Graduation Day

(Class of '10)
Franatee and I graduated our 3 week Swahili course yesterday-yuss! Yes, we have actually markedly improved in our ability to understand simple conversations. One of our last 'tests' was to speak to a local in Swahili for an hour. This guy had a pretty interesting background. He used to track animals at Lake Manyara for 2 years, including leopard andsurvived at least one angry leopard encounter. He finally quit tracking (and became a vegetarian too-rare in Africa) when a tracking buddy was severely mauled by a leopard.

Friday night, after getting our certificates, people were keen to party. Following dancing onsite to a local band (plus some amazing trick shots in pool I will never ever be able to repeat), a group of us piled into a van and drove to an Arusha nightclub called 'Colobus'. The place was packed with European students/tourists crowded in a kareoke area. Having never been one to shy away from kareoke, I belted out some of my tired old favourites 'Billie Jean', 'Benny and the Jets' etc. Franatee did well on 'Zombie'...there is much room for improvement in our duet rendition of 'Up where we belong' The highlight of the night out is a tie between the African who sung 'Lady in Red' to his partner (wearing red) and the whole room shouting out Toto's classic 'Africa'. Got home at 230am tired and with our voices gone.

So Franatee and I are getting picked up from language school in about an hour (hangovers and all) and going back to Moshi. No more great food or fast internet. What will be especially tough to get used to will be the loss of the 'uni hostel' atmosphere here. Its been 3 fun weeks of socialising, volleyball and global networking. It has been especially good for the Kiwis working in remote areas of Northern Tanzania to be able to come together if only for 3 weeks to bond. Hope to make some visits in the year ahead to new friends working in interesting places.

(yeah!! we are certified!)

On the move

The rainy season gets lots of siafu (driver ants) on the move. Woke up this morning to see a huge colum of ants sweeping past the front door. You could clearly see the massive soldiers guarding the column as it rolled over and devoured any hapless insect unlucky enough to be in its path. I was only bitten 3 times in various parts of myself taking this picture..

Lake Placid

After a quiet Friday night watching a movie on a laptop, while two Sudanese gentleman smoked hashish in the room from a hookah (cough), it was time for a change of scene. Franatee, a chum from Illinois who is working in Kenya and I jumped on a daladala (minibus) to take the ride into Arusha. The daladalas are an experience alright. Picture an ancient minibus colourfully adorned with random slogans packed to the gills with people carrying all manner of things and you are almost there. We got off in the centre of Arusha where I had a tantrum until Francoise agreed to go see a movie with me in the suburb of Nijiro. We jumped in a taxi, balked at the 80 000 shilling price the driver wanted, and pleaded it down to a more reasonable
20 000.

Nijiro was pretty ho hum, I was starting to feel a bit queasy, like some food poisoning was coming on. Or maybe it was seeing Sandra Bullock in the afternoon movie we saw: 'Blind Side.' No actually, twas good to relax and watch a rare flick in a pretty decent theatre. I was starting to feel more and more ill but we meet up with another mate for dinner and drinks at the Arusha Backpackers replete with '80's music and nice sunset views of Mount Meru. I was a bit too ill for clubbing that night so we taxied home to the sounds of the 80's aid song 'We are the World'.

Sunday, I still felt a bit tender. That arvo, I felt a bit better and a group of us piled into a van to do a wander around Lake Duluti.


The lake which is pretty close to downtown Arusha is a haven for hippo, lots of bird life, lizards and snakes. We didn't see hippo or green mambas but we did see some big swimming lizards, huge spider webs and a variety of bird life. And got bitten by a few siafu ie big mean driver ants (of the army ant family apparently). These ants are big, bite hard and are hard to squash...they are the terminators of the ant family...the fact they like to wander far up into clothing before attacking is also not appreciated.

After the walk we relaxed at the local pub by the water, drinking beers as the sun went down and petting (hopefully non-rabid) local dogs.


Drove home in the low light to the smells of cooking fires and a reggae beat. A good day.

