Often times I have to remind myself that “This Is Africa” or “TIA”. TIA is a common expression among Peace Corps Volunteers here in Tanzania whenever anything happens that would never happen in America. Like when a fellow volunteer dropped her phone down the choo (the pit latrine where everyone goes to the bathroom) and her neighbors decided that she just had to save her phone. So they created a 6 foot wooden pole with a cup attached to the end to dig out her phone amongst other nasty things I’m sure. The neighbors were soo excited that they rescued her phone! But then she secretly had to get rid of it because of the awful smell. Honestly that’s just gross, or no wait ....This is Africa!
I’m not saying that every TIA moment is gross or even that dramatic. Many TIA moments are simply times when things are lost in translation, but ultimately every “This Is Africa” moment makes you stand back and think... did that really just happen.
One embarrassing TIA moment was on my first day of work when one of my co-workers asked how Moss and I met. I replied “chooni”, which I thought meant “in school/college,” but when everyone started cracking up I realized I must have said something incorrectly. After endless laughter my colleague said “kweli?,” meaning “is that true?” I didn’t understand why it was sooo funny, but I said “nimefikiri” which means “I think so,” but then they laughed even more and once the laughing ended someone finally explained in English that I said Moss and I meet in the bathroom. I had said “chooni” which means in the bathroom, rather than “chuoni,” which means in college. Urghhh.... One letter difference messes the entire meaning up!
Another lost in translation moment occurred about 2 weeks ago when I was attempting to bake for the first time, without an oven! In our peace corps training we learned that you can create an oven by putting an inch of sand in a large pot and after this pot heats up, you can put a smaller baking dish inside, and the sand disperses the heat more evenly like an oven. Anyway, I went outside to collect sand to put in my pot and my neighbor asked in Swahili why I was cooking sand. I attempted to explain to her that I wasn’t cooking sand, but I was using the sand to bake. The only trouble is that I didn’t know how to say sand or bake, or even cake for that matter. So I said something along the lines of 'I put little pot in big pot with ... (and pointed to the sand)...I try cook bread." She giggled, shook my hand, and walked away probably thinking that this crazy foreigner likes sandy bread. Oh well, at least my mini chocolate cake turned out delicious!
Another crazy TIA moment occurred at the end of last week as Moss and I returned home from the beach. Right after sunset we were walking our bikes down this little dirt pathway that leads to our house and we see a group of five children (I’m talking young kids maybe 7 or 8) playing with fire. That’s right; they had sticks of fire that they were swinging at one another. Here in Tanzania it is not unusual to see a small fire, because that’s the way to dispose of trash (you simply dig a small pit on your property, throw your trash in there, and light it once a week. Our trash pit has actually become a popular place among the neighborhood children as they love to root through there looking for goodies. It’s a little disturbing, so we have tried decreasing this practice by burning it more frequently.) Anyway, a large trash pit was burning on a property only three houses away from ours where a new home is being built. Thus far they have only constructed a three foot tall brick foundation, which looks like an outline of the rooms that will exist one day. So not only were the children swinging sticks of fire at each other, they continued to take these sticks and light one of the ‘rooms’ on fire. Well it’s not exactly a room because it is simply bricks in a square shape, but none the less I was shocked! Some children ran to collect more sticks to build up their new fire and we could see the flames growing... The following day all was well and no harm was done, but honestly that was crazy!
There are so many TIA moments in our lives these days that this blog entry could go on for ages. I will have to add more when I’m not super busy at work.
In other news, something awful happened to Kali. We think she broke her front leg or dislocated her shoulder. We are not sure how it happened exactly, but Moss thinks it might have been when she jumped off the office table. She is miserable, in a lot of pain, and can’t put any weight on her leg. I am going to talk to one of the doctors at work today to get some advice, but we are not sure what to do as there are no vets anywhere around here. Keep her in your prayers.
Miss you all!
XOXO
Monday, October 25, 2010
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Pictures
A DAY AT THE BEACH
Local fishing dhows plowing the waters off of Shangani Beach. Usually about four or five men man these boats, as they fish with hand-lines, nets, or fishing traps. The local fishing industry is what is known as an “artisanal fishery,” as it entails primarily the use of traditional equipment. These boats sail out from port just before sunset, and set up for the night, waiting to pull in their gear in the morning. Once dark, the lanterns on their boats line the ocean horizon, like a string of Christmas lights in a perfect line across the night sky.
