29/10: Teaching

Today I went to work by myself and it actually went okay, though I was half an hour early. Today went much better than yesterday and I was pretty much in charge of the class, though it was Bevin who made the work. It was math today and most of them were really good. So what I did was check their work and help them if they had any mistakes. I will only be teaching until the 12^th of November because that is the graduation day. After that it will be a normal kindergarten. Today I brought lunch so after work I went to the cybercafé again and then home, when I got there I had hot chocolate with milk instead of water. A bit TFP6 in the evening – it is much more of a reality program than song contests usually are.  

28/10: First day of work (again)

I have to take two matatus to get to work a bit annoying, but it only takes some thirty minutes. The place I work is called St. Martins and has the slogan: Hard work pays. It is a preschool, with much more work than play. I wanted to do care more than teaching, but what I will be doing is mostly teaching, with a bit of care. I have the top class with a teacher called Bevin. Top class is the children that will go to standard one in January. I immediately saw who the bullies in the class are. One is them is Victoria, the only one I learned the name of because everybody kept repeating it. But otherwise they all seemed very sweet. I mostly just watched them the whole day, other than at their break because then I could play with them. We have to work every day from 8 am to 1 pm Monday to Friday. So at 1 pm or around there we left. When I say we it is because there is another volunteer at my project: Linn from Norway. I had forgotten to bring lunch and I didn’t want to go all the way back home just to come to town again. So I stayed in town and had lunch and went to a cybercafé. When I was done I took a matatu home. I had an afternoon nap and some tea before dinner. After dinner we saw Tusker Project Fame 6 (TPF6) which apparently comes every day.

27/10: Merica Hotel

For breakfast today there was bread, but not white bread, brown bread! After breakfast I just relax with a book until lunch. Did I say they serve cooked vegetables? Really good too with chips and meat. Then after lunch Charlene and I went to the Merica Hotel. One of the two places you can always find volunteers apparently. They have a swimming pool there, so I imagine many afternoons are spent there. Though I personally think I have gotten plenty of sun in Zanzibar. We were there from around 2 pm to 7 pm. It started raining about 3 pm and after that many of the others there were skyping and things like that. I read through almost my entire lonely planet guide book and I have some things I really want to do in the weekends that I have here. Dinner is always at 8 pm, so we came home for that. We took a piki-piki both ways. One for both of us. I have never taken one in Arusha, but Charlene trusts this guy John so I tried to do that too. Though why it should be less dangerous here than in Arusha I don’t know, but there is less traffic. By the way a piki-piki is a motorcycle.

26/10: Nakuru

Today I woke up to a new country, but it didn’t seem all that different. We got up early so that we could go to Nakuru in good time and have the city induction. Sarah, the other volunteer, have lost her baggage and she wasn’t feeling very well. But off we went with the matatu (basically a dala-dala) to Nakuru. It took us about 2.5 to 3 hours to get there. Once there we went straight to the office for our induction. I would have preferred to go to the family first, but it was good to get my Kenyan number because there is no more money on my Tanzanian. There is no where near as many volunteers here as in Tanzania, only about 15-20 I think. Sarah was still not feeling very well so we hurried a bit to get her to her Kenyan home. She is from the Netherlands and was on a straight flight from Amsterdam so it is weird that she lost her baggage. One dollar is under a hundred Kenyan shillings, she was so confused that even though we had been speaking about it she only took out 1000 shillings – a bit more than 10 dollars. After that we drove her home first and then me. The first thing I noticed was that there is a garden with grass, flowers and fake logs as decoration. Compared to the concrete garden that I’m used to this was quite something. I have my own room with a toilet and shower that presumably has hot water! It is quite incredible. I then relaxed until dinner. There is another volunteer living there, Charlene from France, she went out to dinner, but I was just too tired. So I had dinner with my new host Miriam. Miriam is a wealthy widow. She has four sons and five grandchildren. One son lives in the US and another in Canada. One is a doctor and the other a pharmacist. She herself is an employer and a nurse at her own hospital. Funnily enough it seems her husband was working with the same things as my dad. She seems really nice and open. After dinner we sat together in front of the television watching Tusker’s Project Fame season 6. It is an East African x-factor of sorts. Not everybody have a voice worth bragging about though. But it was fun even though I only saw the ending. After that I went to bed. I had already unpacked earlier and it felt really good to finally be able to do that – not having to live out of my bag any longer.