In other news apparently there are to be mass strikes in Tanzania on May 5th as a measure of unhappiness with minimum wages...might be a good day to stay home with a good book.

http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/markets/tanzania-union-want-meet-president-planned-nationwide-strike/gse sun went down

You have the right to (not) remain silent

At one of the many functions/parties they have here in language school, Franatee happened to meet a lawyer dabbling in human rights from the town of Same'. He was quite excited to meet up and talk shop. I was at pains to tell him my 'shop' was quite limited in stock thus far. We had a coffee that was all too short, talking about the challenges to human rights in Tanzania.

Aside from the obvious ones ie rampant corruption, poverty, lack of any apparent framework to monitor/implement Constitutionally protected human rights etc, we discussed at length the mind set of people here. A lot of people are not free in their minds here, if that makes sense at all. They are passive and afraid. Which is understandable given the over-arching structural issues, not least of which is crushing poverty of course...but if people don't have an inkling of self worth or any sense of entitlement, then it is hard for service providers to involve them as active partners in other measures to improve their wellbeing.

'Ideas are power' my new friend solemnly entoned. We agreed to keep in regular touch, I think he can help any work I do here to be relevant.

Its not really an accurate or appropriate comparison, but I keep thinking of the 'Black Conciousness' movement in 1970's South Africa and how powerful a mobilising force it can be to remind people that 'you are worth it'.

Hmmm.

Market Crash

We have a pair of Trumpeter Hornbills that roost outside our dorm here at language school (you can google what they look like.) Their 'song' if it can be called that, sounds like a recording of whinging toddlers in a dairy in Hataitai on repeat 'waaa-aaa-aaaaaa'. Anyway...

Swahili lessons are into the second week now and we are learning how to interact in day to day situations, such as the market. Ah, the pressure of bargaining coupled with mathematics in a foreign system...I hate it. Tuesday we had a mock market set up on the premises to test our skills and I just could not add two sums to get a grand Jumli (total) for a 'customer'. She walked off in disgust and I started 'hornbill-ing (waaaaaaa) to Franatee for help. I hate maths.

That night drowning the sorrows of that day, the wife, a classmate and I heard music in the distance so wandered into a farewell function with skits, speeches, dancing and singing for final year Tanzanian environmental students. We were greeted like dignitaries, asked to introduce ourselves and to speak to the class as to what we thought were the challenges for them for the future. I babbled off something I remembered from the end of Rocky IV 'if I can change, and you can change, maybe we all can change' or something. They loved it. Then it was time for slow conga dancing and traditional singing before Francoise and I got asked to sing something from our native land. After debating hakas and waiata we settled on the safest course and crooned most of the national anthem (in English lamentably). Not a bad wee night.

The next day, it was time for the real thing and a big group of students were bused to a local Arusha market to buy things for the kitchen in Swahili. That's a lot of foreign money heading to a poor area. It felt like the start of 'Saving Private Ryan' before they hit the beach; the bus shaking to a halt while our teacher shouts 'You will ONLY buy things at a good price, do NOT take ANY expensive items into the market, on exiting the bus, do NOT stop until you get well past the beggars and hustlers, now GO GO GO!!!'



Actually it was kind of relaxed and people appreciated the attempts of muzungu to speak the local tongue. Though we did get ripped off I think more than once...but at least I bought a fetching kitenge AKA the Zanzabari man skirt.

Ngorongoro Crater

Despite some poor rainy conditions (this being the height of the rainy season and all) Francoise and I with two others arranged to have a driver from language school take us the 4 hour drive for a day trip to the Ngorongoro crater. Quite nice to have Lake Manyara and the beginning of the Great Rift Valley in the distance on the road trip.

Ngorongoro is about 2000 feet deep and 100 square miles in distance. Aside from being spectacular to look at in itself, the crater acts as a natural enclosure to concentrate crazy amounts of African wildlife. Within a short space of time we had seen buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, Thompson's gazelles and lions.

(can you spot the lion sitting in the background?)

I was eager to see elephant and after seeing a few in the distance we had the chance to get close to a herd and have a couple of them cross the road in front of us. One in particular got right up next to my open front window(waving its massive Doug killing tusks in my face).

It was humbling to see a tusker that close. I felt quite teeny.



