I think you all know the song, Cecilia, right? If not, look it up and listen to it. We made new lyrics to the song and sang it for our swearing-in ceremony, and I think it explains a lot about our feelings about living here right now.
Chorus 1:
Tanzania, you're breakin' my heart
you're shakin' my confidence daily
Tanzania, I'm down on my knees
I'm beggin' you please to be home
To be home
Chorus 2:
Tanzania, I can't figure you out
you're makin' me feel like a baby
lakini sasa, nina familie yangu
na kila siku 'najifunza
na wewe
(but now I have a family
and every day I learn
with you)
Verse:
Teachin' class in the afternoon
with my students packed into the room
Ninarudi nyumbani
kufua nguo, bado siwezi
(I return home
to wash clothes, but still I can't)
Chorus 3:
Tanzania, 'nakupenda sana
'nakupenda sana, Tanzania
Familia zetu, tutawakumbuka
tutarudi tena kuwaona
Asante
(Tanzania, I love you so much
I love you so much Tanzania
Our families, we will miss you
we will return again to see you
Thank you)
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Things I Bought Today
Here is a comprehensive list of the things I bought/will buy today to get ready to live in my new house:
wash buckets and small pitchers/cups to wash dishes and clothes (I don't have a sink or running water)
a crappy cutting knife that may easily break soon (cost- 70 cents)
a spoon
a wok/frying pan thing
a metal spatula and a wooden spoon
a set of aluminum pots (forget about non-stick, those are hard to find and super expensive)
a set of hot pots to keep food warm
a small charcoal jiko (8" in diameter, 8" tall maybe)
a cutting board
a good lock for my front door
black pepper and curry powder
air freshener for my concrete squat toilet room
dish soap and steel wool
flour, butter, pasta, jam, pb, bread, powdered milk, sugar
And I think I'll survive on that in my village for the next week or two, I hope. At least the pb and j sandwiches will sustain me if nothing else I cook works out. Not exactly the things you would think to buy when setting up a new apartment in America are they?
I can get rice, tomatoes, fish (really gross fish-ey fish), bananas, mangos, and onions in my village, along with soap and cooking oil I think. Luckily it's very easy for me to get into Iringa town and buy absolutely anything I need, so I'll get some dishes, more buckets and water storage tanks, maybe a nice kerosene stove, more staple food, and that sort of thing next time I come. I hope you're all enjoying your safi (clean, fancy, excellent, awesome) lives in America!!!
wash buckets and small pitchers/cups to wash dishes and clothes (I don't have a sink or running water)
a crappy cutting knife that may easily break soon (cost- 70 cents)
a spoon
a wok/frying pan thing
a metal spatula and a wooden spoon
a set of aluminum pots (forget about non-stick, those are hard to find and super expensive)
a set of hot pots to keep food warm
a small charcoal jiko (8" in diameter, 8" tall maybe)
a cutting board
a good lock for my front door
black pepper and curry powder
air freshener for my concrete squat toilet room
dish soap and steel wool
flour, butter, pasta, jam, pb, bread, powdered milk, sugar
And I think I'll survive on that in my village for the next week or two, I hope. At least the pb and j sandwiches will sustain me if nothing else I cook works out. Not exactly the things you would think to buy when setting up a new apartment in America are they?
I can get rice, tomatoes, fish (really gross fish-ey fish), bananas, mangos, and onions in my village, along with soap and cooking oil I think. Luckily it's very easy for me to get into Iringa town and buy absolutely anything I need, so I'll get some dishes, more buckets and water storage tanks, maybe a nice kerosene stove, more staple food, and that sort of thing next time I come. I hope you're all enjoying your safi (clean, fancy, excellent, awesome) lives in America!!!
Monday, December 1, 2008
It looks like Africa here
Well, I arrived at site. After a long bus ride followed by a taxi ride for an hour on a dirt road in the rain, my headmaster and I arrived at our school after dark. I discovered my house is very nice and rather large with two bedrooms and a living room, an enclosed compound in the back, and bathrooms and a kitchen room across the enclosed area. However, as I'm at a new site in a new house, I have nothing but a bed, two tables and a couple chairs, a bucket and a kerosene lantern, and my clothing and books I brought with me. No stove, no pots and pans, no shelves or wardrobe or anything. Also, I wrote in my last post that my house would have electricity and running water. False. It has neither. So in addition to all of the things I need to find, buy, and figure out how to get back to my house, starting with a charcoal and a kerosene stove, I also need to figure out a system for water: getting it to my house from the neighbor's, storing it at my house, and then boiling and filtering it for drinking. I also heard that in the dry season the tap water for the whole town is only turned on on Fridays, so you have to store all of your water for a whole week! Woah!
Luckily my headmaster is really nice and has worked with 3 Peace Corps Volunteers before me. His family has been feeding me and entertaining me with chatter at his house (maybe too much! I haven't had time to sit in my house, unpack, or anything like that yet). He's also looking into getting some living room furniture and curtains for me this week. That'll make things a little more cozy.