25/10: To Kenya

The children woke us up in the morning, but as I had to leave at 12 it didn’t matter. We ate breakfast and I finished my packing before we saw another movie. It was almost over when the taxi driver came. I thought it would be someone else, by the name of Mshana, but it was Ndessa, another driver I don’t know. Out of four drivers it has to be one of the two I don’t know. I then said goodbye to Laura and the family. Grace’s parting words were: “I hope you enjoy Kenya more than Tanzania.” I am not sure that was her exact words, but words to that effect. Laura and I looked at each other and I could see that we were both thinking: “what?!” I know the first three-four weeks weren’t the best I ever had. But after that I really enjoyed myself, though I never particularly did that in her company of course. We reached the airport an hour later. I then checked in, went through passport control and baggage control after they had called my flight. Then I just sat waiting for my flight, it came and suddenly I was in Nairobi. It was no problem getting the visa and getting my bags, but when I got out I couldn’t find anyone from Project Abroad. In the end I found her, she was just hiding far away with a little sign. Then we went to a guest house as there was another volunteer coming later. We will go to Nakuru together tomorrow.

24/10: Getting back

When we woke up we were met by rain, rain that kept coming down in incredible amounts. We were at the bus station at 8 am and we left/we were supposed to leave at 8:30 am. We had to pay more money to have our bags with us and then we were off. Stopping only for one break before we were in Arusha at 5 pm. Then we had a very quick goodbye before Laura and I got into a cab and went home, because the bus station was so busy and there were so many flycatchers. When we got home I started packing the rest of my stuff because I am leaving for Kenya tomorrow. It feels weird to get back, but having to leave again so soon and this time for good. Freja wrote me asking if we wanted to meet for dinner so we could have a proper goodbye for me. When we went to say that to Grace and Patrick we saw that Patrick was grilling meat for us, so we amended it to meeting for dessert afterwards. I had my last chocolate chip milkshake something that has been a kind of tradition for us. We talked, agreed to stay in touch and said goodbye. I had my last drive with Imma on the way home. I wanted him to be the one to drive me to the airport, but “it is not his turn” and “it wouldn’t be fair to the other drivers.” I said that was just bullshit (I surprised even myself in doing that), but she wouldn’t budge. Seriously what does it say about Project Abroad Tanzania that they won’t even let me drive to the airport with a driver I know and trust, but want me to go with someone I don’t even know instead? Nothing good, that are not worth all the money we spend on them and that is a lot. Why this? When we got back we watched a movie and went to sleep. My last night in Tanzania, for now.

 

23/10: Tanga

We stayed at Mkoma Bay for lunch because we wanted to savor the last of our time here to relax a bit more before going to Tanga. We wanted the taxi to come at 2 pm, so that we had time to buy bus tickets for tomorrow. They told is it would come at 2:30, but it didn’t come before after 3 pm. As it takes an hour to drive and we thought the office would close at 4 pm, we were a bit behind. Though we didn’t get to Tanga before 4 pm, we got bus tickets. We have never heard about the company before so it will be interesting. After buying the tickets we arrived at our hotel/motel: Motel Sea View. It seems like a nice place. Then we went to a supermarket and then to dinner. We ate dinner at the Mkonge Hotel. It was a really nice dinner, though we walked there and it got a bit dark. Then we went back to our accommodation so we could take a shower and get to bed early. There was no water at al so we could just go to bed early. 

22/10: Relaxation

This is our last full day of relaxation, so we enjoyed it to the fullest. Swimming, sunbathing, reading, sleeping, eating etc. we didn’t really do anything of great significance, but it was still a very good day.

21/10: Mkoma Bay

We started the day early as we had to take a boat to Pangani on the mainland at 7 am. There were some problems before we wanted to board that we solved. A lot of people were sitting close to our boat on the beach and at first I didn’t understand why, but as we were about to board someone came and said that the people wanted to go with us to Pangani for a funeral. But the boat really wasn’t that big, so we didn’t think everyone could fit without our bags getting wet or sinking, so we ended up having four people and a baby with us for the funeral. We felt kind of bad not taking more, but we didn’t want to jeopardize our safety. After 3-3.5 hours we arrived at Mkoma Bay. The beach and water was a disappointment after Zanzibar. Then we went up to the reception and the way was covered in leaves and dirt and it didn’t look very nice. We had arranged with the owner to have one double and one triple room with all separate beds. We did not get any of that. We got two double and one single and one of the double doesn’t even have separate beds. I had expected so much more from a place like this. If you can’t give us the rooms we book or separate the beds then tell us, it wouldn’t have been a problem if they had only told us in advance. But otherwise the place is very nice. We relaxed the rest of the day, me with a good book just as I like it. As it is half-board dinner is included, in the form of a three course meal! It was really good. There is only one other person here except the owner, so it is very quiet and peaceful. But that is what we need before we are back in Arusha in a few days.

