was relieved that it didn't drag on, which at one point it sounded like it might. It's a really weird feeling having something big like this happening when you're away from your family in a totally different part of the world, where everything's a different time for you than for them. We were having a going away party taco night for Adam, and it was the day back home, when my mom called me. She called back an hour or so later, but I was busy making tortillas and didn't answer my phone in time, and she didn't call me back, so I didn't find out he had actually died until the next day, which was probably easier, talking to my mom about it when it was just me and Bill at the house instead of everyone in the middle of a party the night before. So there's that.

In other news, the taco night was a success. Adam, while not a Peace Corps volunteer, has been volunteer teaching in Moshi for the last 9 months or so, and he's definitely been a part of our group. He's going home next week for the summer, and then coming back to Tanzania, which is nice, cuz he's a really great guy, so it'll be fun to have him back. Also, we made corn tortillas, which were okay. A bit tougher than our usual wheat ones. And taco meat and guac and salsa and rice and really good beans. Plus margaritas. With triple sec and everything. Except not limes, cuz everyone always forgets the swahili word for limes and lemons here are green anyways, so Josh got lemons instead. Which really wasn't a problem, they still tasted like margaritas, just slightly lemonier ones. And we had a bunch of leftovers, so Bill and I fried up the leftover tortillas and made nachos the next day, which was exciting.

Also, I got selected to do some of the English training sessions at the next PST, which I'm super excited about. Next week is TOT (training of trainers) in Morogoro, where we'll sort out the schedule and who's doing what exactly, and work on our lesson plans together, which should be fun, because I'm a dork about these things and like them a lot. Plus, I get to see both some of my friends who I haven't seen in a while, and I'll get to go visit my host family, which will be very nice. Also, Mel's host mama just had a baby. In the time we've been away at site, which really puts how long we've been here into perspective. Once we'd been in country 9 months, me and Mel would say "we could've had a baby," but Mel's mama actually did. (Tanzanians are superstitious about talking about babies before they're born, so Mel didn't even know her mom had been pregnant until afterwards, which would never happen in America.) And I like babies, so I'm looking forward to this too. The only annoying thing about it is the scheduling, right smack in the middle of the week, which means we have to miss a full week of school for a 3 day training, which seems silly and unnecessary. But it's how things go here. Hopefully I can figure out some good teacher-less lessons for my students to do while I'm away. I'm thinking of giving them a story to spend the week reading and we can discuss it when I get back the next week, to go along with personality/character, which is the next topic in my scheme of work.

Peace Corps volunteers have an uncanny ability to make whichever country they are living within a little America.

Our friend came up with the idea of making a corn hole (or bags, as some others call it) set to play when we all hang out. Jon and I had the wood boards made in our village and our friend bought an old T-shirt, beans, and had a seamstress make bean bags. We’ve been play corn hole for hours every time we get together.

Jon & Jordan playing corn hole in the parking lot of our hotel.Safari Steve, our buddy who we often hung out with during training spent the last week creating a risk board with markers and crayons and folding tons of origami boxes and cranes for the pieces. Last night, we played for hours on end. I controlled most of North America until Safari Steve took me over. The square pieces can represent up to four “army men”, the baby cranes are horses and the big mama birds are tanks.

the incredibly well-made risk game board and piecesmy baby bird defending Greenland

the first epic battle: two mama birds defending North Africa and BrazilThree mama birdsmy epic battle: defending Greenland with mama bird. I won!Mama birds “doing it”

Hey hey!

Not much news, but I've got some spare time and internet this weekend in Newala so I figured I'd post some words (and pictures)...

April ended with a Peace Corps Super-Regional (Lindi and Mtwara regions) conference, held in Mtwara town. It's always nice to have the chance for all 24 PCVs in the deep south to get together and catch up. The week-long conference was half catch up/share time with PCVs and staff and half focused on malaria training. Each PCVs local ward's CCA (community change agent) was there to talk about ways we can collaborate together in our respective villages. The highlight of the training was going to a nearby village with a "mobile video unit" that drives around and sets up a projector and shows various movies, this one a 45 minute Tanzanian love-story/fishing action drama/important lessons about malaria learned feature film. Tons of adults and children showed up and piled on the ground and it was really fun! Oh ya and then we spent our last afternoon at the beautiful beach :). It was also great timing for us to get some much needed time together for planning our girls empowerment conference, which will begin in just 12 days. I'm really excited, but I'll be relieved if and when we are finally able to pull it off!

Things are moving slowly in the village, as usual. A few weeks ago the 2nd year students at the nearby teacher's training college had their graduation ceremony. Tyler and I went and got to see Hanako (the JICA volunteer teaching computers there) and Tetsuko (JICA volunteer teaching in Newala) and eat some tasty pilau (Tanzanian spiced rice, special for weddings, ceremonies, etc.). This last week my ward's Malaria CCA (community change agent) had a meeting in my village with some Mamas. Trying to teach people to use mosquito bednets (when they don't have beds) is tricky! Hopefully in June the MVU (mobile video unit) from Mtwara will be coming to Maputi to play a movie, which should be more fun than listening to someone talk about the importance of malaria prevention!

And guess what! Peace Corps finally approved a pay increase of 20%! After seeing prices increasingly rise, some things nearly doubling in price over the last year and a half, it'll be really nice to have that extra 50,000 shillings (~ 30 USD) per month. Speaking of money, I'm supporting my former student, Karimu, during his A-level schooling. He's studying way out west of Songea. It is always amazing to me to see how little money Tanzanians are able to live on, and for just around 250,000 shillings (~160 USD) he can pay for school, room and board in the hostel, his uniform and supplies (of course a calculator for math class!), food and walking around money, and travel to/from home for an entire year! I'm trying to pay this from my modest PC living allowance, so if anyone is interested in helping support an amazing student this year or next year, let me know :)

I think that's it for now! Happy birthday sister (2 days ago)! And happy mother's day ma (tomorrow)!

“English class has already started. Do not enter. Do not knock on the door.”Tanzanian time does not work for me when I am trying to teach. Students can no longer enter my class late. Tanzanian teachers beat students who come late. I generally just let them come in without much harassment. The students have started taking advantage of this and come in groups, ten minutes late. Not anymore. They won’t get beat by me, but they won’t get their lesson either, which is arguably a worse punishment. And in the end, if the students are not in class, they’ll end up getting hit anyway by the teachers who patrol the school making sure students are where they are supposed to be. I imagine one week after my sign being hung, students will figure out how to be on time to English class.

First off, no. It's not what you think. It is indeed an acronym, but it stands for something different in the Education sector of Tanzania. The order varies depending on who you ask. In fact, you could ask the same person 6 times and get six different combinations of the same three things:

Kuandika. Kusoma. Kuhesabu.

read the rest

So I started teaching Life Skills at the secondary school. I can already tell that I am going to love teaching. These kids are stoked to learn about sex, condoms, stds and HIV/AIDS. I decided to start out teaching about peer pressure then work my way into everything else. Some of the kids are so bad! I set the ground rules my first day and they know they will be punished if they break them (NO talking when I am talking). Since I'm not really into beating the students with a stick I am going the route of making them hold penny to the chalkboard with their nose.It works, they seem to respect me for the most part. I also have kids from other forms (grades) snaking into my class to listen. I don't know if it' because they want to learn or they just want to see the American chick teach in Swahili.

I also started a sports club for the youth. I also made sure to get the street kids, orphans and students all involved as well as boys and girls. I decided since they mostly just play soccer that it would be fun to introduce them to kickball. I thought it would be easy but let me tell you that this was one of the hardest things I have done here.A bunch of kids showed up to play but introducing foreign concept to them was really something...."we use our hands AND our feet?". After literally 5 minutes kids started leaving saying it was too hard but eventually the ones that stuck around got it and loved at. After the kids who left saw them playing and loving it some of them came back.I have my second meeting/game today so we will see how it goes.

The previous volunteer started a group of OVC (orphans and vulnerable children) caretakers. They make school uniforms and such and sell them. I have started going to those meetings too, getting them back up and running.

My Swahili is ummm gradually getting better. I don't think I'll ever bee 100% fluent though, we shall see. My relationship with my village is better then ever. I seem to have a good rapport with people of all ages. It took a while to differentiate myself from the volunteer that was here before me. She was the first PCV in the village so when I arrived most of the villagers assumed we wold do things exactly the same. It's fun to teach them about American culture.

Thats all for now!

So yesterday was a super awesome productive day. I got up in the morning and took care of some VAC things that needed doing, updating the website and texting people to delegate responsibilities. (Yay Mar helping to put together a Swahili joke book! I’m excited about this project) Then I taught my first 2 classes, both of which went well. I came home and made some toast and worked some more on my grant proposal for the library project, right up until it was time for my third class. I taught my class, returned home and, feeling productive, wrote some songs to teach my students. I use the word wrote loosely. Rather, I wrote new lyrics to pre-existing songs. So now I have an adjectives version of jingle bells and an occupations version of we’re off to fight the injuns, from Peter Pan. Then it was off to English club, where I actually taught my adjectives song, which the kids were able to get the hang of pretty quickly. I even had them write their own verse at the end, which was fun. (They came up with “black and white, wide and narrow, male and female, these are opposites that I know, they’re all adjectives”) I really like using songs, cuz they help with both memory and pronunciation. Plus, I’m trying to get a session on songs and games added to the incoming training class’s PST, including a section on how to change lyrics to fit what you’re teaching, so it was good to get a bit more practice with it. Then, immediately after English club, I had a library meeting with Mr. Alex and Beatrice, where I showed them the narratives I’d written based on what we’d talked about. They liked them, and had a couple of good suggestions of things to add. Then we hashed out the goals, objectives and indicators, and brainstormed about the Do No Harm section. They were much, much better at thinking of potential negative effects of the library than I was. Then I went to my Airtel spot, called Bill briefly (he’d had a good day with his trainings as well), bought some tomatoes and a soda, and returned home just before dark. (Because my village is more some houses next to a road than an actual centralized community, I try to be home before it’s completely dark.) Then I cooked some soup, using the super basic ingredients I had (tomatoes, potatoes, onion, garlic, bullion, herbs and powdered milk) which turned out pretty tasty. Then I typed up everything we’d talked about and adapted our responses from the application to fit the proposal format. (We need 1 application to submit to the Peace Corps, and 1 separate proposal to submit to Peace Corps Tanzania. The questions on each are similar, but not quite the same.) So now basically all I need to do on this grant is write up the executive summary, convert the prices from shillings to dollars, have one last meeting to check everything with Mr. Alex and Ms. Njau and send it in. Super exciting.

I have family that loves me a lot. I love to brag about how I have family that loves me a lot. Some volunteers here get one package a year. Meanwhile, I get one package per week. I got the ultimate package -my cousin built me by hand a solar panel unit that can charge my computer, power light bulbs and generally make my life so much better. The teachers at my school know how to install these units and one afternoon, Jon and two teachers got it installed.

Step one: Jon putting together the solar unit as per perfectly detailed instructions from my cousin.

Step 2: Tanzanian colleagues installing the solar unit to our roof since they have installed their own and a few of our neighbor’s units.

A close up view of the installation on our roof.

Step 3: Jon going into our “attic” to pull the wires through from our roof into our house. Jon came back out completely covered head to toe in spider webs and dirt. Jon needed to make the trip again to pull extension cords through the ceiling to the room we put light into.

Step 4: Hanging up the battery and meter reader onto our wall. We can plug our electronics into the box. At the moment this picture was taken, we were charging our computer and my ipod.

Step 5: Light bulb! Candle lit dinners are not romantic. Life seems more romantic when you can see the face of the person you love :)

THANK YOU Brian and Dianna!

Guess what?!  Chicken butt. It was recently May first!  May first in Tanzania is Labor Day.  There were a bunch of festivities including a 100-meter dash, tug-a-war, chicken catch, soccer game, netball game, etc.   I was really excited about the chicken catch.  You chase a chicken around a big field and whoever catches it first [...]

A disgusting flying long-legged bug that lived in my bathroom for two days before I decided it had it’s opportunity to leave, but didn’t. I asked Jon to kill it because it looks like a large mosquito. If it is a large mosquito, perhaps the malaria inside of it would be more harmful to me than a tiny mosquito carrying malaria. I gave it two days, but in the end, it met it’s death via toilet paper.

I didn’t come here to find myself. In fact, I came here because I thought I already had found myself, and this was the next logical step in the trajectory that I had chosen for my life. Recent events, however, … Continue reading →

Ok, so I know I’ve been M.I.A., but its been for good reason! Ill explain everything from as far back as I can remember. Malaria Grant… APPROVED!!!! I have been working on a grant which recently was approved.  The project is called Sudents Act! Against … Continue reading →

I was not sure if I was going to blog about something that happened two days ago, but I think writing about it may help overcome my fear.

Yesterday morning I woke up, negotiated the mosquito net, walked down the hall, unlocked the door to my kitchen and saw that my backdoor was wide open. I did not recall leaving it open and upon further inspection I saw that the nails that had held the door shut had been bent because the door was forced open. I looked around the kitchen and noticed that only my am/fm radio had been taken. The first few thoughts that flashed through my head were as follows:How did I not hear this happening? The door must have hit the table in my kitchen making a huge noise and I did not wake up.I am glad that I locked the door from the kitchen to the rest of the house. I do not really have anything of value save my life, but I am just glad the intruder did not get further into my house. My space has just been invaded. Boundaries have been crossed. I feel sort of violated. I feel like the trust I have built up in my village has just become null and void. After getting over the initial shock. I got dressed, went to school and told the other teachers what had happened. Another of the teachers said the intruder came into his house as well around 3:30am, he did not see him, but he scared him off when he heard the guy rummaging in the kitchen. This made me feel a little bit better because I was not solely targeted. After I talked to my mkuu who said he will be installing better locks on my house, I called PC to report the incident. Not much they can physically do, but it is good to know that they are alerted.

I tried not to think about what had happened the night before, but as the sun began to set last night I started to get a little anxious. Before bed I turned on the light in my kitchen, barricaded the door with buckets, pots, pans, anything that would allow me to hear if someone had entered my house from a dead sleep. I also boobie-trapped my kitchen door in case they penetrated my bucket fortress. Around 9pm the mkuu, night watchman and other teachers came to my house to help me with locks, etc. Thanking them for their help, I turned in. Needless to say I did not sleep well last night – one eye open. Actually I did not sleep between the hours of 2 am and 4 am. I kept feeling like I heard noise. I am hoping that tonight I will be able to sleep better, but I really do not know. Like I said, I feel the trust I have built up has been completely broken down because of this one instance. I feel like I am starting from square one again. Thinking back, it feels like my first night at site. I didn't sleep, I was just sweating bullets in my sleeping bag, wondering what would walk through my door in the midnight hour and running through scenarios of how to handle it. I know people say that you cannot live in fear, but I feel that usually relates to things that you can physically control. I cannot control if someone really wants to come in my house. If they want in, they will get in. All I really have going for me is the close proximity of my neighbors, my wit and a whistle. I also have done a fair amount of kickboxing here, but I am not sure how I would fair in real combat.

So here I am writing to the world about this issue. This type of thing is actually quite common for volunteers. It is the nature of living in a country that is poor. It is also the nature of a culture that had no boundaries for personal space. People will take what they want without respect for boundaries. Very rarely do these people get caught because the mind frame of HCNs is, “ well if they took it, they must need it more than me”. During our training we were told that thieves will actually say thank you to you as they run off with your wallet. I am sure if the guy who broke in and stole my radio had come to my door during broad daylight and said, “Sorry, Madam, I am going to break in to your house tonight, steal your radio and freak you out”, I would have said, “Here take it now. Look out though the antenna is broken, but I just put new batteries in!”, to save myself the lost sleep and the worrying.

Well now that I have that off my chest, I do feel a little better. I think I will start to trust again, slowly, not because I want to, but because I have to because I will not sleep for the rest of my time here. I still feel safe in my house, but just on edge.

Alright on to another thought for this post, clothing choices of Tanzanians. I may have talked about this before, but I think it is worth a revisit. Yesterday on my way to the post office, a Tanzanian got on the bus wearing a long sleeved biking jersey complete with the water bottle pockets in back. I could not help but laugh to myself and think what he does with all those pockets. Did he think to himself upon purchasing the jersey, “Hey! This is a great shirt, love the color, zipper up the front and it even has added pockets!”? Clearly not. I am also positive I will not see this guy tearing up the Alp d'Huez in July. Basically I really just want to know if this guy knows the shirt he is wearing is weird and not meant to be worn off a bike and not without tight biking shorts and a helmet.