After elephant-mageddon we stopped and lunched near a lagoon filled with hippo basking under a tree covered in weaver bird nests. And Black Kites. How was I to know these extremely agressive raptors had learned to associate tourists with food?! I had a cake in my hand, suddenly I heard a 'whoossh!' and most of the cake and a portion of the skin on my left hand was taken by a diving kite. Despite my bloody paw, I could not believe what had just happened...so I held out some cake in the hand again. Sure enough two kites shot past my screaming self again...our driver suggested I eat lunch in the car...
On our leisurely drive out of the crater we caught a rare glimpse of a black rhino and her baby before the long drive back. A long day and the park entry fees are a bit steep but definitely worth it.

Plus we didn't have the troubles of another group of students here who went to Arusha National Park the same day as our mission then had their car break down in a fire ant ridden area...ouchy

'Sweep the leg'

Having spent too long being sedentary, I decided to try out an aerobics class on campus. It turned out to be a full on body combat class full of dancing, boxing moves, and roundhouse karate kicks set to Euro-trash electronica dance. I was sweating buckets after 20 minutes...I have a long way to go to be fit enough for the karate tournament.

That night, Francoise and I piled into a car with 7 other NZers living locally and went out to an-ex German colonial house, now a posh restaurant overlooking Lake Duluti for a bite. A surreal, guilty pleasure and definetely made you feel like a colonial interloper. Don't know if any of the photos we took of us hoeing into Bavarian Black Forest Gauteau are worthy to be published in a NZ volunteering magazine.

Drove home to the sonic pulses of Bats and the screechs of bush babies. There is a party tonight (Friday) to celebrate the end of the first week of class...

Update-

The party was a weird mix of soft merimba and salsa laden dance tunes and gyarating conga lines in a darkened dance room...both seemed very popular with the locals that came along...I did get into one 'dance off' situation with a local, luckily it ended with a truce before I passed out from the high knee lifts..

Pole' Pole' (slowly) learning

Franatee and I have finished two days of intensive Swahili training. We can now say we are not Finnish tourists and that we need a driver to take us to a farm. Ah, its good to get the basics of grammar construction though. I wish I had gotten those for English...

The language centre is pretty relaxed, a Danish not-for-profit learning centre. It is reminicent of a holiday camp in New Zealand. Albiet one with black and white Colobus Monkeys playing and hooting at you from the adjacent treetops.

After 3 weeks of relative isolation from other Westerners, its a nice change of pace to kick back with our fellow course mates that have ended up for various reasons in Africa. Even if some of them struggle with my New Zealand accent. There's the Danish lawyer working in the Kenyan Government that has some interesing insights into that neighbouring country, another Dane working for the UN in the small West African Republic of Benin, various Americans on various tasks, plus two other university volunteer Kiwis working in remote areas near the Serengiti. A shame they don't get all Franatee and I's 80's pop culture references..

I've been busy, as said, sinking some 'Tusker' brand beers, talking up my poor tennis skills then failing to play competently at tennis, doing Swahili homework and enjoying the scurvy fighting heapings of green vegetables. Its nice and cool and thus easy to sleep in Arusha compared to Moshi.

Hope to visit another National Park in an upcoming weekend if possible. That and I want to attempt to hunt down the rumoured sole kareoke bar in Arusha...

Deadly Viper Assasination Squad

Writing this Sunday afternoon in the language school common room. First day of class tomorrow.

Anyway, If you've seen Kill Bill you may remember Uma Thurman's assasin code name was 'Black Mamba'. As another character in that movie noted of the black mamba's bite; 'The amount of venom that can be delivered from a single bite can be gargantuan.' Without anti-venom, a Black Mamba bite is 100% fatal, usually within 20 minutes.

So anyway being bored late at night Francoise and I decided to go for a monster frog hunt around our house. Don't ask. Our security guard looked on at us dubiously as we fossicked around a pile of construction material out the back. Despite hearing some weird shuffling noises, no frogs. So dejected we went back inside. Quarter of an hour later we hear excited voices calling us to come outside. Our guard and his mate had killed with sticks what they said was a 'black mamba' snake. They said that it had come slithering out of the pile of stuff we were loitering around earlier.

