bugs

I think the worst thing about being in Tanzania are the insects, especially the mosquitoes. I could tell you the number of times I've been bitten by mosquitoes since I got here if I bothered to count the large, swollen red lumps that cover my legs. I have no interest in counting them, since I have the sneaking suspicion that knowing exactly how many there were would make them all itch even more than they do already. The worst is on my feet. Stupid, cowardly ankle bitters! The government is considering using DDT to control the mosquito problem. At first, I was appalled by the idea, but after waking up 3-4 times each night to reapply hydrocortizone to my bites, I'm beginning to be swayed to the environmental dark side. After all, the environmental issues in the US weren't just caused by using DDT, they were caused by using huge amounts of DDT and dumping it from airplanes on everything field we could find. Using small, controlled amounts of DDT may prove to be a life saver.

Malaria infects 300-400 million people and kills over a million of them each year. It is both preventable and curable, yet people still die, especially people with weak immune systems like children, pregnant women, the elderly and people who are already sick. It is also somewhat of a tragedy that HIV/AIDS receives so much funding and attention, while general health is ignored. Health issues like maternal mortality, diarrhea, malaria and TB affect many more people in Africa than does the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The first four are all easily prevented or cured, but there is little funding available and so millions of people die every year for lack of health facilities, clean water and medication. The US government has donated over $100 million to Tanzania and every penny is earmarked for HIV/AIDS programming. In a way, this is a great crime. Health and disease cannot be isolated from their social, political and economic contexts, yet this is precisely what the US government is seeking to do. It is trendy to fund HIV/AIDS programming, and so it is funded at the detriment of health issues in general.

In some weird way it pleases me that the Masai men I see walking around are as stoked to see me on a bicycle as I am to see them in their garb.

A tale of two days in a city

Saturday

I caught a dalla-dalla at 9:30am from a stand near the Barker's house. The bus system in Tanzania is all privately owned and there is always room for one more on the bus. They are cheap, even by Tanzania standards (about 20 cents a ride) and they are perpetually overcrowded. I made it down to Posta, the main post office, and waited until Godfry, one of the Tanzanian interns at CARE, arrived. He had promised to take me all over Dar today and warned me to wear good walking shoes because we were going to cover a big chunk of the city on foot.

First we walked around City Center and he pointed out various buildings of interest: the tallest building in the country, the national bank, various ministries and embassies, etc. Then we went into the National Museum, which has a rather hodge-podge feel about it, but was interesting nonetheless. The museum is undergoing some major renovations so only two buildings were open. The first building contains the history of Tanzania from the stone age to the near present, documenting the settlement of early Bantu peoples, almost two thousand years of global trade, colonialism, and independence. A big chunk of this part of the museum was dedicated to describing the life of Mwalimu J. K. Nyerere, the first president of Tanzania and leader of the independence movement. To get to the second building, we passed through a courtyard that contained all of the cars that Nyerere used while in office. For a self-proclaimed socialist leader, the man rode in style in his BMWs and Rolls Royces. The second building was much less coherent than the first and contained things like two million year old human skulls, Masai weapons, and a bicycle made completely from wood.

Next we walked along the beach past the state house, president's mansion and his neighbor, the prime minister's house. This road led us directly to the fish market where Godfry wanted to stop and say hello to a former CARE employee who had taken up the fish selling business. I guess you can make more as a fish monger than a NGO employee, even in a third world country. He was a very friendly guy and, in typical Tanzanian fashion, he invited me over for dinner.

From the fish market, we caught another dalla-dalla to Kariakoo, which Godfry claims is the second largest market on the continent. I believe him. The market is literally the size of a suburb. Just imagine if your city placed all of its business establishments into one place, everything from the shopping mall to the hardware store, the office supplies and beauty boutiques, grocery stores and road side stands. It's all there in one crowded, loud, dusty place. There are little shops crowding both sides of the street and there are hawkers selling everything from electronics to ladies' underwear overflowing off the sidewalks. The streets themselves are filled with people. It was like the streets of New York during a festival, except today was just an ordinary day at the market. We spent an hour walking around, never seeing the same street twice and never leaving the boundaries of Kariakoo.

When 1pm rolled around we were both tired and hungry. Godfry was worried that the food wasn't good at the market. I'm inclined to be cautious about food here, since a mistake can leave you chained to a toilet for two weeks. We hopped on another bus to ride out to a place near where Godfry's brother lives. I had a fried fish with rice and Godfry had fried chicken. I paid as a thank you for taking me around and the bill came out to around $5 for two people. He escorted me back to Posta where I said goodbye and took the bus home. I was really worn out from the day, so I spent the evening reading the Barkers' copy of Jonathon Strange and Mr. Norrell.

