MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!
I hope you all are
having a wonderful holiday season! This time is always difficult to be away
from family and friends, but at the same time it makes me love and appreciate
those that I do have back home so much more.
I just celebrated my second and last Christmas in Tanzania! Just like
last year, I went swimming, sweated far too much, and ate burritos; not a
typical Christmas, but enjoyed the same traditions from last year! I did successfully make 2 batches on Mom’s
sugar cookie recipe (which I cut out candy canes and stars of David since
there’s no cookie cutters) before I got tired of baking over charcoal and made
it a cookie cake instead. We also played
only Christmas music for 2 straight days, ate lots of sweets, did a white
elephant gift exchange, had lots of Christmas decorations, cut down the branch
of a tree to make a Christmas tree, and drank lots of beer. So all in all, it
was a pretty great Christmas and felt pretty American! (pictures to come on Facebook)
Some quick updates…
I had an amazing World AIDS Day event! The whole village
pretty much showed up and out of the 200 test kits, 178 people tested. People were running up to me to tell me they
got tested and were negative and seemed so happy. We had tons of performances
including a choir, primary student choir, and poem reading that all encouraged
people to get tested, and other performances of acrobats, dancing, and a magic
show for entertainment. There were guest
speakers including the chairwoman of our group who is HIV positive, my
counterpart for the event, and the clinic doctor. After all the performances,
speakers, and testing, we had a woman’s soccer match, a men’s soccer match, and
condom demonstrations. The entire event
was planned by the committee and they ran the whole show. It was great to see it all come together
(especially after many budgeting issues and issues getting the test kits), and
the committee was so pleased with the turnout of the event that they are
planning another testing day in March (after the 3 month window period).
The school well project is just about completed. The water catchment tank is built and
cemented and ready just in time for the rainy season to fill it up. Before leaving for holiday traveling,
everything was completed except the gutters under the roof. The school is very excited to have some
access to water, and we are planning to utilize the water to help during the
dry season for clean drinking water, hand washing, and permagardening. We have also begun to look at potential
projects now that this one is wrapped up (maybe a library…).
Right before leaving for the holidays, a few proactive
farmers that I am close to in my village began their permagarden preparations.
We double-dug the beds and made holes, berms, and swales to help direct the
water to stay in the garden beds. I
helped supply a few varieties of vegetable seeds to start off the gardens to
provide for future seeds and to diversify diets. The goal is to have 3 household to have at
least 2 garden beds with various seeds, use various organic fertilizers/
pesticides, and meet together to discuss successes and failures. I have prepared all of my beds again and
waiting to return before planting seeds, but can’t wait to have some more
veggies in my diet too!
Right now I am in Dar after celebrating Christmas in Ndanda
(Mtwara region). I have reunited with
some of my best friends in my class to head to Zanzibar for New Year’s and then
to Mafia to swim with whale sharks! I can’t wait!! Then our whole class will
meet up in Dar for our Mid-Service Conference.
I am excited to see everyone again! I’ll also hopefully find out some
information on how extension works in Tanzania since I am thinking about what I
might do when I finish my 2 years here (or at least thinking about beginning to
think about my future…). So far the job market back home is still not looking
too promising… I’ll gladly take any advice or suggestions! It’s a funny feeling
having planned my life out up until Peace Corps so now I have no idea what I
want to do or where I want to live.
To wrap up this blog post, I thought you might enjoy some things
that have become normalized in the past year for me… I am sure I will
add to this list as I think of more:
· Warm beer
· Eating with hands
· Waking up at or even before sunrise
· Sitting on buses with boobs and butts in your face
· Sitting on buses while getting rained on
· Sitting on buses while getting boogers flicked at you
· Sitting on buses for 15 hours at a time and thinking that wasn’t so bad
· Chickens on buses
· Getting proposed to daily
· Kids peeing on you
· People openly picking their noses
· Faces in your window at all times of the day
· Being called Mzungu (foreigner)
· Eating ugali
· Having flies land on you all the time!
· Killing bugs by closing you book on them while reading
· Reading and eating by candle light
· Being so packed on a daladala (minibus) that your feet are no longer under you but somewhere behind you and you have to cling to anything/anyone to stay standing (and considering these bus rides good arm workouts)- I call this “gecko-ing”
· Being scared to pee since you never know what’s living in the choo (bathroom)
· Killing rats in rather malicious way and not feeling guilty
· Getting kids to run errands for you in exchange for candy
· Chickens chickens everywhere!!!