West Shangani beach, near the original town of Mtwara, which is now no more than a row of mud thatch buildings amidst a forest of coconut trees. Sitting on this beach, you often have to remind yourself that you’re basically looking out towards Saudi Arabia. But when you get in the water, there’s no mistake that you’re swimming in the Indian Ocean. The water is warm, if not hot, heated by the bay’s shallow surface. The tide comes in fast, but even at high tide, you could walk several hundreds of meters out before reaching water over your head (you have to walk carefully, watching closely not to step on any sea urchins).
Moss enjoying the view
Merritt posing by the coral
At Msemo Resort, which is about a 15-minute bike ride from our house. This is a nice place to come relax and feel like we are on vacation rather than living and working in a small African Town.
HOME IMPROVEMENTS
Tanzanians have an unyielding affinity for painting rooms in a two-tone color scheme – dark on lower half, and a lighter shade on the upper half. While we’ve kept the pattern in our living room, the hallway seemed a little dark and dingy, though the remains of it can still be seen, as on the far wall in this picture. Now our house is mostly white with black floors, and although Merritt says it reminds her of a hospital, it is a lot more clean looking and comfortable. On the left is the office, the middle room (the former duka shop) is still unpainted and will serve as our workshop and a place to hang laundry. And the far room on the left will be a guest bedroom (so karibu!). In the middle of the hall on the right is an extra bathroom and shower room. The master bedroom is at the end of the hall on the right.
The new office – it’s still a little bare but nevertheless an enjoyable place to sit and work or read. Cooler than are other rooms (a relative term as you can see), from here you can take in the daily happenings of Magomeni. And the mosquito netting serves as kind of one-way window – allowing one to look out on the world, but apparently not allowing outsiders to look in. Here in Tanzania, the ability to go unseen is a rarity and it certainly is part of our growing affinity for this room.
Looking out the office window
The Kitchen. While I was away in Dar es Salaam for 10 days, Moss worked hard to paint our entire house and build furniture. These two tables are his works of art, as well as the desk in the previous office pictures. Notice the green buckets... they are our ‘dishwasher.’ Because water is sometimes unreliable, we keep one bucket full of soapy water and one bucket full of clean water. Our bucket system makes doing dishes a quick, easy process!
Our guest bathroom/shower room, coming from the living room this is located in middle of the hallway on the right. We often use the shower room to do the worst chore ever... laundry! Image spending 4 hours in this little room scrubbing your clothes...not fun.
Our bedroom, to the left is our bathroom and to the right is a bookshelf filled with clothes. Can you see Kali, snuggled between our pillows?
The bookshelf that Moss made. It was so nice to finally unpack after living out of a bag for three months.
In Other News
Okay so this is absolutely disgusting! But since we had the picture, we thought we should share it. This is the result of Moss dropping a pot of boiling water on his foot. He was unable to run for 2 weeks and is still limping around. The wound is finally healing and he is feeling much better, but as you can see this was a rather painful accident.
This is a picture of Maren (one of my new favorite people) and me in Dar es Salaam. She is the other Peace Corps Volunteer working for I-TECH. She lives in Mbeya, which is about 10 hours away from Mtwara, but we will be traveling to Dar together once every three months for an I-TECH conference.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
The “Mzungu” Thing
It’s been a while since we’ve posted an entry on the blog, and for that we apologize, but it’s been a busy couple of weeks – Merritt’s been out of town for a week and a half conference in Dar, followed by week long seminar at COTC after her return. And for myself, in addition to my work at the marine park, I’ve spent a week painting the inside of the house while Merritt was away, along with continued house improvements (e.g., replacing old, dilapidated faucets; cleaning up and starting a small garden the backyard; building desks and tables for our kitchen and a makeshift office). There’s still plenty of work left but the place is starting to look and feel less like the old, dirty duka/baa (i.e., shop/bar) that it used to be, and a little more like home.
