A Month In - Possible Sites

After more than a month of anxious speculation, Merritt and I recently got some good news about a site and work assignments. After hearing some sketchy details when we first found out about our placement to Tanzania, on Monday we learned that Merritt will be working, as a Peace Corps volunteer, for a government organization that is co-funded by the U.S. CDC Global Health Department and the Tanzanian Ministry of Health – where she'll be teaching public health trainers and developing public health training programs, largely in the field of HIV/AIDS education. It all sounds very interesting, and I am really excited for her. Apparently it's a new cooperative venture for the Peace Corps Tanzania, and Merritt was specially requested to be sent here for the job.

It also means that we'll not have the typical Peace Corps experience, as we will be living in a town rather than some small village, with to our surprise, running water and electricity. The two possible towns are Mbeya and Mtwara, which are both in southern Tanzania, the first high up in the mountains (approx. 5,600’) and known to be the coldest spot in the country, and the latter on the coast, slightly smaller, and considerably hotter.

Mbeya has about 270,000 residents and is known as a key transportation and trading center, with the Tanzam Highway and Tanzara Railway running through the town, and located near Tanzania's boarders with Zambia and Malawi. Though described as a “bustling” and “scruffy” town, it's also apparently “highly scenic,” given its location in a gap between the Mbeya and Poroto Mountains. Coffee, tea, chocolate, and bananas are all grown in the region.

Mtwara, on the other hand, is located near the boarder with Mozambique, and is smaller in population (around 70,000). Apparently the town was originally a small fishing port, but the infrastructure was greatly expanded after World War II, by the British, as part of an effort to develop the local groundnut oil industry. Though the venture largely failed, the region has had somewhat of a recent revival, thanks to the tourism industry.

Merritt and I will be sent to one of these towns, another trainee, who worked as a nurse in the U.S., will be sent to the other. The decision will largely hinge, it seems, on what kind of job they can find for me. The Peace Corps’ Tanzanian Program is not really designed to work at the town-level, being almost exclusively based at the village level. And the Peace Corps country staff, when they learned that they were getting two special health trainees, did not actually know that one of them was married and would be accompanied by her husband. So it seems like that it has been somewhat of a scramble to find an assignment for me, but the good news is that I may also be working with an NGO and perhaps using my legal background to some degree.

One possibility, which I have expressed strong interest in, is working in Mtwara in the area of fisheries and marine resource management. There is a newly designated marine reserve just off the coast, the Mnazi Bay-Ruvumu Estuary Marine Park, which could be a good source for potential projects for me, but the director of the Peace Corps environmental program here in Tanzania needs to find a counterpart with whom I can work, so it still remains up in the air. Either way, Merritt feels it will work out well for us, and we’re both really excited about her assignment, and
hopeful about mine.

Well, a month into training, and a month to go. Merritt and I are excited to learn where exactly we’ll be stationed for the next two years, and to finally get there. Training has been a challenge, with the intense language work, the administrative bureaucracy that exists even with the Peace Corps all the way here in Tanzania, and with adapting to a vastly different culture. Our host family is very kind and welcoming, but the differences nevertheless exist and we have tried hard to bridge the gulf between us. Not being able to really communicate is the most challenging and frustrating. While I am glad to have the home stay experience, I feel that it would be more valuable if I had learned more Kiswahili prior to arriving. My host “Baba” speaks decent English, though I hate to make him work hard, particularly after he’s worked a long day at his shamba(farm), but the conversations we have after dinner, in what I’ve come to call “Swanglish,” have been really enlightening – learning about the economics of orange farming here in the Tanga Region, marriage customs in Tanzania, the superstitions surrounding albinos, the history of the village, and his work as a sub-village elder. But if I could speak even passable Kiswahili, I could really learn a lot from this experience. Having essentially no language skills, beyond basic survival Kiswahili, means I can only hold the most basic of conversations before I am at the end of my abilities, even after a month of language classes. It’s not that hard a language to learn, grammatically speaking, but the vocabulary makes it like learning Chinese or Arabic – there are a few English-derived words, but other the rest is a syllabic “shagalabagala” – with the entire language seemingly based around the hundred or so possible consonant-vowel combinations. So learning vocab, which grammar aside,is the basis of any conversation, is a slow and challenging process.