Sunday Sally and I both woke up late. This means I got out of bed at around 7:30am and lounged around in my pajamas until 10am or so. Then Paul rode over with his laundry since the place he's staying at doesn't have a machine. He did a load and we set off on our bikes to pick up his friend, Gaysha. We rode down New Bagamoyo Rd until it became Bi. Titi Mohammad Rd and we split off down Ocean Rd, which ran parallel to the beach path Godfry and I had walked on Saturday. Even before you get to the ferry, you know it's coming up by the long line of cars waiting to board. I'm so glad we were on bikes because we passed them all by and rode right up to the ticket booth. It was only 200/- (17 cents) for the ride from City Center to Kigamboni peninsula. The ferry takes 5 minutes to cross the channel. There really should be a bridge there instead, and the government claims it will eventually build one, but there is no sign that that will happen soon. Pedestrians and those on bikes get across easily and those driving cars have to wait hours. Driving around the inlet would also take hours, so either way, car drivers are screwed. Here's a map to show you what I mean:

The top arrow is the ferry and the bottom is the direction we rode in for the beach. I've also included a black dote that is where I live and a red dote that is where the CARE offices are located.

After we got across it was another 10 kilometers to our destination: a beach resort on South Beach. It was 3000/- to get onto the beach, but the attendant handed us drink vouchers for the bar worth the same. The beach was so beautiful! I have this idea about myself that I'm not much of a beach person, but every time I'm at a beach I definitely become one. The combination of water, breeze and sun just makes me want to lie in the sand and sleep for hours. I splashed around in the water for a bit, had overpriced veggie curry for lunch and then napped in the sun for a few hours. My drink voucher eventually went toward a mojito, which was too heavy on the lime but still pretty good. Tanzania doesn't have silly things like a trade embargo with Cuba, so you can actually buy a mojito here with Cuban rum in it. Imagine that.

Since we are right on the equator here, we only get 12 hours of sun, no matter the season. At around 5pm the sun was beginning to set so we brushed the sand off ourselves as best as possible and hopped back on our bikes. It was much easier getting back to the ferry since it was slightly down hill in this direction. The trip back was uneventful, except that I almost ran over a chicken that dashed in front of my bicycle. Stupid chicken. All in all, the ride was over 30 kilometers, which is probably the longest I have been on a bicycle ever. My butt will probably be sore all week and it really doesn't help that I have to ride to and from work every day. This morning was uncomfortable, but I think the beach was definitely worth it.

The workshop for Zanzibar has been postponed until September. Apparently there was a conflict with another CARE workshop the same week. I get the sense that planning for these things is a lot more informal and impromptu than in the US. The next workshop is in Iringa, which while the setting may not be as interesting, it will probably be better for my wallet. I was going to lead a session at the Zanzibar workshop and Edson told me to keep preparing for the same session for Iringa. I'm in charge of explaining the general concepts of governance and good governance to workshop participants.

This morning I attended the British Council's monthly Policy Breakfast. The topic was interesting, but the speakers chosen were not. There is a plan to ratify a NGO Code of Conduct in Tanzania, and the debate is over who should enforce it: the government, the NGO Council, or the legal system. The NGO Council wants it to be completely voluntary and leave any wrong doing to be pursued by the courts. The government wants to enforce it, ostensibly for fairness, but there is a lot of concern about government control over the non-government sector.

The debate over accountability in the government and NGO sectors is one I'm familiar with from my studies. Most NGOs are very accountable to their donors and hardly accountable to the people they're supposed to be serving. This means that if the services delivered are poor or incorrect, people have few avenues for demanding change. Edson asked me if I had any solutions, and it was my turn to laugh. Accountability is such a huge part of justice, but I don't know if it's a justice many in the world will ever be able to access. I certainly don't have answers.

The Policy Breakfast was a good beginning for my day. I'm helping Edson write up a proposal for DFID (the UK counterpart of USAID) that has to do with increasing government accountability. The grant is for over $20 million and I can just hear all the higher-ups salivating over the prospect of getting all that money. Having DFID as a donor agency is something CARE Tanz has been pursuing for a while, and they really want this proposal to be good. Wish us luck!

food and work

The trip to Zanzibar left my head in vacation mode and I've been really tired for the last two days. Monday I felt exhausted and yesterday I was also very tired. I was beginning to worry that the tiredness may be the onset of "general malaise" which is a symptom of malaria. Today, however, I feel fine, especially after a cup of tea and two cups of Africafe. Zanzibar also did a number on my intestines, which may have been a cause in my being so tired. Things are settling down, though.