But other than such endeavors, life goes on here in Mtwara. Now that it’s October, were supposed to be entering the hot and rainy season, but except for a brief downpour one afternoon last week, I can’t detect any change in the weather. To hear news of the approaching fall in the States makes me miss the seasonality of the temperate zone. Even in extreme southern Tanzania, the amount of daylight might change by at most half an hour during the year, and the temperature seems likewise always well above 80 degrees, despite apparently peaking upward of 110 during the middle of the summer. While Tanzanians talk about the benefits of the predictability of such a climate, I have tried to convey the sense of time that seasons can impart on life. I guess coming from Vermont, it should be no surprise that come September and October, I miss fall.
Anyway, what I had really hoped to discuss in this entry was not recent travels or even the weather, but a more tangible part of life here, specifically the reality of living life as an outsider, a foreigner, or more appropriately here in Tanzania, as a “mzungu.” Just for a little clarification, a mzungu is, practically speaking, a white person. But the term doesn’t literally translate so directly – for example, “kizunguzungu” is an adjective for being dizzy, like if you were describing to a doctor that you’re suffering from dizzy spells.
Apparently, the term “mzungu” (or “wazungu,” for the plural) was derived from the concept of foreign white people having literally travelled around the world to come to Tanzania. The white people’s willingness to travel around and around the globe is a real mystery to Tanzanians who can’t fathom going so far away from home. While the country is quite large and the people have, in some cases in the past, been forcibly relocated by their government, few Tanzanians can hardly fathom life outside the district they call home, and in this respect, the mzungu term seems relatively innocuous. But when little kids shout the term at you as you ride by on your bike, or adults drop it on you in the middle of a conversation, like it’s a given, it’s a different story – not nearly as innocent, or as tolerable.
It should noted that I fully expected to be called a mzungu well before I ever stepped on the continent, but I didn’t foresee that it would bother me so much. Just imagine taking off at 7:20 in the morning for work on your bike, and hearing, as you push up the long, steady hill to town, kids shout from half a league away “Mzungu! Mzungu! Mmmmzzunguuu!!!”
The other night, walking to one of the near by dukas (i.e., shops), within only a couple of hundred meters of my house, a little kid in the path caught sight of me, and proudly proclaimed “Mzungu!” Finally having had enough, I walked right up to the kid, and told him, “Mimi si mzungu. Mimi ni Mmerikani!” (“I am not a mzungu. I am an American.”) The kid, taken aback by the comment, was speechless for a couple of seconds and then softly muttered, “Mzungu?” Frustrated by this response and aware the kid clearly didn’t understand my emphatic statement, I thought for a second about what to say next, and then slowly, and as calmly as I could, said, “Unasema ambaye mimi ni mzungu, lakini halafu wewe ni nini?” (“You say that I am a mzungu, but then what are you?”)
I wasn’t looking for any particular response, or even any response at all, and I could see that my comment had hit its mark. The kid didn’t know what to say, let along the answer to my question. And that was the point. I simply said to him, “Sawa. Je unaelewa sasa?” (“Ok. Do you now understand?”) He replied with “Sawa,” and I was satisfied, and continued on my way to buy my eggs and tomatoes.
It isn’t that I consider the “mzungu” label to be racist, and for many kids, the exclamation is solely one of excitement at seeing someone that they’ve only ever heard about. There’s no spite or animosity in the label, at least not most of the time. (For example, when a student completing research at the marine park asked me about the term, I explained to him that it couldn’t be compared with some of the epithets that African Americans have historically had to endure in the U.S.) But I strongly believe, and all the more so now, that such labels are wrong solely for the fact that they are labels. The reality is that people don’t want to be defined by some label, even if there’s nothing overtly wrong with the name. But yet, as humans, our natural disposition is to try to classify people – whether it’s by the color of their skin, the length and style of their hair, or the clothes they wear. It’s a behavior that we can only proactively prevent, by refusing to let ourselves try to simplify the world into neat little categories.
One interesting aspect of the “mzungu” thing is that one only rarely hears the term from adults. You know these kids are hearing and learning the term from someone, and every once and a while, they’ll throw it out there and act like it’s not a big deal. But like when the student at the marine park asked me whether I minded the term, the real answer for him was, if you have to ask, then you already know the answer. While I don’t know all the history of the country’s colonial period, I don’t think there’s much collective recollection among the people of Tanzania of the pain and suffering that distinctions based on race can produce.
