Have you ever heard that quote about people being more afraid of their potential for greatness than of their potential to fail?

I was talking to a friend about this last night (a tough conversation to have through texts), and I’m not sure I agree with it. I think people settle for mediocrity because, even though they may see their potential for greatness, simply trying to reach it risks failure. Rather than putting oneself out on a limb and trying to do something great that we wish to accomplish, we shy away and cling to the big trunk of mediocrity where everyone’s hanging on, not failing per say, but also not achieving. It takes a lot of courage to make that leap- to expend one’s time and energy and risk disastrous failure in the attempt to achieve something wonderful.

A handful of my favorite quotes come to mind:

Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. ~Mark Twain

At first our dreams seem impossible.

Then they seem improbable.

And then, when we summon the will,

They soon become inevitable.

~Christopher Reeves

Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again more intelligently.

~Henry Ford

Let us turn obstacles into stepping stones, weaknesses into strengths, disasters into triumphs. ~Author Unknown

And probably the most relevant quote to these thoughts:

For better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to rank among those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much because it is they who live in a gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat. ~Teddy Roosevelt

Powerful, encouraging quotes, yes. However, it’s a much more difficult idea when put into real practice. How do we overcome our tendency toward mediocrity for fear of risking utter failure?

I have a tough term facing me when I return to site today. Not only am I still teaching all of Form IV Biology and Chemistry, but

1) We have mock exams (practice for national exams in October) in a couple of weeks, for which I alone, being the only science teacher at the school, must prepare the lab practicals in Biology, Chemistry, and Physics. I tell them I don’t know what that means, that we don’t really have lab practical exams in the US, and certainly not on Volumetric and Qualitative Analysis. We don’t even have gloves for handling chemicals. But no matter, the job falls on me (I might get help from a fellow PCV, though- cross your fingers!).

2) I am in charge of programming a four day conference on HIV/AIDS teaching knowledge and life skills to both deaf and hearing students in August. As a former (and possibly future again?) camp counselor, the only biologist and the health specialist for the project, I get to plan the whole program and tell everyone else what we’re doing. While I’m really excited about it and will love being a “camp counselor” again for a few days, I’ve never planned four days of activity of 16 deaf and hearing students and five teachers all by myself.

Potential for greatness. Fear of disastrous failure.

3) I’m leading a staff seminar on health tomorrow, which I scheduled for myself and am very excited to do. I have plans to facilitate discussion about health at our school, to talk about what we’re doing right and what we could do better, to brainstorm solutions to the issues we face and to motivate staff to get involved and work a little harder at promoting health in our school. After all, we live in TZ, where malaria and HIV are rampant, sex is still a very taboo subject, and a large majority have no education beyond primary school, if they even reached that far. I’m also going to brief them on the HIV/AIDS Conference so they feel involved and like the project belongs to the school. It’s not me doing my own little thing and taking my counterpart teacher along.

But how can I, an outsider who’s younger than any of them (though with a higher degree), jump in and facilitate and manage such change, make such a huge impact that I hope to affect? I’m scared of the potential to fail, to be totally shut down, which is a very real possibility in this situation. How do I do all I want to do and affect change without stepping on toes, offending people, getting laughed at and told I’m just a kid who doesn’t know anything and thinks she’s better than everyone, an outsider who doesn’t know that Africans are fundamentally different that wazungu (this is seriously an argument I’ve met many times)? How can I be such an effective leader and manager and facilitator?

That’s my job. That’s the challenge. It’s super scary and it’s what I came here to face. Starting tomorrow I guess. But now that I think about it, this might just be the new challenge I need, just what I’m looking for to find the fulfillment in being here when everything is so discouraging. If I can face and conquer this fear of disastrous failure when trying to reach great potential, then I’ll return home to the US satisfied. It may take several, or even several hundred, attempts to succeed, but the attempts are what matters- facing and conquering that fear. And tomorrow is just my first big, scheduled attempt, a beginning to a fierce conversation that I hope will last for the entire time I’m here and beyond and will produce many successes and promote many positive changes.

Here goes...

Today’s been a bit stressful so far. Went to the road to catch a bus around 8 this morning, but I just barely missed the 8:00 bus and sat down for some ginger chai at the café on the road to wait for the 9:00 bus. There, I talked to the woman who owns the café and makes the chai and small, greasy baked goods called maandazi. She said my Kiswahili is getting really good these days, which I’ve heard a lot lately. I can definitely feel that I am much better at it now than I was when I first came to Ismani. I’ve reached a new level, one at which I’m comfortable saying most of what I want to say, it’s becoming more fluid (which is one of the hardest things with this language since it has so many prefixes and suffixes and infixes to indicate the subject and object of the sentence, the tense, the time it happens, etc.), and I can understand people much better, even when they speak faster. Still can’t understand the radio completely (though I can kind of follow what they’re saying sometimes, and otherwise I can pick out several key words), and there are some people who just speak so fast and use vocabulary I don’t know so I just can’t understand a word they say. But most people speak clearly enough and use my vocabulary for the most part, so I can get along pretty well.

Anyway, I rushed out of the café at 8:40 when the bus came early. However, it was packed and I had to stand. Not terribly uncomfortable as it turns out, though the conductor decided it was necessary to continually pass up and down the bus, squeezing around people, to go collect money and hand out tickets. At one point, he gave up squeezing around people in the aisle and decided to just climb on top of all the seats (this was while the bus was sailing down the bumpy dirt road to town). At the “airport” (large field of grass) down the mountain from Iringa, those of us standing on the bus had to change to a daladala. A minivan made to seat about 7 people, the daladala this morning carried 20 people and a baby. Don’t ask me how that works; it’s like a clown car.

So I made it to town and made for the bus stand to ask about prices and times to get to various places in the future. I haggled a bit with one lady on the price, but she wouldn’t budge, so I left without my ticket. On my way to the ATM, I realized I’d forgotten my nice REI backpack in the back of the daladala. And then I realized that I’d left my passport in it.

Fighting a heart attack, I walked swiftly to the daladala stand to try to find the one I’d taken. All I knew was it was grayish in color. How to find it? Then a guy about my age came up to me and started babbling about the bus stand and fighting for money. He was holding out a bill to me, offering me money since I wouldn’t pay the price the woman at the bus stand was asking me to pay. This was definitely a first- he’d followed me a few blocks simply to offer to help me with money? Hmmm… I told him that it was ok, I’d buy my ticket later and be sure to get a good price, then decided he could help me in a different way. I told him my predicament with the daladala and my bag, and he took me around to different conductors asking where to find the car. Apparently they all know each other, and all I had to do was tell them when I came in and where I caught the daladala. They led me straight to it. Thank goodness. And I’m so glad that I met that nice guy who offered me money. Odd, yes, but he did seem genuine and helped me find my bag.

So today I plan to go to the safi duka (nice store with good, though expensive, food items such as powdered milk, fake butter, bouillon cubes, oatmeal, and spices. Then to the market to grab a few veggies, a restaurant to splurge on the best cheeseburger in Tanzania (about $3), the posta to pick up some packages and send some letters, and the pharmacy to buy 5 kilos of dog food (Supa Dog) for Batman. And then to return home, hopefully before dark. Big day. After a couple more days at site, I’m off to Morogoro again for a PEPFAR community theater workshop. I’m so excited to learn about how to use theater to communicate HIV/AIDS and behavior change messages. Hopefully, it will be helpful in the health club and HIV/AIDS conference I’m planning (more about that later). I need something to reenergize my ideas and get some projects going for next school term. So, here we go!

I've decided I can no longer stand camping every day and have thus ordered some woodwork from the local "fundi." First, I asked him to make me a long table to be used as my "kitchen countertop" where I can cut veggies, put my stove on (off the floor), and put a wide mouth bucket on to use as a sink. Then I'll put a small shelf above that bucket with another bucket and make it into a faucet. I'm so excited to have a real, makeshift sink! I've also ordered a tall bookshelf to use as a "pantry"/"kitchen cupboards," so I can put all my food on it rather than my concrete floor with the spiders and other various bugs. I also splurged and bought some large tupperwares for my fruits and veggies because my mouse keeps eating them. I'm working on killing the mouse, but it's turning out to be rather difficult. These things should be ready in two weeks, and I can hardly wait. It'll not only improve my morale and productivity, but it will also puppy proof the house a little more. Imagine trying to cook on the floor with nothing but a kerosene stove and a headlamp and a 4 month old wild and crazy puppy at your feet, stealing every piece of food and every lick off a utensil he can get. He once took a whole egg from a pile of 3 that I was about to crack and ate the whole thing! While he's getting much better about obeying me and knowing whether he can eat or lick something on the floor, he's still an excitable little guy who can't always control his urges. But I love the little dude. Especially when he crawls into my lap (or sometimes he jumps...) to lie down for a nap. So cute!