But Merritt and I are slowly getting a grasp on the language, and feel, after some uncertainty, as though we will eventually be able to master the language, though it will probably take a year or so, if we work at it. We had our mid-training exams on Friday, and we both feel like we did reasonably well.

The best part about reaching the midway point of training is that it means we get to take a break this weekend, so I am writing this from the beautiful seaside resort of Mkoma Bay, just north of the small village of Pangani, which is about 55 kilometers south of the town of Tanga. Owned by a couple, one of whom happens to be a former Peace Corps volunteer and the other a Dutch ex-pat, Mkoma Bay is a mid-range resort with a dozen or so raised tents, a half dozen stone “bandanas” and one large house with three real bedrooms, but which can sleep many more. Forty of our Peace Corps training group, all except one loner, have rented the entire resort, with the help of the owner’s generosity (and what now seems their likely relief to have the business). With kayaks and bikes, and a bar and pool on a small cliff overlooking the Indian Ocean, the place seems a million miles from our “vijiji” (i.e., villages), and is a welcome relief from what has been a pretty intense first month of language and cultural training.

Our first night here, after arriving at sunset, our group quickly made there way down to the beach for a night swim in the Indian Ocean, my first time in its warm, salty waters. As the stars came out, I learned that the constellation I’ve been confused about for a month is actually the Southern Cross. After coming up from the beach, we found dinner waiting for us, on the deck next to the pool, where the stars looked even brighter.

While the resort’s bar is overpriced, they are kind of skimping on the food, and the internet is not anywhere close to what I’d hoped for, we’re a happy lot, and some of us our already dreading the idea of returning to our home stays.

But with a month of training left, one week of which will be spent on shadow, it seems like the end is insight, and soon we can have the kind of personal freedom that this weekend is really reminding us that we’re missing. Just getting to wake up with an entire unplanned day before me made me realize what’s been the most difficult part of
training.

We have been living with our new host family for 4 days now and I have to say that life is sooooo much different than it used to be. I'm not even sure where I should begin!

I will walk you through the typical day...
We wake up when the rooster outside our bedroom window crows (around 5:30 am). The women in the house do all the work so our 'mama' is already up at this time sweeping the courtyard. I put my earplugs in and try to sleep for another 30 minutes. Right when I get up, I sweep our room and then its off the the 'Choo' to take a bucket bath. To walk to the choo I have to wear a Khanga, basically it is 2 pieces of cloth that look like 2 giant bandanas, one is tied around the waist and the other is worn over my shoulders. The women here wear these Khangas everywhere. The choo is right outside and basically it is a cement rectangular room that has a hole in the ground (where everyone goes to the bathroom) and then it has a little area to hang your khanga as you take a bucket bath.

Surprisingly I really like bucket baths... my 'mama' or 'dada'(swahili for sister) will bring me a big bucket of water that has a small pitcher in it, and basically you just take a shower, using the pitcher to drizzle the water over your head. Short hair definitely makes the bucket bath quick and easy. Moss takes his bucket bath after me and then we have 'Chai'/breakfast together before school.

The first two days we each got 5 pieces of white bunny bread covered in butter for breakfast...Not my favorite, but bread is considered a nice breakfast by Tanzanian standards, because it is a manufactured product that is not easy to come by as there are no ovens around here. This morning we each got a huge plate of pasta with one hardboiled egg on top. It was actually pretty tasty. Oh and I forgot to mention that we eat with our hands! No silverware for us! And even more tricky is the fact that you are only allowed to eat with your right hand...it's not an easy task! Cracking and peeling a hard boiled egg this morning with one hand was pretty funny.

The reason for this one hand craziness is that they reserve their left hand for the bathroom only...that's right...they don't have toilet paper so they use water and their hand when they go to the bathroom. So their left hand is basically off limits for everything else. Moss and I stocked up on T.P. so we haven't had to experience this part of the Tanzanian culture.

