1. Twenty people. Zero relatives.
2. White Elephant gift-giving game without manipulative strategies or loud screaming/bad salesmanship/accusations of theivery.
3. As of 10:00 on Christmas morning, three chickens and a duck were alive in the courtyard. By noon, we had slaughtered them all. By 7:00 in the evening, the chickens were fried and the duck was baked. We ate them all.
4. Christmas dinner by candlelight...because there is no other light.
5. Sleeping on concrete and wooden slats.
6. Laura's 2007 Christmas Tree = 2-foot high neon-lit palm tree (picture the window of a dive bar) draped with a wooden candycane garland. The neon lights on the tree twinkled not because they were supposed to but because the electricity from the single, small solar panel at the house I was at didn't suffice to keep them lit.
7. Human-biting (and human-eating, according to the Discovery Channel) ants called "siafu" crawling into people's pants.
8. Pouring kerosene in the doorway to keep out the human-eating ants while we slept on the concrete floor.
9. Collecting rain water in buckets.
10. None of the following of my favorite things were involved: gift-giving, tree-trimming, marching around my parents' family room like a doofus, a chocolate fountain, (truly) twinkling Christmas tree lights, family, endless boxes of Christmas ornaments, butter cookies, apple pie, and many more.
While it's really hard not to miss my traditions, sometimes it's important to embrace the different.
First Christmas in Tanzania = Different.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Sunday, December 23, 2007
There Won't be Snow in Africa this Christmastime
Ah Christmas. You feel it in your bones, according to the soundtrack of a certain trendy-becoming-classic holiday movie. You feel the nip of the frost and the snuggly, goodwill sensation evoked by the white flake-covered ground, by the colorful reflection of the lights draped carefully over trimmed and watered landscaping, by the fresh scent of pine that emanates from berry-freckled garlands and wreaths.
Or, if you're me, in Tanzania, you feel the hot equator sun scorching your SPF-30 lathered skin, even through the bone-rattling more-than-mile-high winds. And although there are muddy puddles off which the lights could reflect, they don't, because lights require electricity, and that's something we just don't have out here in the bush. Nor do we have much Christmas spirit. Aside from the occasional cheesy rendition of "Jingle Bells," I haven't heard a single holiday song, and most of my neighbors still don't know what their plans are for celebrating (although at least one has plans to stay home, eat pilau - an Indian spiced-rice dish that they cook on special occasions, and drink soda). I have a stuffed snowman, a miniature tree, a wooden candy-cane garland and a single ornament (along with some red and green M&Ms...mmm), and the most decorated house on the block ("block").
I don't mean to complain, really. I'm learning to enjoy it here; I've even found some pleasure in cooking over a charcoal stove. My best dish so far is probably my cream of tomato and potato soup, which not only sounds nice because it rhymes but also contains some protein because I thicken it (that's the "cream" part) with a powered milk substance called Nido. It is rivalled by my garlic-cheese rice, though, which I can only make within a 24-hour period of leaving town, due to my lack of refrigeration. I also enjoy making chiapattis - another Indian dish that they eat ALL the time - which are basically really fatty, fried pancakes. But I make them with water, not oil, and I splurged 7,500 shillings on a non-stick pan so that I don't have to cook them in oil, either. So they're basically just eggless pancakes.
Another reason I can now enjoy cooking is because I got a cabinet made that has a mini-countertop so that I don't have to squat or sit on the floor like a Tanzanian. Speaking of furniture, I also got a cabinet made for my bedroom, in which I put all of my clothes, which got moldy from the inconquerable moisture that hangs in the air, and, as I found out, especially in between wooden shelves. Now, I'm waiting on five more pieces of furniture, ordered from the same carpenter. I'm also making some other house-oriented progress: I hung curtains, and fabricated running water (using buckets, spigots, and a knife) in the main house and in the choo (that's my toilet room). Once I've finished decorating, I'll try to include some before and after photos so you can all compliment my resourceful style.
