My apologies once again for my neglectful blogging habits, I know many of you worry about me so rest assured I have not been eaten by lions or leopards... although I did have a few chunks of my toe taken from me by some rascal burrowing fly larvae. (Have you ever heard of a jigger? My American friends from the South say chigger. In Swahili we say funza... and if you're a mzungu, you say funza and roaring laughter is sure to follow) More on that later! On with the blog.
I spent the last week of May in Elerai as the solo volunteer, where not even my girl Edita- a local intern who works with us occasionally- was there to keep me company. I was a little unsure about how the week would play out, since we often have a ton of down-time during the afternoons and many GSC staff members like to use that time to hide away in their tents for naptime, or disappear to god knows where. (Can you blame 'em?) However I'm really pleased to say that I had a fantastic week bonding with the crew. We camped in a nearby village, Olmolog, because they were a little more equipped to accommodate us although most of us did camp in tents. There were beautiful views of Mt. Kilimanjaro and the sky at night there was absolutely incredible-- I hadn't had many opportunities in my life to see the night sky in such detail before: shooting stars, the milky way, satellites, the works. In fact I couldn't shut up about the Milky Way... I kept trying to explain what it was to my Tanzanian friends but that required a whole set of vocabulary that none of us really had in the others' language.
My fellow sustainable ag trainer, Ediltruda, was in between hair styles that week so I treated her to an Andi Bruce original style, free of charge. (Special rafiki price! Did you guys know rafiki means friend?) I'm a little ashamed to say I had no idea how hard it was to braid African hair, and my efforts to give her a new style really were... original... but Ediltruda was such a good sport! I told her I was only slightly offended when she put a wrap around her head before we went to eat dinner.
Our driver and my homeboy Musa was also an amazing buddy that week. He could tell when I was getting antsy and would offer to show me some cool. mini-hikes around our camp. He used to be a nature guide of some kind so he's great at identifying plants and animals. One afternoon we went for a walk shortly after some rains and the mud was absurdly sticky... I was wearing flip-flops, and after every few steps my flip-flops became wobbly, gnarled 5-inch platform stilts. No matter how often I scraped the mud off the bottoms, it would accumulate again within a few steps and threatened to suck the sandals right off my feet it was so sticky! I could hardly keep it together, I was a laughing, fumbling mess and I think Musa quickly regretted bringing me along.
That week I wasn't feeling the greatest so I didn't help too much in our double-digging practical. I got lots of "pole sana"s from our participants (an expression of sympathy) and a few women took the opportunity to skip out on some digging by keeping me company, which I selfishly loved. I quickly had a whole new set of Maasai girlfriends asking me all kinds of questions about my family and where I'm from. Their patience with my crappy Swahili was really sweet and one girl in particular was best at understanding what I was trying to say, which was particularly great because Swahili isn't their first language either. One of my favorite questions was, "Why did you leave your Mama in America??" I know, shame on me!!
When I got back from the village on Friday I met a big batch of new volunteers who had been in orientation in Arusha all week. Some were doing short-term projects and have left already, but it's really nice having new friends around the office and in the villages with us. Saturday we did the famous hike on Mt. Meru with our favorite guide Rogers, stopping as always in his mama's boma on our way down the mountantain for a home-cooked lunch straight off the shamba. Rogers is also great at teaching me more Swahili, as well as Maasai, so I had a blast chattin' it up all day long with as little English as possible. I like to tell people I am half Maasai and half Chaga (my homestay family's tribe, originating from Mt. Kili) but definitely not a mzungu...
I spent that weekend hanging out with some of the new volunteers and bonding over games of pool, football on tv, Konyagi, and nyama choma of course. Saturday night there was a huge game on-- Barcelona vs. Man United-- and we watched the game with friends at a giant outdoor bar that was packed beyond capacity. As you could imagine the crowd was rowdy as all hell, and each play was met by animated theatrics from fans on both sides. Every time Barcelona scored a goal, Saning'o stood up and pointed to the opposing fans sitting next to us, obnoxiously chanting "Pole, pole pole pole!" to the tune of the Mexican futbol chant, "Ole, ole ole ole!" I also spent a bunch of time with my family that weekend, where I fell in love with my homestay dada (sister)'s hilarious impressions and surprisingly funny slapstick humor. No doubt that girl could make it big as a stand up comedian.