One of the female teachers at my school took me to her house one afternoon, where I talked a little to her and another teacher. For most of the afternoon, though, I talked to one of the teachers' boyfriend who teaches in Iringa and has very good English and Western ideas. It was a lot of fun to talk to him, and it encouraged me that it's possible to have male friends in this country. Maybe. The trouble is that Tanzanians do not have intergender friendships at all. So we'll see how that works.
The landscape at my school is really nice. It looks like Africa. You know, the savannah yellowish tall grasses and trees with flat tops dotting the landscape. Just what you imagine as an American who's seen The Lion King but never stepped foot in Africa. And the blue mountains of Iringa town rise up in the distance. All this I can see right outside the windows of my house. The village nearby is right next to the school, and the market and shops are about a ten minute walk if you go straight there. However, the villagers were so curious about me when we walked around yesterday that we had to stop every few feet to greet and chat. They speak a local language here, so the greetings are different, but most people also speak Kiswahili so my training was not entirely in vain. However, my headmaster introduced me to everyone one by one, and I really can't say much more than my introduction myself, so I would stand there awkwardly, alternately nodding in confirmation of what I understood and furrowing my eyebrows trying to figure out what else they were saying so quickly. Mostly I just walked around wide-eyed and overstimulated by the sights. Village life is soo different than life in the town. Woah!
So I can't figure out whether to be scared to death of the prospect of getting everything I need and learning to live in a village independently and speaking broken Kiswahili to villagers who've maybe never seen an mzungu (white person) before, or excited and stimulated by the challenge of setting up a new site and getting to know villagers and making friends with them. I think right now I'm mostly on the side of scared to death, but I won't give up hope. I'm sure this month will be the most difficult, trying month I've ever lived, but things will come and I will become more comfortable and less overwhelmed, little by little as time goes on. What I'm really excited about is the time when I do get more comfortable and have my house set up a little and I'm able to at least support and feed myself. I'm excited to speak better Kiswahili so I can actually talk to people and maybe even make some friends. If I can get through the first few weeks (including the beginning of January when I start school), I think I'll be set. Then I'll be able to face any challenge that ever comes my way.
So here comes the determination, the courage, the independent streak, and the sheer strength. This is it- I'm really doing it!
Luckily my headmaster is really nice and has worked with 3 Peace Corps Volunteers before me. His family has been feeding me and entertaining me with chatter at his house (maybe too much! I haven't had time to sit in my house, unpack, or anything like that yet). He's also looking into getting some living room furniture and curtains for me this week. That'll make things a little more cozy.
One of the female teachers at my school took me to her house one afternoon, where I talked a little to her and another teacher. For most of the afternoon, though, I talked to one of the teachers' boyfriend who teaches in Iringa and has very good English and Western ideas. It was a lot of fun to talk to him, and it encouraged me that it's possible to have male friends in this country. Maybe. The trouble is that Tanzanians do not have intergender friendships at all. So we'll see how that works.
The landscape at my school is really nice. It looks like Africa. You know, the savannah yellowish tall grasses and trees with flat tops dotting the landscape. Just what you imagine as an American who's seen The Lion King but never stepped foot in Africa. And the blue mountains of Iringa town rise up in the distance. All this I can see right outside the windows of my house. The village nearby is right next to the school, and the market and shops are about a ten minute walk if you go straight there. However, the villagers were so curious about me when we walked around yesterday that we had to stop every few feet to greet and chat. They speak a local language here, so the greetings are different, but most people also speak Kiswahili so my training was not entirely in vain. However, my headmaster introduced me to everyone one by one, and I really can't say much more than my introduction myself, so I would stand there awkwardly, alternately nodding in confirmation of what I understood and furrowing my eyebrows trying to figure out what else they were saying so quickly. Mostly I just walked around wide-eyed and overstimulated by the sights. Village life is soo different than life in the town. Woah!
So I can't figure out whether to be scared to death of the prospect of getting everything I need and learning to live in a village independently and speaking broken Kiswahili to villagers who've maybe never seen an mzungu (white person) before, or excited and stimulated by the challenge of setting up a new site and getting to know villagers and making friends with them. I think right now I'm mostly on the side of scared to death, but I won't give up hope. I'm sure this month will be the most difficult, trying month I've ever lived, but things will come and I will become more comfortable and less overwhelmed, little by little as time goes on. What I'm really excited about is the time when I do get more comfortable and have my house set up a little and I'm able to at least support and feed myself. I'm excited to speak better Kiswahili so I can actually talk to people and maybe even make some friends. If I can get through the first few weeks (including the beginning of January when I start school), I think I'll be set. Then I'll be able to face any challenge that ever comes my way.
So here comes the determination, the courage, the independent streak, and the sheer strength. This is it- I'm really doing it!
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