As frustrating as the school system is, I had a pretty good week. Batman was super excited to see me. He's turned into a little devil! He tears up the house, steals my underwear and socks, sleeps in my suitcase (which is my dresser still) once I am sound asleep, and gets so excited to see me and other people he knows that he jumps and squeals and scratches and bites (playfully of course, but it still can hurt). So we're working on training for that. Any tips? He's such a cutie, though, with his big bat ears which he hasn't grown into yet, even though he grew a lot while I was away for two weeks. He's a cuddler, too, and loves to jump on the couch (I try to get him to stay on the section where I put his sheet) and then curl up next to me, sometimes crawling into my lap. It's really adorable.

I have a student who's very helpful to me, too. She took care of Batman while I was away. And while I was quite miffed that she found a hidden key to the house (I gave her only the key to the courtyard), let herself in, ate some of my pasta, and gave my precious expensive powdered milk to the dog (though I specifically told her he didn't need any milk, only the dog food I had left in my courtyard kitchen for him), she also took good care of him, washed dishes and mopped my house for me when I returned, went with me to the village and helped me find eggs and potatoes and all sorts of things I can't usually find, and then brought me some pumpkins and corn from her family's farm. So how could I be angry with her? She's so nice and eager to learn and to talk to me and take me everywhere I need to go and then clean my house for me. So I guess I'll just deal with it.

We had mid-terms at school this week. Monday's tests were canceled because no one had copied out the tests for the students yet. No one thought to do that before the day tests were scheduled to start, of course. And then the school secretary copied a few tests, painstakingly slow even though 3 of us teachers were there helping, until tea break when she left again for the day. L-a-z-y. I love her little boys (about 3 and 1 years old- so cute! and they love to play with me), but she can be so hard to deal with. I just don't know what to say to her, because she doesn't work, she's always complaining about how strict/mean the headmaster is (I think he's great), and she doesn't really talk about anything else.

So anyway, we started supervising tests on Tuesday. But no one made copies of the tests for Wednesday, and then the "copy machine" broke. The "copy machine" is a hand crank piece of metal far older than I am, to which you must attach a specially typed paper attached to carbon paper and then add ink and crank a few times before you can put paper in. Now, a simple sautwering (how do you spell that?) gun would have easily fixed the problem, but of course there are none of those to be found. And even if there were, there would be no one to find it because no one thinks it's their job to do such a thing.

So we ended up writing the rest of the tests on the chalkboards. The poor teachers who had to write up my tests! My tests were super long compared to the others, even though they were only 2-3 pages long. And the students thought they were so hard! But I'm not ashamed. The hardest classes I've ever taken have usually been the ones that have taught me the most, not only about the material I was supposed to learn, but also about how to think critically, how to integrate ideas and make connections between them, how to apply my understanding to new situations, and how to synthesize new information given what I already know. And I’ve realized that’s what’s really lacking in these kids’ education. And that’s just what I plan (and hope) to teach them. Instead of being super frustrated with this system and angry at the kids for their lack of knowledge and critical thinking skills, I need to find ways to be patient and turn that anger/frustration into something productive, into a lesson. I have to meet the kids where they are and bring them up to par rather than continue to expect that they know things and can think for themselves and then get frustrated when they don’t/can’t. So that’s going to be a new goal of mine, both for myself and for my students.

But there’s also good news. We have 5 new teachers! That brings us up to 10 teachers, technically (not that they all actually teach, of course). The new ones are temporary (3-4 months probably), but that brings the student to teacher ratio down below 100:1! Sad that I think that’s wonderful. Then yesterday, my counterpart and I took my Frisbee out to the football field and we taught the students who were hanging around how to throw and catch. They loved it! Even though it poured twice, they just took the Frisbee inside a classroom and continued til the rain stopped. And they complained loudly when we left. I left my Frisbee with my counterpart today so they could play again this afternoon. Maybe I’ll teach them Ultimate this week and we can have competitions. Fun!

So life’s pretty good lately. I’m dealing with frustrations and enjoying the beauty of my site and getting to know people better. I feel a little more a part of the community these days, though I’m still often confused and feel like a little kid who can’t do things correctly or handle situations at school, etc. Slowly, it’s coming along. And I’m hoping to plant my own garden, starting tomorrow. We’ll see how that goes!

So now I’m in Njombe town south of Iringa for two weeks for in-service training. Half of my training group is here (the half that lives around here in the southern highlands) plus Tanzanian counterparts we each chose from our sites to come to training with us to help us do our volunteer stuff back at site. My counterpart, a neighbor and teacher at my school who’s become kind of a friend, is really awesome, and I think he will help a lot with implementing all these ideas when we get back. Already we’re planning to make a garden behind our houses (the thought of growing my own vegetables and herbs is so exciting!), and I think we will do a lot to minimize the use of corporal punishment in school, which has been a huge problem. I hate listening to kids being beat with a stick and then crying and whimpering and pleading for it to stop. Plus, it’s so ineffective. So I think my counterpart actually agrees now and will help support me in my convictions when we get back. Hopefully we can help each other be better teachers and help the other teachers be better, too. And hopefully we can implement some outside of school programs to teach the kids life skills and keep them busy and motivated to study as well as work in the community to improve villagers’ health and behavior, especially regarding our students (girls get chased out of school if they become pregnant, usually by a villager not in school). I have so many ideas and want to do so much, it’s overwhelming! How can I possibly do everything I want to do? I guess that’s why I have a counterpart.

So anyway, training has been good. This week we’ve focused on PEPFAR and HIV/AIDS education. We learned all about HIV/AIDS, the disease progression and symptoms as well as how it works molecularly. Sort of a refresher course for me, but it reminded me just how much I love the biochemistry of disease and how it relates to the individual and personal level as well as the epidemiological level. It got me thinking about grad school in immunology or epidemiology or public health with a specialty in one of these when I get back to the US. I think I’ll be ready to go back to school by then, and I’ll be all fired up about global health, too.

This weekend, it’s back home to school for me. I think I’m more excited to be back at site now. But it has been super frustrating so far. I have at least one really terrible day per week. And it’s very discouraging to be involved in this broken school system with so many hopeless characteristics. Can I really help do anything when I’m only one of 5 teachers at a school of 720, the kids don’t have teachers in their classes most of the time, the exams are pretty damn hard, everything is taught to the exams and regular school grades don’t matter, the kids are supposed to be taught in English at secondary school but don’t have any foundation in the language from their primary school during which they sat in the classroom every day without any teachers so now they don’t know any English at all, the teachers we do have spend more of their time drinking chai and punishing students than teaching their scheduled classes, and the chalkboards are so bad that you can hardly read what’s written on them. Those are just a few of the frustrations. Seriously, this country drives me nuts sometimes.

But I just have to keep telling myself that whatever I do, however little, can have an effect. That even if the kids don’t pass on to Advanced level secondary school, they can learn valuable life lessons in school, about health and nutrition and farming and how to interact with others and how important education is, so that they can live better lives and then help give the next generation a better life, however minimal the changes are. Eventually, after several generations, education might be valued, genders might be more equal (in a family planning debate the school had a couple weeks ago, one argument against family planning given by a Form 4 boy was that if women don’t have enough children, they will have more time on their hands, and thus they will be prostitutes- Oh My God!!!), people might be healthier, agricultural practices might be more efficient, etc. It’ll just take time…

So we’ll see how the next couple months go until our school break in June, during which I plan to lead a week long girls’ conference with 3 other volunteers (we’ll each bring about 10 girls with potential to learn about reproductive health and life skills like self-confidence and communication and encourage them to show those boys that they can be just as good students and leaders and they can go somewhere in their lives) and then do some traveling around the country. It’ll be a nice break, I’m sure.