· Not knowing whether the sound outside is a goat or a small child
· Babies crying all day long
· People sweeping dirt starting at the crack of dawn
· Cooking delicious meals and baking with a charcoal jiko (tiny charcoal stove)
· Considering a meeting that started only 2 hours late an improvement
· Considering getting a meeting at all as a major accomplishment
· Sweating from just standing outside
· Sweating when just sitting under your tin roofed house
· No hope of a normal poop for 2 years in your life
· Feeling like its Christmas morning when it rains since you never have enough water
· Picking out worms and bugs from your food and considering any missed bugs will get cooked and if anything add some protein to your diet
· Gardening to add veggies to your diet
· Not having fruit and veggies available year round
· Licking wrappers of anything sent from home because you can never get enough chocolate, peanut butter, etc
· Celebrating holidays when it’s convenient (i.e. diarrhea on your birthday is fine since you can celebrate your birthday next week)
· Having broken down buses be “fixed” by chucking items from under the bus on the side of the road
· Explaining everyday why you don’t have children yet
· Explaining everyday that there is no ugali in America
· Explaining that not all Americans are blonde and blue eyed
· Bathing with a bucket
· Not having a way to preserve food longer than a day
· Choosing between drinking water, showering, washing dishes, or watering a garden
· Navigating through your house by headlamp
· Being able to see outside perfectly at night form the moon and stars (no electricity)
· Getting to town and still not having electricity to charge things
· Wiping the bottom of your feet together every time before getting into bed because they never stay clean
· Sweeping your floors multiple times a day because there is always dirt
· Having 3 options of food when in town (rice and beans, ugali, or chipsi mayai- fries with a fried egg on top)
· Eating a lot of undercooked chipsi mayai
· Forgetting the English translation to words since you only use the Swahili word now
· Always waiting for something- meetings to start, buses to come, projects to begin, etc.
· Ngoma (drumming/dancing/chanting/singing) all night long
· People blaming malaria for all sicknesses
· Getting asked to buy chai or being told “I’m hungry” just as an annoying gesture (usually not actually expected or true)
· Kesho (tomorrow) never actually meaning tomorrow
· Getting Karibu (welcomed) to everything
· Having no privacy. Ever.
· Getting stared at constantly
· Having people point out you’re sweating when you return from a run
· Having people point out you’re reading when you’re reading, you’re cooking when you’re cooking, you’re sleeping when you’re sleeping (or at least were), etc.
· Being called Stefanya
· Eating oatmeal every morning
· Listening to Celine Dion on every long bus ride at a volume that causes ringing in your ears long after the trip
· Speaking only Swahili minus phone calls with other volunteers
· Being told now that my Swahili is so good I can return home and get a job as a Swahili teacher in the states, and that I should only focus on learning Kiyao (local language) now
· Being called fat as a complement- all the time!
· Receiving gifts of food (pumpkins, mangoes, cashews, greens, etc)
· Being told American/world news by Tanzanians since I like to live in a bubble and never listen to news, read it online, or get newspapers
· Having 20 kids in or around my house whenever I am home
· Having a 35 year old best friend, a senile bibi (grandma), a mama and baba and many other close friends and “family” in my village
And although some of these things might sound obnoxious or
difficult, I am completely honest when I say all these things are a part of my
life now and have made this year so exciting and fun and I am so happy to still
be experiencing all (well most) of these things. It’s great to look back at how
a lot of these things were huge adjustments (i.e. killing rats, water shortage
problems) and others came pretty easily (no electricity, enduring bus
rides). All of these things have pushed
me in ways I never imagined and really opened my eyes to things we do and don’t
need to live comfortably. This past year
has been one amazing journey and I am looking forward to continue this list of
what a “normal” day in my life is and can’t wait to see what new things my
adventure here in Tanzania will bring throughout 2013! I am so grateful to all
of you continuing to stay in touch with me and for the continual love and
support from home! For those who have been sending letters/packages, thank you
so much! There is still nothing like getting mail at the post office here, and
9 times out of 10 I have something to look forward to! For those who have yet
to send anything (cough cough Gereme, boy roommates in SB) you still have a
year to send me some letters!
I wish you all a Happy New Year’s celebration and all the
best in 2013! xoxo