Another odd clothing choice of Tanzanians is the rash guard. Yes, the one you wear at the beach instead of sunblock or for it's real purpose – to surf. The men wear the shirts under their dress shirts. One the teachers at my school wears one all the time and I do not have the heart to tell him it is NOT an undershirt. I am hoping that by the time I leave I will have worked up the nerve to ask him what he thinks of the shirt and what he believes it's purpose is.

This observation leads me to an even bigger one – common sense. There is a severe lack of it here. I can name about ten incidents everyday where common sense is not present. This would drive my father crazy and because it would, it drives me nuts as well (similar personalities). For example, people cannot figure out that when someone is getting off a bus and they are sitting behind you and you are blocking the aisle, that you need to stand up!!! Not hard to figure out. Sorry, Bibi (grandma), please move your butt off the folding chair, so I can leave! Another example, if I start writing notes on the board, you should be finding the appropriate notebook and starting to copy notes. Do not pick your nose, talk to your friend or stare out into space. I go through this with my students everyday. It is now May and I still have kids who will sit through the first 20 minutes of class without opening a notebook, if I do not come around and check their desks.

I am sure I can come up with a million other examples, but I think that I will look at lack of common sense very differently in the States. I won't get upset when the light turns green and the person in front of me does not move because she is yelling at her kids in the back seat, when people just assume I want cream in my coffee and sugar (I enjoy skim milk and Splenda, thank you) or when people do not move to one side on a moving sidewalk or escalator. I never thought there could be a place on Earth where common sense could be severely lacking on a large scale, but apparently I have found it.

Okay, I think that is enough ranting for this post. May is finally upon us, which means obligatory graduation ceremonies, Memorial Day, rowing championships and cold weather if you are living Mbeya, Tanzania. I hope everyone at home is well!

All my love from TZ.

This past week there's been a flurry of blog posts from PCVs, so why not add to it?

I don't know why the background color on this is messed up. Bear with me.

PSDN meeting happens in Dar in a couple weeks. I'll let you know how it goes.

It's always fun to head to Dar and the PC office: use free, fast internet, eat good food, shop, (if you're me (which, I am)) drink, talk with staff and subtly remind them how much your Swahili sucks. *sigh*

If it seems like I write about traveling a lot, it's because I travel a fair amount. Some may say that it's because I don't like my site (false). I do like my site. It really has grown on me. House is good. Plenty of seafood. Neighbors are awesome. Work is work, but you get that anywhere. I'm on a freakin island. But I also like to travel and visit other people/places. It's also given me the chance to see some differences between Pemba and the mainland: Pemba is a pretty rustic place. Almost feels like it's an afterthought of Tanzania. It's not mainland, where everyone else is. It's not Unguja (Zanzibar), the historic, flashy, monkey making, tourist spot. It's Pemba. Everywhere you look there are half-finished buildings with piles of bricks/stone sitting on one side, waiting to be put to use. At my school, the teachers' office/science lab/computer room and teachers' house have stood half-finished since 2009. Roads? Where we're going we don't... have roads. OK, there are paved roads here. Two of them. (One main one that runs from the port town (Mkoani) in the south to Konde (Doug's town) in the north. There's another one that intersects the main road in a town about 45 minutes from me and runs east/west to the town of Wete (Dave J's town).) There's plenty of roads being constructed on the island, but construction (along with most things here) moves at a snail's pace. Lots of dirt roads and sandy trails and paths.

On the mainland, especially when you're riding in a bus, you see bars/taverns/lodges all over the place. They kind of let you know that you're approaching a town/city/populated area. On Pemba, no way. I know I've mentioned this before, but there are only 2 bars on the entire island. It's a completely different culture here when it comes to alcohol. Also, women are less visible (kind of mean that literally, with the whole ninja get-up some wear) on Pemba than on the mainland. Especially in the markets. On the mainland, there are chapati mamas, women vendors, women fundis [tradespeople], and waitresses. Here, most of these roles are filled by men. That's not to say that women are completely absent in the marketplace, but it is dominated by men. The women are at home cooking, cleaning, looking after the children, and/or on the farm. Oh, and of course, everything here shuts down 5 times/day for prayers.

April showers bring May.... showers. Crap. This is duck weather.

Rainy season is here. It started out weeeaakkkk but I guess it needed some time to get going. What this means for me? Cooler temps, grayer/darker days, good napping weather, plenty of drinking water (hooray), and bugs (boo). More scorpions around AND spiders as big as my hand that can jump? Not cool, nature. Also termites, get the f*ck out. (It's amazing they can find what little wood (no jokes, please) there is in my house: window and door frames.) I've said this before, but it also makes teaching a little more difficult as a hard rain on a tin roof will drown out any voice. Not sure why, but rain water doesn't rinse soap as well as my well water did. What say you, science folk?

When leaving my house I bring sunglasses and an umbrella. I actually don't know why I even bring an umbrella. In the words of Andrew W.K.: "I get wet." And biking is a bit more difficult and messy. The mud-guards I recently put on my bike don't really help. And the mud/sand are reeking havoc on my chain and gears. But I think I prefer to get soaked 'cause of the rain over getting soaked 'cause I'm sweating. And I only get wet/muddy if I feel like leaving my house...

Sunlight drought: Friday, April 27 - Tuesday, May 1. But by the evening of the 1st, it was pouring again.

Rainy season definitely influences my mood. After not seeing the sun for 3.5 days, it takes me some time to get motivated to go out. And, of course, by the time I actually find the motivation to go somewhere (the market, for example), it starts to pour. Ces't le vie.

A student drew a funny picture of me during a class. It was one of those "this teacher is stupid" drawings that we've all done or seen. If you've ever read the BFG by Roald Dahl, you have an idea of how the picture looked: Lanky (not really me, but whatever); big, floppy feet (OK, maybe); big, long, droopy earlobes (maybe? I dunno. Are my earlobes droopy?); beard (got me there); some sort of button-up shirt and pants (that's a given); and a star on my crotch. Yep. A star on my crotch. It was one of those "draw a bunch of straight lines through a center point" star, but still. Not sure what was meant by that. I even checked and my fly was up the entire day. Anyway, I saw the pic and wanted to take it after the class to put up in my house, but the student tore it up before I could get it. Sure taught me a lesson: confiscate all contraband (not really, but I can't think of a better word for it) immediately.

I got pillows to use as cushions for the furniture in my house. Also got a rug. Slowly, I'm spreading out where I actually live in my house.

Its funny how once you start acquiring stuff, you think you need more. Ex: my living room/kitchen. First, it was furniture. Then, got a stoven because I didn't want/like to cook on a charcoal jiko [stove]. Then thought I needed a kitchen table. Got that, then needed a rug. Got a rug and pillows for my living room, now I think I need a coffee table. And another fan... so I don't have to move the one I have back-and-forth from my bedroom to my living room (depending on which room I'm in at the time). I know a lot of this has to do with 25+ years of living in the States, but people here are perfectly happy with sitting on a rug on the floor, cooking the same 3-4 meals with a charcoal jiko, no fan in any room of their house, sleeping on a foam mattress which lays on the floor. If you cut out the living situation of my neighbors here and pasted them in the U.S., they would be labeled "poor" quicker than some of the spiders here can run. Here, though, its kama kawa [normal, typical]. They seem happy too. They'll acquire the occasional... "thing" every so often, but they seem quite content with having water, (basic) food, a roof over their head, something to do (farm, clean, look after kids) during the day, and not having any major health issues. Life is much simpler here. Does the fact that many people here have only seen glimpses (if at all) as to what else the world has to offer play a role in this? I'm sure. But on the whole, they seem happy. (Maybe I've watched Fight Club one too many times.) Flip that around, many people here and elsewhere don't know how good they have it (myself included). Many do not have a roof over their head, food in their stomach, a job/purpose (we all like to feel needed). Even in the States (where many people here are shocked to hear there is poverty) people struggle to put a roof over their head, feed themselves and their family, find a reason to exist. ("Life is suffering."- I mean that in the universal sense, not the "life sucks" sense.) We all have our burdens to bear, but there is likely someone worse off than you are. I'll get off my soapbox now.

But... I am getting a "canopy" (roof extending out from my front door) put on my house. My neighbors (who built the house) are doing it. It's something they planned on doing since the start. Sweet.

Another English Day in late April in Chakechake [Chak-ay-chak-ay] (our banking town, former-largest town in Pemba, I do a lot of shopping there) with American Corner. A combination of students from my English Club, Doug's English Club, and students from the director of American Corner's school. Went well. Ran a little long, but at least we got fed (pilau!). There were a couple of cute kids there (maybe 5-7yrs old) who spoke pretty good English (is "pretty good English" pretty good to say?), and were very happy drawing pictures of the wazungu who were at English day (all 3 of us.) I guess I'm just a drawable (...?) person. My beard makes it pretty easy to tell which drawing is supposed to be me.

I don't think my CPT enjoys going or even wants to go to these things. He just sits in the back of the room, staring at nothing, sometimes leaving the room to text/talk/play on his phone. At least he doesn't fall asleep (which other teachers have done). But he talks a good game when I bring up doing these kind of things at school. I get the feeling that he says he wants to participate because he thinks that's what I want to hear.

My mama seems a little cold towards me after I told her I only needed/wanted her to cook for me 2 days/week. Eeek. Sorry. I want to cook more, get out to the market more, feel like I actually live here. I hope it's just a temporary feeling. In a semi-related story, I made a pretty awesome rice & beans one night. Note: undercooked beans give you more gas than properly cooked beans. I also cook with peanut butter more here than I ever have in the states (not including PB&J (with salt and vinegar chips *drool*), PB & fluff, PB & nutella) . Go spicy peanut sauce. And with the portions of food that I cook for myself, I'd be surprised if I didn't put on any weight. But, then again, my mama made huge portions for me and I only, at best, stayed the same.

My school is broke. "Hatuna pesa" ["We have no money"]. My headmaster revealed this during a teachers' meeting. He had to ask the teachers (excluding me) to chip in to help fix the roof of some of the classrooms so it doesn't leak when it rains. And it sure does rain. (I'm pretty sure he excluded me because I want to write a grant to finish the office/science lab/computer room and teachers' house.) Not sure what this will mean for the rest of the year as far as school days/teachers salaries/extra curricular activities. [10 days later...] Actually, a couple extra curricular activities are happening. There's football and, what can only be called, a poetry slam/rap battle. A handful of students create, practice, and perform poetry. There's 2 teams of students trading barbs back and forth about life, school, family, etc.. It was pretty cool to watch them practice, especially with all the other students around yelling "oooooohhhh" after a particularly good jab. The students travel to other schools and compete against other teams on the island.

There will be a wine-making contest here in Pemba. It will be between the PCVs and one VSO vol. I plan to make a coconut-vanilla-lime wine (basically Malibu hooch). I'll let you know if I go blind.

Nostalgia: I miss the atmosphere that comes with the NHL playoffs. Starting in M.S./H.S., to college, to post-graduation, I've always had a good time with a room full of friends, booze, greasy food, the tension (especially when the Sabres were in it (shut it, Rangers fans)), explosions of noise when something happens, sudden-death, people gloating, people pouting, (the morning after a combination of Cinco de Mayo AND a Sabres opening game of round 2 - good god, who won?) being "that guy" and wearing a jersey out to the bars.

I miss road trips in the States: Hopping in the car - alone or with friends, windows down, music up, cruising down a country road or on the highway, watching the scenery fly by, road trip snacks, interacting with other people in other cars, the conversation in the car, the non-awkward silences, falling asleep and seeing other people fall asleep, pit stops, realizing you're almost there. I have to say, getting there is bittersweet. Enjoy the ride. ("Shoulder to the wheel", anyone?)

"It's important to remember that every reality is always happening at the same time." - Chuck Klosterman

Things:

*New/Different music I listen to since I fika'd [arrive...'d]: Foo Fighters (listening to everything, not just the hits), Wilco, 2Pac, The Beatles, Bob Marley. Not that I've never listened to these, but they're becoming staples. Some other smaller bands I got from a vol here (Valentiger, Little Village, Bangups) are also good. Tom Petty, Pink Floyd, Zeppelin have all solidified their spots on my all-time roster.

*Breaking Bad is good. But god damn, it's depressing.

*I'm reading "Atlas Shrugged." After finishing it, I've heard I'll either become: a pink commie bastard or; a right-wing nut job.

*I've really been enjoying the sounds (rain, crickets, the occasional bush baby) at night when I go to sleep.

*Did I see rays being sold at the fish market? Anyone know if they're any good?

*Random (acid trip) flashback: there was quite the learning curve in 5th grade when all the guys went and bought gel deodorant. How many times did we need to turn the knob? 20? Perfect. Related story, I'm out of deodorant.

*I really like the phrase "drunk as a skunk." Not sure why. Probably the rhyming. Also, how did a skunk get so drunk??

*I'm either growing another butt muscle or I really pulled something riding in the trunk of a car.

Peace Corps uses a ridiculous number of acronyms. I use them a bunch when I write without thinking of the fact that you guys out there reading this have no idea what many of them mean, so I put together a list.

APCD- Associate Peace Corps Director, the person in charge of each program. We have 2 for education, Hilda for the North and James for the South.

CBT- Community Based Training, your CBT is the group of 4-5 trainees that lives in the same area as you during PST, used for both the group and the place

CD- Country Director, ours is EB (that's her name, not an acronym) and she's awesome

CLT- Communicative Language Teaching, an English teaching technique focused on getting students to use English to communicate

COS- Close of service, there's a COS conference 3 months before home, and then your COS date is the day you actually finish your service. Sometimes used as a verb.

DC- Washington DC, where Peace Corps' headquarters is

ET- Early terminate, when a volunteer decides to go home early. Used as a verb.

HCN- Host Country National, in this case, a Tanzania

HOS- Head of School, your headmaster

ICT- Information and Communication Technology, computer classes

IST- In Service Training, the week long training after you've been at site for 3 month, including HIV training

LCF- Language and Culture Facilitator, the Swahili teachers during PST

LPI- Language Proficiency Interview, the oral Swahili test you take twice during PST and once before COSing

MSC- Midservice Conference, the conference you have after you've been at site for a year

NECTA- National Examinations Council of Tanzania, NECTAs are the national exams that students take after forms 2 and 4.

NGO- Non-Governmental Organization, sometimes volunteers work with NGOs, especially if they extend for a 3rd year.

OMS- Office of Medical Services, the medical office in Washington

PC-Peace Corps

PCMO- Peace Corps Medical Officer, the Peace Corps doctor

PCPP- Peace Corps Partnership Program, a type of grant where they post your project on the Peace Corps' website and people donate

PCT-Peace Corps Trainee

PCTZ- Peace Corps Tanzania

PCV- Peace Corps Volunteer

PEPFAR- President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, the government's HIV program, and where the funding for PCTZ's HIV work comes from.

PIP- Performance Improvement Plan, when you get caught breaking rules, you get PIPed

PSDN- Peer Support and Diversity Network, a group of volunteers who are trained in supporting others, who you can call if you need someone to talk to about something.

PST- Pre-Service Training, the 2.5-3 months of training before you swear in and become a real volunteer

RPCV- Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, someone who has finished their service

SOW- Scheme of Work, the outline of what you're going to teach for the year

SPA- Small Projects Assistance- a type of grant

SSC- Safety and Security Coordinator, the staff member in charge of safety and security issues

TAC- Time Away from Community, when you're away from your site

TEFL- Teaching English as a Foreign Language, what I do.

TOT- Training of Trainers, when the PCV facilitators and staff get together to plan and prepare prior to trainings

TPR- Total Physical Response, an English teaching technique using lots of actions

TZ- Tanzania, or Tanzanian

VAC- Volunteer Advisory Council, a group of volunteers that sorts out issues with staff. I'm the president.

VAST- I don't remember what it stands for, but it's a type of grant for HIV/AIDS activities

VRF- Volunteer Reporting Form, the form we fill out twice a year to report our activities to Peace Corps

VSA- Village Survey Assessment, something that health and environment volunteers need to do their first 3 months at site to assess the needs of their community

VSO- Voluntary Service Overseas, the British version of Peace Corps

WU- Weekly Update, an email that gets sent to volunteers each week. Pronounced Woo.