Maybe I’m just in a really weird mood because this is such a different situation- I live far away from other Americans and rarely see them, much less get to town for internet and such, so I’m really in my own little world. I’ve now been on my own longer than I was in training with these friends, so it’s kind of weird to see these friends after being away from them all for so long and we didn’t even know each other for 3 months to begin with. Plus, it’s a social explosion to go from some Tanzanian semi-friends that take such effort to communicate with and be culturally appropriate with to suddenly being around 16 other friends from training who have all had their own lives for the past 3 months (and while we text and even call each other on occasion, we really don’t know what’s going on in each others’ lives). But I can relax around them and just be myself, speak quickly and with an American slur and slang thrown in, wear pants and sit in a chair however I want and drink beer and just act like an American without worrying about what others think of me (I hate that I have to worry about that, but it’s what you gotta do in a different country like this).

And then this weekend, I’ll go back to being on my own at site, rarely seeing any of these friends, struggling to cook and clean and teach and implement all my great ideas in my community, though at least with the help of a counterpart. Crazy. But I get to see Batman! And one friend pointed out that the next 6 months will probably be way easier than the last 6 months because now we know what we’re up against, we’ve struggled through some of the initial problems, and our Swahili is improving along with our relationships at site, etc. So that’s a nice thought! J

I hope my mood stabilizes and I can just enjoy being here, living and working with the Tanzanians without too many frustrations. I’ve learned a lot to deal with the issues of teachers who beat students, students who don’t understand any English, students who won’t try and won’t study or do homework, etc. Hopefully I’m now ready to tackle and conquer these frustrations so that the joys of working with students, hanging out with the teachers, etc. can be more joyful and make life good rather than simply bearable.

The day came when I decided I needed a puppy, mostly for the company,from a small furry bundle of energy with whom I don’t have to worryabout communication (once trained, anyway). So I asked everyone I metthat day to help me find a puppy. And one guy listened and arranged ameeting the following day with a man who owned a puppy. After waitingfor 2 hours after the set meeting time (remember, this is Africa), wemet with the man in his living room lit by the soft light of akerosene lantern. My new friend and the puppy-owner discussed thematter for awhile as I struggled to understand everything. They wantedto make sure I would take good care of the pup and find a place for itwhen I leave Tanzania- a bit ironic considering the fact that fewTanzanians take good care of dogs.After some young entrepreneurial boys agreed on a price of about $3 inTanzanian shillingi, I paid and then we left and they brought the pupout and gave him to one of my students who was going to escort me homein the dark. So I didn’t really get a good look at him til I got homeand put him in a broken wide mouth bucket with a sheet.

He’s a typical Tanzanian mutt: skinny, short-haired, mostly light brown. His legs and belly are white with a few tan speckles, his tail is black with a white tip, and he has some black markings on his neck, snout, and the tips of his ears. And his ears are HUGE! He’s got a serious wingspan with those things, probably about as wide as he is tall (~a foot). Hence, his ears have christened him with the name Batman. Never thought I’d name my dog that, but it fits him and Batman is my favorite superhero, so it works.

I had him for three weeks, potty training him, trying to get him to sit and to come (come is a very difficult command for most dogs- they come running when they feel like it, but now and then they look at you with mischief in their eyes, turn and bolt the opposite way). One of the first few days I had him, he managed to sneak into my room (the door is usually closed to keep him out of trouble), jump up onto my bed and get under the mosquito net, then squirt puppy diarrhea all over. I discovered theis when I sat down on the edge of my bed that night, exhausted and smelled something rank. Ewww! So I had to sleep on the couch that night without a mosquito net, tossing and turning and being bit by mosquitos all night. But he made up for it by curling up with me and cuddling happily all night. He just hates the fact that he has to sleep next to my bed and not in my bed with me every night.

So then I came to Njombe town south of Iringa for two weeks of Peace Corps in-service training. He was pretty well potty trained by then, and my next door neighbor (also a teacher) was starting to train him to “Nipe tano” (Give me five). It was super cute. I’ve been missing him now for a couple weeks and hoping that my student is taking good care of him and he’s not too mad at me for leaving him alone. Can’t wait to see him again and hear his cute little whimpering puppy noises when I come home and he gets overwhelmingly excited to see me!

I'm really just fine without the comforts of America, so I don't really need anything. Nor do I want gobs of stuff to fill my house. If people here can live without it, so can I. But if you're just dying to send me something, I thought I'd write down a few simple, light, and inexpensive items that might just improve the quality of my life (though letters will truly do just fine):

~Rennet tablets (should be pretty cheap) and cheesecloth for cheesemaking (my first batch of mango wine is already brewed and delicious if I do say so myself)

~Mac and Cheese packets (I can get the macaroni here, so you can just send the cheese packet with the recipe to save on shipping)

~anything instant (hot cocoa, cider, soup mixes, Crystal Light, etc.) to reduce cooking times and making drinking water a more pleasant experience

~maps/almanac- I've received a US map and a map of the world, which are wonderful, but if you know me well, you'll know that I LOVE maps and I can spend hours and hours looking at them)

~Rough Wilderness Guide to Tanzania (never got a chance to buy it before leaving the US...)

I'll add and make changes to the list as I go and think of any more useful items, so check back here if you're looking for things to send.

As far as packaging goes, things sent in a padded envelope that are under 4lbs will be easiest on customs taxes. Label them "educational materials" or something else very vague and if there's anything expensive, don't report the true cost (because customs taxes are steep! They tried to get me to pay $35 to receive a package that was labeled $100 value- not worth it.). I've heard writing Bible verses or putting religious stickers on packages help them get through easier without any mysterious losses, though I have no proof it's true.

…one which I’m gaining in heap loads every second of every day.

I’ve heard it said that PCVs in different regions of the world gain different perspectives based on their regions. Volunteers in Asia become more philosophical, those n Central and South America become more political, and those who volunteer in Africa gain a sense of humor and an immeasurable amount of patience. When I first heard this in training, I laughed, but I’m beginning to believe it. My friends in Peru, Guatemala, Kazakhstan, etc. will have to tell me about their experiences in the rest of the world, but the Africa part is true. While I’m sure all volunteers gain all of these things, I truly believe Africa gives one both humor and patience. Without these, no one would survive here. Sometimes, to keep myself from crying or screaming in frustration, I just have to laugh and chill.

Like when I get on a bus packed with 5 times as many people as seats and my bags become scattered in whatever nooks are open, and I have to stand in the aisle squished against 5 other people, some women with crying babies tied to their backs and others carrying 4 squawking chickens in my face, for 2 hours on a bumpy dirt road, stopping every 3 minutes to pick up or drop off furniture, luggage, children, people, and animals (including but not limited to goats and chickens) just to get home from a day trip to town. How can you not cry from the stress? You just laugh. And you say “Hakuna shida,” one of the Tanzanian forms of hakuna matata- no problem, no worries. There are plenty of other ways to say this based on region and dialect.

(In fact, someone said “Hakuna matata” to me the other day, and I understood but was confused as to why he said “matata” instead of the more common “matatizo.” A few minutes later, I recognized the line from The Lion King and realized the man deals with tourists all the time and probably uses the phrase often with white people. A sign that I’m really getting used to Kiswahili and I’m no tourist.)

Or when an immediate, emergency transport to town (usually two and a half hours by bus and 45 minutes for a private car) for a visit to the doctor turns into a day long trip followed by two full days waiting for people and broken machines to produce results of tests, each followed by calling the PC medical officer to inform her of the results and ask which tests to get next. I was surprised at how calm I was. My stomach sure hurt, but I sat and waited for African time to pass, sure that things would get done and we’d find the right treatment at some point. After all, Peace Corps has great medical assistance. So you chuckle and chill out because worrying just won’t help.

So rest assured that Africa makes me laugh every day. Have you ever watched a rooster crow? Or little children in primary school march in droves giggly and giddy, imitating the mzungu (white person, or technically, European) that they’re following and shyly asking questions and sneaking smiles? I’m gaining plenty of patience in order to face any situation imaginable.

When I came to Iringa about a week and a half ago, sick, I splurged on a $20/night safi hotel with a comfy bed, hot shower, Western toilet, soap, mirrors, towels, and omelets with bread and honey, sausages, fresh papaya juice and chai for breakfast. I felt like such a tourist, though I loved speaking Kiswahili to the pleasantly-surprised desk workers, bell hops, and restaurant servers.