Ulp..I asked them several times if it was in fact the deadly black mamba, they were adamant...so contritely we undertook to do no more late night frog hunts.


As a postscript, in the morning we told our Masaai Volunteering contact, showed him the photo and he was dubious. He was sure it was just a common grass snake and that locals get too hysterial about snakes.



That said, the photos on the net I've looked at of the grass/house snake look nothing like the one we found...it looks a lot more like a small-ish Black Mamba
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_mamba

hmmm

All snakes bad.


HISSSSSSSSSSSSS

“Out with the old, in with the nucleus”

The above title is an obscure reference to one of my favorite episodes of The Simpsons, the one where Homer has to go back to college in order to retain his job. Much hilarity ensues.

Francoise and I have been working at Mildmay Tanzania for about 3 weeks now and are starting to generate some momentum in our respective roles. However, a requirement of our volunteering role (and I guess the subsistence monies) is that we undertake some serious Kiswahili language training. Three full time weeks at an institute at Arusha starting April 12th. Living in dorms on campus.

Back to campus life in 2 days ai? Hopefully there will be the internet so I can record my hijinks, pranks and run ins with the crusty old Dean. I hope I can pass. And become Arusha Campus Party King (TM). And I hope there are no language nerds. Jocks like me hate nerds.

(PostScript)
I also learned last night having a rare after dark drink with Francoise in a local bar how innocent I am. I thought those women at the bar were just friendly people...how was I supposed to know they were prostitutes...you don't really encounter them out trawling at Murphy's Law in Petone...sigh

Raindrops keep fallin' on my head

In lieu of a sleep deprived discussion of late night chanting next door, strange wailing noises at 3am, absent security guards and handymen peeking in our window at 11pm to say "'ello!", here is a relaxing shot of Francoise biking on the home stretch to our pad.

(cue 'Platoon' Music)

Came home from a relaxing break in Arusha to find the house flooded from the frikkin toilet of horror that has been 'fixed' 3 times already. Given it was Easter Sunday and no one was around Franatee and I affected hasty repairs...which held till 1am so we had to wander outside, avoiding prowling monster toads to find the tap thingee to turn off all the water...character building. Here's hoping 4th time is the charm.

The typical speed of competent home repair services in Africa:

Manfred

Arusha National Park

Safari time!

(Franatee writes-)
Met up with our friend for breakfast at a local café and chugged down some coffee to brace ourselves for working out how to catch the bus to Arusha. It was pretty crazy with different people shouting at us to get on their bus. (I think the bus drivers must pay them to do it cost they were pretty determined and almost came to blows). Lots of the buses had interesting slogans on the back, for example "Simba Video Coach" Some were a bit unnerving, such as "Neema ya Mungo" (Grace of God) and "God Protect Us" hmm.

Found a seat, but like so many forms of transport over here, there's always room for one more - including a man who started doing infomercials en-route. Doug held his bag of goodies while the man starting rattling off the bargains of the day in Kiswahili. There was aloe-vera soap, tooth-whitening toothpaste and the product dejour – thrush cream. I felt rather embarrassed for him but he didn't seem bothered as he animatedly gestured to where it could be used. We ended up buying some soap.

At each stop people came by the windows trying to sell stuff. I got my munch on with some roasted corn which tasted not-quite-popcorn-not-quite-corn-on-the-cob. After a two hour trip we finally arrived in Arusha and I was happy to discover that my legs still worked after the squashed ride. We have conquered Tanzanian buses unscathed! Now for the safari!
(Franatee interlude ends!)

So we hooked up with a tour company and did a day tour through Arusha National Park. While no elephant sadly, giraffe, baboons and buffalo were in abundance as was nice driving through rain forest with panoramic views.

(nice crater in background)

(buffalo and water buck)

(note buffalo in background are a safe distance from stupidly gesturing tourist)

Nice to have a break to chill out. Nice talking politics with tour guides. We go back to Moshi Easter Sunday then its clothes washing and more general house setting up dull stuff.