I went shopping yesterday for food. It was kind of a shock to my brain. The raw produce was extremely cheap. For instance, potatoes were selling for 700/- a kilo, which comes out to about 25 cents a pound. On the opposite end of the scale, a box of cereal cost, on average, $13. The cheapest cereal they had was Wheatabix, which is cereal compressed into bars that dissolve into mush when milk is added. While I do miss breakfast cereal, I am not willing to spend $13 a week on it. I picked up the largest box of Wheatabix I could find, which cost about $10 and should last me for three weeks or so. It tastes like cardboard, but it's full of fiber and other healthy things that I'm probably not getting enough of here.

Work at CARE has been alright. When I'm helping to prepare for our upcoming workshop, things are interesting. When I'm editing the UGI report, I find myself wanting to fall asleep. I think I've read through the thing about a dozen times by now (it's 53 pages long) and I'm getting a wee bit sick of it. I keep assigning myself really small editing tasks so I can do them quickly and move on before my attention completely fades.

The workshop is back in Zanzibar and begins on Monday. I think we are taking the Sunday afternoon ferry over, and we'll be coming back on Friday. The workshops are for CARE staff to help them better integrate good governance into their projects. The UGI review discovered that most of the CARE staff believe that they are promoting good governance, but when asked, can’t actually explain what that means. So these workshops are to introduce them to the basic principles of good governance and CARE’s governance framework. CARE aims to promote participation, accountability and transparency. Transparency is to ensure that government decisions are made in a fair and open manner. Accountability is meant to hold decision makers responsible for their actions. Participation is to educate people about their rights and about navigating the legal system to ensure that those rights are upheld. Honestly, we could use more of this work in the US. I told this to Edson. He laughed and said the US is the one pushing Tanzania and organizations like CARE to do this work.

Some pictures from Zanzibar

Nutmeg in the wild!

Our guide cutting open a sour sop fruit.

Turmeric sure is yellow!

One big fruit standing next to another.

Spices!

Meredith!

Miranda!

A big clove tree next to a coconut palm.

Typical Zanzibari food: Pilau, curry, spinach and chapati.

The view from the ferry.

A really cool door. I took too many pictures of cool doors there.

Most of the streets were very narrow.

A dhow.

The delights of Zanzibar!

The trip to Zanzibar was quite fun, even though (or perhaps because) I spent way too much money there. To start off with, the ferry was much more expensive than we thought, which means the guy selling us tickets was probably scamming us. That’s the state of things, so what can you do. We bought first class tickets, which ensured that we would be in an air conditioned cabin. Despite the extra cost, the cabin smelled like it wasn’t cleaned regularly and the AC barely functioned. I spent most of the two hour ride feeling sea sick. When we got out off the boat and through customs (traveling is so bureaucratic here) we were immediately accosted by touts. We made the mistake of mentioning where we were staying and one immediately stepped up to insist that the hostel had sent him to pick us up. After 10 minutes of harassing us, we finally relented and went along. We made it safely to the hostel, though the man at the desk was upset that we didn’t wait for our real ride from them. The touts were really persistent and kept saying, “How can you not trust us?” etc. It’s a good lesson to learn and I’m glad we made it to the hostel without incident. We ate at the restaurant near the hostel and it was quite good. I had kingfish curry with rice and a bowl of fresh tropical fruit for dessert.

I was up the next day before 7am. At the cheap places, the bathroom is down the hall. It wasn’t too bad (i.e. there was always toilet paper), but it was a little odd to shower while standing next to a toilet. This meant that the toilet was usually wet all day, but the up-shot was that at least it was being cleaned regularly. Breakfast was included in the price of a room (less than $20 a night)! They served us three kinds of fruit (banana, tangerine, and pineapple), toast, choice of eggs, and tea and coffee. It was definitely a refreshing way to start off our day.

The previous night, we had been convinced by the receptionist to take a Spice Tour this morning. It was about $12 and included a tour of nearby spice plantations, fruit tasting, lunch and time on the beach. The plantation was very wild looking and I would probably have mistaken it for a forest if I wasn’t told what it was. All the different crops were mixed together—giant clove trees next to tall slender coconut palms, banana and cacao trees, low lying turmeric and cassava plants, and trees covered in black pepper or vanilla vines. It was all very beautiful when taken in together, with the red soil and vibrant greens and yellows. Our guide took us through the plantation on foot, explained to us the various popular and traditional uses for each of the crops, and let us smell and even taste a few of them.

