Goodbye

Kwa heri, Tanzania!

Last night in Tanzania

Well, this is it.  Tonight is the last night I will spend in Tanzania.  What am I going to do?  Probably just spend it packing and hanging out with Barkers listening to NPR on the satellite radio.  

Last night was cool, however.  I took Paul, Nora and Dorcas out to dinner at Addis in Dar, which is the Ethiopian restaurant near our house.  Ethiopian food is so good.  We had chicken, lamb, red snapper, lentils, chickpeas, and potatoes with tons of injera (it's kind of like a giant sourdough crepe that you use to pick up your food) and lots of spicy sauce.  The food comes on a giant plate and everyone eats by tearing off pieces of injera and scooping up whatever they want with it.  Occaisionally the plate is rotated so you can taste some of the hard-to-reach stuff on the other side.  Who's up for finding an Ethiopian restaurant in Boston with me??

I'm doing a fine balancing act with my luggage.  I have to keep track of weight (each piece can only weigh 23 kilos!) and make sure that all the breakable stuff is properly wrapped.  I'm sticking most of my clothes and all the fabric I bought into my spare duffle bag and all the wooden carvings into my hard suitcase.  Now I just have to go around the house accounting for all the things I might have left lying around that were subsiquently cleaned up by Maria, the housekeeper.  She's rather brutally efficient when it comes to cleaning.  I hope I can find everything.

Bagamoyo

The workshop is going well for the participants. It's almost entirely in Swahili, so I spend most of my time working on the manual and learning how to use the open source publishing software I downloaded. Also, I eat. We're fed four times a day by the hotel and then afterwards, everyone wants to go into town for dinner. Last night, Rama took Edson and myself out to dinner at a local restaurant. They totally had a whole skinned goat hanging from the ceiling next to the guy with whom we placed our orders. I don't think I've ever seen a whole animal skinned like that in real life before. It was kind of cool. Afterwards, I tried to explain the US food and safety system to Edson and we both had a good laugh.

We chose the kuku choma and grilled bananas, because the goat was too expensive. The chicken was as tough as I remember it and the grilled bananas are totally growing on me. I think we'll have to try it when I get back. Buy some green bananas and stick them on a grill. Trust me: it's awesome with vinegar and salt. (On a side note: 'kuku' means chicken and kaka means 'brother.' I've had this terrible fear that I'll address someone with "Habari gani, kuku?" So far it hasn't happened. I hope I haven't jinxed myself by telling you my secret. On another note: dada means 'sister' and 'baba' means father. Dilip, an intern from India, addressed an elderly gentleman with "Shikamoo, dada." I'm sad I wasn't there to see the man's expression...)

One of the Tanzanian interns bought me a bracelet today as a goodbye present. It made me feel bummed out, since it's now a visual reminder that I'm leaving soon. I have to keep from crying!