After a rather uneventful week in Nduruma where I worked with the HA group teaching food drying, I returned to Elerai where we continued our work with the rest of our regular trainings as well as kuku vaccinating. This time though, we had a handfull of the new volunteers with us, and it was fun showing them around. We arrived on Monday June 6, but didn't start work right away. There was a major water shortage after some elephants had apparently trampled the village's water piping. That meant that women in particular had to spend the majority of their day searching for and fetching water for the family to use at home, carrying it miles and miles by foot. Understandably, we didn't have many participants that week. We trained our groups on how to make sack gardens, as opposed to double dug beds, because while both are styles of conservation agriculture, the sack gardens really consume much less water because of their small size. In the afternoons after trainings I often went on beautiful long walks with the other volunteers, or spent my time chatting with the village kids, swapping games and stories. A few in particular were such charmers, I really miss those faces! One in particular I first met on market day. He was probably around 10 years old, riding a bicycle, his face completely covered in white flour-- which he refused to wipe off, of course, and batted and swatted at my attempts to dust his face. He told me his name was Mkapa, which at first our intern Emmanuel told me means "retarded person." I later learned that I just misheard him, and Mkapa is the name of a retired president. Oh, thank god.
After a night out that Saturday with the crew, I spent Sunday with my dada Karen. We needed a ball pump for the football we had bought some time ago, and decided we should also get our toe nails painted. Throughout Arusha you can pay for a traveling manicure/pedicure, from guys who just walk around town carrying a basket of nail polish and manicure tools. When we sat down, Karen insisted that I go first, and we chose to get matching bright pink polish. The man picked up a squirt bottle of soapy water and began by scrubbing and cleaning my toes (a normal first step if you've never had a pedicure before)... but I couldn't help notice his glances up from my feet at either me or my dada. I'm not talking about the types of glances a traveling pedicure man might normally give a young girl getting her nails painted. I'm talking about the type of glances you give a stranger when you suddenly become aware that they have some grave misfortune upon them.. I was getting nervous. When he finally said something to Karen she didn't seem to respond, and continued watching in silence. "What did he say??" I asked. "Nothing..!" she said. Next thing I know, our guy gets up and runs off to bring out the BIG tools. I had no idea what was going on. I knew something was really wrong when he stopped paying attention to my nails and began digging into my right big toe. I kept hearing the word funza, and asked repeatedly, "WHAT is a funza?!" but Karen didn't know the word in English... which in hindsight was probably a really good thing, as I was only slightly aware of what was going on. Eventually the woman next to me says, "Mdudu!" which means BUG!, and I felt my face go pale. Our friend's digging into my toe revealed a larvae about the size of my pinky nail, tucked away cozy and warm in the corner of my big toe. He handed me the damn thing on the end of his metal digging device... I was horrified! Karen and I spent the next hour or so in silence, punctuated by the occasional, "Stop thinking about it!! Try to stop thinking about it!" Haha... I'm pleased to say though, that the event didn't stop me from schooling Nuru, Mama Karen's brother my age, in soccer that evening at home.
For the next week or so I had a blast telling people the news of my funza. From co-workers to villagers participating in our trainings, people find it HILLARIOUS that a mzungu had gotten a funza. Especially those who know I like to call myself Maasai would tell me, "Now you are a real Maasai!" I felt like I had been through initiation. That next week returned to Olmolog where I had a ton of fun playing soccer with my little buddies in the village (using a small ball made out of bundled up plastic bags). There was even a lunar eclipse that week, which was incredible to see.
After an appropriately rowdy weekend with my friends and a nice dinner at my buddy's house Sunday night, I started to feel sick Monday morning. Actually, I was amazed that it took me so long to get sick, part of me thought I might make it through the whole 6 months unscathed by travelers' tummy bugs. But then again, my experience surely would have been incomplete without it. I spent Monday through Wednesday in bed eating very very little, and was blessed with the ability to sleep through most of it. One day when my stomach was at it's worst, Mama came into my room with a tray of a creamy white porridge. She mixed in some milk, lime, and sugar, and told me to eat up. I thanked her profusely but insisted that my stomach was in no condition to withstand food. She considered what I said and suggested, "Well, if you throw up, you can't throw it all up, so eat! It's only porridge, it can't harm you." She turned in the doorway on her way out with a very motherly, "Force yourself!" I nearly cried I was so troubled by the situation. I knew Mama wasn't about to let me skip the porridge, but steaming white goo was the last thing I wanted to put in my mouth. After a few more "Force yourself!!" reminders, I eventually bit the bullet and had at the porridge one bite at a time. Very slowly I worked my way down about an inch in the giant bowl, and to my surprise, my stomach felt more and more at peace. What is it they say, Mama knows best? Believe it or not folks, it's true. Mama's magic porridge saved me and my recovery began at that moment.
That week my US Mom and Dad arrived in Tanzania to visit! They spent their first week on safari while I was home in bed, and I will pick up here with my next blog entry. Thanks everybody for your patience! Another post soon, I promise. xoxoxo
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