But it was oh-so-worth-it, especially being sicker than a dog, and I realized how difficult life in the village really is. I hadn’t had a hot shower since I left the States four and a half months ago. It was heaven. So I decided to stay a second night while I was healing just to experience such luxury a little more before returning to my mosquito-ridden house without electricity or running water, my cold bucket baths every other day, my ever-molding vegetables, my broken charcoal stove, and my foam mattress with a large dent in it exactly the size and shape of my body.

It’s certainly a challenge, but also an adventure and a great opportunity. I’ve never thought for one second that this is not what I’m meant to be doing right now in my life. This is exactly where I’m supposed to be, even if I don’t always feel like I belong or that I know what I’m doing. In fact, usually I don’t. But I wake up every morning and get out of bed to keep trying with my head held high. Someday, eventually, I will truly belong in this community and it will be my home.

I've realized that the US is progressive simply because people say "It's possible." We're always thinking of progression, of development, of opportunities to make our lives easier, more efficient, longer, and supposedly happier. People know that if they work hard, they have the opportunity to do anything they want. We constantly think of the future- our goals, our plans, progression. But do we lose sight of the present in our attempts to make life better later?

Here, it’s the opposite. People live entirely in the here and now - What do I want or need now? What am I doing right now? – so much so that I think it’s hard for them to look into the future and plan. Saving money, valuing education and the opportunity it might bring, inventing ways to make life easier, and planning the development of the country to improve its infrastructure and, again, make life easier are just not prevalent attitudes here. I’m not sure if people just don’t know about these things, if they don’t think it’s possible, or if they just don’t care. Or maybe some combination thereof, depending on who I ask.

One of my goals here is to change these attitudes. I want to tell people there are easier ways; there are things that will help improve life. I want to tell them that these things are possible, that change is possible, and that everyone can make a difference, however small, in producing such change. I want to inspire my students and others I meet to think outside the box and believe it’s possible for each one of them to make the change they see is needed. I want to help people improve their own lives.

Can you tell I’m a Peace Corps Volunteer?

In America, everything, every tiny little tool or machine, is designed to make life more efficient, and hence "easier." I'm sure you recognize that big machines like dishwashers and washing machines and dryers save a lot of time, and there are useful utilities such as running water (and it's clean for drinking, too!) and electricity (which saves an incredible amount of time cooking, heats water, and of course provides an opportunity for time well used after dark). But you've also got little amenities that make life so much more efficient. For example, a potato peeler. Ever thought about how much easier something as simple as a potato peeler can make your life? Well, after cutting and peeling all my veggies with a dull 70 cent knife for two months (everything must be peeled due to possible contamination of skins by dirty water), I've learned to appreciate such things. Even such a thing as a kitchen counter is a safi amenity, as I do everything from cutting veggies to scrubbing clothes until my fingers bleed and washing dishes with a dirty rag on the ground of my courtyard, seated on a broken plastic stool.

Life is just tough here, for everyone. All time is spent on everyday tasks: washing, cooking, farming, and taking care of the kids (though usually older ones are responsible for taking care of the younger ones- I've seen barefoot four year olds carrying two year olds tied to their backs by a piece of cloth). It takes all day just to survive.

And I wonder, what if Tanzania had all those amenities? Would they have more time to think and progress and provide jobs besides farming (or in some areas, attempting to cultivate dry, nutrient- poor dirt in the hopes of feeding your family and making enough extra for soap and buckets and matches)? Or is it the innovative, optimistic, opportunistic minds of America that make such things happen?

Sometimes this country frustrates me so much. First of all, Dar es Salaam is a dirty, disgusting, sketchy city with nothing to do. I walked all around city center over the last few days, and while there are a few (expensive) good restaurants, the city is basically just hectic and dirty, without sidewalks or anything interesting to see. Even the harbor and waterfront is dirty and smelly and somehow ugly (I’ve never known that the oceanfront can actually be so awful).

Granted, there are also plenty of good, nice people, which help cheer things up, and I really do love those conversations and interactions which really mean a lot but they're mixed in with not so fun interactions as well. Many men see me as a ticket to America, an inferior woman, so I have to shake those creepers off before I punch them in the face (just kidding). I ended up spending a lot of my time in Dar in my hotel room, and then a PCV friend also came and we watched some movies. I felt so lazy and terrible for lying around not exploring the city, but I'd had enough of that after two days. So I'll be excited to get out of here and back to my village and my town of Iringa nearby, so clean and nice and friendly and easy to get around (by comparison).

Then there was this morning, waiting at the bus stop and then getting on a daladala to try to get to the Peace Corps office. I'd done this a few times last week, but today was extra terrible.

We waited forever for the right bus at this awful huge bus stop, getting blatantly stared at from everyone who passed (the white skin and blonde hair kinda sticks out around here). I've mostly gotten used to the stares, but it still seems disrespectful to me for someone to stare for so long at another person, like I'm an alien from another world. And even when I greet them or smile, they don't respond; they just continue staring, stopped in their tracks. But oh well, I shook it off and got ready to get on my bus.

When the right bus came, I moved towards it along with a mass of people and we waited, chewing at the bit, while the conductor of the bus struggled to hold us back and let the current passengers off first. As the last woman was descending the stairs, the first guy in line broke through the conductor and ran up the steps, triggering a violent gnashing and crushing of the herd behind him to enter the bus. The woman trying to get off the bus got squeezed against the door and cried out in objection and pain, but her cries went unheard amongst the turmoil. As I shoved my way aboard, as politely forceful as possible (my PCV friend braced himself against the door to help me through), someone stepped on my foot hard. I almost lost my shoe as I was pushed onto the bus backwards, carried by the crowd. Luckily, I managed to get a seat and feel a tiny breeze through the window ahead on my way through the hot, sticky city before I arrived at the oh-so-gloriously peaceful (and air-conditioned) Peace Corps compound.

Apart from the sheer stress of such a situation, I wondered why this sort of thing bothers me so much. My PCV friend and I discussed it along the way, and we concluded that we’re just so frustrated with the chaos of this country and the impossibility of changing it. In our lives, we have both always been people to identify a problem, brainstorm the best solution, and believe in the possibility of implementing the solution to change the world (however small and seemingly insignificant that change may seem). Never before have we been presented with problems for which a solution is impossible.

There’s no way that the bus situation described above will ever be fixed because that’s just not how this country works. No matter how much everyone hates that system (or lack thereof), no one will take a step to change it and no one will pay attention to an attempt to change. The person who stands up to try to change will change nothing but his/her own opportunity to board that bus. People simply care more about getting on the bus and trying to get a seat to take them 5 blocks away than they do about the safety of those people or having an easy efficient way of boarding and de-boarding a bus.

And I see this impossibility in faces everywhere. People are always telling me how impossible things in this country are. As much as I want to inspire change here and motivate people to believe in the possibility of change, I, too, get bogged down with despair. How will these things ever change? How can they change?

In the US, most people have the mindset to believe in possibilities, and we have an environment in which change is possible. We constantly look for ways to improve on the current system, to make life better and easier and more efficient, to make more money, to be “happier.” And even though the stress and overwork that results from such an attitude exists, I do think we’re happier. We at least have the opportunity to be happier by choosing not to work too hard and overstress ourselves, while enjoying the beauty of such a small silly thing as a potato peeler (another blog on that later).

But here in Tanzania, there is no system, there’s nothing to understand no matter how hard I try to “figure it out.” Instead, there is chaos and the stress and frustration that goes along with it. How can anyone live at peace with that?

Maybe I’m simply frustrated today and it will pass with time. Maybe I need to find more hope and inspiration within myself and my support network so I can continue working to create that environment of “It’s possible.” Maybe it is possible, but I just can’t see a way right now and I need to keep looking and trying to get through, over, or just beyond the huge mountain looming over me.

I won’t give up on it. I refuse to give up hope. I refuse to stop trying.

So I bet you're all wondering where in the world I've been and what I've been up to for the past 6 weeks or so. I'm sorry I've been terrible about blogging and sending updates lately. Internet time has been limited (and still is), but I hope those of you who read my blog have gotten updates through parents or other friends or emails or something. This will have to be a quick update, with more to come later (I'll start writing on my computer at site then bringing already written updates to send online when I come to town- the trouble has been that the power generator at my school only started working last week and it worked for about 4 evenings of two and a half hours each before it broke again; there's no other way to charge it in my village, though I can at least charge my cell phone for 30 cents at any barber/salon since they all have solar power, that is if it's sunny out).