I'm in Dar right now, having spent a day and a half at VAC meetings. VAC is the volunteer advisory council, and we meet three times a year to address volunteer issues, and serve as a liasion between staff and volunteers. This is my second meeting, and I really love it. Last time we reorganized VAC so that each volunteer is representing 2 or 3 regions instead of just one, to streamline the number of representatives and make VAC more efficient. This was the first meeting of the new, smaller VAC and it went quite well. What happens is first the volunteers meet to review the issues people have raised, and add any new ones. Then we divide and do "sector meetings" where reps meet with staff to discuss the issues specific to that sector. (Programming, medical, safety and security, grants, and the country director for overarching issues) I was the secretary, so I met with the Country Director (CD). In dealing with the aftermath of the robbery, I got to know EB, our CD, pretty well, and I really like her. This meeting totally confirmed it. I trust her judgement and I think she is very smart about how she leads our country. So that's reassuring. Then, in the afternoon we come together and have a big meeting of staff and volunteers together, where we go over the responses from the sector meetings, and discuss things that need more discussion. As the secretary, I take notes on a computer hooked up to the projector so everyone can follow along. We also keep a list of things that still need to be worked out. These issues will have working groups on the 2nd day of VAC. The 2nd day is pretty informal. The working groups meet, and the secretary puts together the newsletter, including a summary of what was discussed at the meeting. It also includes regional updates, where each rep writes a little bit about what the volunteers in their region are up to. So that's how VAC works. During our meeting today, we elected a new president and secretary. I'm going to be president, and Brie is going to replace me as secretary. Basically we said "who wants to be president?" and I said I did, and then because I will be president, we needed a new secretary and Brie said she wanted to do it, and no one objected, so that was that. I imagine president and secretary elections will continue to work like this in the smaller VAC. Because reps are appointed on a rolling basis, it means only 3 of the 7 of us will actually be here for the whole next year, and we needed to fill 2 positions. But I don't think it's a problem, and I'm glad to have Brie as my secretary, I think she'll be good at it. So now, as president, I'm the one who needs to remind reps to keep in touch with the volunteers in their regions, and send me their issues so I can pass them on to staff. I'm looking forward to it. I like working with the staff members, and it's really cool to see things I was involved with actually happen. For example, I've been pushing to get English teacher grammar books since PST, and they finally arrived! I got the first copy, which is super exciting. Cuz I'm a dork. But a happy dork, cuz I like VAC and getting to see the staff. Telling them about everything I'm doing at site makes me feel accomplished, which is a good feeling.

I started up an English bulletin board using conversational English for students to glance at. I used Jon and I as the first “subjects” and will highlight two Tanzanian teachers every few weeks. I hope that this will show students that their teachers use English and will motivate them to have more confidence to speak English. When I run out of teachers to highlight, I am going to “interview” students.

Yesterday I showed up at the clinic to weigh babies, as I do every Wednesday. This week, the nurse on duty had a special surprise for me: she asked if I wanted to help her deliver a baby. It was a morning of firsts—Mama's first time giving birth, my first time attending a birth, the baby’s first time venturing out of the womb. The nurse laughed at how excited I was. To a Tanzanian woman, the fact that I had made it to the ripe age of 23 without having witnessed a birth was kind of ridiculous.

Staring into the terrifying mess between the soon-to-be-Mama’s thighs, I saw oozing gooey whiteness, chunky dark redness, and, lower down, dripping out of a smaller hole, mucus-y yellow-brownness with a distinct and unpleasant smell. I know I’m supposed to use positive adjectives to describe such a miraculous event, but my first thought was: gross.

Then everything changed. Hiding shyly behind this curtain of deeply human fluids, I glimpsed the tiniest hint of curly black hair. That detail, extraordinary and dizzying, turned the scene from disgusting to indescribably beautiful.

A brand new life. A tiny, helpless, wrinkled being in the process of discovering that his cozy little home—all he’d ever known—was merely the prelude to a grand and tragic symphony. As the soft walls that had held him in a tight embrace for the entirety of his being began to contract, pushing downwards and outwards, the little dude began to hear epic chords, the music of a world he didn’t realize he’d been preparing to enter ever since the moment, about nine months ago, when, through a serendipitous mix of timing and the idiocy of the young, sperm from a commitment phobic taxi driver met with and entered the egg of a pretty village girl with very dark skin, chubby cheeks, and deep black eyes. The girl, Amina, had run away to the big city to find a new life. And so she did, through not in the sense she had hoped. Now, back in the village, the new life Amina found in the city was ready to make his debut, and I was there to cheer him on.

The first thing I noticed after the nurse gently wiped away the blood and discharge was that Amina’s vagina seemed strangely one-dimensional. I saw what looked like two holes—the top one a few centimeters larger than the bottom one. The two holes were separated by an inch-and-a-half wide, half centimeter thick membrane. There was nothing else, just the holes. The baby’s head was now pushing against the membrane, stretching it and trying to rip it in two. The nurse tried to help the little dude get past this unnatural barrier. The membrane and the slit-like appearance of the woman's genitals is the result, the nurse explained, of a severe form of female circumcision that involves removal of the clitoris, inner and outer labia, and the sewing up of the remaining tissue. This form of female circumcision is fairly uncommon in Tanzania, and definitely against the law, but it continues to happen today, always in secret and usually to girls between ages 2 and 8. I fought the urge to go to the room next door where the woman’s mother was waiting and yell at her for letting her daughter go through that awful ritual however many years ago. The nurse seemed to think it more prudent to admonish the girl herself.

“If you hadn’t been cut, the baby would have been born by now. Instead, it’s in distress and you’ve been in pain for almost 10 hours. If this baby is a girl, remember this moment when your mother tries to talk you into cutting her,” the matronly woman said with a disapproving scowl.

There was an awkward pause broken by another wave of contractions. More black hair came into view through the widening—but still not wide enough—top section of the woman’s unnaturally segmented vagina. The head floated into view. The area between Amina’s fleshy thighs began expanding outward, pushing… pushing… pushing… and then, suddenly, the baby’s head began to recede.

“I can’t do it,” Amina whispered as she collapsed back on the hard examination table. “I give up.”

“Not an option,” the nurse replied matter-of-factly. “Shut up and push.”

Unconvinced that this was a time for tough love, I moved to take the girl’s hand and tried to think of something encouraging to say.

“Your baby has a lot of hair,” I offered.

Amina’s short laugh set another contraction in motion. As the baby’s hair slid back into view, Amina continued to whisper over and over again, “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.”

I watched more and more hair slide into view and the head start squeezing into a cone-shape. The hint of a forehead peeked out uncertainly.

“You can, you can, you can,” I chanted in time with Amina’s protests.

“Shut up and push!” the nurse repeated sternly. I gave her a mean look and she grinned at me, then reached in with her hand to cup the awkwardly shaped head, twisting it like she was trying to unscrew a stubborn light bulb.

The unnatural membrane—leftover from a cruel needle stitching up a place that should never be stitched—began to stretch. Beads of blood appeared, much brighter red than the dark, chunky kind still oozing out from deep instead.

And then, suddenly, a face! A scrunchy, wrinkly, angry-looking face. Before I had time to fully register the bizarre sight of a squished head poking out between its mother’s thighs, the rest of the baby’s body flopped out and into the nurse’s practiced hands. I took a quick peek and informed Amina that she had given birth to a son. She smiled weakly. Three and a half kilograms of human being had suddenly joined the world, but something wasn’t right. The baby’s skin was rapidly turning yellow, chest and belly looking sickeningly deflated. I held my own breath as I waited, waited, and waited for the baby to inhale. He didn’t.

The nurse, unfazed by the infant’s terrifyingly lifeless presentation, worked quickly and quietly, placing the baby on Amina's chest, instructing her to hold him. Amina's lungs filled up with each breath as though she was trying to breathe for both herself and her baby. The nurse sucked out some yellowish goo from the baby’s mouth and nose and pumped gently against his chest. Tears began to spring to my eyes with the horrifying realization that the baby might be dead, and the nurse started blowing on his slack, yellow face. As she did this, she used both hands to tie off and cut the umbilical cord with a single graceful motion.

Suddenly, as though he had just remembered that he was supposed to breathe in order to survive, the little guy took the tiniest gulp of air and let out a strangled gasp. Tears of relief ran down my cheeks as the nurse kept up her regimen of blowing into his face and pumping his chest.

Once the baby seemed to have figured out the basics of survival in the world outside the womb, the nurse lifted the whimpering infant, wrapped him in a clean blue khanga, and placed him on a metal scale. His face turned from yellow to pink as she recorded his weight. Leaving the baby on the scale, she turned back to the mother to help remove the placenta.

I couldn’t take my eyes off the baby. Alone on the cold scale, he seemed impossibly small and helpless. He was breathing less deeply than he had been in his mother’s arms and the pinkness in his face was fading as quickly as it had appeared. I know absolutely nothing about newborns, but something told me he needed to be held. He had yet to open his eyes.

“Can I pick him up?” I asked the nurse, both eager and terrified at the prospect that she’d say yes.

“Yes,” she said.

Carefully cupping his head, I lifted the baby boy and held him gently against my chest. I took a few deep breaths, hoping he would learn from my example. Color rushed back into his face and his big brown eyes shot open. He looked up at me and scrunched his nose as though he was trying to figure something out. Then he let out a loud, healthy cry.

“I’m here,” he announced in the ancient language of newborns.

“Karibu nymbani,” I replied. "Welcome home."

Jon and I implemented a movie rewards system at our school. One challenge of working in a Tanzanian system is that there is no “positive reinforcement” system in place to help students behave. Students are only punished for bad behavior and never rewarded for good behavior. The Tanzanian teachers use corporal punishment to punish bad behavior. That’s the only thing in place here. So, there are a few ways I punish bad behavior. Generally, I include games, songs, and dances into my classes. I take away these things when the class is misbehaving. They get really disappointed. If it’s just one student, I kick them out of class – which ultimately leads to them being beaten by another teacher. I have moved kids to different parts of the room. I have put kids into the corner to face the wall (sans a dunce cap). But, I want there to also be positive behavior reinforcement and that’s where Jon and I decided to show movies. We give out tickets to students that have shown us good behavior, done well on homework or examinations, or try really hard in class. Then, twice a month we show a movie at school and if a student has a “movie ticket”, they can come and watch. We only have 36 tickets to give, so the students need to show really good behavior. Interestingly enough, students are ecstatic and beg for a movie ticket, yet we have had really low attendance. The students who are receiving tickets are not coming to see the movies, even though they whoop for joy when they get a ticket. I hope as this system goes on, the attendance increases. It’s a new concept for the students to be rewarded for behavior so maybe it will take some time for the excitement of the movies to bring out more ticket holders. Of course, when I show a movie, all the other students without tickets are begging to come in. I don’t yet understand why those with movie tickets aren’t coming.

the movie tickets on the side and the general rules to watch the movie.

Living in a foreign country for an undetermined amount of time forces you to prioritize. In the absence of permanence there is compromise. What do I need? What can I live without? How much do I invest in my life here? This can be a positive, it helps you simplify and identify what’s important to you. Fifty pairs of shoes I can live without, a constant source of reading material is non-negotiable. This transient lifestyle is more challenging in other areas of life. For me, the most difficult area of compromise is in personal relationships. The social landscape of Dar es Salaam is unique. While there are more than three million people living in Dar, I, along with most people I know, mainly socialize in a small community comprised of educated Tanzanians and ex-pats (short for ex-patriot). The ex-pats come from all over the world, every nationality has a small residential representation, many of whom live in an area known as “the peninsula”. The peninsula is separate from the crowded streets of the rest of Dar es Salaam, and is surrounded on three sides by beautiful views of the Indian Ocean. The diplomats live in the fancy houses that are ridiculously expensive, yet fit within the budget of the various foreign embassies and aid agencies. They are mostly families doing a few years in Dar, then moving on to the next station. Throughout the nicer areas of Dar apartment buildings are shooting up. These over-priced shared spaces are filled with well paid female aid workers, business men, and a variety of characters with unique stories. Beyond the pail young savvy ex-pats live in shared houses in gentrification-friendly neighborhoods where the real estate is cheap and so is the beer. Because of the transient nature of the ex-pat community there are all sorts of unique living situations, mine for example: I enjoy a beautiful house on the ocean just off the peninsula, and share with a wonderful American woman and her daughter, it was meant to be temporary, but then I stayed. While I would like to count myself amongst the young and savvy, by living in a big beautiful house on the edge of the peninsula I have given up a certain amount of ex-pat cred. I’m neither here nor there, I exist in a sort of in-between state. This is true of my timeline in Dar. Typical Dar timelines are as follows: The short-termer. Interns, students, volunteers, and development workers all fall into this category. They’re mainly females in their 20s. Short-termers have an air of excitement and adventure about them. They enjoy a funky social world with lots of beach time, and a sweet life in America waiting for them at the end of three-months. Surfs up! The long-termers. This group is a bit more diverse and includes entrepreneurs and others with business interests in Tanzania; white Africans who have made Tanzania their home; teachers; volunteers who came to Tanzania for a few months and wound up staying; and other randoms. Many long-termers socialize within a circle of other long-termers. It can be emotionally exhausting to be connecting with people and then saying good-bye over and over. On the other hand, many of the long-term men enjoy the company of the short-term girls. The in-betweeners . In-betweeners are an assortment of professionals that are in Tanzania for an undetermined amount of time (myself included). In the beginning, they take advantage of every social activity available. Dar is a friend-conducive environment. When you’re a young ex-pat you already have something in common with most people you meet: you’re away from home, doing something somewhat exotic. You bond over the quirks of Dar. You spend the first several months balancing work and a demanding social calendar. You make many friends, who then start to leave. You begin to see why friends of yours who have been here longer are jaded. Your social circle becomes a blend of short-term, long-term, and in-betweeners, which can be challenging to navigate. Relationships in Dar are difficult because of something we all know, but no one says: this is temporary. There is a steady influx of young ex-pats who are fun, interesting, young people. You meet them at the bar, soccer practice, embassy karaoke, reading on the beach, etc. When you meet someone at a bar, within the first five minutes you will know where they’re from, why they’re here, and most importantly, when they are leaving. Because that’s the thing: as steady as the influx is, there is an equal outflow. Dar’s a revolving door, you never know who might be coming or going. It’s important to have a local support group in what can be a stressful environment, but the revolving door can complicate things. Is it worth investing in a friendship with someone who may be out of your life next month? A common solution to this is superficial relationships—exchanging pleasantries amongst large groups of friends who you hang out with every weekend. These relationships are an easy way to keep people at an arm’s length. You enjoy their company until they’re gone (which they will be, eventually). No harm no foul, but, ultimately no depth. While it’s great to have a large group of weekend friends, these relationships are based on low-expectations, which, among other things, lend itself to an unfortunate atmosphere of accepted flakiness which is rampant in Dar. As I said in the beginning, this transient lifestyle forces you to identify what’s important to you. Relationships, I have learned, are not something I’m willing to compromise on. And so, as with all investments, it becomes necessary to accept the risks, in this case, the possibility that a good friend may up and leave. In some ways that gives the relationship, in its temporal state more value. It allows you to let your barriers down and experience life in this crazy ex-pat world more fully. Beyond a support system, you gain perspective, humor, someone to share the cost of a late night taxi, and someone who in ten years you can call up and say remember that time in Tanzania… I’ve learned to fully embrace my experiences here, not matter how long it lasts. We can enjoy the beauty of a sunset, even though we know it’s temporary; what’s more, that sun will rise again.

Holidays are different here than they were back home or even in Korea. There are those that are celebrated here, like Christmas and Easter, just during the wrong seasons and without the usual celebratory things (like eggnog and bowling). There are those that Tanzanians don't know about, like Thanksgiving, which still exist because we celebrate them anyways. There's those that I just skipped entirely, like Halloween and St. Patrick's Day. And then there are Tanzanian holidays that we don't celebrate back home, which sort of become meaningless days off of school. This past week there have been two of those. April 26 is Union Day, celebrating the day that Tanzania was formed out of Tanganyika and Zanzibar. And tomorrow is May Day, which is apparently also an official government holiday. These are spaced just close enough together to be really fricking annoying. Let me lay it out for you. Thursday is a holiday, Friday is a working day (except not for me, because I don't teach on Fridays, yay!), the weekend is the weekend, Monday is a working day, Tuesday is a holiday. An awful lot of holiday, no extended weekend whatsoever. Really ridiculous holiday spacing. Also annoying, because it throws off my teaching schedule even more than VAC on Thursday and Friday this week is already doing. I'm planning on leaving my class notes with a student to write on the board so my kids can still get some practice in while I'm away, but I don't trust them to learn new material without me, especially because the next set of topics will only get a class or two each (family, occupations, appearance, ownership, etc). And while I'm on the subject of holidays, let me just say that the southern hemisphere is screwy, and because the weather is starting to get cold, that means it should be Christmas time, but it's not, which seems unfair. I feel jipped. Christmas is the reward for putting up with impending cold!