In other news, a not-atypical example of the expectations Tanzanians have of white people. Last Sunday morning, at 6am, I was lying in bed half-asleep, debating trekking out to my choo to pee. I was leaning toward dealing with the discomfort of my bladder in favor of the cozy warmth of my flannels, hoodie, and two blankets, when there was a "Hodi!" outside my door ("Hodi!" is what they shout instead of knocking). I ignored it. It was a student; I could tell by the voice, and I couldn't think of any reason a student would need me, specifically me, the new mzungu teacher who barely knows the language or the school grounds and hasn't even read the nationally-regulated syllabus yet. But she hodied again. And again. When she switched to "Please Madame may I come in?" I thought maybe there was an emergency. So I yelled "Subiri! (Wait!)", put on a kanga (a piece of cloth the tie around my waist because it's unacceptable for me to be seen in pants), and looked out my window. It was, in fact, a student, but not one from my school (the uniform was different). Stupidly, I opened the door anyway. The girl, maybe 14, was standing on my porch in her neon pink school sweater at 6 o'clock on a Sunday morning WITH HER SHOES ON (a strict no-no in a country where there is dirt everywhere, dirt/insects are synonymous, and cleaning a house is a full-time job because by the time you finish the second room, the first is dirty again). Anyway, I was pissed. "Karibu (Welcome)," I said, not meaning it. "Please Madame, mother mine is very poor. No has fees my study. Help you." Confused, I told her to switch to Kiswahili. She explained that her family is poor and can't afford to send her to school, although she had been accepted to one of the top private girls' schools in the country. Then she handed me three letters, all from different people, two in incoherent English, the other in Kiswahili too advanced for me to understand, but the salutations on all three read "Dear Mzungu." I also noticed that the letters were actually written to the mzungu (another PCV) who teaches at the school where she had been accepted. At this point, I was too confused and too tired, had to pee too badly to question what she was doing at my house in the bush when both the school to which she had been accepted and the mzungu to whom the letters were written were in a large town about four hours south. And I certainly wasn't going to pay her school fees. So I told her I couldn't help her and sent her away. Then I swept my porch, peed, and went back to bed.
Anyway, if you've made it to the end of this post, that probably means you really love me. So I take this opportunity to make my own solicitation: please, if you write a letter, include wall decorations. Anything from magazine pictures to funny headlines to photos or doodlings that might amuse me. My walls are depressingly blank. And if a bar of dark chocolate or another American treat happens to slip its way into the envelope, it will probably get eaten by someone, somewhere ;).
Let me know what else to write about! I can't imagine that you care about this stuff, so let me know what you do care about and I'll write about it! Have a stellar holiday everyone! Signing off, xoxo...
PS. Thank you to Band Aid for the ripped-off title of this post.
Or, if you're me, in Tanzania, you feel the hot equator sun scorching your SPF-30 lathered skin, even through the bone-rattling more-than-mile-high winds. And although there are muddy puddles off which the lights could reflect, they don't, because lights require electricity, and that's something we just don't have out here in the bush. Nor do we have much Christmas spirit. Aside from the occasional cheesy rendition of "Jingle Bells," I haven't heard a single holiday song, and most of my neighbors still don't know what their plans are for celebrating (although at least one has plans to stay home, eat pilau - an Indian spiced-rice dish that they cook on special occasions, and drink soda). I have a stuffed snowman, a miniature tree, a wooden candy-cane garland and a single ornament (along with some red and green M&Ms...mmm), and the most decorated house on the block ("block").
I don't mean to complain, really. I'm learning to enjoy it here; I've even found some pleasure in cooking over a charcoal stove. My best dish so far is probably my cream of tomato and potato soup, which not only sounds nice because it rhymes but also contains some protein because I thicken it (that's the "cream" part) with a powered milk substance called Nido. It is rivalled by my garlic-cheese rice, though, which I can only make within a 24-hour period of leaving town, due to my lack of refrigeration. I also enjoy making chiapattis - another Indian dish that they eat ALL the time - which are basically really fatty, fried pancakes. But I make them with water, not oil, and I splurged 7,500 shillings on a non-stick pan so that I don't have to cook them in oil, either. So they're basically just eggless pancakes.
Another reason I can now enjoy cooking is because I got a cabinet made that has a mini-countertop so that I don't have to squat or sit on the floor like a Tanzanian. Speaking of furniture, I also got a cabinet made for my bedroom, in which I put all of my clothes, which got moldy from the inconquerable moisture that hangs in the air, and, as I found out, especially in between wooden shelves. Now, I'm waiting on five more pieces of furniture, ordered from the same carpenter. I'm also making some other house-oriented progress: I hung curtains, and fabricated running water (using buckets, spigots, and a knife) in the main house and in the choo (that's my toilet room). Once I've finished decorating, I'll try to include some before and after photos so you can all compliment my resourceful style.