First of all, I'm doing really well. There's certainly no need to worry about me. It's definitely a roller coaster of emotions and experiences, but for the most part, things are good. And they're improving, little by little. Every day, I learn more and more Kiswahili and speak more fluently. I find myself expressing thoughts and concepts more easily (especially "I can't give you money because I'm a volunteer and I only make enough to feed myself. I am here to teach at the secondary school..." and so forth).

Also, since school has started, I've talked a lot to the four other teachers and I hang out with them in the office and outside of school every day. I've started to really like them and enjoy their company. The women are still a bit reserved; they like to talk to me but they don't always have a lot to say. The men, who live on either side of me in our own little "neighborhood" (3 houses on the other side of the school apart from the village), are a lot of fun and talk to me much more. They're comedians at heart and they seem like pretty decent guys- one is 23 and the other is 25. They help me with my Kiswahili every day and get a kick out of teaching me their tribal languages (each area in Tanzania is dominated by a tribe with its own language in the same family as Kiswahili but also very different). Even last night, we all walked to the village to get our phones charged and then sat in a "bar" drinking hot milk. When our phones were finished charging (by power generator), we walked/tripped home in the dark, laughing the whole way, and then they invited me to join me for a late night dinner before bed since they had cooked a chicken that day. So it's nice to have some friendships beginning with people my own age.

I do wonder what the villagers think of me, though, always hanging out with men. Is that a bad thing? I never had to think about such a thing before. I think I hang out with them just because men are more confident and so they aren't afraid to come talk to the American and even practice their English sometimes. I guess I'm sort of an "honorary man" in some respects, though- I have a good education, I'm strong and confident, I wear pants when I go to town, I'm not married yet and live on the other side of the world from my parents- these are characteristics women just don't have, for the most part. But anyway, many more thoughts on gender issues to come...

As for school, it opened two weeks ago and I've succeeded in teaching all of two classes of two periods each. And I think that might be more than the other teachers have done. Not even half the students have shown up yet, either, which is the main reason we haven't taught yet. It takes a long time to register everyone and get their school fees (most students have trouble coming up with the $20 required to enter the classroom for the year) and then wait for them to clean up the school environment before beginning with studies. So I sat in the teachers' office at my newly claimed desk for most of the time, chatting with the other teachers (so fun to finally get to know them!) and preparing my order of topics for the year and lesson plans for when I actually start. I also took it upon myself to make the school timetable listing each teacher's schedule for the week. I loved it, since it was like a big complicated Sudoku puzzle to me, and I think the other teachers were glad to be rid of the work! Classes should pick up soon, which I'm really excited about because I can't wait to get to know the students and have them get to know me. I'm technically scheduled for 48 40 minute periods per week, though the school only offers 42 periods per week, and Peace Corps recommends we start with no more than 24 periods per week. So I'm working that out. I'm teaching Forms 2 and 4 Biology and Chemistry, and I really like a lot of the topics covered in these subjects for these years, so I don't want to give any of it up... We'll see.

Otherwise, I'm slowly integrating into my community, meeting people, trying to remember people I've met before, making friendships with the teachers, and continuing to work on my cooking and baking skills with a charcoal jiko (sometimes the banana bread turns out perfect and delicious, and other times the brownies turn out with the bottom 3cm as burnt blackness stuck to the bottom of the pot). I've been taking a lot of naps because of all the activity and stress of being constantly confused about what's going on and what I'm supposed to be doing, but I'm pretty happy these days and starting to settle into life here.

So that's all for now I think- I'll write about funny stories, my Christmas and New Year's celebrations, school, teachers, thoughts, etc. and post them within the next month. I'll continue working on writing letters to everyone and would love to receive mail here! Love you all!

I think you all know the song, Cecilia, right? If not, look it up and listen to it. We made new lyrics to the song and sang it for our swearing-in ceremony, and I think it explains a lot about our feelings about living here right now.

Chorus 1:

Tanzania, you're breakin' my heart

you're shakin' my confidence daily

Tanzania, I'm down on my knees

I'm beggin' you please to be home

To be home

Chorus 2:

Tanzania, I can't figure you out

you're makin' me feel like a baby

lakini sasa, nina familie yangu

na kila siku 'najifunza

na wewe

(but now I have a family

and every day I learn

with you)

Verse:

Teachin' class in the afternoon

with my students packed into the room

Ninarudi nyumbani

kufua nguo, bado siwezi

(I return home

to wash clothes, but still I can't)

Chorus 3:

Tanzania, 'nakupenda sana

'nakupenda sana, Tanzania

Familia zetu, tutawakumbuka

tutarudi tena kuwaona

Asante

(Tanzania, I love you so much

I love you so much Tanzania

Our families, we will miss you

we will return again to see you

Thank you)

Here is a comprehensive list of the things I bought/will buy today to get ready to live in my new house:

wash buckets and small pitchers/cups to wash dishes and clothes (I don't have a sink or running water)

a crappy cutting knife that may easily break soon (cost- 70 cents)

a spoon

a wok/frying pan thing

a metal spatula and a wooden spoon

a set of aluminum pots (forget about non-stick, those are hard to find and super expensive)

a set of hot pots to keep food warm

a small charcoal jiko (8" in diameter, 8" tall maybe)

a cutting board

a good lock for my front door

black pepper and curry powder

air freshener for my concrete squat toilet room

dish soap and steel wool

flour, butter, pasta, jam, pb, bread, powdered milk, sugar

And I think I'll survive on that in my village for the next week or two, I hope. At least the pb and j sandwiches will sustain me if nothing else I cook works out. Not exactly the things you would think to buy when setting up a new apartment in America are they?

I can get rice, tomatoes, fish (really gross fish-ey fish), bananas, mangos, and onions in my village, along with soap and cooking oil I think. Luckily it's very easy for me to get into Iringa town and buy absolutely anything I need, so I'll get some dishes, more buckets and water storage tanks, maybe a nice kerosene stove, more staple food, and that sort of thing next time I come. I hope you're all enjoying your safi (clean, fancy, excellent, awesome) lives in America!!!

Well, I arrived at site. After a long bus ride followed by a taxi ride for an hour on a dirt road in the rain, my headmaster and I arrived at our school after dark. I discovered my house is very nice and rather large with two bedrooms and a living room, an enclosed compound in the back, and bathrooms and a kitchen room across the enclosed area. However, as I'm at a new site in a new house, I have nothing but a bed, two tables and a couple chairs, a bucket and a kerosene lantern, and my clothing and books I brought with me. No stove, no pots and pans, no shelves or wardrobe or anything. Also, I wrote in my last post that my house would have electricity and running water. False. It has neither. So in addition to all of the things I need to find, buy, and figure out how to get back to my house, starting with a charcoal and a kerosene stove, I also need to figure out a system for water: getting it to my house from the neighbor's, storing it at my house, and then boiling and filtering it for drinking. I also heard that in the dry season the tap water for the whole town is only turned on on Fridays, so you have to store all of your water for a whole week! Woah!

Luckily my headmaster is really nice and has worked with 3 Peace Corps Volunteers before me. His family has been feeding me and entertaining me with chatter at his house (maybe too much! I haven't had time to sit in my house, unpack, or anything like that yet). He's also looking into getting some living room furniture and curtains for me this week. That'll make things a little more cozy.

One of the female teachers at my school took me to her house one afternoon, where I talked a little to her and another teacher. For most of the afternoon, though, I talked to one of the teachers' boyfriend who teaches in Iringa and has very good English and Western ideas. It was a lot of fun to talk to him, and it encouraged me that it's possible to have male friends in this country. Maybe. The trouble is that Tanzanians do not have intergender friendships at all. So we'll see how that works.

The landscape at my school is really nice. It looks like Africa. You know, the savannah yellowish tall grasses and trees with flat tops dotting the landscape. Just what you imagine as an American who's seen The Lion King but never stepped foot in Africa. And the blue mountains of Iringa town rise up in the distance. All this I can see right outside the windows of my house. The village nearby is right next to the school, and the market and shops are about a ten minute walk if you go straight there. However, the villagers were so curious about me when we walked around yesterday that we had to stop every few feet to greet and chat. They speak a local language here, so the greetings are different, but most people also speak Kiswahili so my training was not entirely in vain. However, my headmaster introduced me to everyone one by one, and I really can't say much more than my introduction myself, so I would stand there awkwardly, alternately nodding in confirmation of what I understood and furrowing my eyebrows trying to figure out what else they were saying so quickly. Mostly I just walked around wide-eyed and overstimulated by the sights. Village life is soo different than life in the town. Woah!