The plantation tour ended with a visit to a stand where the local farmers were selling most of the spices we saw for about $1 per 1/8th pound. There were even vanilla beans selling for less than $2 for 4 beans. I bought 4 packets of vanilla, and one packet each of the following: black pepper, cloves, masala tea mix, and vanilla tea. After the spice stand, we were taken to a place with benches where we got to sample a bunch of different fruit. I liked most of what we were given. My favorite was the sour sop fruit, which was sweet and tangy. My least favorite was the jack fruit, which kind of tasted like pineapple bubblegum.

All in all, we got to see, smell and taste the following spices and fruits:
Cloves
Cocoa
Ginger
Cardamom
Cassava
Pepper
Turmeric
Neem tree
Star fruit
Sour sop
Nutmeg
Cinnamon
Vanilla
Henna plant
Jack fruit

The whole time there were little children running around weaving little trinkets out of palm fronds and begging for money. I hate encouraging kids to associate white people with handouts, but I did eventually hand over the 100 shilling coins I had on me. It was hard to say no to the little guys.

I decided I didn’t really want to spend time on the beach, so I went back to Stonetown with Sally to walk around. The town is a warren of narrow, stone cobbled streets between crumbling, high walled buildings. It would have been much more charming if all the shop keepers had been less insistent that we enter every single shop we passed by. With the notable exception of the shop owned by Mr. and Mrs. Cheapest, I only purchased stuff from quiet and polite vendors. The amount of attention my skin color received from almost every merchant in town made me want to buy a hijab to hide under. Then again, the further impairment of visibility would have made it even harder for me to get out of the way of the many motorbikes whizzing through the narrow streets. The self proclaimed Mr. and Mrs. Cheapest were rather charming and talked me into buying a bunch of shawls from their shop. It wasn’t a hard sell, given the shawls’ bright colors and soft textures. They are made on Zanzibar, though not by hand. I saw many people selling shawls in the various shops, but Mr. Cheapest—who was the first shop I came to—wound up having the best selection, in my opinion.

There was a big festival going on in Zanzibar while we were there, though we didn’t know before hand. It was an international film and music festival, but because we weren’t prepared for it, we didn’t really get to see much of it. We did catch a bit of Taraab music on Saturday night, which is an eclectic mixture of the island’s many cultural influences. Also at the festival were a bunch of craft merchants, who managed to talk me out of all the cash I’d brought with me. Haha. It’s all pretty stuff—shawls, batiks, and a wood carving.

Hidden back in a corner of the craft fair was a group of young men selling beautiful wooden sculptures. They are all from a carving school up in Bagamoyo, a town about 40 kilometers northwest of Dar. Many of the venders had a very similar selection of stuff, but not these guys. There seems to be a mentality of ‘if something sells, continue making copies of it.’ For example, there was a famous artist in Dar who had the last name of Tingatinga. He painted these very whimsical and brightly colored pictures of animals and people. There are now hundreds of shops selling knock-offs of Tingatinga, because tourists love buying them. Some of the Tingatinga painters are quite good, but they are still copying this one man’s style. The wood carvers from Bagamoyo were not copying anyone. The sculptures were all unique—a refreshing change from the hundred shops all selling the exact same collection of tchotchkes—and combined traditional Tanzanian themes with Modern abstract design. Some were very realistic, while others were grotesque and strange, but all were expertly crafted. I didn’t have anywhere near the amount of cash on hand needed to purchase the piece I really wanted. I have plans to get out to Bagamoyo in the near future, so I will definitely drop by the studio to see if it’s still available. I settled on a small-ish bust of a woman carved from ebony. It’s really heavy, but was worth the sore shoulder I got from carrying it in my luggage.

All in all, I’m very pleased with the trip and especially pleased with the food I ate. I had seafood for dinner both nights. The first night, it was the kingfish curry and the second night, I had fried calamari. At the restaurant on the second night, we sat on cushions on the floor and the room was adorned with Arabic and African decorations. The calamari came with pilau, and little servings of mango chutney, pumpkin, and greens. The meals were all delicious and the desserts were even better: crunchy chocolate and pistachio cake, soft and moist date cake, and bowls of fresh fruit. Next week I’m returning to Zanzibar to help run a workshop with CARE. I don’t know how much time I will have to wander about again, but hopefully the food at the workshop will be equal to what I had this weekend.

After such a long post, no pictures! I know you all want to see them, and I will try to sort through them and post some tomorrow. Also, I purchased a number of neat postcards. I have the addresses of a few people already, but if you would like to receive one, just email me your address: alexis ‘dot’ close ‘at’ gmail ‘dot’ com.

Off to Zanzibar!