In other news, a not-atypical example of the expectations Tanzanians have of white people. Last Sunday morning, at 6am, I was lying in bed half-asleep, debating trekking out to my choo to pee. I was leaning toward dealing with the discomfort of my bladder in favor of the cozy warmth of my flannels, hoodie, and two blankets, when there was a "Hodi!" outside my door ("Hodi!" is what they shout instead of knocking). I ignored it. It was a student; I could tell by the voice, and I couldn't think of any reason a student would need me, specifically me, the new mzungu teacher who barely knows the language or the school grounds and hasn't even read the nationally-regulated syllabus yet. But she hodied again. And again. When she switched to "Please Madame may I come in?" I thought maybe there was an emergency. So I yelled "Subiri! (Wait!)", put on a kanga (a piece of cloth the tie around my waist because it's unacceptable for me to be seen in pants), and looked out my window. It was, in fact, a student, but not one from my school (the uniform was different). Stupidly, I opened the door anyway. The girl, maybe 14, was standing on my porch in her neon pink school sweater at 6 o'clock on a Sunday morning WITH HER SHOES ON (a strict no-no in a country where there is dirt everywhere, dirt/insects are synonymous, and cleaning a house is a full-time job because by the time you finish the second room, the first is dirty again). Anyway, I was pissed. "Karibu (Welcome)," I said, not meaning it. "Please Madame, mother mine is very poor. No has fees my study. Help you." Confused, I told her to switch to Kiswahili. She explained that her family is poor and can't afford to send her to school, although she had been accepted to one of the top private girls' schools in the country. Then she handed me three letters, all from different people, two in incoherent English, the other in Kiswahili too advanced for me to understand, but the salutations on all three read "Dear Mzungu." I also noticed that the letters were actually written to the mzungu (another PCV) who teaches at the school where she had been accepted. At this point, I was too confused and too tired, had to pee too badly to question what she was doing at my house in the bush when both the school to which she had been accepted and the mzungu to whom the letters were written were in a large town about four hours south. And I certainly wasn't going to pay her school fees. So I told her I couldn't help her and sent her away. Then I swept my porch, peed, and went back to bed.
Anyway, if you've made it to the end of this post, that probably means you really love me. So I take this opportunity to make my own solicitation: please, if you write a letter, include wall decorations. Anything from magazine pictures to funny headlines to photos or doodlings that might amuse me. My walls are depressingly blank. And if a bar of dark chocolate or another American treat happens to slip its way into the envelope, it will probably get eaten by someone, somewhere ;).
Let me know what else to write about! I can't imagine that you care about this stuff, so let me know what you do care about and I'll write about it! Have a stellar holiday everyone! Signing off, xoxo...
PS. Thank you to Band Aid for the ripped-off title of this post.
Friday, December 7, 2007
My First Attempt at a Blog Entry...And Typing with a Broken Finger
"There is a Lonely Planet guide to my country. How remote could it be?"
- Me, July 2007
So here I sit, at an internet cafe in Njombe, Tanzania, the one-paved-road mountain community that Peace Corps calls my "banking town." There are, in fact, two banks, two gas stations, a post office, and two parallel roads (one of which is the paved one) flanked with small, over-the-counter shops, each selling more or less the same items at more or less the same negotiable prices. There is even one Western-style hotel, where you can get a hot shower straight from the tap if you stay up late enough or wake up early enough. So here I sit, at an internet cafe in Njombe, Tanzania, the most bustling bit of civilization I will see for at least the next six months.
I came here today in a vehicle Tanzanians call a "basi," or, for those not particularly linguistically inclined, a bus. It is not a bus. It is an extended VW van, as square as a school girl in penny loafers, with a roof rack on which the luggage conductor straps everyone's belongings and then sits himself. This vehicle, which comes by my school on the way to town once a day at 7:30am and leaves town to come back toward my village at 1:30pm, should not be confused with a daladala (from the Kiswahili word "dala," meaning "dollar," which was the fare when the vehicles were first introduced in Kenya), which is Tanzania's most common, regularly-running system of transportation. The daladala is a stretch minivan, curvier than the "basi," and usually with an elevated roof to allow passengers to stand. More on the daladala experience another day, as I want to describe my current residential situation.
I live in a row of ten teachers' houses, set back from the main (unpaved) road, on the other side of which is my school, a well-known, co-ed boarding secondary school that I cannot name due to Peace Corps regulations. My house is at the end of the row, about two plots away from my nearest neighbor, because my headmaster once heard that Americans value their privacy. There is one woman, a teacher's wife, who has clearly never heard this fact, because she has invited herself over every evening for the next week to teach me how to cook. Although I will not enjoy dumping a liter of oil into each of my dinners for the next week, I will very much appreciate lessons on cooking over a charcoal stove. Because Tanzanians insist on cooking inside, though, I might also come back to America brain damaged from carbon monoxide poisoning...and I've also been inhaling a lot of bug poison, because it's the only way to teach the little imps the difference between my space inside my house and the Great Outdoors.