So I can't figure out whether to be scared to death of the prospect of getting everything I need and learning to live in a village independently and speaking broken Kiswahili to villagers who've maybe never seen an mzungu (white person) before, or excited and stimulated by the challenge of setting up a new site and getting to know villagers and making friends with them. I think right now I'm mostly on the side of scared to death, but I won't give up hope. I'm sure this month will be the most difficult, trying month I've ever lived, but things will come and I will become more comfortable and less overwhelmed, little by little as time goes on. What I'm really excited about is the time when I do get more comfortable and have my house set up a little and I'm able to at least support and feed myself. I'm excited to speak better Kiswahili so I can actually talk to people and maybe even make some friends. If I can get through the first few weeks (including the beginning of January when I start school), I think I'll be set. Then I'll be able to face any challenge that ever comes my way.

So here comes the determination, the courage, the independent streak, and the sheer strength. This is it- I'm really doing it!

So I went to Dodoma for shadow and had an awesome time. Despite the fact that it's in the middle of nowhere desert, there are quite a few trees around and some of them are even green. It can be quite beautiful actually. And while the days are brutally hot and the sun beats into your skin (I learned the true value of chapstick), the nights are quite cool with a lovely breeze. Not such a bad deal.

We took a bus from Morogoro to Dodoma, where we met the volunteer we would be "shadowing" (i.e. hanging out with for 5 days), and then we walked a short way to find a pickup truck to take us on the road to the village and school. While the distance is only about 20km, it took a good hour precariously perched on the edge of the truck bed, squished beyond belief by the number of passengers with their loads, bumping up and down on the poorly cared for dirt roads. Quite an adventure, but that's not the end of it. I was also bargained for, for the first time in my life. Yes, a man tried to offer three cows, a few goats, and a handful of chickens to our volunteer (a male) in order to take me home as his wife that night. You might imagine how this might feel to discover (suddenly) what this man was saying, but I assure you no one really knows until they've been in this situation. At least it was an extremely high price, right?

Once I guessed what was going on, my shadow buddy/fellow trainee asked if I needed a husband and I agreed. He proceeded to explain to the man that I was his wife, and I showed off my ring (Skogfjorden!) that I happen to wear all the time. The man then became very afraid for his life and apologized profusely, thinking that my muscular new "husband" was Jean Claude van Dam(sp?). Jean Claude saved my life that day, but I now need a new action plan for dealing with these men who want to marry me when I am on my own at site and travelling to town. I have a few ideas to test, but I welcome any further suggestions as well!

Once we arrived at the volunteer's site, we pretty much just cooked and talked for 4/5 days straight, nonstop. Many students (upper level high school, ranging in age from 18-22ish) came over to talk, and we had a blast asking them questions, answering their questions, learning about each other and our cultures, and inspiring them to make goals and achieve them. I also talked to a Maasai student who told me a little about his culture and language. It was very interesting, and I hope to learn more about that particular tribe while I'm here.

Anyway, we went to Dar es Salaam after shadow for more training (of course) and for site announcements. It was so nerve-wracking and exciting to wake up the morning of our announcements knowing we would soon hear about our sites and where we'll spend the next two years of our lives. The staff described each site for a few minutes, one at a time, and then announced the name of the person who would be going there. As I was the third person mentioned, I didn't go through quite as much suspense, but it was still very exciting to hear where all of my friends would be going.

So without further ado, I'd like to announce my site to you:

I'm going to live about 40 km north of Iringa town, in the district of Iringa in Iringa region. The area is supposedly mountainous and beautiful and can get near to freezing temperatures in the winter (June-August), despite the fact that my information sheet says the climate is "hot tropical." The school has about 630 students, coed, with boarding facilities for about 200 of the girls. There are about 8 host country national teachers, none of whom teach science as far as I know, and a headmaster. They want to share their African culture with me as I teach them about American culture, and they want me to help out with sports (including volleyball, soccer, and netball) and clubs (English debate, geography, history, etc.) as well as teach any science classes I can. My house is on the school property, has two bedrooms, running water, and two and a half hours of electricity (I don't know if that's per day, per week, per month...). And that's all I know for now, until I arrive at my site in about 6 days!

I'm sure you can all find some information and pictures about the area on the internet sometime, and feel free to email me with questions and comments, or interesting information because I'm curious too!

So my schedule for the week:

Swearing in is on Wednesday morning, during which I will wear a gorgeous African dress I had made out of some beautiful material here. Until then, I have to pack, pick up a few necessities from town, and hang out with my host family. On Thursday, we bus to Dar, stay overnight, and then depart for site with our headmasters early on Friday morning (more than half of us have to travel back through Morogoro to get to site, but whatever). I'm guessing I will arrive at my site either Friday evening or Saturday morning. Hopefully, my headmaster or someone in the village will feed me for a few days until I can get a charcoal stove, pots and pans, basic foods, and other necessary kitchen items. Then I move in, buy everything I need (my house will have nothing but a bed, a table, and a couple chairs) with my allowance from Peace Corps, get to know my village and neighbors, and start on all of the projects I would love to do, like starting a garden, building shelves and tables, etc. I have a dream of building a trellis in my backyard and planting passion fruit vines to crawl up and provide a shade arbor in the yard. Doesn't that sound lovely? We'll see if I manage it...

Anyway, I'm super duper excited to get to site now. The nerves are settling a bit and even though I could never be completely prepared for these, I feel as ready as can be to go. This is the real plunge, the real test, the real challenge. Can I survive on my own in a small village in Africa? Can I teach kids here efficiently, not only from the government-issued syllabi, but also about life skills, girls' empowerment, HIV/AIDS, etc.? Can I communicate and make friends in my village? Well here I go; I'm gonna do it.

Tune in next week (or the week after?) for some answers to these questions, along with a better description of my site. I'll also get a new address to send out as soon as I can so you can all send me letters. Love you and miss you all!

So I just wanted to send an update of the basics of what's going on here these days:

We finished language training last week and have had tests for a few days now in oral and written Kiswahili and in education (kind of a silly test- "list ways in which kids might misbehave in class and appropriate punishments"). Now I'm done! Tomorrow I'm going to visit a volunteer in Dodoma, the political capital of Tanzania in the middle of the desert, for five days to shadow him, see what life is like at site, relax a bit, and ask gobs of questions. They paired us all up for these visits, and I'm going with a friend named Chris. I think we'll have a lot of fun and get a lot out of the trip because we get along well and he loves to ask questions. I don't think I'll have any questions left by the end because he'll ask them all!

We'll then travel to Dar es Salaam straight from shadow for site announcements. I can't wait to find out where I'm going! I requested a cooler site in the mountains in a smaller village where I can really get to know people, so I hope that comes true. I really don't think I'd be happy with going to the desert, but I guess that might change after shadow. Mostly, though, I'd just like to be near the people I get along with best, especially the closer friends I've made during training. It would be frustrating to be so far away from my good friends, but I guess we would make the effort to get together on occasion anyway. Plus, there will be many volunteers already out there to get to know when I go. So any site will be amazing, I'm sure. I can't wait!

We come back to our host families after a couple of days in Dar and an early Thanksgiving dinner. We'll have a couple of days of training in gardening and permaculture, which should be awesome (I can't wait to have my own garden at site!), and then we have our swearing in ceremony to become real volunteers. The next day we're supposed to travel to site with all our crap (more than I can carry myself by far) and our headmasters (awkward! we've never met them and we're supposed to travel with them for a few days to get to site?!). We don't start teaching until mid-January, so we have a month and a half to get to know our sites, get settled, and prepare to start teaching. It will be nice at first to have my own house and do things independently, but I think it might end up being a long, lonely month of heavy rains. We'll see.

So that's the basic schedule. I've got plenty more adventures to relate, but I can't write them all here right now. Please write to me (although I'm getting a new address when I get to site) and send me your address so I can write to you.

So I climbed a mountain the other day. Someone said Mount Uluguru was 2600 meters high, but that may or may not be true.