As some of you may know, the Tanzanian A-level school year is broken up into two major breaks, one in September-October and one in March-April. This being April, I’ve just finished the latter break: new timetables have been drawn up, my students are slowly trickling in from all parts of the country, and the school is undergoing a thorough makeover to beat back the now-ubiquitous rainy season weeds. Slowly, the cogs of Songea Boys’ are beginning to turn again, and, as of this week, I’m back to my normal teaching schedule, as if I never left. In the end, I guess, things always go back to the daily grind.

That being said, I can’t say I’m not looking forward to a little peace and quiet in Songea. This most recent recess has seen me in a variety of different places---most of them quite far from home---and it’s definitely been an exciting/hectic trip along the way. In fact, I’m pretty sure I did more traveling during this past break than I did during my entire first year of service.

To be fair, I did do some work during this time as well, but most of it was concentrated into the first week of break, and it’s not really worth talking about: I merely procrastinated like crazy during the second term and then had to grade a semester’s worth of homework, quizzes, midterms, and finals for two 180-student classes in the last seven days of school before I had to leave for Dar. Quite frankly, I don’t even recall much of that week… all I remember is finishing an entire box of red pens, cutting brownies into small pieces to serve as carefully-rationed mini-incentives for completing ten tests at a time, and reaching a level of efficiency I didn’t think was even possible by internet-raised twenty-somethings like me. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Peace Corps Education Volunteer Experience.

But again, that stuff---and the stuff I did in Dar---isn’t the point of this post. This post is about my aimless wandering, and I began that in Moshi and Arusha.

Moshi/Arusha

For the more geographically inclined, Tanzania can be roughly divided into five major areas---the North, the Southern Highlands, the Deep South, the West, and the Zanzibar Archipelago. Zanzibar, while safi, is kind of in a league of its own: it has its own president, its own government, and its own culture (very Swahili, a hybrid of Arab, Indian, and East African cultures). The North is where most of the infrastructure is and where most of the tourists go: that’s the part with Kilimanjaro, the Serengeti, Ngorongoro Crater, Olduvai Gorge, etc. On the other hand, the Southern Highlands area (where Songea is) is nice---but not too nice---cooler, and less frequently visited. The Deep South is hot, dirty, and largely neglected. The West---well, no one really goes to the West because there really isn’t much there.

As a staunch Songean, I had never really ventured north of Dar until this past March. Indeed, in my previous travels, I had seen a fair portion of the Southern Highlands, the Deep South, Zanzibar, and the West, but I had never really seen the part of Tanzania that is largely considered to be “quintessential Tanzania” (and, to some extent, “quintessential Africa”), i.e., Northern Tanzania. Granted, I still haven’t had the truly classic “African Experience”---gone on safari, climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro, etc.---but that crap is expensive, and it’s way beyond my monthly Peace Corps pittance. But still, given that I was already in Dar at the beginning of my large break, I felt compelled to make a brief foray into the vast North---to immerse myself in a different environment, to see friends I hadn’t seen in months, and to indulge in the North’s legendary safiaccoutrements (swimming pools, safari lodges, wazungu food, etc.).

I gotta say, as far as Moshi was concerned, I was impressed. Paved, clean, multi-lane streets with medians. Multi-story buildings. Well-manicured public parks and gardens. Grocery stores and bakeries at every major intersection, featuring frozen goods, imported Western items, and properly-butchered meat. A cheap burger joint. Well-dressed schoolchildren who spoke decent English. White people everywhere. And, despite all this, it wasn’t Dar. It was pretty mind-blowing.

Arusha was pretty similar, albeit bigger and more chaotic. It doesn’t surprise me that Arusha is both the tourist and crime capital of Tanzania, as it has perhaps the worst bus stand in the country… from the moment you get off the bus till about a block away, you pretty much have to beat off the touts, “certified safari guides,” and other assorted con artists with a stick. The city, though, is nice: I’m pretty sure it boasts the only sushi bar in country (and it’s actually Japanese-run, so it’s legit), and it has a huge ShopRite at the edge of town, in which I spent---I kid you not---about an hour-and-a-half gawking at the vast array of cheeses and vegetables on display. Unfortunately for me, many of these nice things have a price, and I only had enough money on me at the time to buy four tuna rolls and an ice cream sandwich at these places, respectively. Not really enough for a full meal, per se, but it sure beat the hell out of Paul’s Patented Half-Assed Sushi---rice, vinegar, carrots, avocados, and SPAM hunks mashed into amorphous balls and dipped in soy sauce.

As far as the stated agenda goes, my primary reason for venturing all the way to Moshi and Arusha was to run the 10th Annual Kilimanjaro Half-Marathon, which was located in Moshi. I was originally intending to run the full marathon, but training difficulties (read: my being fat and lazy) precluded the fulfillment of this goal, thus leaving me with no choice but to attempt to waddle my way through the half as fast as possible. It was actually a pretty fun event: as PCVs, we tend to make a bit of a party out of the weekend, and when I wasn’t cramming every last calorie I could into my face, I was hanging out with a lot of folks I almost never see, which was pretty fun. The race itself was also pretty nice: it was about half uphill, and half downhill, and there were a ton of participants---well over 2,000 for my particular event. My only real complaint (aside from the Kenyans kicking my ass) was that the ending was a bit weak: I managed to match pace with a fellow PCV about ¾ through the race, and we had made plans to do an awesome, elaborate celebration dance across the finish line… only the final stretch of track was completely congested with other participants, so we didn’t get to do anything. Heck, they didn’t even tell me my finishing time; I think it was somewhere between 2:05 and 2:15. Lame.

Everybody gets a trophy day!

Singida and Mwanza

The latter part of my break was primarily focused on getting to Rwanda, which I had heard allowed Americans in free of charge (i.e. without a $60 entrance visa). Since I’m in Peace Corps and thus a cheap bastard, this moved Rwanda to the top of my list of countries to visit while in East Africa. In truth, I also wanted to visit Rwanda because I had heard that it was vastly different from Tanzania… I felt that spending a year-and-a-half cooped up in Songea had somewhat warped my perception of Africa as a whole, and it was important to see how the other side (or sides) lived. Also, I had heard the country was beautiful and that it had a… unique history, and I was genuinely intrigued, so why not go?

Rwanda, unfortunately, is a pain in the ass to get to from Songea, and I had to pass through a number of towns in order to get there. The first of these was Singida, which, while nice, was fairly unremarkable: it’s a regional capital, it’s moderately sized, and it’s in a semi-arid desert. Its one claim to fame (at least, according to the PCVs there) is that it has really nice rocks---an assertion that is vehemently contested by denizens of Mwanza, who maintain that their rocks are far superior to Singida’s puny pebbles. Having been to both cities, I can now say that Singida’s rocks are, in fact, more impressive than Mwanza’s, but that’s not really saying much. It’s like two Tanesco agents arguing over who works harder: either way, they’re both still corrupt, shiftless jerkoffs. In all fairness, I’m probably just saying this out of jealousy, as both Singida and Mwanza are substantially nicer than Songea. Or maybe I just hate Tanesco. Or maybe both.

In any case, Mwanza is a pretty nice town---the second largest in Tanzania, in fact---and it’s kind of like a mini-Dar: the weather’s the same, the architecture is the same, and it’s located next to a large body of water (Lake Victoria). It has an awesome public library (this first of its kind I’ve seen in Tanzania) and awesome, caught-that-day tilapia for dirt cheap. It also was the place where I saw one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen in my service:

My first afternoon in Mwanza, I ate lunch at a semi-nice restaurant with an open garden area and long tables. As I was waiting for my food, I noticed a large group of Tanzanians occupying the table across from me. Each was well-dressed and had a laptop opened in front of him or her, and one of the women was reading from a piece of paper. One of the men, sitting next to the woman, was furiously typing on his computer while she was speaking. It took me a while to realize, but then it dawned on me…

Whoa. He’s taking minutes. That must mean that this is a meeting. But this is lunchtime. Tanzanians never conduct business during meals, unless… HOLY CRAP IT’S A WORKING LUNCH.

I repeat: a working lunch. In Tanzania.

In my entire service so far, I have never seen Tanzanians work during lunchtime; in fact, I get routinely admonished for letting my food get cold at school because I’m doing work, “Chakula kwanza, Mista Paul. Chakula kwanza.” Not just that, but I routinely see Tanzanians literally drop everything and furiously elbow check each other out of the way to get to food when it’s served (especially on “meat day” at my school), and if I happen to be teaching during lunch break, it's pretty much guaranteed that there'll be nothing left for me when I get back. These particular Tanzanians in Mwanza, on the other hand, were not only conducting a productive meeting with a scheduled agenda---and minutes---but they were also doing it during the hallowed hour of lunch break. Crazy.

And the best part? When they were actually served food, they waited. They finished their current item of business, politely asked for spoons (so as to not get their hands dirty), and begun to eat whilediscussing the next point. It was just so… civilized.

Man, maybe I HAVE been spending too much time in Songea.

The Bukoba Incident

As nice as that little interlude was, Bukoba gave me a firm reminder that I was, in fact, still in Tanzania, and that Tanzania doesn’t always take too kindly to foreigners. Don’t get me wrong, the town is nice enough: it’s green, pretty, and fairly safi (it has the biggest freaking cathedral I’ve seen in country… like National Cathedral big). It also serves as the kinda-halfway point between Mwanza and Kigali, and getting there allowed me to ride the ferry across Lake Victoria. (I don’t know why, but I have a strange obsession with riding boats in Tanzania. If there’s a major body of water with a boat that goes across it, I must ride it. I know, it’s weird. Don’t judge me.)

Your requisite Bukoba tourism picture. The island in the background is Msira.

In any case, the reason why I only have a lukewarm impression of Bukoba is because I was robbed there. Well, partially robbed. Let me explain:

During my stay in Bukoba, I was sharing a hotel room with a German girl I had met on the boat (that way, it worked out super cheap for both of us). The guesti was pretty average fare: while there were no bars on the windows, the beds were comfortable enough, and there was round-the-clock supervision from a clerk. Moreover, our room was on the second floor of a building overlooking a major intersection, which I thought afforded us a little extra security: in order to break in, one would either have to bring an exceptionally tall ladder and set it up in the alley adjacent to the building (which, incidentally, had a bunch of fundis working in it), or sidle about 20 feet along the building’s front façade (again, in full view of a major traffic intersection) from the main balcony to the window, which locked from the inside anyways. By no means was our hotel Fort Knox, but I still felt reasonably safe leaving my stuff there.

One day, after a fairly lame excursion to the nearby island of Msira (all we wanted was to chill on the beach, but, as wazungu, we were given a mandatory escort around the island and were forced to fuel the village head’s nasty drinking habit by paying him tribute… the guy even stole the tip we gave his son for helping us out), my roommate and I returned to the guestito wash up and prep for dinner. Strangely, however, when we unlocked the door and tried to get in our room, the door wouldn’t budge---it had been bar-locked from the inside. Seeing as we had the actual key on us---and, in fact, had had the key with us the whole day---this was fairly alarming, as it proved fairly conclusively that someone had broken in at some point during the day. Peeking through the ventilation holes above the door only served to confirm this suspicion: all of our valuable items---my computer, my Zune, her and my headphones, our cellphone chargers---were gone. After questioning hotel staff about seeing any suspicious activity during the day (and their saying that there was none), we came to the unfortunate conclusion that we had been robbed, and, by this point, the perpetrator was long gone.

Still though, I wanted to verify beyond doubt that my stuff had, in fact, been stolen, and since there was no other way to get into the room, I asked the hotel staff if we could break the lock and enter. After some discussion of the particulars (repair costs, etc.), the staff relented and we kicked in the door. It was actually pretty badass, and, had I not been distracted by the whole being-robbed thing, I probably would have enjoyed it a lot more than I did. I guess all that Tae Kwon Do training ultimately paid off.

The next 30 seconds are a bit of a blur. I remember the door collapsing, rushing into the room, and making a beeline for my bed to check my valuables (my roommate did the same for her side). I remember muttering a string of curse words upon realizing that the thieves had taken literally everything of value I owned, and I remember quickly making plans on how to spend the rest of my Peace Corps service computerless. I also remember hearing a loud shriek from the opposite end of the room, whipping my head around to see what was happening, and seeing one of the hotel staff dragging a terrified teenage girl---replete with dirty school uniform---out of our room’s wardrobe, throwing her on the ground. When she tried to scurry away, he pinned her down under his knee and proceeded to methodically beat the snot out of her. Holy crap.

As it turns out, this girl was the thief: she had broken in sometime during the afternoon (how she accomplished this, I still have no idea), and she had gotten trapped in the room when we had returned early to get ready for dinner. Guilty as hell and with no way out, she elected to hide in the wardrobe, perhaps to forestall her inevitable ass-whooping by a few extra seconds. Seriously, though, this girl could not have been caught more red-handed: she was literally clutching the bag with all our valuables in it when she got caught, and despite being thrown on the ground and receiving a vigorous face-pummeling, she refused to let it go… we had to physically wrench it from her grasp. Fortunately for us, all of the important things were accounted for (computer, money, cellphones, chargers, etc.), so that afforded us some measure of relief. There was still one item missing, however---my Zune and headphones---which was the cause of some lingering consternation on my part.

Now, to be fair, my Zune is pretty old, and it can’t really do anything that my computer can’t already do better. I wouldn’t have died if I didn’t get it back. But still, I use it a fair bit in country; its battery, despite four-and-a-half years of extensive use, is still better than my computer’s, and it tends to come in handy on the longer bus rides. Also, it was pretty reasonable to assume that it was still in the room somewhere: if the thief had an accomplice or if this was a well-coordinated strike, there would be no reason for her to hold on to everything else and juststeal the Zune… she would probably just have dropped the entire package out to her friend in the alley and that would be that. No, it had to be in the room. I just didn’t know where.

So now began the fun part---the interrogation. First, we had to clear the area: given that the town wazungu had been robbed in plain daylight and the thief had been apprehended, a mini-mob of about 30 people was forming outside the hotel, and there were at least 10 complete strangers in the hotel room, waiting their turn to grab the thief and smack her around a bit to get her to confess where the missing Zune was. It actually got fairly intense at one point… one of the hotel staff had her pinned down and was threatening to burn her eyes out with a fully-heated immersion coil if she didn’t fess up (luckily, my roommate made a diving save to unplug the coil before this actually happened). Regardless, we managed to get most of the randoms out of the room and lock the door, which allowed me to summon up my best gentle-but-firm/good cop Kiswahili and have a one-on-one talk with her.

The talk, unfortunately, was unproductive. For one, she was still a bit discombobulated, as she was beaten pretty badly and thus bleeding a bit/sobbing uncontrollably. On top of that, she was having a great deal of difficulty finding a story and sticking with it: she first denied any knowledge of my Zune, then she admitted to taking it but claimed she didn’t know where it went, then she introduced a previously unmentioned accomplice, Evarastus, to whom she dropped my Zune out the window, etc. With her story becoming progressively more convoluted and nonsensical (if she and her accomplice apparently used a ladder to climb in the second-story window, why the hell would he (a) only take the Zune with him when he left and (b) deliberately screw her over by yanking out the ladder before she could get down?) I began to lose patience with her incoherent babbling, telling her to shut her dumb, lying mouth and listen to me.

I put forward what I felt was a reasonable proposition: she could either return my Zune to me and we would go our separate ways, or she could continue to hold out and go to jail. I tried to explain to her that we got her, she was completely and utterly caught, and if she was a good girl and returned my Zune to me, she had nothing to fear, as I could use my white man powers to guarantee her safe passage through the mob. I further explained that, even if she did manage to successfully steal my Zune, I had the charger, and given that my Zune’s battery is not what it used to be, the thing would be dead weight in a matter of hours (and I defy ANYONE to find a replacement Zune charger in Tanzania, much less Bukoba). Finally, I warned her that continued obstinacy would invariably result in further beatings, if not by the mob, then by the police. Sadly, this proposal was met with renewed protestations of innocence---“I don’t have it!”/“Evarastus took the ladder!”/“I don’t have any money, please let me go!”---and, given that nothing sets me off more nowadays than Tanzanians bitching to me about being poor (especially ones who steal from me), I took that as my cue to grab her by the arm, drag her to the police officer waiting outside my room, and escort her down to the Bukoba police station for processing.