Merritt, for example, had a co-worker, whom she had just spent the previous week getting to know during a health conference here in Mtwara, excitedly proclaim, as people gathered for photos on the last day of the conference, “Oh, let me get a picture with the mzungu!” Merritt, though she complied with the request and didn’t voice her frustration, was really offended, if for no other reason than this lady not only knew her name but knew her on a personal level. And I can’t blame Merritt for being upset about the incident.
For me personally, whereas previously when some kid has shouted “Mzungu!” at me, I’ve either simply ignored them, now my patience with the term is running a little thin. Undoubtedly it’s a battle I won’t be able to win, and I will likely always be chased with the term no matter where I go, what I do, or how long I stay in this country. But I’ve decided, at least for now, that I am not going to accept being called a mzungu. To simply ignore it, or pretend it’s acceptable is to give in to the term – to implicitly recognize the legitimacy of it.
At one point I debated whether I should try to turn the tables on people who use the term – to come back with something like “mzaliwa,” which means “native,” an expression you’ll often read used by white Europeans and Americans in old books on safari hunting in East Africa and Tanganyika. But as bothered as I am by the mzungu term, I can’t seem to throw around similar epithets. Not only would I personally be disgusted with myself, it seems more likely to anger people than to make them realize the error of their own ways. And that’s one of the funny things about such labels. We’re so quick to use them, but so offended when they’re applied to us. I guess it’s easy for ourselves to ignore the double-standard in such reactions.
Merritt and I have accepted a whole set of new struggles in our daily existence in volunteering for the Peace Corps here in Tanzania (from dealing with the bureaucracy of a federal agency, to the challenge of having to learn a new language, to the problem of securing enough reliable clean water). But neither of us foresaw that the feeling of being an outsider, a foreigner – someone to be stared and pointed at – would be the single hardest obstacle to assuming a normal life here in Tanzania. We continue to try to integrate – by learning the language and culture, dressing and acting appropriately, and telling people about the nature of our work here – but there seems to be a barrier arising out of our skin color that may ultimately prove insurmountable.
But other than such endeavors, life goes on here in Mtwara. Now that it’s October, were supposed to be entering the hot and rainy season, but except for a brief downpour one afternoon last week, I can’t detect any change in the weather. To hear news of the approaching fall in the States makes me miss the seasonality of the temperate zone. Even in extreme southern Tanzania, the amount of daylight might change by at most half an hour during the year, and the temperature seems likewise always well above 80 degrees, despite apparently peaking upward of 110 during the middle of the summer. While Tanzanians talk about the benefits of the predictability of such a climate, I have tried to convey the sense of time that seasons can impart on life. I guess coming from Vermont, it should be no surprise that come September and October, I miss fall.
Anyway, what I had really hoped to discuss in this entry was not recent travels or even the weather, but a more tangible part of life here, specifically the reality of living life as an outsider, a foreigner, or more appropriately here in Tanzania, as a “mzungu.” Just for a little clarification, a mzungu is, practically speaking, a white person. But the term doesn’t literally translate so directly – for example, “kizunguzungu” is an adjective for being dizzy, like if you were describing to a doctor that you’re suffering from dizzy spells.
Apparently, the term “mzungu” (or “wazungu,” for the plural) was derived from the concept of foreign white people having literally travelled around the world to come to Tanzania. The white people’s willingness to travel around and around the globe is a real mystery to Tanzanians who can’t fathom going so far away from home. While the country is quite large and the people have, in some cases in the past, been forcibly relocated by their government, few Tanzanians can hardly fathom life outside the district they call home, and in this respect, the mzungu term seems relatively innocuous. But when little kids shout the term at you as you ride by on your bike, or adults drop it on you in the middle of a conversation, like it’s a given, it’s a different story – not nearly as innocent, or as tolerable.
It should noted that I fully expected to be called a mzungu well before I ever stepped on the continent, but I didn’t foresee that it would bother me so much. Just imagine taking off at 7:20 in the morning for work on your bike, and hearing, as you push up the long, steady hill to town, kids shout from half a league away “Mzungu! Mzungu! Mmmmzzunguuu!!!”