I found out the morning of (Sunday) that we were indeed set to go, where to meet, and when. Unfortunately, I had not yet asked my host parents if I could go because I hadn't seen them much last week, I was waiting for more details about it, and we'd had a guest over the night before. It was also the day they decided to sleep in and skip church. So there I was wondering what to do, wanting to go climb the mountains but not wanting to wake them up, asking my little brother what to do and not getting much help from him. Eventually I was able to tell the house girl that I wanted to go for the day and she said I could go.

So I met up with the group of my good friends and our guides, Julia's host brothers, and we got on a daladala (small bus/van/overcrowded vehicle) that was the sweetest ride ever. Not only did it have a sparkly samurai fish painted on the back and spoiler wings on the top, but the inside was pink and padded with a long mirror running along the middle of the ceiling. And then there was a plastic crystal-like gear shifter. Amazing. In town we bought some buns and PB for lunch and then headed up the mountains near town.

After three hours and a stop in a stream to cool off, we stopped for some lunch in front of an old haunted looking house overlooking the city through the canyon. Then we trekked on, this time much steeper and into the forests to the top for another three hours. They kept telling us it was only 30 min, 15 min, etc. even though it took longer and longer and we had to stop repeatedly to catch our breath. By this time, we had all run out of water and were rationing our last few sips for ourselves, sweating profusely and becoming delirious out of thirst. We also hired an extra guide, who was trotting up the mountain wearing a flannel button-down shirt, nice slacks, and the pointed men's dress shoes that are oh-so-popular here in Tanzania. He picked carrots for us in the farms growing along the mountain sides while we huffed and puffed up the mountain without water.

Finally, we curved around the back of the mountain and arrived at the top overlooking everything opposite the city. It was incredible to look out over the mountain range in all directions, completely natural and covered in green forests. The only mountain taller than Uluguru was a pointed rocky one behind it, jutting out from the rest of the majestic mountains.

On top of the mountain is a radio tower and a handful of men who guard it for a week at a time. They offered us ugali (a stiff mashed potato like thing made out of corn flour that Tanzanians eat with their hands and dip in spinach or beans; eaten in place of rice) when we arrived at the top, but all we wanted was water. We guzzled down the water they offered us, not caring whether or not it was boiled or safe (though it did taste like charcoal, at least) and lay there on the grass until our thirst was quenched. I took a little nap in the sun and then ate some ugali with spinach and beans and finished off another peanut butter sandwich.

By 5:00 we were headed back down the mountain, hoping we'd be back in town by dark, 6:30pm. What a joke! We took a different route, this time much steeper and more slippery, so we half slid half jumped/ran down the mountain, getting a few cuts and bruises here and there. Our guide in his pointy shoes, however, stayed perfectly clean far ahead of us, chuckling at our inefficient mountain climbing skills.

Eventually we ended up walking along a ridge that slowly sloped downward toward the city. We walked along in the tall grasses overlooking the canyons and mountains on either side of us and the sunset behind the mountains to the left. Eventually we came upon a tiny village, where we bought two large bunches of bananas and snarfed them down. They were the most delicious bananas I've ever had.

As we continued on, the light dwindled and the city down below began to light up. It was gorgeous. We kept hoping we were almost down, but soon it became dark and we pulled out our cell phones with flashlights on them. Our legs became jelly-like as we slowly made our way down through the paths. Water had again run out and thirst set in. We watched the stars and the fireflies as we waited for the slower ones, whose legs had started to object and refused to walk downhill any longer. We also worried about our families and texted them continuously giving them new estimates of when we'd be home. By 8:15 we had arrived at the road and by 9:00 we found the car that was waiting to take us home because daladalas don't run that late at night.

So we all made it home okay, gulped down glassfuls of clean refrigerated water, and sank into bed. I'm still sore today but it was totally worth the effort. What an adventure!

Next time, I'm bringing four Nalgenes full of water.

I'm sooooo excited!!!! We've been partying all day today (yes, that means we started drinking at about 6:45am- oops! but don't worry, not too much, just a little extra celebratory-ness for the morning). We were supposed to be picked up at 6am to go to a hotel bar to watch the election happenings, but it got a bit delayed and we didn't make it until about 6:45 and the election was called at 7:03 our time.

So basically we had just gotten there and settled down to watch the action, we saw that Obama had taken Virginia, and then the signal for the TV went out and it started raining super hard. However, some people got phone calls and texts and some people brought their computers and got free internet, so we found out quickly he had won. A bit disappointing that it was so anti-climatic, but we were very excited anyway!

Luckily, the power came back on just before Obama's acceptance speech so we were able to watch that even though we missed McCain's concession. Despite the fact that it was super hot and humid in there, I had the chills for about half an hour straight. Even now, I just got the chills thinking about it despite the intense heat here! It's so amazing that the hope of his campaign reached people, that so many people went out to vote, and that we have our first black president- so cool! This is some serious history that we will remember and I can’t believe I experienced it in Africa, in the country next door to his father’s.

I can't wait to see what he does once he gets into office. He has a lot to live up to in office, but if anyone can do it, he can. I think he has the right mind and the right personality to change politics around and make a big difference in many people’s lives. Plus he’ll have a Democratic Congress to help the government be productive, more efficient, and more modern. At least I think he’s boosted morale and from what it looked like on the news, the economy is already starting to get better with the hope of Obama taking office in just a couple of months.

The Peace Corps Volunteers and Trainees are all really excited about this- talk about celebration! Tears, chills, hugs, shots, cheers… we had it all this morning. What an awesome day. And as for Tanzania, people here are also incredibly happy. I haven’t heard of one person here who wanted McCain to win, probably partially because Obama has African roots but I think they all realize he would be a great president of the US for America and for the world as a whole. I think pretty much the whole world is celebrating this victory right now; it will change the image America has gained in the past few years into a much more positive, revered view of our country. Awesome!

I don't have a lot of internet time today so I'll try to keep this pretty short yet informative and entertaining.

I started my internship teaching last week- I'm teaching about 11th grade age kids organic chemistry. While it's just the basics for the next few weeks that I'll be in charge of the class, I did have to learn all about fractional distillation of crude oil in order to teach it on Wednesday. I know that stuff backwards and forwards now after spending 160 minutes teaching it in one day. I'm going to be a chemistry genius by the end of my time in Tanzania, I think, or at least for the basics of chem! Next week, I teach on Tuesday and Wednesday for a total of 320 minutes, which is actually quite a bit considering the fact that we still have language training, etc.

We had language tests on Friday (oral and written), which I think turned out just fine for me. The fact that I'm constantly using the language and practicing and learning new things means that I generally don't study except in class. It's pretty nice. We switch language teachers starting next week, though, as this is the halfway point of our training. I really can't believe it!

While I'm getting super excited to go to site, I'm also scared to death. I'll be dropped off on or shortly after Thanksgiving to a new house in a new village somewhere in rural Tanzania, possibly without electricity or running water, and I won't know anyone at all. I'll also be required to speak in Kiswahili pretty much all the time I'm not teaching. We don't start teaching until mid to late January either, so we've got lots of time to do whatever we feel like and get to know our communities and start building relationships. Apparently volunteers usually visit each other (the ones nearby) about every 2-3 weeks, so there's an outlet for frustrations and for needing American time. It's going to be so awesome to be there!

The last thing is that we went to Mikumi National Park this weekend and we saw all kinds of wild animals- giraffes, elephants, baboons, warthogs, zebras, etc. No lions (darn), but we were allowed to get out of the bus at one point this morning and walk up to a pond/lake in which a herd (?) of hippos were chilling (on the other side, probably about 30 yards away), and I was about 4 or 5 feet from a real crocodile in the wild, which was super scary (but totally safe- there was a bit of a cliff going down into the water and we stayed a couple feet away). What an awesome experience!

Anyway, I've gotta go but keep the letters and emails coming please- I'd love to hear from you!

Since my last entry was rather lengthy, here is a summary of a few things that I've enjoyed here in Tanzania (for those who prefer the bullet point to paragraph style of writing):

~There's a soda called Tangawizi (Ginger) that tastes like a strong ginger ale, and it tickles inside the back of my nose when I swallow. Quite an interesting experience.

~Tanzanians take a half hour chai (tea) break every morning at 10:00 or so. the job of the Personal Secretary in a secondary school in TZ is to type exams, class lists, schedules, etc. and to make chai.