The police station was pretty standard procedure. I sat down with an officer to file a report, while the thief was made to sit in a corner, facing the wall. I claimed dollar values for my stolen goods, while various witnesses were asked to corroborate my story. I had pretty much abandoned all hope of getting my Zune back at this point, so I was pretty relaxed; I just didn’t really want to let the thief get off scot-free after she so flagrantly wronged me only thirty minutes prior. Finally, it came time for the thief to give her testimony, so she got up, stretched, and began walking towards the table.

Little did she know that, in stretching, she had inadvertently pressed the main button on my Zune’s flywheel, causing the main display to project a bright, neon-blue rectangle directly on the center of her skirt’s waistband. She was looking at us, so she didn't notice that she had totally given herself away... but, to the rest of us, it looked like she suddenly started sporting a giant, glow-in-the-dark belt buckle.

Naturally, this caused everyone to straight-up jump her: the guards, random onlookers, the officer who was interviewing me---everyone essentially pig-piled her trying to get my stuff back. Fortunately, some quick-acting female officers were able to extract her from the fracas and drag her kicking and screaming back to the cells for a more thorough strip search. My items were returned forthwith, and I went and got a beer.

So, how do I feel about the whole situation? Okay, I guess. In truth, this was the first time in my life that I’d ever been full-on robbed; while there have certainly been instances where I’ve had things go missing under suspicious circumstances, I had never been cleaned out like this before, and I can say without hesitation that it’s not a fun experience. Moreover, while I’m no stranger to Tanzanian mob justice, this was probably one of the more intense beatings I’ve witnessed in country (there is one notable exception, but I won’t get into that). Honestly, I feel bad for the girl… she’s obviously fairly poor and desperate; otherwise, she wouldn’t have tried pulling a stunt like that, and there may be outside factors that I don’t know about (maybe she was put up to it by someone, like the ever-mysterious Evarastus). On the other hand, I’m still a bit angry: it was obviously a targeted attack, planned malevolently, and the dumb girl was either too pigheaded or too stupid to take me up on my generous, get-out-of-jail-free offer. In the end, though, I guess I feel lucky more than anything… if my roommate and I had come back later, the thief would have been long gone, and I would have had to spend the rest of my service sans computer and mp3 player. Damn, that would have really sucked.

In any case, that about does it for this part of the trip. The next day, I found myself in the fertile, rolling hills of Rwanda, and that began a whole new slew of delightful anecdotes and whimsical misadventures. I don’t know when, exactly, I will write about these delightful anecdotes and whimsical misadventures and post them up here, but probably… soon. Maybe. Stay tuned for part 2!

When Jon and I first learned of where we would be living, the Peace Corps staff member simply stated “there are a lot of potatoes there”. Really, that’s not anything to be too excited about. However, it truly is the livelihood of the Tanzanians living around us. As each week rolls by, the potato fields are being completely filled with peasant workers pulling the potatoes from the ground. Our dirt road is lined with semi-trucks being packed full of potato sacks as shown above. Potato season has returned. The potatoes are being driven to all parts of Tanzania and even up to Kenya. Jon and I are excited to get some more potatoes from the farmers who are unable to get rid of them fast enough and just give them to us. It’s really unique to live in a place where the seasons punctuate the landscape.

Thursday was Union Day. 48 years ago, Tanganyika (which is what continental Tanzania used to be known as) and Zanzibar united, to form Tanzania. Sort of a geo-political version of Bennifer and Brangelina. To celebrate Union Day (which I hope you all did in your own special way), Kenzie and I went to the regional Union Day celebration, which was conveniently nearby, at our local secondary school (which is two villages away). All the bigwigs and smallwigs were there, from Iringa Region, from the district, from the county, from the ward, from each of the villages, and probably from some other level of government that I’ve forgotten to mention. Also there were children from at least 6 different schools, both primary and secondary. They sang, they danced, and were by far my favorite part of the day (more about them later).

After the party had been officially started (every Tanzanian meeting and party has to be officially opened, like courtroom proceedings), it was time for introductions. There were perhaps a 1,000 people at the party, if not more. Well over a hundred were introduced by the Master of Ceremonies. It took some time. When you are introduced, you are expected to stand, wave, and say something followed by “Hoye!”, to which the crowd responds, “Hoye!”. For example you could say, “Muungano Hoye!” (Yeah Union Day!) and the crowd would respond, “Hoye!” (Yeah!) You could also go with “Tanzania Hoye!” (Yeah Tanzania!), “Elimu Hoye!” (Yeah Education!), or “Wafupi Hoye!” (Yeah Short People!). Any of those would get an enthusiastic “Hoye!” in response (the last one might not stir the hearts of the taller folk in the crowd, but give it a shot). Back to the introductions. After we had gone through each and every level of government (with me wondering all the things that this country would accomplish if it cut out one of the three or so levels of unnecessary bureaucracy), Kenzie and I were placing bets on whether or not we would get introduced. We clearly were not on the Emcee’s card, but we do, you know, stick out a bit. And sure enough, he was preparing to segue gracefully into the next part of the party...when someone tapped him on the shoulder and said something along the lines of “don’t forget the pasty ones”. At which point the Emcee launched into a bit about how this year they are rewriting the national constitution, and how there is no ubaguzi (racism), how nobody cares about color here, which was why he simply had to introduce the two volunteers here from America. Kenzie and I stood up, I gave a big “Muungano Hoye!”, and we sat back down, all the while me thinking one simple thought:

“What a crock.”

I had actually decided a few days before the party to write a blog about some of the negative parts of my time here (the specific inciting incident will be explained shortly). I try and give a fairly accurate accounting of my time here, and it is mostly upbeat, because I mostly love my life here. If I had to make the choice over again, I’d do it all again with no reservations. This, for me (and for my villagers, I think), has been an unalloyed good. Yet some things still rankle. There are moments each day when I wish to be back in America. There is at least one time a month when I grow furious with someone or some situation, until I am mentally squashing them like tiny, squishy bugs. A lot of those situations come from an inescapable, infuriating reality of Tanzania: racism.

I don’t think I took too much for granted in America. I was always pretty damn grateful for being alive, healthy, shod and clod. But what I absolutely took for granted was living in a society that is heterogenous. I lived in Brooklyn, for goodness sake. They used to parade a statue of the Hispanic Virgin Mary by my window, right before they lit her on fire and cooked latkas picante (more of that is true than you might imagine). Black, brown, white, albino, Asian, you freaking name it, they were just other New Yorkers, other Americans. A bus fare was the same for me as for Yao Ming as for Samuel Jackson (not that I imagine either of them take the bus all that often). Not here. Here tomatoes cost more because I’m white. Bus fares cost more because I look different. Everywhere I walk (not in my village, but in any other town in the country), I am serenaded by choruses of “MZUNGU!!!” (Whitey!).Female volunteers are routinely asked to take young men back to America with them. We are assumed to be physically weak, ridiculously wealthy, and incredibly stupid, all at the same time. While Tanzanians are among the most welcoming people I have ever met or heard of, anywhere, there is a class of angry young men who blame many of the present-day difficulties (poverty, AIDS, etc.) on any and all white people. Which, on one hand, is understandable. Colonialism did Africa no favors, and centuries worth of harm. On the other hand, not only wasn’t I alive for that, but it wasn’t my country, and I came here to help. I try, I really do, to not let it bother me. But there’s only so many times you can be talked to like a stupid puppy before you start yelling. Which happens, from time to time.

So that is awful, and I hate it. Two points worth making for the other side: 1. It is a racial thing, but it is also a class thing. Rich Tanzanians are quoted higher prices than poorer ones. And conversely, poor rural Tanzanians are often treated like dirt by rich, urban ones. I have a much, much easier time getting a meeting at the District than anybody in my village. Tanzanian drivers will pick me up, give me free rides, but will pass by my village friends with nary a glance. So the racism goes both ways. Which leads me to 2. America doesn’t exactly have all its ducks in a row either. I don’t catch a ton of news, but I’ve heard plenty about Trayvon Martin. You cannot do the job I do and still think that one sort of people are innately better than another. We are different, yes. But it’s the height of arrogance to think that given the same opportunities that we have, these people would not do equally as well, or better.

Back to the party. After the introductions, my school’s children stepped forward. I love watching Tanzanian schoolkids perform. They do a high-pitched shout-singing that is really beautiful when done in unison. For this performance my kids danced with baton-like instruments, and they also had village-made kazoos (which made my heart glad). They sang about Union Day, about the leaders who had made it possible (Nyerere and Karume, of Tanganyika and Zanzibar, respectively). They broke it down with the traditional Hehe dance, the Dua. One of my favorite students, Ephus, ran around cheering and jumping, and everybody laughed. They absolutely killed it. The head honchos from the region loved it. Other students loved it. I loved it. I was so proud of those kids (it should be noted that I had nothing to do with it), of what they had done… and what they had endured.

On Monday I had gone down to the primary school to talk to the principal about a few things. He and I often do not see eye to eye, but we’ve managed to collaborate on a number of projects, and since I have a few more in the works, I had to go over them with him. After our meeting he mentioned that the students were preparing for the party on Thursday, and would I like to see? Of course, I said. Plus one of my teacher friends was running the rehearsal, and I had to see her about something anyway. So we went down to the soccer field, where the students were prepping, with batons and kazoos and drums and a pretty murderous noon-day sun. I grabbed a patch of grass and watched them work. From time to time my teacher friend would stop them and correct them, showing them the proper steps, yelling at the students who were doing the routine sans flair. I was happy: I was back at rehearsal. Then, during a quick stop, the principal called all of the boys off to the side, obviously unhappy with their lack of chutzpah. He said something to one of them, who ran over to where I was sitting. The child said, “Samahani” (excuse me), then reached down to where I was sitting. I moved aside, and he pulled up a long, thin stick that I hadn’t even realized I was sitting on. He ran back over to the principal, and gave it to him. At which point the principal proceeded to beat the living shit out of a bunch of 11-14 year old boys.

This isn’t the first time I’ve seen this. Yet it is not something I’ve ever gotten used to, nor do I really want to. My friends who teach full-time in schools here see it every day, in varying degrees of brutality. I’ve seen teachers make a female student kneel and hold a large rock over her head until she was physically unable to continue. I’ve seen teachers make students roll up their trousers or skirts and kneel on gravel for as long as they deem necessary. This day with the principal was fairly typical: he had the boys get on all fours in a line. He started using the switch on their behinds. But something particularly angered him about one of my favorite students, Amos. So he started hitting him on the ribs, on the chest, until the child was lying flat on his back, crying, still being beaten.

What do you do? I know there are plenty of volunteers who see nothing wrong with raising a hand to your kid. That never happened to me, but I guess I get it. But this isn’t that. This goes way over the line of cruel, and it isn’t even effective. Tanzania’s educational scores are low, to put it kindly. The students don’t know any more after they’ve had the tar beat out of them than they did before. Yet this isn’t my place. I’m not here to impose American values on Tanzanian institutions. This man is my superior. So I sat there, digging my fingers into my ribs, not sure how I would ever look Amos in the eye again. He’s used to it, I supposed. I’m not. Hope I never will be.

One more, back to the party. I had to sneak out early. I’ve gotten good at that. I went to the bathroom, then went Viet Cong style through the woods to the road. It’s a cardinal sin to leave a Tanzanian party before eating. This, however, is not my first cardinal sin. I got to the road and started flagging down cars to get a ride back to the village (I had a date with my friend. We are doing Occupational Therapy house calls for old people, with Kelsey making scarily accurate diagnoses, and us relating her advice back to them). I got a ride from a couple of older, apparently Indian, men. They knew a little English. I asked them where they were headed. They named a city in the north of the country. I asked them where home was. They named the same city. It was then that I realized that these men, when they talked to each other, spoke Kiswahili. That they are, despite appearances, Tanzanians. There are a couple hundred thousand ethnic Indian and Arab Tanzanians. They’ve lived here all their lives. This is their home. They speak the language. And if I think that I sometimes feel like a stranger in my own house...I can’t imagine what their lives must be like. I do miss this part of America: the differences. The blend. The plurality. I'm sure something is lost when you start blending cultures together. But a lot is gained, I know that.

On to some happier thoughts at the end. We have winners! I refer you all to the photo album “The Unnamed” on my facebook profile. The naming rights for Cow #1 were purchased by Kelsey Drake for $200 (somebody should marry her). I have not yet been told its name. Cow #2 has been bought and named “Where’s Waldo” by Mr. Robert M Schwartz (take a bow). Cow #3 was purchased and christened “Leinad” (I like that my name is being incorporated multiple times) by Her Aussie Highness, Jeanne Fennell. And Cow #4 has been bought, paid for, and named “Rambo” by the distinguished John Arigot. Thank you all so much for playing along, and I can’t omba (request) enough times for those who didn’t win to still donate to the project. I am going out to Ruaha on Monday to finalize all reservations, and will provide a full budget/itinerary in a couple of weeks. This is going to be one hell of a trip, made possible by all of you. I can’t say enough times how wonderful you all are for making this possible. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.

Waldron, out.

For the past week, I’ve been helping my mama and her family husk the corn they’ve harvested. Since the rainy season is basically over, it’s time to start the harvesting process. The villagers mostly farm corn, and I’ll explain why. So, what they do is harvest the corn, and then get all the kernels off the husk one by one. Next they lay them out in the sun to dry. After this, they take them to a mill to get ground up into flour. The end product is thus, corn flour. This is the staple of their diet. Corn flour is what they mix water with to make ugali, a semi-hard blob they serve with either beans or cassava leaves. You should really google ugali, it’s good stuff (not). But, I’ve grown accustomed to eating ugali, because, that’s their diet. It’s really a pure process, the villages grow (or so is the plan depending on the rains during rainy season) all the food they need to sustain them throughout the dry season. Most if not all of the Tanzanians in my entire region have not and will never experience the chaos of what is a grocery store. It’s simple really, they have figured out how to grow exactly what they need to survive.

Apparently the next fruit in season is oranges. I have yet to see a plethora of oranges, but I’m hopeful. So, the major fruits of the seasons are: mango (Dec-Jan), orange (April-May), pineapple (July-August), then mango again. Bananas, and papayas are kind of always off and on throughout the year. I think it’ll be really cool when I experience mango season again, because that’ll mean I’ve been here for a year J

Hold your applause please, but I’ve been rat-free for 3 months! Knock on wood for me will ya?

Although the dry season doesn’t have much to offer, one blessing I can think of is that the sun is more reliable. Using my solar charger (thanks Jonathan!), the sun has now consistently charged my phone, iPod, and kindle. Thanks sun!

Things are steady but slow here in the village. I can see that getting things started will take some extra effort and persistence on my part. Yesterday, however, while I was doing my walk around the village to see if anything was happening, I stumbled upon a meeting. This meeting was being conducted by a Health Institute based in Mtwara. They are part of a group called “Mtunze mtoto mchanga” (caring for newborns). I was thrilled! This group of about 7 women and 4 men are all volunteers who were getting more training on going to house to house to assess the progress of newborns. The trainers got my contact information and I’m hoping to become more involved with their organization. Apparently they’re coming back in June and I’m definitely going.

A group of the new volunteers put this together a while back and I thought I'd share it with you guys. Enjoy!

We are in the city Morogoro for our in service training. So for the first three months we've been gathering information about our villages- for me that's environmental information, villagers' lives, crops grown, stats about the village, and the HIV problem etc... Now at training we discuss project ideas with Peace Corps officials, learn how to start and implement projects, write grants, and get ideas from other volunteers.

And have a little bit of fun. It's nice to hang out with our training class peers, the health and environmental volunteers. And also to meet other Peace Corps volunteers who are helping train us. Morogoro is much hotter than my village, and of course a hustling bustling city. Today we saw an amazing tree nursery started in the Eastern Arc mountains right near here by an environmental club.

Once I get back to my village I'll start teaching the primary kids about environmental issues in their area. It should be fun working with the kids, and also a good way to have an organized project. Much of the way Tanzanian school children learn is by rote memorization so it will be a nice chance for me to creatively teach in a way they have never experienced before.

I'm also doing an exchange program with an American school teacher so that she'll be able to teach her students about Tanzanian school children and vice versa. Maybe both sides can learn some creative ideas from each other. We Americans can learn from Tanzanians about their indigenous knowledge about crops and the land they live on; they can learn from us about education, business enterprise, and creative problem solving.