Speaking of my house, it's the nicest one outside of town, I think. I have a walled-in courtyard (which I have to cross to get to my toilet - a ceramic basin in a concrete floor, my bathing room - a sizable cement room with a drain in the floor, and two other outdoor rooms for which I haven't yet chosen uses). I have an extremely large living room, and one or two guest bedrooms, depending on how I decide to use the space. I hung curtains in my bedroom the other day, and in doing so tumbled off of the wobbly chair I was standing on and broke my left middle finger. I splinted it myself, using a stick, and am hoping it heals straight. My nearest shop is about one kilometer away, which is pretty close. But I cannot buy any sort of food there, so I'm going to have to learn to garden vegetables, and then become a vegetarian.
This is, without question, the most beautiful landscape I have ever lived in, or seen, for that matter. In front of my house, there is emptiness for miles and miles until the emptiness commingles with the horizon, beyond which a claustrophobic, end-of-the-flat-earth sensation in my gut tells me there is only more emptiness. I never knew a person could feel claustrophobic from too much of nothing. But seriously, it's gorgeous. Behind my house, rolling hilltops of farmland end not with a horizon of nirvana, but with majestic mountain peaks. Pretty breathtaking for an American city girl.
So, I'm almost out of internet time, but until school starts on January 14th, I'll probably be in town fairly often, checking email and buying things for my large, empty house. Let me know what you all want to hear about next time; I am here only to please. Until next time, signing off...
- Me, July 2007
So here I sit, at an internet cafe in Njombe, Tanzania, the one-paved-road mountain community that Peace Corps calls my "banking town." There are, in fact, two banks, two gas stations, a post office, and two parallel roads (one of which is the paved one) flanked with small, over-the-counter shops, each selling more or less the same items at more or less the same negotiable prices. There is even one Western-style hotel, where you can get a hot shower straight from the tap if you stay up late enough or wake up early enough. So here I sit, at an internet cafe in Njombe, Tanzania, the most bustling bit of civilization I will see for at least the next six months.
I came here today in a vehicle Tanzanians call a "basi," or, for those not particularly linguistically inclined, a bus. It is not a bus. It is an extended VW van, as square as a school girl in penny loafers, with a roof rack on which the luggage conductor straps everyone's belongings and then sits himself. This vehicle, which comes by my school on the way to town once a day at 7:30am and leaves town to come back toward my village at 1:30pm, should not be confused with a daladala (from the Kiswahili word "dala," meaning "dollar," which was the fare when the vehicles were first introduced in Kenya), which is Tanzania's most common, regularly-running system of transportation. The daladala is a stretch minivan, curvier than the "basi," and usually with an elevated roof to allow passengers to stand. More on the daladala experience another day, as I want to describe my current residential situation.
I live in a row of ten teachers' houses, set back from the main (unpaved) road, on the other side of which is my school, a well-known, co-ed boarding secondary school that I cannot name due to Peace Corps regulations. My house is at the end of the row, about two plots away from my nearest neighbor, because my headmaster once heard that Americans value their privacy. There is one woman, a teacher's wife, who has clearly never heard this fact, because she has invited herself over every evening for the next week to teach me how to cook. Although I will not enjoy dumping a liter of oil into each of my dinners for the next week, I will very much appreciate lessons on cooking over a charcoal stove. Because Tanzanians insist on cooking inside, though, I might also come back to America brain damaged from carbon monoxide poisoning...and I've also been inhaling a lot of bug poison, because it's the only way to teach the little imps the difference between my space inside my house and the Great Outdoors.
Speaking of my house, it's the nicest one outside of town, I think. I have a walled-in courtyard (which I have to cross to get to my toilet - a ceramic basin in a concrete floor, my bathing room - a sizable cement room with a drain in the floor, and two other outdoor rooms for which I haven't yet chosen uses). I have an extremely large living room, and one or two guest bedrooms, depending on how I decide to use the space. I hung curtains in my bedroom the other day, and in doing so tumbled off of the wobbly chair I was standing on and broke my left middle finger. I splinted it myself, using a stick, and am hoping it heals straight. My nearest shop is about one kilometer away, which is pretty close. But I cannot buy any sort of food there, so I'm going to have to learn to garden vegetables, and then become a vegetarian.
This is, without question, the most beautiful landscape I have ever lived in, or seen, for that matter. In front of my house, there is emptiness for miles and miles until the emptiness commingles with the horizon, beyond which a claustrophobic, end-of-the-flat-earth sensation in my gut tells me there is only more emptiness. I never knew a person could feel claustrophobic from too much of nothing. But seriously, it's gorgeous. Behind my house, rolling hilltops of farmland end not with a horizon of nirvana, but with majestic mountain peaks. Pretty breathtaking for an American city girl.
So, I'm almost out of internet time, but until school starts on January 14th, I'll probably be in town fairly often, checking email and buying things for my large, empty house. Let me know what you all want to hear about next time; I am here only to please. Until next time, signing off...
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