~Saying "hello" can take about five minutes if done correctly. When two people meet, they ask each other how things are in general, then proceed to how things are at home, school, work, this morning, today, etc. There's also an extra greeting to show respect for an elder.

~I received a stack of Chemistry textbooks for TZ today (at least 10 books!) and had to carry them home. I was worried about not having resources to know what to teach, but I'm afraid I may have too many now!

~I rode in a car to school the first two days- it was like off-roading except in town. The roads are all dirt roads and they're uneven with ditches and bumps, presumably due to the heavy rains in April-June.

~Since the sinks at school don't work, washing my hands consists of dipping a cup into a bucket of water on the floor and dumping it on my hands with some soap.

~Dinner takes about 2-3 hours to cook every night.

~I eat papaya, banana, watermelon, pineapple, and oranges every day. Mango season starts in December. :)

~It's not uncommon to hear goats baa-ing outside my window in the evening. I also wake up to roosters at sunrise every morning.

~Washing clothes by hand in TZ can make your fingers bleed, at least until you develop the necessary calluses. It also takes about 2-3 hours to finish a normal load of laundry.

~People stare at me when I walk through the streets, mostly our of curiosity and surprise. Most, however, greet me (in English or Kiswahili) and are very excited to talk to me, especially when I respond in Kiswahili.

~The roads around here do not have names (or at least no signs), so even though I know my way around, I couldn't tell you what road I live on or where my school is except by a few small landmarks.

~The mode of transport here is a daladala, or a van/small bus built for about 10-12 passengers. I've never seen one with less than 15 passengers, most carry about 20-25, and my daladala yesterday must have had about 30 (we were all sitting on each others' laps!). However, they go fairly slowly, so I don't feel unsafe.

~While most of the training so far has been useful, we spent two hours today learning "how to write on a chalkboard." It was by far the most ridiculous lesson I have ever received.

That's all for now, but I will add more interesting tidbits later. I would love to hear from you if you get the chance!

I'm just now starting to settle in to my life as a Peace Corps trainee here in Tanzania. After two days of vague orientation and a few vaccinations at the office in Dar es Salaam, we came to Morogoro, a few hours' bus ride west of Dar, where we began some survival language training, got to know each other better, ate delicious Tanzanian food and drank lots of chai, and prepared to meet our host families here in Morogoro.

We moved into our new homes on Monday the 22nd, which was a very exciting and somewhat scary experience as we had very little Kiswahili capabilities and no information about our families before moving in with them! One bone, they dropped us each off in front of gates to our houses and we hauled our overloaded baggage as we struggled to greet our families politely in Kiswahili (greetings alone can take a few minutes, and that's before you get to "My name is..." and "I come from...").

Though I was prepared for a bustling household full of small children with a bucket for a shower, a squat toilet outside of the house, and a charcoal stove, I found a much different home awaiting me. Not only does my family have TWO normal toilets inside the house and a real shower (cold water only), but they also have a large TV, sound system, a Play Station 2, and a cell phone/mp3 player. I have a mama, a baba (father), a kaka (brother) who is almost 10, and two dadas (sisters, although I don't think either is really part of the family- they just live here) who are 13 and 23. Everyone except for the 23-year old dada speaks very good English, although they try to speak Kiswahili to me as much as possible to help me learn. I understand more and more every day.

The whole family is very sweet to me- even my dada who doesn't speak English points and smiles and helps teach me the language. I think we could become friends as we become more and more able to communicate. Most nights, Mama likes to come into my room to sit with me and chat and sometimes helps me study a little before bed.

I have class during the day with a small group of other trainees for the science education program. We have 4-5 hours of Kiswahili every day and have begun our education studies (the education system in Tanzania, how/what we will teach, etc.). We have a chai break every morning from 10 to 10:30, which is lovely. We love the fact that Tanzanians take a break in the middle of the morning every day to have tea for a half hour!

In the afternoons after lunch, we have been wandering around our area of town, practicing our Kiswahili with the locals, orienting ourselves to our community, grabbing a cold soda in the shade, and getting our feet very dusty. We've also been to the center of town a couple of times, which is very interesting. The outdoor markets are full of fruits, vegetables, rice, beans, and lovely fabrics. Getting to town is very interesting as well- we take small buses/ vans called daladalas which are quite old and break down now and then. I think they're meant for about 10-12 people, but I've never seen one with less than 15 people in it. Yesterday's had approx. 30 people I think!

Morogoro is a beautiful area of vibrant colors- green tropical plants, red dust and bricks (that deep, full red of the Southwest of the US), and blue skies, with big, majestic, jagged mountains at the edge of town. Though none of the streets have names (at least no signs) and few of the stores have signs, I am beginning to be familiar with the community and the town. Despite the minor frustrations of living in a new environment with a new family, I am enjoying myself and excited for what is to come!

Well, here I am at the JFK airport, waiting to board a flight to Amsterdam that's been slightly delayed. After just a couple hours in Amsterdam (no, not enough to explore), we'll fly to Dar es Salaam. A long trip on not much sleep. It feels a little like I'm back on Term in Asia, flying around the world in a large group, getting to know the people with whom I'll be travelling, playing cards in the airport, and taking up quite a good chunk of the seating in the gate areas. The past couple of days have also felt a lot like Skogfjorden, discussing ideas about the definition of development and what might be involved in a job description as a "development facilitator," doing simulations of how a cross-cultural exchange in this particular setting might feel from both the perspective of the Volunteer and that of the local person whose culture the Volunteer is trying to understand. It's been so much fun to meet all sorts of people, all science and technology educators (or rather, we will be if we aren't already!), many of whom have recently graduated from college and some of whom know people I know. We're all super excited to be going, although I think we also share many of the same anxieties about what we might find in Tanzania.So I'm off to Africa. Really truly beginning what I've planned for and anticipated for so long. Can't wait!

This is how I feel about going to Tanzania right now- I'm diving headfirst into the unknown, excited, all-in, but with butterflies in my stomach and hearing my voice scream loudly the whole way down.

I considered naming my blog Hakuna Matata for the song in my favorite Disney movie. A Swahili phrase most people recognize meaning "there are no worries," hakuna matata is a good reminder to simply relax and let the wind carry me where it will. However, I'm not sure it represents my upcoming journey very well, since I know I will have troubles and challenges to face in the next 27 months. Still, I wanted a name more interesting and meaningful than "Liv's experience in Tanzania." 

Green, yellow, black, and blue are the colors of the Tanzanian flag as well as, with the exception of black, my favorite colors. They are the colors of the earth, the sky, the ocean, the rain, and the sunshine (and of course pineapple!). They're fresh, optimistic colors that generate memories of days gone by, joys of the present, and hope for the days to come. Maybe that sounds a bit cliche, but I find that these colors represent me, provoke in me existential thoughts about life and about the earth, and frankly, make me smile.

The next two years will, undoubtedly, be a life-changing experience for me. Through my trails and accomplishments, new relationships with both Americans and Tanzanians, and ever-developing understanding of the world, I will grow and mature (let's hope!) and become a somewhat different person. 

Sometimes I think- I've travelled all over Europe and Asia, lived with a host family in Thailand, learned other languages, so really, how hard can this Peace Corps thing be? It's a lot of the same thing for an extended period of time, right? -Except for the fact that I'll be forced by necessity to become entirely fluent in another language, unlike the time I've spent studying a language for fun. And I'll be in Africa, a continent on which I've never stepped foot and about which I know very little. Plus, I'll be teaching, a trade for which I am not trained and have never had any serious desire to do beyond working at Skogfjorden. 

It's a bit scary to think that I have no idea what's ahead in my life. I don't know exactly what I'll be eating, who I'll be hanging out with, how I will spend my time, how much access to electricity, the internet, and the outside world I will have, how I will accomplish daily tasks such as grocery shopping or going to the post office or even attaining safe drinking water, how well I will be able to teach, etc. It's all a complete mystery at this point. But I have to keep reminding myself that the excitement and the butterflies in my stomach are part of the experience. 

So, in less than two days, I will board a plane to Philadelphia, PA for a couple days of registration, intense pre-training, and last minute vaccinations. And on Tuesday the 16th of September, I will be on my way to Peace Corps training in Tanzania. I'll miss you all very much and hope to hear from you by mail and email. I'll keep you updated on my adventures as much as possible as well!