The bicycle ride to work this morning went well. I am beginning to suspect, however, that the Tanzanian version of a clown is a mzungu on a bike. Everyone I passed seemed to think I was the funniest thing they'd seen all morning. I think Uswege's words to me yesterday hold true: "Every man in a car is king! He doesn't care about you on your little bicycle." Having a car is a status symbol and someone who owns a car would never ever not in a million years ride a bike. In the US it feels like the opposite holds true: riding a bike is the status symbol- "Look how cool and environmentally conscious I am!" Anyway, I appreciate the exercise I'm getting, so I say to hell with cultural norms and expectations!

Well, by now you're probably wondering about the title of this post. I'm going to Zanzibar this weekend with Sally, a friend of Sally's and two of Sally's Friend's friends. I just wanted to write that out. Their names are Meredith, Miranda, and Adrian. Meredith and Sally are from the same university, though I think Meredith is an undergrad. She met Miranda and Adrian this summer on a study abroad program in Uganda. Now they are all traveling around together until school starts in August. Sounds like a blast to me.

I'm leaving work after lunch to meet up with them. We're going to try to take the 4pm ferry to Zanzibar. At least, my guide book says there is a 4pm ferry. Who knows what reality will present us with. Sally is going to check the ticket booths this morning and call me if our plans have to suddenly change. The fast ferry takes about 1.5 hours and is about $35 for one way. Some of the girls want to spend the day on Zanzibar's beautiful beaches, but I'd rather explore Stonetown and see the old buildings. The island has been inhabited by various ethnic groups for at least the last two thousand years and is supposed to reflect styles from African, Arabic and Asian cultures. It’s supposedly more expensive than the mainland, but not anywhere near the cost of a tourist destination in the US or Europe. Everything is relative here.

I probably won’t post again until Monday, but you’ll finally get to see some pictures! (Provided, of course, that no one runs off with my camera.)

The rain falls mainly on the dirt road...

Last night, the Barkers convinced me to go play tennis with them in the morning. They seem to relish waking up early, because our departure time for the tennis courts was 6am. So I got up at 5:30am, put on some already dirty clothes, ate a bagel and then followed them out the door. The trip was about 20 minutes by bike (I'm so out of shape and my legs burned most of the way) to a place called the Norwegian Club, which sounds a lot fancier than it actually was. The club is right behind the International School, which I'd seen on a drive around the city, so I sort of knew where I was.

We played for maybe 20 minutes before the skies opened up. The rainy season is over, so these little showers normally last a couple of minutes and are pretty light. This one, however, was a decent downpour and we were all thoroughly soaked. When it finished, the court was too wet for us to play, so we packed up and headed out. The route back to the Barker's house is about 5 miles of dirt road, which had turned to mud by now. My bike didn't have any fenders on it, and by the time I made it back, I was covered from the waist down in road mud. Blegch. Good thing I've been waiting to do laundry...

I took a shower and phoned the CARE offices to send a driver to pick me up. It was only 8am and I was already done with bikes for the day.

Today I've been researching various donor organizations who have previously funded governance programming in Tanzania. It was a little boring, but I recorded a bunch of web addresses for future reference. When I finally start writing my MA paper, I think these will come in handy.

I moved into Paul and Nora's house last night. The driver who took me after work yesterday was also dropping off other people, so the route he took was rather confusing. I learned this morning when we took a more direct way that the house is not far from CARE offices.

The Barkers have a house guest, Sally, who I mentioned earlier. She's here with a guy, also named Paul, who is interning with Abbot Labs, but on a different project. He's about a year younger than I am, and is going into his last year of engineering at a school in Wisconsin. Both of them are into biking around Dar, and in the month that they've been here so far, they've covered quite a bit of the city. Paul (the elder) has loaned me a spare bike, which is a bit beat up but still works as it should. I'm pleased with the new mobility I've been afforded. Unfortunately, I didn't really bring any clothing appropriate for bike riding, since at no point during my planning did I imagine I would be traveling in such a manner. Paul claims that in the many countries he's worked in Africa, Tanzania has the best conditions for biking. All the major roads have very wide pedestrian areas, which is good safety-wise since people are even worse drivers here than in Worcester. I know that's hard to believe, but Massachusetts does not actually have the worst drivers on the planet.

Paul bicycles in to work at 7am, so I left with Sally this morning since she leaves at a more reasonable time. She's working at Mohambili, probably the largest hospital in Tanzania, and CARE is on the way to her destination. The route is very simple and only has two turns. Once I'm out of Paul's neighborhood, I just follow the main road down to the Stanbic Bank and take a right at Kinunduga road. The trip took slightly longer than 10 minutes. Hopefully, I'll be able to remember the correct turn into Paul's neighborhood this evening.