The other night, walking to one of the near by dukas (i.e., shops), within only a couple of hundred meters of my house, a little kid in the path caught sight of me, and proudly proclaimed “Mzungu!” Finally having had enough, I walked right up to the kid, and told him, “Mimi si mzungu. Mimi ni Mmerikani!” (“I am not a mzungu. I am an American.”) The kid, taken aback by the comment, was speechless for a couple of seconds and then softly muttered, “Mzungu?” Frustrated by this response and aware the kid clearly didn’t understand my emphatic statement, I thought for a second about what to say next, and then slowly, and as calmly as I could, said, “Unasema ambaye mimi ni mzungu, lakini halafu wewe ni nini?” (“You say that I am a mzungu, but then what are you?”)
I wasn’t looking for any particular response, or even any response at all, and I could see that my comment had hit its mark. The kid didn’t know what to say, let along the answer to my question. And that was the point. I simply said to him, “Sawa. Je unaelewa sasa?” (“Ok. Do you now understand?”) He replied with “Sawa,” and I was satisfied, and continued on my way to buy my eggs and tomatoes.
It isn’t that I consider the “mzungu” label to be racist, and for many kids, the exclamation is solely one of excitement at seeing someone that they’ve only ever heard about. There’s no spite or animosity in the label, at least not most of the time. (For example, when a student completing research at the marine park asked me about the term, I explained to him that it couldn’t be compared with some of the epithets that African Americans have historically had to endure in the U.S.) But I strongly believe, and all the more so now, that such labels are wrong solely for the fact that they are labels. The reality is that people don’t want to be defined by some label, even if there’s nothing overtly wrong with the name. But yet, as humans, our natural disposition is to try to classify people – whether it’s by the color of their skin, the length and style of their hair, or the clothes they wear. It’s a behavior that we can only proactively prevent, by refusing to let ourselves try to simplify the world into neat little categories.
One interesting aspect of the “mzungu” thing is that one only rarely hears the term from adults. You know these kids are hearing and learning the term from someone, and every once and a while, they’ll throw it out there and act like it’s not a big deal. But like when the student at the marine park asked me whether I minded the term, the real answer for him was, if you have to ask, then you already know the answer. While I don’t know all the history of the country’s colonial period, I don’t think there’s much collective recollection among the people of Tanzania of the pain and suffering that distinctions based on race can produce.
Merritt, for example, had a co-worker, whom she had just spent the previous week getting to know during a health conference here in Mtwara, excitedly proclaim, as people gathered for photos on the last day of the conference, “Oh, let me get a picture with the mzungu!” Merritt, though she complied with the request and didn’t voice her frustration, was really offended, if for no other reason than this lady not only knew her name but knew her on a personal level. And I can’t blame Merritt for being upset about the incident.
For me personally, whereas previously when some kid has shouted “Mzungu!” at me, I’ve either simply ignored them, now my patience with the term is running a little thin. Undoubtedly it’s a battle I won’t be able to win, and I will likely always be chased with the term no matter where I go, what I do, or how long I stay in this country. But I’ve decided, at least for now, that I am not going to accept being called a mzungu. To simply ignore it, or pretend it’s acceptable is to give in to the term – to implicitly recognize the legitimacy of it.
At one point I debated whether I should try to turn the tables on people who use the term – to come back with something like “mzaliwa,” which means “native,” an expression you’ll often read used by white Europeans and Americans in old books on safari hunting in East Africa and Tanganyika. But as bothered as I am by the mzungu term, I can’t seem to throw around similar epithets. Not only would I personally be disgusted with myself, it seems more likely to anger people than to make them realize the error of their own ways. And that’s one of the funny things about such labels. We’re so quick to use them, but so offended when they’re applied to us. I guess it’s easy for ourselves to ignore the double-standard in such reactions.
Merritt and I have accepted a whole set of new struggles in our daily existence in volunteering for the Peace Corps here in Tanzania (from dealing with the bureaucracy of a federal agency, to the challenge of having to learn a new language, to the problem of securing enough reliable clean water). But neither of us foresaw that the feeling of being an outsider, a foreigner – someone to be stared and pointed at – would be the single hardest obstacle to assuming a normal life here in Tanzania. We continue to try to integrate – by learning the language and culture, dressing and acting appropriately, and telling people about the nature of our work here – but there seems to be a barrier arising out of our skin color that may ultimately prove insurmountable.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