I'm going to try and post some photos now of some of my experiences:

I'm so happy! I'm finally able to teach at the primary school. My entire Peace Corps service was setup to teach about the environment at the primary school, which is like an elementary school in the United States. This is one of my primary projects. The other ones will take longer to get established. So on this past Monday, I started. My class is class (darasa) 6, which is ten and eleven year olds approximately.

My first day was an introduction to the students, and for them to introduce themselves to me. We then talked about what is the environment. Keep in mind I'm teaching in Kiswahili. I've had 6 months in Tanzania to brush up on my skills, and I finally feel confident and capable enough to teach (little kids) in Kiswahili. After this I took them outside to find various objects in the environment (something hard, soft, green, thorny etc..)

My second class was started with singing a song about bees (nyuki). The kids loved it, and I have to admit it was fun. Tanzanian schoolchildren love to sing, throughout the day you can hear them in the classrooms and sometimes assembled on the schoolgrounds singing. There is also a time when several kids play a drum while most sing- the drumming is a deeper glimpse at African culture in my mind. Anyway we talked about habitat, where living things live (all around). Then I talked about activities I planned for World Malaria Day.

This was this past Wednesday 4/25. Because Malaria is such a huge problem in Tanzania Peace Corps really stresses education. It is not a big problem in my village, because we are about 2500 meters in the mountains and mosquitoes are few. However, when villagers travel down the mountain is can be a big problem, to the closest city Mbeya, or in Dar Es Salaam and much of Tanzania. So for Malaria day I showed a movie that is both entertainment and educational about malaria called Chumo. Very well made movie in Kiswahili. Many students came and a few adults too.

We then made a lotion which can protect from mosquito bites. It comes from a tree that grows in Tanzania called Neem. To make it you boil the leaves of the tree, then add common bath soap and cooking oil (called mafuta). After mixing this all together you remove from the heat and cool. The result is a lotion that can be spread onto the skin, in which mosquitoes will not bite.

The next big event I'm planning for is Earth Day. The official world earth day was April 22nd, but I was not able to schedule events for my village so i'm trying for May 5th. I'm trying to have students draw a cool picture about the environment, play some environmental games, maybe gather some seeds from local trees. I'm also hoping to show some villagers my garden, which I'm still amazed at how well it has flourished, and also my compost pile, which I'll add to the garden when I plant again.

Amani means "peace" in Kiswahili, and its one of my favorite Swahili words. It also describes my state of being in the village right now. Upendo is "love", and when you have a title like "peace," I think its obligatory to add "love," :). And Maisha is "life". A little hippy, a little sentimental, a whole-lot Chelsea, haha.

Well, it's been about a month now since I've returned to the 'vil, and as difficult as reintegration after being away (and around Americans and modern amenities), I am beginning to be really at peace in the my village. The first few weeks were a pretty tough, but as of this week, I have begun to teach at the secondary school, and present on health topics at the clinic, or in other words, do "real" work. As opposed to my visiting, taking walks, and generally just hanging around that I otherwise do. :)

Starting to present/teach/interact even further in the community has really be wonderful, and being back around my neighbors, friends, and smiling/peeing babies, who were generally happy to see me again, and with whom I can now have slightly more in-depth conversations, (they were mostly 'hello, how are you? how's your family? Have a good day' there for a while...). Sure, there are days/moments/times where I get in a homesick or sad funk, but maybe its the starting work, maybe its the amazing support I get from home, but I'm starting to feel like I'm not COMPLETELY out of place in my village. Its a good feeling. I'm in town this weekend, after spending over two weeks in the village straight. As I was preparing to leave, I was excited (needed to use the atm and hit the supermarket, as well as hanging out with my lovely sitemates!), but I didn't feel like I HAD to leave the village, like I had in moments before. Don't get me wrong, I'm SO happy to be in town and definitely needed it, but, I realized I am really getting to LOVE my village. Which, at times, seems crazy when the roosters start crowing at 3 am, the teenagers cat-call and do other generally annoying things, I can't take a five second walk for pleasure without interrogation of where I am going, but I really am. People are recongizing me and introducing me to others, I get regular "zawadi" (gifts) of fruits from villagers, and the kids as SO excited when I come up the path to my house.

Besides theses mushy-gushy reasons, I have been thinking of other reasons Why I love my village/TZ:

(In no particular order, and will probably add to it in future blogs)

1. Where else can I indulge my embarrassing music tastes and sing along without being ridiculed? Yes, Tanzanians love Celine, too.

2. There is no such thing as LOW carb anything here. Andazi, Chapati, Sconzi, etc. Being the bread queen, I'm loving it.

3. No make-up? Haven't washed your hair in a few days? These are the days I get the most compliments. Not sure what that says about me, but the vanity is different here, and refreshing.

4. You greet EVERYONE you meet EVERYWHERE you go in the village. It was frustrating at first, but now I'm going to go back to the states and get stares from the strangers I can't help but greet. I LOVE the friendliness of Tanzanians.

5. You running late? You forget something? It's "hamna shida" (no worries). For the perpetual worrier in me, the relaxed, understanding of Tanzanians has been a lesson in life for me.

6. Kids. Though there are times (almost daily) that I wish there weren't a million little kids playing around outside my house, being loud and driving me crazy, when I hear "Shel-She, Mkono, Mkunde" from a group of toddlers and see them waving and jumping around like they haven't seen me in weeks (sometimes its just later that day), I can't help but smile and feel so warm and fuzzy. Then, there's my baby who loves me so much, she pees on me. Can't put a price on love like that. Seriously though, the kids here are respectful, sweet, and always helpful. I promised Mom I wouldn't smuggle any home in a couple years, but we'll see.

7. Dukas. These are the little stores/more like stands where you stand behind a screen or at the front of the booth and the proprieter gathers all your items for you. The reason I love these is the fact that you never know what they will have. Granted most, have your standard TZ village duka staples: rice, beans, cigarrettes, pens, paper, soda (sometimes), string, razor blades, locks, and other things, but it's the times like the other day when I found a hologram Obama belt buckle, spaghetti (usually just towns!), and bobby pins, that I got excited. Neither have been purchased (yet--trying to be frugal but just got paid, so we'll see), but the discovery was just as exciting . Tanzania makes so much sense, and so little, but I'm loving discovering all its little quirks.

Maybe it's the cooler weather, maybe it the less stress after beginning work, or the super- resfreshing cold, fresh juice I just drank (one of my fav spots in Tanga!) but I'm feeling pretty positive today. Of course that could change tommorow, or even later this afternoon, but for now, I think I'm supposed to be here and this is what I'm supposed to be doing. For all the being alone and figuring things out on my own, I could NOT do this without the support that radiates to me here from my family and friends at home, and my fellow PCV friends, who, thanks to a free PCV-PCV calling plan, I can to talk often! Cards, letters, packages, and texts are constant reminders of that support, but I also know its the prayers, good vibes, karma, and whatever other positive energy you all send across the pond. I appreciate it and it helps me everyday, because despite growing to love my village, it is a challenge every single day. But then again, I guess life itself is a challenge, right?

The next month holds teaching once a week at the school and clinic, participating in the village health group, and possibly starting a teen-health/excerise club in the next month or so, a site visit from PC, and continuing to try to learn Swahili and make my village understand my broken Swahili, cooking (hey I used my charcoal jiko for the first time the other day--woo hoo rice and lentils!), and trying to maintain this postive attitude. But with the aforementioned (and probably ongoing) list, that shouldn't be too hard. :)

Lots of Love from Lion King Land <3

p.s. I still promise to put pics up here eventually. Technology was not my friend in the 'states, and I am still fighting it here! :)

In Tanzania malaria is the #1 killer of children under five, a leading cause of morbidity and mortality among outpatient and inpatient admissions, malaria accounts for up to 40 percent of all outpatient attendance. I talk about the possibility of eradicating malaria (to everyone everyday). My friends, neighbors, and strangers don't believe it, they think I'm crazy. Malaria is a fact of life here, period. I spend a lot of time wondering what Peace Corps Volunteers could do to give people the hope and energy to be aggressive in malaria interventions. I don't have answers but I think asking questions is a start: When was the last time you had malaria? What would it look like if there were no malaria in Tanzania, Africa, the world?

It's hard to know the effect of malaria on a country, continent or the world. But it's not hard to recognize what it does to one person or family. In February I had malaria for the first time. I sleep under a mosquito net every night, I take a prophylaxis once a week, I know where the best health care in town is and I can afford it, Peace Corps has also provided me with a self test kit and the drugs to cure malaria. I started treatment less than 24 hours after I noticed the first sign and was still in bed for two days.

Neighbors in the village usually have none of that. When they get sick some can't afford to travel to the nearest dispensary or health center. If they make it to a dispensary, their illness might be misdiagnosed, appropriate drugs might not be affordable or available, prescriptions might be incorrect or misunderstood; problems seem overwhelming which is why "it's a fact of life" is the easiest solution.

I encourage people to work together- to learn. - to educate their communities.- to save money for or find sources of bed nets.- to support local leaders in demanding better services.- to be creative in finding ways to strengthen health care and medical supply systems. - to share their successes.

Tutokomeze malaria.

Thought I would write a quick update. Not much has happened since I last wrote, but time is passing.

Library update:-Yesterday the Mkuu and I went to the bookstore and bought all of the books for the new library! It was along day, but I was glad to have it out of the way and the $1+ million shillings out of my account.

-The fundi brought the 9 tables for the library a few nights ago and they are very nice! Just what we had expected.

-Two other fundis knocked down part of the wall between the two classrooms yesterday! Now we have a door way between the study room and the room where the books will be kept.

-The only things left are the chairs, bookshelves and to screen the windows!

Overall I am really happy with the way this project is turning out. I honestly thought I would take a while to get all of our ducks in order, but when things need to get done here, they get done.

Life update:

Today is a Tanzanian holiday, so there is no school. Consequently, I am filling out scholarship applications for school, searching for apartments in Portland and cleaning my house. For some reason I woke up at 5:45 this morning,so by 9 am I had washed dishes, done a load of laundry and cleaned by bedroom. BAM!

Everything else is going well here. Planning with the other volunteers for the girls' empowerment conference, which I will unfortunately be unable to attend because of a change in school break scheduling – that's the way the cookie crumbles.

Hope everyone is well at home.

All my love from TZ

Sometimes I tell people I stayed another year because I couldn't see the change I wanted to be in the world... in a school system with so many problems (some described here and here) it's much easier to see the gaps than the bright spots. I was too impatient to keep teaching without seeing dream-worthy results so I switched to health.

It's been six months since I started working on malaria. In addition to my workat MASHA I've been trying to make it attractive and easy for PCVs to get involved in malaria projects. My mind is full of ideas but my ability to articulate them through the right channels needs improvement.

I see volunteers at trainings, email them project ideas, sometimes call to see if they're up to anything malaria-related and at each occasion beg for updates, pictures or feedback. Then I hear nothing and try not to waste too much time wondering whether or not anything is happening to eliminate malaria in the 130+ villages where volunteers live.

Yesterday was World Malaria Day. As a Malaria volunteer, it was more exciting than Christmas. I got texts, phone calls and emails about all sorts of malaria action. It was good timing because last week I facilitated a 3-day malaria training with Peace Corps, MASHA, JHU and PSI. After similar trainings in June and August I think when the new extending malaria volunteers start there will be more than enough work for 2-3 PCV.

Somehow the next 6 months are going to be much easier.

Today is World Malaria Day. Malaria has a special significance in Tanzania. Malaria is Tanzania's top killer. Malaria has an every day presence here: mosquito nets, anti-malarial pills, bug spray. Not every one is as lucky to have access to such things to protect themselves, though. I've known too many people that have suffered from malaria. One of my Form III students last year was hospitalized from cerebral malaria. It changed him. He started as one of my top students and after the disease had run it's course, he could not read or write and his personality had changed. So much of this suffering could be prevented through simple education and behavior change. Use you net. Go get tested early. Take your full prescription of medicine. Unfortunately, this is not the happening.To celebrate World Malaria Day at school, we borrowed a projector from a nearby school, and gathered all of the students to watch "Chumo." This is an educational, yet entertaining, film about malaria that was specifically made for Tanzania. The kids loved it! Watching my students watch this movie was like watching people at a live sporting event. They cheered for the good guy, booed at the bad guy, and laughed at some really weird stuff. Watching them was entertainment enough for me. All I can hope is that they took some valuable lessons away and will take measures to protect themselves an their families. All the students gathering to watch 'Chumo"

My headmaster leading the pre-viewing discussion about malaria

Happy World Malaria Day everyone!Peace out!

I just returned from a girl’s conference meeting in Iringa. There are 12 volunteers participating in this, our 2nd annual, conference and each volunteer is bringing 4 girls + 1 counterpart. The conference will be at the end of June. With this conference impending, I thought I’d take a few minutes to talk about girls [...]

‘Cause I’ve been in a very list-y mood recently, I’m going to have a completely pointless post about top five things I’ve done/watched/read in country or just in general. None of these are going to be in any order, unless indicated, so take ‘em as they come. Again, I repeat, this a completely pointless entry, but it’ll at least give you an idea of the things my brain thinks of while I’m sitting through lessons at school. Awesome. Ready for this? Here we go!

Top 5 Books I’ve Read While In Country- Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman- Acts of Faith by Eboo Patel- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë- A Song of Ice & Fire by George RR Martin - The Power of the Myth by Joseph Campbell

Top 5 Books I Want To Read Next- Luka and the Fire of Life by Salman Rushdie- Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John LeCarre- The Strain by Chuck Hogan and Guillermo Del Toro- Zone One by Colson Whitehead- The Fry Chronicles: An Autobiography by Stephen Fry

Top 5 TV Shows I Started Watching While In Country- The Hour- Luther- The Wire- Homeland- Downton Abbey

Top 5 Methods of Procrastination- Hoyle Puzzle and Board Games 2012 (Rummy Squares)- Going through numerous TV shows, episode by episode- Making stupid journal entries about Top 5 things- Cleaning my room (!)- Collaging

Top 5 Places in Kyrgyzstan- Talas (Laugh it up all you want, 19s, I love Talas!)- Lake Issyk-Kul- Tav’s village WAY down south in Naryn- Besh Tash Nat’l Park (or so I’ve heard)- Bishkek (for that little urban fix when you need it)

Top 5 Kyrgyz Foods- Oromo- Kartoskha Manti- Shasechka- Lagman- Kasha

Top 5 Games I Want To Play On My Fake-N64- Banjo Kazooie- Wave Racer- Super Mario Brothers- Banjo Tooie- Goldeneye (for the first time)

Top 5 Places I Most Want To Be Right Now- Jambiani, Zanzibar- Tutukaka, New Zealand- Chicago, Illinois- Rome, Italy- Edinburgh, Scotland

Top 5 Celebrity Crushes At The Moment- Zachary Levi- Idris Elba- Benedict Cumberbatch- Kit Harrington- Michael Fassbender

Top 5 Movies I’ve Watched In Country- Melancholia- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (pt 2)- The Beginners- 50/50- Robin and the 7 Hoods

Top 5 Things I Want In My Next Apartment- Badass kitchen- Giant fluffy bed- Windows; lots of ‘em- Storage space galore- Kitten/puppy

Top 5 Things I Always Have In My Purse/Possession- Water bottle- Sotka- Kindle- Blistex (Don’t worry, Mom, I’m not addicted yet… ;) )- Planner

Top 5 Foods I Cannot Wait To Eat Again In The States- Fettuccini Alfredo (and breadsticks) from OG- Strawberry and baby spinach salad with a Strawberry Vinaigrette Dressing- Gorp- Cheesy-ass slice of pepperoni pizza- Mom’s Chex Mix with a giant glass of Skim Milk

Top 5 Grad Schools Into Which I’m Looking- Columbia- NYU- Johns Hopkins- Edinburgh- St Andrews

Hope that was at least entertaining reading for a rainy day. Thinking about you all and wishing you the best of luck with everything – especially if you’re finishing up semesters, dissertations, years at uni, etc. God knows I’m not ready for that again. Haha. Let me know how you’re all doing. Miss you kids like crazy!<3

It was too good to be true. We were informed tonight that the water is going to go again soon. Looks ilke that the pipe must have been fixed with duct tape or something. So, we spent the last hour filling everything up we can. Naturally, all our buckets, moving onto pots and bowls. Then, any empty container we can find such as old water bottles, old jars, old wine bottles, things we keep around "just in case". It's still the rainy season, so we'll be able to catch some rain again. But, since we actually got a warning this time about there being no water - we wanted to fill up as much as possible. I am so grateful that Jon spent the weekend cleaning and mopping and doing all of our laundry. At least we don't need to use our water on any of that for a while!