Paul and Nora are leaving for a long visit to the States on Thursday, so Sally and I will have the house to ourselves. There is a grocery store within easy biking distance, so it will be almost like having our own apartment. My only complaint about the house is that it's not sealed as well as Dorcas's and there are more mosquitoes inside. My bed has a net on it, so I'll be fine at night. The upshot is that they have a washing machine. The thought of either myself or one of the housekeepers washing my clothes by hand was rather upsetting. I didn't want to do it, but neither did I want to subject anyone else to it.

Let me recap the last couple of days. On Friday night, Dorcas and I were invited over to the Country Director's house for dinner. He and his wife are very laid back people and dinner was an informal affair. His name is Paul, his wife is Nora, and they have a house guest named Sally. Sally looks like she's in her 50s and she is here in Tanzania doing research on health issues. If I remember correctly, she is working for the philanthropic arm of Abbot Labs, one of those giant conglomerates with various business interests all over the world. I've heard of Abbot Labs before because their HIV/AIDS research lab is in Worcester. They make a very effective anti-retroviral and a few years ago, Clark students held a protest in the street outside their building demanding that they give the drug away for free to people who need it. Sally admitted that the money Abbot Labs is giving away is barely a smidgen of what the company is worth.

Saturday morning, I walked down to the CARE offices to meet up with Aba. People at CARE (but not Dorcas) were worried about me walking to the offices because I'm a small white girl from the US. What I think many people don't realize is that there are dangerous cities even in the First World. I want to be like, “People in Tanzania are just poor. In Worcester, not only are they poor, but they're also dealing with drugs.” I walk around Worcester during the day, and I'm damn sure going to walk around Dar. Take back the streets! Or something like that :) People on the streets in Dar are about 3000 times more friendly than in Worcester. I got more than a few Hujambos! and Habaris! from people who passed me, including a police man who politely inquired if I knew where I was going. I think during the 5 years I've lived in Worcester, not a single stranger on the street has ever given me a polite greeting.

Anyway, I was walking to the CARE offices to meet Aba. She had offered to take me around to the shopping centers in Dar. Aba is from Ghana and is going through a kind of mid-life crisis. We spent most of the morning talking about our favorite hobbies (she likes to make perfume and I like bread baking) and how sometimes we wished we could just drop everything and go work with our hands. The first place she took me, Shoppers Plaza, had a bookstore in it. I browsed the cookbooks and Aba was hunting for a book on perfumes that she had seen on a previous trip. The Plaza looked like a very small mall and the only other place of interest for me was a bakery. Our next stop was Sea Cliff Village, which has a grocery store that Aba likes. Finally, we visited the Slipway, which has a lot of tourist-y shops in it. The crafts are more expensive but probably of better quality than what can be found elsewhere.

I spent most of Sunday reading my copy of The Illuminatus! Trilogy, which is pretty much the exact opposite of the book I just finished, Truman Capote's In Cold Blood. A shout-out to Maria for suppling the latter! Mille grazie!

I'm falling into a routine at the office. Today was pretty normal. I sat with a few of the Tanzanian interns during lunch. They asked me what I did this weekend and I told them. Afterwards, one of them, David, said that I had only seen the mzungu part of town and offered to take me around the “real Dar es Salaam.” 'Mzungu' basically means 'white person' and I would have to agree with him. I definitely only saw the white ex-pat part of town. The other intern, Godfry, mentioned that his family has hosted several Europeans before, so he knows about all the places tourists like to go. North of Dar, there are some interesting towns. There's one with the ruins of an old mosque and one that was the last place in Africa that thousands of captured people saw before being shipped off to a life of slavery. They both sound worth checking out. I looked into the price of a safari and they are rather prohibitive, so I think I'll have to be content with just going places with people from CARE.

The Country Director, Paul, offered to let me stay at his house for the remainder of the summer. Dorcas has company coming in a few weeks, so I've been looking for an alternative place to stay. I'm glad he took me in, since the cost of finding a place to live here probably ranks up there with Boston. Unfortunately, Paul and his wife are leaving for a 5 week vacation to the States on Thursday so I have to move in tomorrow. I've rather grown accustomed to Dorcas and her family. I will also miss Hawa's cooking :( Most of my stuff is now back in my suitcase, which I will bring with me to the office tomorrow morning. I hope my new bed is as comfortable as the one I'm sleeping on at Dorcas's. Given how cluttered my room in Worcester is, it still amazes me how most of the important things I own can fit in a single (albeit large) suitcase. At least it has wheels...

