Monday, July 13, 2009

Maisha Mazuri (Good Life)

Hey all my fans!!!! I don't really have time to post a detailed blog right now, and I don't think I could accurately recount all that's happened in the last 3 weeks even if I tried. So I'll try to be concise yet hilarious using handy dandy bullet points:

Interesting Things That Have Happened to Me in TZ So Far
  • Getting charged by a water buffalo
  • Scorpion in the choo (pit toilet) my first day at my host family
  • Bat living in the choo
  • Seeing a crocodile in the river while sitting on a rock washing clothes
  • Teaching my host family how to make spaghetti and them loving it(Cultural exchange woot!)
  • My host family me telling me every day that I'm "numba moja kwa Kiswahili" aka the best at speaking Kiswahili in my village and they're proud of me
  • Getting my hair braided by my aunt while sitting on the ground outside looking up at a million stars
  • Watching crazy Swahili music videos called "Taarab" and listening to Bongo Flava
  • eating ugali at EVERY meal....ughhhhhh
  • naming a baby after my brother...that's right Tim
  • eating everything with my hands out of communal plates (including the aformentioned spaghetti)
  • being the daughter of Mama Bonge (aka Big Mama), a witch doctor
  • getting to watch Mama Bonge heal people using herbs, smoke, chickens, chanting, and all this crazy stuff
  • watching a "scanner" ceremony in which people were speaking in tongues and going into comas due to "evil spirits" being in them
  • cooking everything over a fire and taking bucket baths every morning
  • riding my bike in a skirt and khanga because only prostitutes wear pants
  • hearing about people in my village being attacked by pythons and crocodiles at the aformentioned river
  • teaching all the little kids at my house the hokey pokey, the shark song, peace like a river, if you're happy and you know it, and any other song I can remember from childhood. THE KIDS HERE MAKE MY LIFE!!!!!
  • learning tons of kid songs in Swahili from them
  • carrying my baby nephew on my back in a khanga like a Tanzanian woman and everyone loving it
  • learning Swahili from our teacher Chacha Busada (aka Chacha the Wise) every day
  • speaking all Kiswahili with my family and actually being understood most of the time (though understanding them is harder)
  • it being absolutely BEAUTIFUL everywhere!!!!!!!!
  • making up songs with my fellow trainees
  • eating a whole plate of chocolate peanut butter soup on the day we did experimental cooking
  • 34 Americans singing the National Anthem together in the middle of a field in TZ on the 4th of July
  • totally impressing the Country Director when she came to visit by showing her my house and Mama Bonge telling her that I'm "like her own daughter and she can't imagine me leaving"
  • haven't been really sick yet, but my GI tract is definitely on constant high alert
  • basically just being a total DBA living with no power, water, anything, and loving it (most of the time)

Basically, I've survived a month in TZ! This week I have my placement interview and my Swahili midterm (not worried) then we are going to the beach for a mini vacation Friday-Sunday! It's awesome but hard living with a host family and having them constantly checking up on me so a break is definitely in order! After that we have 1 more week of language, 1 week of tech training, and then we find out our placements! CANNOT WAIT to know where I'll be for the next 2 years. After that we shadow current volunteers for a week then come back to Dar for Swearing-In on August 19th. So the time is ticking down!!! I promise I'll try to post pictures soon but I haven't busted out my camera with my host family yet so I don't have too many. Life is good, crazy, and I love it. Miss you all so much though and hope all is well back home! Write me!

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