So yesterday was my grandpa Pep's 90th birthday. I talked to him on the phone, and he reminded me to update this thing. So that's what I'm doing. If I can't be out in Colorado for his birthday, at least I can do this.

Anyways, what am I up to? A bunch of things. For one, I'm teaching, like usual. This year my school decided to do away with midterms in favor of a weekly test, which means that every friday the kids take 2 half hour tests in two different subjects, and we cycle through the 11 subjects that my school teaches like that (English, Swahili, Basic Mathematics, Chemistry, Biology, Physics, Commerce, Book-keeping, Civics, Geography, ICT/Computers). Last week was English's second turn. And in grading the first group of tests it became very clear that we had not adequately covered the negative simple past tense. (So many "I don't broke the cup"s. No "I didn't break the cup"s, at least in 1C, the lowest level class.) So we spent an entire class doing nothing but reviewing it, and now I think they get the concept. The helping verb is in the past form, not the main verb. Also, my form 1A kids made me happy last week. They had been getting increasingly loud/unfocused in my class (which they always have at the end of the afternoon, the worst time for getting kids to pay attention) and on Wednesday I told them that they had bad behavior and that they needed to stop talking and listen. Then on Thursday, they are the quietest they have ever been. We have something like ten minutes of extra class time because we cut out our usual waiting for them to shut up time. So I thank them for changing their behavior, and point out what about their behavior today is better than their behavior yesterday. And then after class is over, the class monitor comes up to me and tells me that they had a class meeting and decided that they will be quiet in my class because I don't use a stick. Yay not beating kids! Also, yay for kids taking the initiative to decide to be quiet without be beaten. That made me glad. Anyways, so there's teaching. There's also English club, where they're working on preparing a debate. Debates in theory are a great idea. In practice, they're totally a mess in this country, and I personally don't find them useful. For one thing, they use stupid terminology. Instead of "I support the motion" and "I oppose the motion," they use "propose" and "oppose," which is not only inaccurate (only the first person is actually proposing!), but also rhymes, which means half the debate is spent asking students to repeat themselves just so we know which side they're on. The other thing that makes them stupid is that no one judges the quality of the arguments they make, it's just a numbers game. They add up the number of points each side has made and whichever has more wins, regardless of how stupid or nonsensical the points are. Also, they tend to debate topics that the kids really don't have the vocabulary/understanding to debate in any sort of a nuanced way. They love debating globalization, for example. Anyways, because of my feelings toward Tanzanian debates, I mostly stay out of it and let my counterpart lead those sessions. So next week, they'll be debating the motion "Rapid growth of tuition is increasing the failure of students," which probably makes no sense to you, because tuition means something totally different here. In America tuition means school fees. In Tanzania, it means classes outside of school, usually on the weekends. Also, it gets pronounced twee-shun. So there's that. In addition, our life skills club continues. Last month we did a lesson on steps in making good decisions, which went pretty well, and this month we're applying that to alcohol and drug use. We talked about reasons for using alcohol and drugs and consequences of using alcohol and drugs, and they did a role play about a boy who drinks and smokes with his friends and then gets caught robbing a house for more money to buy alcohol and drugs. Also, I don't think I've ever seen a large group of people look more terrified than the form 2s did when we were discussing liver damage. Good lord they looked scared shitless. Also, I think we've finally sorted out the budget for our library grant, so it should be ready to be submitted to Peace Corps soon. Yay progress.

Also last week, I did my first ever condom demonstration. Me and my counterpart teach her (mostly) women's group about HIV/AIDS once a month. (This is really the only thing that I do here where I actually use my Swahili.) Last month we covered the basics of how HIV can be transmitted. During that session they overwhelmingly responded that they did not, in fact, know how to correctly use a condom. So this month, condom demonstration it was. We started by putting some true/false questions inside condoms, blowing them up like balloons and passing them around the circle. Then when my counterpart said stop, whoever was holding the condom balloon needed to break it and answer the question. The idea behind the activity is that it's a non-threatening way for people who've never used a condom before to touch one, and also to demonstrate how difficult they are to break. Plus, sharing new facts. So after that, we walked them through the steps (check the expiration date, check the packet for air, use your hands to open it, etc) and then we gave them the steps on slips of paper and had them put them in the right order as a group. Finally we passed out some condoms and bananas and had them practice. There was also an extended discussion of bananas v. carrots as fake penises. Amusing.

Outside of work, things are pretty much the same as usual. I hang out in Moshi. We made cookies this weekend. I'm reading books and knitting socks. I've been eating a lot of raw vegetable salads. Kachumbari is a tanzanian salad of tomatoes, cucumber, onions, salt and vinegar or lemon juice, sometimes with green peppers or shredded carrots. Sometimes I make kachumbari, sometimes I make a vinegrette to put on it instead. VAC is coming up again, so I'll be in Dar again at the beginning of May. (Seriously, I literally go to Dar just about monthly. Which is ridiculous. Also, this means that I've never actually been to one of the form 4 life skills club meetings, because so far I've been in Dar for both of them. Plus, since spring break pushed things back a week, I'm missing the next one too. And possibly the one in June for my trip to South Africa. I kind of feel like I'm never going to actually teach them.) So that's my life.

It was a miraculous day, when around April 17, the water returned to our well spicket. No more collecting rain water or sending students on trips to get our water. Laundry has resumed!

The past two months have been very busy! Last month was IST, In-service Training, Peace Corps-speak for when our training class reunites for two weeks of further technical training. We learned about grant writing, project design, technical info about malaria, HIV/AIDS, education and etc. It took place in Morogoro, a beautiful town at the base of a mountain, and it was a busy two weeks that, for better or worse, felt a lot like summer camp. Returning to my village was a little overwhelming…for one thing now I’m back to only partially being able to express myself in Kiswahili and passing my evenings by lamplight, but also now is when volunteers are supposed to be ready to start projects.

The first project I’m going to try is a permagardening project at the primary school. After meeting with the teachers to discuss the benefits of a permagarden project, the teachers were so enthusiastic and supportive that they said, “ok this is great, we’ll start tomorrow.” Woah woah woah…hang on a second! My counterpart and I had to rein them in and explain that we all need a little bit of time to prepare and organize the students first. It was exhilarating that they wanted to run with it, but woah, guys! Pole pole.

The World Food Program provides corn meal, beans and fortified millet porridge to my primary school for free, so the students have food to eat every day, but they don’t get vegetables. They get calories, but they still lack nutrition. Also, a few people in my village have said that vegetables just can’t grow in our soil. I made a demonstration permagarden at my house, and vegetables indeed can grow in our soil. So the permagarden will teach about nutrition, soil health and vegetable cultivation, and hopefully also demonstrate to others that with a few soil amendments and a bio-intensive garden design, they can grow beautiful vegetables for their families and for sale.

I am happy to report that bees have moved into both my hives! I haven’t been into the hives yet to see how they’re doing, but I see them coming and going, way up there in the trees. Next month we will lower them by the cover of night and get some honey and I can’t wait! Next month is when the rainy season ends. The beekeeping schedule here still confuses me, considering it is the opposite to beekeeping in the US or Europe, where we harvest honey when the environment is green. Here the honey season is when the environment starts to dry up.

It is interesting to experience a rainy season where the rain has such an obvious impact on every day life. For the entire month of February it didn’t rain at all. Many farmers’ corn fell over and was ruined. It was so sad to see the plants’ leaves start to brown, the pumpkins’ leaves collapsed like a closed umbrella (because after all what use is an umbrella with no rain?) And when it finally did rain, in March, the farmers were in their fields almost immediately, trying to replant their ruined fields of corn with sunflowers to try and make up for the loss.

I went to a nearby Gogo village for the Easter holiday with some friends from my village, and I got a new Kigogo name there. In my village I am “Rain” because I arrived with the rains. In this other village, I am matika, or “When the corn is yea-high [holding hand to hip-height]” in Kigogo. I am fascinated by the specificity of certain words that some languages have. As far as this suburban-raised gal knows, in English, corn is corn from the kernel to when it’s grilled on the cob. In Kiswahili, there is a word for a fresh coconut that is mostly water and a different word for a coconut that is dried and mostly meat. A different word for cooked and uncooked rice. There is a name for each individual type of ant but no word for a generic ant. And there are many different kinds of ants here. I have only been able to commit siafu to memory, probably just because those are the ones that bite. But these differences are becoming more important as I become increasingly conversant in Kiswahili, and as I see that ants of various kinds are just more prominent in every day life--at least one day a week a temporary river of ants courses through my house, each time in a new location. Similarly, there are many names for aunts as well. A paternal aunt is shangazi and a maternal aunt is mama mkubwa, also reflecting the environment here in Tanzania.

There’s a rugby tournament in Dar today. I’ve been encouraged to show up because I’m a girl, and according to rules and regulations “every team must have at least one woman or a boy under the age of 14”. I’m considering playing if only to celebrate the fact that it has finally been recognized that women are just as physically competitive as pre-pubescent boys. Victory! I’m proposing a Scrabble tournament where every team must have at least one man or a girl who doesn’t speak English.

It’s touch rugby, so, instead of tackling my opponent (either another girl or a boy under 14) I would just touch them, with both hands. This is all I know about the game: each player is matched against an opponent on the other team. If your opponent tries to get past you with the ball, you touch him and that’s a “down” (or something). The team tries to get the ball down to the other side of the field by throwing the ball sideways, like a fish at Pike’s place market, while running forwards without exceeding 5 downs (or whatever). When your team makes it to the end of the field with the ball that’s a goal, called a “try” (maybe?). It’s a fast game.

I played once, many moons ago. I was invited to play with the “co-ed” team during their weekly pick-up game. I showed up at the International School of Tanganyika’s football pitch that afternoon expecting a “Thanksgiving afternoon family pick-up game” atmosphere. Instead I was thrown in without warm up, introductions, or explanation beyond the command “cover that guy”, a big guy, with little shorts. In fact all of them were big guys with little shorts (and nice thighs). There were 23 men and 1 girl (me). These guys took their rubgy pretty seriously. It was a Friday afternoon and they wanted to blow off some steam. I ran up and down the field trying not to get trampled. They were big, sweaty, and going full speed. It was a strange sensation playing with them. I hadn’t been physically intimidated in a while; let’s just say, I now have new respect for Mulan. I’d like to say that I turned out to be awesome, but that would be a lie. I got a few “touches” in and tossed the ball several times before I bowed out 20 minutes into the game. I felt like I was in the way, maybe not as a girl, but as a beginner; a very small beginner in a pool of large players. It was like the time in college when I was thrown into the “Advanced pig-showing group” though I was a novice, I was way out of my league. Luckily, Uncas carried us to 5th place.

To play or not to play? This is my Saturday morning dilemma. I’m heading to the field in a few hours, where I will either A) Spend the day two-hand touching under 14 year olds, or B) Drink beer on the sideline with my girlfriends and enjoy the show. Life is full of difficult decisions.

This afternoon proved to be quite interesting. I went to my site mate Geneva’s house to spend the night on the way to a girl’s conference meeting in Iringa. When I arrived she was having her weekly English club meeting. Geneva informed me that I would be a guest speaker at this meeting, so I [...]

I’ve been back in the village for a few days now, slowly getting back into a regular routine and cleaning up the heaps of termite houses, ant hills, rat crap and weeds that took over my house when I was … Continue reading →

First: Today is, indeed, National Hi-Five Day. Go and celebrate.

Second: This is probably too long and too boring but it's a rainy day. Power is out, but my computer has a charge. The neighbors' kids aren't too loud right now, so I decided to pound out a blog post. Let's start with the most recent events:

Rainy season has started. Woke up this morning to a thunderstorm. It was actually a pretty nice way to wake up in my first morning back in Pemba in about 2 weeks.Travel in Tanzania is a bitch. It took me 4 days to go from Katesh to Pemba: a trip that, at most, should have taken 3 days. Katesh to Singida was no problem (as much as waiting for a car to fill up for 3 hours is "no problem"). Trying to catch a bus out of Singida to Dar was more problematic than it should've been. Bus schedules are normally pretty consistent, but availability of seats, for holidays or other unknown reasons, is not always as consistent. I left Katesh on Sunday, expecting to get into Dar Sunday night, then catch a ferry to Pemba the next day. That wasn't to be. I was able to get the last seat on the last bus coming through Singida in the early afternoon. Wasn't the greatest seat on the greatest bus, but I was on my way, expecting to get into Dar around 10pm. At least, that's what I thought. About an hour after getting on the bus, we pull off onto a dirt road and into, what can only be called, a bus graveyard. The driver stops, revs the engine a few times, then shuts it down. After 5-10 minutes people start to get off the bus and I follow suit. The driver, engineers, and whoever else is "working" at the graveyard attempt to fix the bus, but after about an hour word gets around that they can't fix it today and the bus company would send another bus to pick us up. I think it was about 3pm when we broke down and it was around 7-8pm when the other bus arrived to rescue us. At this point, instead of arriving in Dar around 10pm we would probably get to Dar around 3am. Approaching Dodoma, I consider calling a vol there and asking to crash for the night and get another bus in the morning. At a weigh station 10 minutes outside of Dodoma, my mind was made-up for me: I would be staying in Dodoma that night. As the bus was pulling out of the weigh station, all of the lights on the bus go off. Engine is still running, but we're in the dark: its almost 9pm at this point. I can't believe it. The driver and conductor attempt to fix any wires/fuses that might've caused it, but nothing happening. Me and the older guy sitting next to me start talking about calling a cab to take us the rest of the way. But this wouldn't be necessary because our driver decides that he can make it to Dodoma without any lights (on a 2-way road, no street lights, with mostly semis driving at this point). Not gonna lie, as we pulled onto the road, sped up, then passed another car (all without lights), I thought for sure I was going to be in an accident. But we made it to a smaller bus stand in Dodoma and I got a ride to the vol's house and crashed for the night (Ellen, thank you again). Yeah, I paid for a ticket to Dar but at that point I just wanted to get off that bus. Next morning I wake up, taxi to the main bus stand, and get on a (pretty nice) bus headed for Dar. (The bus was 2-by-2, instead of 2-by-3, with A/C, nice seats, and a TV.) No major disruptions this time, and I get to Dar by mid-late afternoon. I head to the port to get a ticket back home. Apparently direct ferries from Dar to Pemba are hit or miss. Last time was a hit. This time: a miss. Some guy tried to sell me a seat on a "direct" ferry for $45. Dollars. I has no dollars. I left his "office" and bought a ticket to get to Unguja (the main island of Zanzibar) the next day and see what I can do from there. Got my ticket and got a room at the usual PCV hotel. Thankfully, there were 2 other vols there that night so Dar wasn't as boring/lonely as it usually is. Next day I'm on a 7am ferry to Unguja. I get in around 9, find only a ferry leaving the next day to Pemba, and then meet up with a VSO vol there who let me stay at her place for fa-ree. After getting to her place, I put my stuff in my room, turn the fan up to 11 and sleep for a couple of hours. I wake up, eat lunch, use fast internet, eat dinner, then sleep again. This was all Sunday-Tuesday. Wednesday, I'm up before dawn and on another 7am ferry. It was an easy boat ride to Pemba (not for one poor guy who threw up at regular 25min intervals, sounding like he was going to die) and I'm back around 10am. I catch a coasta to my nearest village and walk the 30min to my house.Like I said, I was in Katesh before heading back home. I visited a vol there for almost a week. Visiting other sites is always fun. Cooking good food, drinking beer (a rare occurrence on the island), eating pork (an even rarer occurrence on the island), and just chillin. Also get to see how people have their house set up, which usually gives me some ideas. As I said, I was there about a week and had a really good time.Why did I leave in the first place? That's a good question. My school had break from April 6 to the 15th. Easter weekend there was a big party in a town called Njombe [say it with me, n-JOME-bay], with the party called Njombe Jam. (Njombe is in the southern highlands. It was cold - 50s cold. Such a nice change of pace from the "sweat-your-balls-off" of Pemba.) It was built up pretty well, and I have to say, didn't disappoint. I left site on the 5th and got into Dar no problem. One loonnngg, delay filled (traffic, no bus issues), 14 hour trip later, I get to Njombe and finally see everyone I haven't seen in at least 6 weeks. Njombe Jam was an Olympic-style party: teams, events, PEDs, opening and closing ceremonies. About 40 or so vols showed up from "all over" the country (I use "all over" loosely; teams were grouped by region, and while people from all over did show up, the regions who only had 1-2 people show were grouped together on a team - we were dubbed the "warphans"- and given little chance of succeeding). Opening ceremonies was at the bar attached to the guest house we were staying at, same for closing ceremonies. In between, actual events were played. First day was:Basketball. Placed last. But we were called "scrappy."Relay race - 3legged, wheelbarrow, piggyback. We placed 1st.Flip cup. We placed 2nd.Mario Kart. We placed 4th?Beer pong. We placed 4th. Included an epic 3OT game over 2 venues between me & Mel vs. That-married-mf'er & his wife (Jon & Sara). It felt like college.After day one, our team was in 2nd (of 7). Other teams were worried.Day 2 started a little later than planned (people like to sleep after a full day of drinking/olympics). Also, my team was down 2 members, who decided to head back to site. Ppssshhhh.Events:Corn hole. We somehow placed 4th despite only playing 1 game.Beerster egg hunt - beers were hidden on the guesti grounds and teams had to find their designated brand. Finished 4th again. There was a "golden egg" hunt (one beer, winner take all). We did not take all.And that was it. The Warphans finished 4th out of 7 teams, but were definitely more competitive than people thought we'd be ("scrappy"). But it was great to see so many vols in the same place (not there for a training) and catch up with/meet people. Afterwards, we headed up to Katesh for about a week.