It turns out that my cellphone won't work in Tanzania even if it is unlocked. This is too bad. Vodacom, one of the biggest telecom companies in Africa, sells cheap cellphones so I bought one for around US$35. In Namibia I never felt like I needed the phone, since I was usually with a group and staying in a house with a working phone. Here, if I want to travel around, I'll probably end up going out by myself. It's worth the expense of $35 to know that I'll be able to call people if I need help.

Everyone here is so friendly. Tanzanian culture really values politeness and I've come in contact with nothing but cheery smiles and a willingness to help. I'm rather pleased with my choice of an internship. I can only hope that when/if I get a real job in the Development world, it will be in a place similar to CARE.

Anyhoo, if you want to give me a call, email me and I'll send you my new number. You should probably only try with a calling card which lists cheap rates to Africa.

Yesterday I was feeling a bit unmotivated about sitting in front of a computer and working. Today, however, I've had several cups of 'Africafe' and I'm feeling quite chipper. Edson does not seem to find the brand name 'Africafe' to be nearly as amusing as I do. Like all instant coffee products, Africafe is pretty terrible. With the inclusion of copious amounts of powdered milk and sugar, it now tastes like melted coffee ice cream. I know Tanzania grows coffee and one would hope this would reflect in the available selection of coffee products. Alas. I might check in the tourist/ex-pat sections of town and see if real coffee beans are actually sold. Who knows, maybe some of you will get Tanzanian coffee for a present! (Note: the more you comment on this blog, the less likely you are to receive a can of Africafe as punishment.)

What I'm eating

The food here is delicious. Yes, this is going to be a post all about food. In Namibia during my homestays, I was often served the same thing every day: cornmeal porridge, sauce and some kind of meat. Granted, sometimes it was interesting trying to figure out what kind of meat I was being served, but there is only so much entertainment to be found in mystery meat. I would have killed for a vegetable dish. Tanzania used to be a popular destination for Arab and Asian traders many centuries ago. In fact, the main language, Swahili, is is a combination of Bantu (the umbrella name for peoples who originated in Western Africa), Arabic, English and bits of many others. If their languages were mixing, you can just imagine what the food was doing.

There are two main starches served here: ugali (cornmeal porridge) and pilau (spiced rice). I mentioned the word 'pilaf' today to Edson, but he had never heard it before. If my memory serves me, pilaf is a baked rice dish that originated in what is now Iran. Since Zanzibar used to be the home of a sultanate, it would not surprise me if pilaf was a regular item on the menu. Many of the words “borrowed” from other languages get altered slightly, so it's not a big jump from 'pilaf' to 'pilau.' Anyway, it's delicious. Pilau is generally eaten with 2-5 other dishes that are usually prepared in a sauce. So far I've had (I'm guessing on some of the ingredients): beans in a white sauce; broccoli and leeks in a peanut sauce; a potato, cauliflower, tomato and carrot curry; something that tasted like mung beans in sesame paste; spinach; peas in a mint sauce; and zucchini with tomatoes. The rice goes on the plate first, then a few spoonfuls from each of the other dishes, and finally it's all mixed together and eaten. There is also fruit served at every meal. I guess it's whatever the cook finds at the market that day. Last night Hawa served three different kinds of fruit plus chunks of avocado. Unlike Namibia, I haven't eaten a lot of meat since I got here, and frankly, I'm fine with that.

I'm sad that I won't be able to stay at Dorcas's house in August. She has another guest coming and CARE is arranging to find me another place to live. Hawa's cooking is pretty amazing and I will miss it. Rather than going out for lunch or having it catered, CARE has created a lunch club, or to be more precise a 'chakula' club. The fee for each month is 25,000/= which comes out to around $24. I bet you wish you could eat a homemade lunch everyday for the price of a little over one dollar. The ladies running the chakula club are pretty amazing cooks too. I almost wrote 'mamas running...' but that would have been incorrect. Mama is an N-class noun and is not pluralized, kind of in the way fish and deer are not pluralized. Mama wanapika chakula! By the way, Mama is what you use to refer to any woman between the ages of 20 and 60 and does not necessarily mean that the woman is a mother.

July 8th

My first day at the CARE offices went rather well. Everyone I've met so far has been really nice. I'm still stumbling over Swahili greetings, but everyone just finds this amusing. The word for welcome is 'Karibu,' but Tanzanians use it a lot more often than an English speaker would use 'welcome.' They tend to use it anytime you enter a room or they want you to come closer or when they want to offer you something. Hawa says it a lot to me, I think because it's one of the few words I understand. The proper response to a “Karibu!” is “asante” (thank you). There are other parts of the greeting sequence I'm still trying to figure out. There's no real equivalent to 'hello' which is what I really want to say to people. Oh well.