So, after chai/breakfast we walk to school - the first day our baba (kiswahili for father) walked us to school, and the next day our mama walked us to school. On the way to school we greet and talk to almost everyone we see. We are at school learning kiswahili from 8am to 4:00/4:30pm. Moss and I are in separate language classes, but we are still right next door to each other. We each have 4 other people in our class and then all ten of us have a chai break together at 10am and then a lunch break at 12:30. Durning Chai we are served chapati and fried bread, and then lunch is normally rice and beans. After school we all walk home together and an army of kids follow us everywhere. There is a group of about 30 kids following our every move... it's a funny site. Whenever we talk to them in kiswahili, they just laugh and laugh....

When Moss and I get home we either play soccer with our kakas(brothers) or cook with our mama and dadas (sisters). Our family has 7 kids, 3 girls and 4 boys whose ages range from 2 to 16. Their names are Mwanshamba, Fatuma, Mwanaidi, Jango, Afizi, Kasimu, and Yusuph. The kids here are so well behaved... it just amazes me. They have very little, yet they are incredibly happy, kind, and helpful.

Oh, I forgot to mention the fact that all the cooking takes place outside in an open tinshed on a small 'jiko' which is simply a circle of rocks that prop up the pot or pan with wood burning beneath it. It amazes me that our mama can cook so many different meals on rocks and wood.

After playing, cooking, or studying, we each take another bucket bath, and then its time for our dinner which is always an interesting experience. Our baba(father), Moss, and I all eat together at a small table in the front sitting room, while our 4 brothers sit on the floor next to us and eat off of one big communal plate. Sadly our 3 sisters and mama eat on the floor in a small bedroom. In the Islamic culture the men and the women do not eat together, but I guess since I am a guest they make an exception to this rule. I asked our baba if I could go eat with the girls and he said "kesho, baadaye" which means tomorrow or later/another day... but he has avoided the topic ever since I asked. It really amazes me how strong the gender roles are in Tanzania. The women work their butt off all day long to wait on and serve the men... I'm so glad I was born in America!

After dinner Moss and I head to our room to study and we are normally in bed by 10pm...

So that's a typical day for us here in Tanzania.... it's definitely different, but all and all things are going really well and I am loving this experience. I do miss you all. XOXOX

Morning Run

Fresh back from a morning run out to the neighboring town of Lina – about 3 miles one-way. Merritt and I have taken up running before sunrise with one of the other Peace Corps trainees, a woman our age from San Francisco named Dana. As an alternative to stumbling over the clay-packed, rutted trails in village, we have started to run out past the Ministry of Agricultural Training Institute (MATI), where the Peace Corps group classes are held once a week, taking a left at the split in the road, where the local Roman Catholic Church is located, and down into and up the other side of the valley that runs back towards the way we came.

On the ridge at the other side of the valley, the small town of Lina is comprised of a dozen or so buildings, and another half dozen in the process of being built. When we arrive in town, we’re hailed with “habari” by the villagers out sweeping around their house. From the little crest on which their village sits, one can see into the next valley, and out towards Muheza and Amani Nature Preserve, which encompasses a lone mountain ridge that represents the easterly extent of the Usambara Mountains, which are a part of Tanzanian’s Eastern Arc Mountains. Turning around,one can see east towards the flats that stretch out to the Indian Ocean. By the time we are coming back into Kijiji Mkanyageni, the sun is just coming up, marking the begin to another day in our life as transplant Tanzanians.

Early Impressions

Almost a week now at our home stay, though it feels like a near eternity – to say nothing for how long ago it seems since we stepped off the plane into the hot, sticky air of Dar es Salaam. I remember thinking in the States how quickly time seemed to pass – week after week, month after month. But here, in village life, time seems to go by in a crawl – none of the hustle and bustle of America. Many of the Peace Corps volunteers we have met that are already working in country have commented how it seems like only yesterday that their service began. But after only two weeks, it’s hard to even imagine all the adventures that our 27 months of service will entail. And I don’t see life here becoming anything close to “routine,” though I am sure it must seem that way for the villagers.