Not sure if I've talked about possessions, yet. Not talking "things you own," I'm talking "the devil inside you" possession. Well, not that creepy. "Possession" occurs at school when a girl student (I have yet to see a male student become "possessed") starts to scream, falls to the floor, rolls around, and flails her arms and legs. It's quite the distraction. Procedure (not really, my word) next calls for the girl to be taken outside of the classroom where she is put on the ground and allowed to flail and scream until she tires herself out. Then she's picked up by her arms and legs by a small contingent of students and carried behind the school to chill-the-f*ck-out. During all of this, learning and teaching comes to a halt. How could it not? The reason I bring up possession now is because of a certain Friday. Despite school starting 15-minutes earlier, Fridays are my slow day: periods are 60min (instead of 80), I only teach 1 period, I don't teach until 9:30am, school closes at 11:30am. One Friday I roll into school, but don't end up having any period to teach (my period was taken to give students an exam, without telling me). So I'm just chilling in the teachers' office. Across the courtyard I hear a scream and students running out of a class. Possession no.1 of the day. Maybe 2min later, another scream and more students bolting from a classroom. No.2 of the day. Another 5min later: more screams, more running. 5min later: yep, another one. Four (4) possessions in a matter of 20 minutes. And did I mention that all of these were Primary school students? But wait, there's more. 10 minutes pass and another primary student looses her shit. I had a perfect view for all of these: standing on the... porch (??) of the teachers' office, directly across the courtyard from most of the Primary school classrooms. I pretty much laughed the entire time this was going on. It's really tough not to. Eventually things cool down. Later, I'm in the courtyard with a student, trying my hardest not to give him the wrong translations of words, and ANOTHER student goes nuts. This time a Secondary students, but again, female.

Teachers here chalk it up to "possession." Every one of the possessions I've seen (7, including the 6 on that Friday) have come at the end of term. They don't want to do exams. Instead of your classic "pull the fire alarm," "call in a bomb threat," or "I don't feel well" method of postponing exams, students here (especially females, I think the male students... I dunno what (if anything) they do to get out of exams) prefer the "I have the devil inside of me" variety. Speaking of school...

So I did the hokey pokey in class. Wasn't my proudest moment. The students did not know what it was all about. I used it to demonstrate commands: put; shake; do; turn. I wasn't planning on using it, but my original activity fell down the staircase. Speaking of classes going nowhere...

I threw half of my Form IIIs out of class one day. Then tossed another one out the next day AFTER going over why I kicked them out the day before. Form III is the class that continuously gives me a headache. They come late. No one does their homework. No one has their notebook. No one did the board-work I prepared for the start of class. So I threw out the ones who were laughing while I was asking why they were late, why they didn't have their notebooks, etc. (God damn, I AM becoming an old man.) I'm not giving up on the kids, but I reached my limit with bullshit I'll take with them. After taking a day to think, I decided I'm going to start at the beginning with them. They obviously don't know ANY of the material that the syllabus says they should, so I'm basically going to treat them as "advanced" Form I. I hope they can pick up what I'm throwin' down faster than the actual Form I students. If not, I'll basically have 3 Form I classes.

In a related story, I like how I am able to swear in/during class. The students (and teachers) don't know what I'm saying (yet, and if they learn what I'm saying, good for them) and it makes me feel better. So its a win-win(-win).

Unrelated story:

Whenever I go to the market, I have to go past a number of small clusters of houses. Almost every time I go past a certain cluster there's this douchebag older (I'd say 50s) man who, if he sees me, stops me. I call him a douchebag because he's kind of a douchebag. He stops me in a way a traffic cop would stop someone: "Yes, this is inconveniencing you, but I really don't care; I have nothing better to do right now. Also, where are you going? What are you doing there? And are you coming back? When are you coming back? Oh.... OK, then." These are always the questions he asks. Then after I give him my answers he dismisses (not exaggerating with that word) me with an "Ok. Enough. Go." Not very friendly. Anyway, I bring this up because during one of our more recent exchanges, he tells me, very casually, but matter-of-factly, "later, later I am going to find you a Pemban girl and you will marry her." I ask "you want me to... what?" just to make sure I heard him right. Turns out I did hear him right. This isn't the first time I've had a conversation about my marriage situation here (it happens quite often), but this was the first time I was TOLD that I'm going to marry a Pemban. I tell him flatly "no." He looked shocked that I said this, and asked why. I give my usual reasons: I'm going back to America ("oh, then you can just take her with you"); what job will she have there? ("she won't need a job, she'll be your wife"); I want to go back to school (not sure if this is entirely true, but it usually quiets people about it). But he just laughs at me and thinks those reasons are bull. Now he's pointing out girls (age 13-18, yikes) to me when I go by, then laughing when I say no. I saw him as I was walking back to my house after getting back on Pemba. I flat out told him to stop asking. We'll see how it goes. Marriage means something very different here: women are married, men get married (marriage is something that happens to women, its something that men do); there's a dowry (bride price); men can take more than one wife (although I've heard 2 different rules on when he's allowed to: if he can afford to; if there are irreconcilable differences between him and his first (or second...) wife.) The wife's role is in the house, the husband's is not. BUT, divorces are very rare (if allowed) and I see nothing but loving parents (...minus the whole beatings-being-allowed thing). Just a little odd to hear marriage treated like something you just do, like a haircut.

I really want to do some sort of girls-empowerment event here, but I really think it would be tough for everyone in the community to jump on board. And me leading it, being a male, would also look a little... odd.

Talked about HIV/AIDS at English club. Went well, I think. Seems like the kids already were taught about (and learned how to spit facts out about) HIV/AIDS, but I still went over everything. Plus, I doubt they were taught in English. Talked about how to get HIV, how not to get it, who can get it (anyone), and the best way not to get it (abstinence). But I did mention safe sex. And brought a condom. When I took the condom out of my pocket (still in the wrapper) there were many gasps from the students. One was visibly upset and kept asking me not to put the condom on. Uh... there was no way I was going to put the condom on. But I kept it in its wrapper and put it back in my pocket. It was kind of like when an animal expert is on a late night show and one of the animals gets a little too rowdy (get it off the stage!). Also had a frank conversation with my CPT about his view of people living with HIV/AIDS. He told me how he ate and talked with the woman with HIV while in Morogoro, and it was only after he found out she had HIV did he shun (my words, not his) her. So we talked about that for a little bit (in front of the students) and he told me he will change his attitude. I told him talk is cheap.

Since that English club, I have definitely heard more teachers, surprisingly, talking about HIV/AIDS. One teacher in particular keeps reading the HIV/AIDS related magazines I brought into the teachers' office and I've heard him speaking with other teachers about it. During a student government meeting (I don't know why I'm forced to some of these meetings. I'm sure it's because they want me to feel welcome and involved, which is great. But I understand, at most, half of what is said and I am forced to speak, which amounts to 30 seconds of me saying something "inspiring" in English. Anyway, what was I talking about...) that teacher tells the students something involving HIV/AIDS. The next day I ask him about it and he tells me there are 2 young girls living around the school who have recently gotten pregnant and have HIV. Pretty big deal, no matter where you are. This news re-ignited my desire to have some sort of life-skills/HIV/AIDS event and get a health volunteer on the island.

The American Corner and its teacher, Mohammad, held a small meeting a few Saturdays ago. Me and Doug each brought 4 teachers, and Mohammad (with a few tidbits added by me and Doug) talked to them about ways to use more English in the classroom and ways to gain more confidence in THEIR speaking ability, which will help their students gain confidence. One teacher brought up a good point at the end of the meeting, which was: there's a lot of talk about improving the level of teaching and education by teachers/academics in the country, but not a whole lot of action. Talk is cheap. But it was nice to hear a Pemban actually admit that. It shows that there are those who truly want to change how things work.




Oh yeah. I was selected to join PSDN (Peer Support and Diversity Network). It's basically a support group for vols. They can call/talk to us about any issues they want, all with complete confidentiality. About 30 people applied and 11 or 12 got selected (5-6 from my edu class, 5-6 from the new health/env class). I'm pretty sure I'm the token white guy in the group. There's a training in Dar for it in mid-May.

Things:

*Arrested Development slays me.

*Just got into Breaking Bad. So good.

*My CPT is a weird guy. Other PCVs (and even other Pembans) can attest to this.

*God damn the cookies here are perfect for dipping into hot drinks and juice. Need to find the recipe.

*Got a text from another vol who's parents were visiting here: "my mom just pooped her pants." Nearly died with laughter. In the words of my (at the time, drunken/nearly-passed out 17 year old) sister: "we've all been there."

*I'm happy that I can snot-rocket here without any criticism. It's almost encouraged here.

*I really miss the ease of travel in the U.S.

*Got some chocolate at a store and I was eating it on the dala. I gave a toddler a piece. He threw up. Pole sana.

*Fact: Music sounds better when its loud.

*Thin crescent-moon, milky way, shooting star, high 60s, slight breeze = awesome.

*Most of the students here have the best handwriting I've ever seen. I want them to write all of my notes.

*Temperature is kept by how much I sweat. Months are kept by boxes of malaria medication gone through. Time of the month (must...not...make...joke) is told by the moon.

*I found loganberry here. Its called "ukwaju juice" (juice here is pronounced "jewise" btw) and it reminds me of Buffalo/Canada.

*Don Cherry is a xenophobe. Borderline racist.

*Laugh tracks are creepy.

The conversation went something like this....

Me: I could totally beat you in HORSE. I did back in the states, I could do it halfway across the world.

Brett: (Laughs) You didn't and couldn't beat me.

Me: Prove it.

ROUND 1: Columbia, MO vs. Morogoro, TZ

Brett: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPMRWbHiKX8&feature=related

Ellen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRGPEF6v8UQ&feature=context&context=C447dbafADvjVQa1PpcFOFM3GVNniN-_OX69NtYBarO3sGDUApyp8=

Winner: Me (according to a unbiased class of approximately 20 Mizzou students)

ROUND 2: Columbia, MO vs. Dodoma, TZ

Brett: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2xlNx6LSEI&feature=relmfu

Ellen: (My video to come, and your votes are welcomed)

Alas, it seems my competitive nature still exists despite so many other changes in the last 6 months.

Before I start this entry I want to give everyone who donated or spread the word about my project a HUGE THANK YOU!!! The project was fully funded last week. I am going to ask Peace Corps to give me a list of donors (if this is possible) so I can write you personal thank [...]

Hi all,

Thanks to the immortalizing power of Google search and the reliable stream of prospective Peace Corps volunteers scouring the web for info and stories from previous and current volunteers, this blog has somehow maintained fairly steady traffic over the years (including the reliable traffic spikes when a new class of Tanzania volunteers arrives and their worried parents flock to the internet in search of ANYTHING having to do with "Tanzania" and "Peace Corps"). I even receive emails every couple of months... usually asking about what I've done with myself since my Peace Corps service.

So, here's what I've been up to these last few years:

After letting my parents fatten me up for a couple months in Maine, I moved out to California to link up with three old Stanford Computer Science classmates who were in the process of putting together a startup (called Apture) and they conveniently needed a 4th team member. I rolled with that gig for 2 years (Apture would later sell to Google), and left in 2010 to refocus my work and life around what drove me to join the Peace Corps in the first place and what drives me to this day: building and using technology to try to solve big social problems and empower people and organizations in regions of the world that are in most need of empowerment.

So in 2010 I co-founded a tech NGO called Envaya. Envaya builds and deploys online and mobile tools that increase effectiveness of international development efforts at the grassroots level. Built for the low-connectivity environments of developing countries, Envaya's software empowers community organizations to easily establish an online presence, connect and coordinate, and directly engage the larger development sector.

Envaya serves over 850 civil society organizations across Tanzania in Rwanda, and is the largest online civil society network in East Africa. Our supporters include big US companies like Google and local African organizations like Tanzania's Commission for Science and Technology.

And recently, I co-founded a new company called Telerivet. Telerivet provides an innovative technology service that enables people and organizations to easily create and deploy their own SMS services almost anywhere in the world.

Over the 2+ years of running Envaya (and even before that as a PCV), I have run into countless entrepreneurs and organizations in all sharing similar SMS-related frustrations. Despite there being numerous SMS sites and services and toolsets out there, none cut it for quickly and easily designing and deploying across developing countries a full end-to-end SMS solution that's reliable, easy-to-maintain, greatly customizable, and affordable. I've seen too many people and organizations just plain give up on what could have been amazingly powerful SMS services and campaigns due to being overwhelmed by technical challenges at and directly above the mobile gateway level. So, Envaya's CTO, Jesse Young, and I co-founded and built Telerivet.

Developing countries are where SMS (and USSD and related technologies like m-banking) has the largest opportunity for impact… since for 1-2 billion people SMS is the main form of digital communication. Yet, options are extremely limited (and often prohibitively expensive or technologically difficult) to create and run SMS custom services. That’s where being able to quickly and easily launch one’s own gateway with just an Android device, and easily set up and run a full-scale service with minimal technical experience is so powerful. Our sincere hope is that we'll start to see all sorts of innovative SMS tools and services spring up all over the world now that the technological barriers have been so drastically lowered by Telerivet.

Users are already doing some really exciting things with it, including a social enterprise using Telerivet in Mali to implement a mobile banking system for farmers... and an NGO that has set up a Telerivet-powered service in Somalia to perform SMS-based surveying of people in Mogadishu. For these kinds of users, the alternative to running their own gateway is spending a lot of money integrating directly with local telecoms (which is neither time or cost effective nor scalable). So we make setting up one's own robust gateway and service as easy and seamless as humanly possible. Some other examples and possibilities: https://telerivet.com/page/examples

and an African blog post providing a positive perspective: http://afrinnovator.com/blog/2012/04/06/disrupting-sms-apps-space-telerivets-distributed-mobile-sms-servive-using-android-phones/

So as you can see, I've kept myself busy since my last blog update. The last couple years have been especially challenging and rewarding. Between Envaya's empowering of hundreds of grassroots civil society organizations in East Africa, and Telerivet (even though it's just getting started) building technology that could dramatically change the mobile services landscape for almost 2 billion people, I am proud to still be walking the path I set out on 6 years ago (pretty much to the day) when I signed my Peace Corps acceptance letter.

Last week was spring break. I really didn't do anything exciting. I went to Dar at the end of the week before, saw the doctor, got some medicine, took the medicine, felt better, and came back home. I spent the week reading a lot, and just hanging out. I was in Moshi for Easter, which is not a holiday I care a lot about, but Bill wanted to have a nice dinner, so we did and it was lovely. We had roast goat and potatoes and green beans and sweet corn and a slightly better than usual bottle of wine. It was quite nice. Now I'm back at school, and I'll start teaching again tomorrow. We're working on simple past tense, which seems like it should be easy, but which is actually chock full of irregular words that just need to be memorized (said, went, was, were, had, ran, knew, stood, ate, drank, heard, spoke, taught, sat, slept, wrote, read, bought, all sorts of really super common words that have a grand total of no logic to their past forms).