I met my supervisor, Edson, this morning and he took me around the office complex. Most of the buildings are small, with 3-4 offices in each building. It looks like CARE Tanz started small and then expanded slowly over the years. I think the best part was when he introduced me to the head of the Women and Girl's Empowerment program. Like everyone else, she was very pleased to meet me, but she confessed that she and Edson fought over who was going to get me as an intern. This made me laugh. Edson also spent part of the morning trying to find me a desk to work on, but wound up having to order one when no one had a spare.

I spent most of the day reading various reports and handbooks that Edson piled in front of me on CARE in general and the Governance division specifically. The governance program wants to promote “greater participation, transparency and accountability to planning.” This is a big task, but first everyone at CARE has to be on the same page. My internship will cover mostly internal work: ensuring that when CARE staff say they are “promoting good governance” they all mean the same thing. Edson made me a list of things that he wants me to help with while I'm here:

1. Edit existing draft governance materials
2. Assist in designing, developing and editing new governance materials
3. Assist in developing the governance information dissemination plan
4. Participate and assist in conducting governance capacity building events
5. Participate and assist in developing CARE Tanzania's governance programming strategy

I think that's a good amount of work to get done in two months :)

First update from Tanzania

Hello all! I’m in Tanzania, safe and sound. The plane trip was uneventful, which is how I like it. My layover was in Zurich, which from the air looks an awful lot like East Tennessee: green with lots of agriculture and rolling hills. There are two words I would use to describe the Swiss airport: efficient and pleasant. Its outside walls are floor to ceiling windows which provide an excellent view of the surrounding forested hills. After looking around and stretching my legs I went to sit at a viewing deck. This is when I noticed the Alps. They were very far away and yet still gave the impression of immense size. I didn’t notice them at first, because they are a grayish-blue color very similar to the sky. Seeing them made me wish I had a couple of days to explore the Swiss countryside. Next time, maybe?

The ride to Tanzania was nice. I watched a weird documentary on the European hedgehog before passing out for over four hours. I had originally intended to stay awake on this leg of my journey since it was daytime in my destination. However, my body felt that it was the wee hours of the morning and I wasn’t able to resist. When I woke up, I regretted not getting a window seat at this point since the plane was flying over the continent and I wasn’t able to see anything.

Upon arriving I was really glad that I applied for a visa before I left. There were probably over 100 people who had to wait for two clerks to process their applications. That definitely looked like it would be a horrendous experience after 22 hours of travel. I passed through passport inspection and luggage collection without a hitch. A man from CARE was waiting for me outside the airport and took me to where I’m staying. The house is just outside the city center and is cool and pleasant. Dorcas, my host, lives in the house with her daughter, her housekeeper Hawa and Hawa’s daughter. Dorcas is really nice and Ayeisha is really talkative. Hawa doesn’t speak much English and my Swahili is rather limited, but so far we’ve been able to communicate.

I went for a very short walk today around the neighborhood and down to the major road. Dorcas thinks I should buy a new sim card for my phone so I can use it in Tanzania. Luckily for me, Hawa has a phone charger that fits into mine and has the appropriate sized plug. I’ll see how this winds up working out. Dorcas wanted me to check out the northern Peninsula, a place called the Slipway, but it would have been difficult getting home without a working cell phone. She has a few trusted taxi drivers that she gave me the phone numbers for, which is similar to what my program in Namibia gave us.

Anyhoo, I’m really tired right now. Jetlag is really a pain. Today is a holiday, lucky for me, so tomorrow will be my first day in the office. Hopefully I will not wake up before the sun rises like I did this morning, though it was kind of cool to hear the Muslim call to worship echoing across the city.

Trip part 1

The first leg of my trip will begin in a few minutes. I've stuffed everything I think I'll need in the next two months into a very large suitcase. After dragging it out of the basement, I'm thankful the thing has wheels. We're driving up to New Jersey to stay with my family before dropping me off at JFK on Saturday. I'm so excited!!

Welcome

This is the first post on my new blog, Shajara! Shajara means "journal" in Swahili, one of the official languages of Tanzania. This is where I'll be documenting my two month internship and research trip to Tanzania. I will be spending most of my time in Dar es Salaam, which, while no longer the capital, is still the country's largest city. I will be working with CARE, a rather wonderful (and large) international NGO (non-governmental organization). My plane leaves from JFK on Saturday and will arrive via Switzerland in Dar late Sunday evening, local time.

For those of you who can't easily point to Tanzania on a map, I'll include a few links for your reading pleasure:

BBC Country Profile
Embassy Website
And of course, Wikipedia