One aspect of Tanzanian culture that I have come to enjoy is the people’s appreciation for proverbs and other short, pithy expressions. On one of our first days in the country, one of the other Peace Corps trainees and I were stopped at the Msimbazi Center by a local student who asked us if we could list any English idioms that we knew. We complied as best we could – e.g., to rain cats and dogs, to see the light, to be there in a pinch, quick and dirty – but honestly, I had never really thought about such phrases before this girl’s question. However after living in Tanzania and learning swahili for a little over two weeks, I understand why she had been assigned the question. Tanzanians love those kinds of short sayings and proverbs – they serve as the chorus to their musical language. And as an obvious “mzungo” (i.e., foreigner, or more specifically, white person) I can bring any group of Tanzanians to hysterics by simply repeating one of their common proverbs, which the Peace Corps swahili teachers have wisely made it a
point to include as part of language and culture training.

The following are some of the proverbs, idioms, and other expression that I’ve come to find useful, or just enjoy saying, in our short time here:
• “Haraka haraka haina baraka.” – “Haste has no speed.”
• “Pole pole ndiyo mwuendo.” – “Slowly is the speed.”
• “Mtoto umleavyo ndivyo akuavyo.” – “How you raise your child is how he/she grows.”
• “Siku njema huonekana asabuhi." – “A good day is seen in the morning.”
• “Nimelala fo fo fo” – I slept like a log.
• “Shaghalabaghala” – adverb; commonly translated as “in disorder,” but literally meaning a hot, sticky mess

We made it to TANZANIA! Whoo-hoo!

We have been here for a week now and I must say that so far everything is amazing! Well everything except the heat and humidity. One would think I should be used to it by now because New Orleans is crazy hot, but it’s a lot different without AC.

For this first week we have been living and training in the Msimbazi Center, which is a huge Christian Center in Dar es Salaam that is probably a little smaller than the Rhodes College campus. We were asked to stay in the gates of the center for the week so we can get all our shots and get prepared for life outside the gates... We have been learning about the Tanzanian people, the culture, and the language... it has been really interesting...

One thing that they have stressed is the importance of greetings. Whenever you pass anyone on the street or just walking in the opposite direction you are expected to greet them. If not, it is flat out rude. If this person is older than you, you must say: “Shikamoo” which means I respect you my elder, if they accept this greeting they will respond, “Marahaba,” which means I glad that you respect me. Greetings can go on for more than 5 minutes, which means that getting from one place to another often takes much longer than expected. In the U.S. we are so used to just walking from place to place without greeting each other, but here it is essential.

Another thing that will take some getting used to is the food. Everything is starchy and/or fried.... just what I love! Here is the average menu:

Breakfast @ 7:30:
-Fried bananas/plantains
-Fried cornbread balls
-Sambusa (fried ground beef shaped in the form of a triangle)
-White bunny bread with jelly
-Hot dogs (on the days that sambusa is not served)

Chai break @ 10:
-Chia Tea
-Coffee in the powdered form
-Fried circular things with meet or veggies inside
-Muffins (only once did they have yummy muffins)

Lunch @ 12:30:
-Boiled plantains (when boiled they taste just like potatoes, when fried they taste like a sweet hard banana)
-Potatoes
-White rice
-Beans
-Chicken or beef mixture to put on rice
-Stir fried onions with a little bit of greens

Dinner @ 7:00
-Exactly the same as lunch
-On the good days there is watermelon for dessert

Not exactly my ideal menu, but I’m growing to like just plain rice and beans. I must say that I am really looking forward to moving into our own house in two months, because then we can have our own garden and I can have vegetables again!!!

We are actually leaving the Msimbazi Center tomorrow and we will be moving to Mkanyageni, Tanga to live with our host family, Mr. and Mrs. Akida A. Mbaruku. We will be there for two months and have intense training. I don't think I will have internet access while in Tanga, so I might not be able to update you all for a while. Hope life is going well in the U.S. Miss you.

XOXOX

Merritt

Packing and Getting Ready

The Peace Corps gives us a pretty detailed list of the packing essentials, but it's still not an easy task deciding exactly what to bring for the next two years of life. We each get to bring two bags, and each bag can't weigh more than 40lbs. So that's a total of 80lbs of luggage that we must be able to carry on our backs. That's a little intimidating... I am going to try to pack light, but that's not a strength of mine and all the random stuff adds up in weight.

My mom and I went to Walmart the other day and bought all the little things, like a 2 year supply of tooth paste, deodorant, face wash, and toys for the kids. So in addition to clothes, outdoor gear, and presents for the family we will be living with for two months, we also need to bring kitchen items like spices, measuring cups, and the kicker... Moss found a 5lb cast iron skillet- it's heavy!

Here's a glimpse of our packing process:




In addition to packing, we have been doing a number of other things to prepare for the journey. I sold my car on Thursday, canceled auto insurance, health insurance, and subscriptions. I also chopped off my hair! I figured my hair products alone probably weigh close to 5lbs, so that's one reason why I decided to take the plunge and just cut it off. It's definitely not the most attractive look, but hey I will most probably be living in the bush with no running water or electricity, so looking cute is not going to be a priority.

So far the hardest part about getting ready to leave is the "Goodbyes." I will miss my family and friends so much!

That's the latest news for now. I will have to update you when we get to Tanzania.
XOXO

The Journey Begins...

We leave in 6 days!!! In less than a week from today we will be heading to Philly to meet the rest of the Peace Corps volunteers going to Tanzania. I think it will be about 35 or 40 people in our training group. We will all spend one day in Philly for "Staging" where they prepare us for the journey to Tanzania. They give us a few shots and then we are off.

We are traveling by bus the following day (June 15) to JFK airport, and then we fly to Zurich, Switzerland and on to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. We will spend our first 2 months in "Training" living with a host family in a village outside of Dar es Salaam. In training we learn about the Tanzanian culture, about safety issues, and about how to speak the language- Swahili (the language in the Lion King- Hakuna Matata). We will be eating a lot of rice & beans along with another staple in their diet- Ugali (corn mush)....yummm! I'm sure we will also be taking a number of bucket/sponge baths, as it is likely that there will not be running water or electricity.

We already have our tickets, and so now the packing fun begins.

Background Info

After two years of applying to the Peace Corps- with applications, interviews, doctors, dentists, and a crazy amount of paperwork- we finally got invited to go to Tanzania, Africa!

Moss will be working as an Environmental Extension worker doing Environmental Education and Sustainable Agriculture in Rural Communities. Our welcome packet describes his job as follows:

"As an Environmental volunteer, you will be helping to raise awareness of environmental conservation, assist village communities in effectively managing their natural resources, and promote sustainable agriculture practices. You will teach soil improvement techniques, agroforestry, bee-keeping, and fish farming. You will work to improve vegetable gardening... You will teach farmers how to construct and use appropriate technologies such as energy-efficient stoves. And you will promote improved livestock practices, including raising goats, cows, and pigs."

I will be working on the Health Education Project as a Health Education Extension Worker. Our welcome packet describes my job as follows:

"The purpose of the Health Education Project is to assist the Tanzanian government to improve the health of Tanzanians, especially in rural communities, by promoting Primary Health Care and healthy behavior among community members, particularly to out of school youth, students, teachers, service providers and community groups....
As a Health Education Volunteer you will help to support their communities to combat tuberculosis, diarrheal diseases, malaria and malnutrition as well as encouraging income- generating projects for people affected by HIV and AIDS, including Orphans and Vulnerable Children."

Sounds like we have exciting tasks ahead of us! It is also common for Peace Corps volunteers to have secondary projects outside of their primary jobs, so Moss and I are thinking about starting some sort of sports team... maybe basketball/soccer/kickball...who knows. I will keep you updated.

XOXO,

Merritt