20/10: Nungwi

Today we went to Nungwi. In Nungwi we are staying at Iben’s (Ameniel’s benefactor) ex-husbands place.  She sounded like it was really good. But it is not. We have one room in total with only two beds and Swahili style bathing and flushing. So we were not impressed at all. And we had low expectations. After that we went to Nungwi to see the town. It wasn’t all that interesting we had lunch and then went to another place for milkshake and stayed there until dinner. For dinner we went to Langi Langi because the others had seen their sign out in front and it said all kinds of funny things. We were sitting outside on their terrace and because it was high tide there was water beneath us. We sat and watched the sunset and had good food before going back to where we are staying, we have talked about that we think that it is supposed to be a hotel or bed and breakfast that is just not done yet. Tomorrow we are leaving Zanzibar and going to Pangani. It is weird how our vacation is almost at an end.

19/10: Mnemba

Today we had breakfast at 6:30 am and we were off from Mohammed’s place at 7 am. Our first boat was really small, but that was because the tide was so low at that time of day. We changed to a bigger boat and got our gear a little while later. Mnemba is a private Island and only guests staying at the island lodge can visit, but everyone can snorkel. As we got close to the island we saw dolphins. There was so many of them it was crazy. Two guests from the lodge were just walking on the beach when they saw them and ran back from the beach. We thought it was to get their cameras. It wasn’t. They got some snorkeling gear and they just came running back again and straight into the water with the dolphins. They could just go directly from their hotel and into the water you swim with dolphins, how cool is that? Some of the others got in, but the dolphins swam away really fast as they weren’t used to it. Like the dolphins they saw the other day were. After that we went to the snorkeling place. I got over my initial fear really fast because it was just so incredible. There was a lot of different species of fishes and coral. We went in two times and I stayed there the longest both times. It was just so much fun and there was so much to see! To say the least I was a big fan this time around. After snorkeling we went to a beach right next to the island bit a beach that disappears during the high tide. So soon the water came so we couldn’t be there for long. After that we had to wait for the tide to change before we could go back to Matemwe. Once there we relaxed and I read a lot. I have missed reading. After snorkeling we talked about the lodge on the island. It costs 1550 dollars per night per person. But everything is included. It must be amazing being able to swim with dolphins and snorkel, just like that directly from the beach. It’s so going on my bucket list to spend a week there. It would be the ultimate honeymoon destination.

18/10: Matemwe

Today we went to Matemwe. On the way we stopped at the Kiwengwe-Pongwe forest. When I had asked Anna, a shareholder from Belgium, about it last night she had never heard about it before and thought I meant something else, even though she has been here two months a year for twelve years. But it does exist; it seems to be one of the less touristic places you can go here, we saw the caves in the forest. There were stalagmites and stalactites, though I always forget which is which, and thousands of bats. It was a bit too much for some, but I thought it was really interesting to see. After that we went looking for a supermarket or something because some were running low on sun scream. We thought it would be as good as impossible for our taxi driver to find one. But he did. Then we went to Matemwe. In Matemwe we were going to stay at Mohammed’s restaurant and bungalows. Getting there the taxi driver did have a bit of trouble, but we got there after asking I didn’t know how many different people about it. Mohammed should just put up the sign like all the other hotels. The guide book said that Matemwe is good for its white sands and village life. The village didn’t impress us a whole lot. When we got close we drove past a boy of about twelve standing with a butcher knife, when he say us he made a motion like he was going to cut his throat, but he was staring straight at us. A little while later Sofie was taking a picture out the window of a house or something, but a little away a group was sitting. It is never a good idea to take a picture of a person without asking, especially if they are Muslim.  One of the women in the group started yelling all kinds of weird things about a camera and it was the very angry kind of yelling. Mohammed is very nice and charming and so is the rest of his family after you get over the first stares. His bungalows are just back from the beach, so a very short walk away and there is a lot of seafood on the menu. After we ate lunch we just relaxed for the rest of the day. I slept a little, read and watched an episode of breaking Bad with Sofie. After dinner we had to go to bed early as we are going snorkeling tomorrow around the Mnemba atoll which is supposed to be really breathtaking, so let’s see how it goes.

17/10: Peacefulness

We stated the day with watching the sunrise. I took so many pictures its crazy. But it was really beautiful. The others went to a dolphin trip, but I stayed at the hotel because I know that they aren’t treated very well mostly and it would be way to deep water for me. It was good to be able to go back to sleep for a little while and to spend some time just by myself. I haven’t been really good at writing this since my computer broke, but now I’m up to date again. I also read a bit, relaxed and had lunch. Just as I came out after I had had more sleep three girls came over and started dancing, singing and writing in this book. It was a quiet day, a peaceful day, but the kind you really need sometimes. After dinner we just talked for a long time as the day drew to a close.

16/10: Santa Maria Coral Park

Today it is Eid, some kind of Muslim holiday connected to Abraham’s son or something. So we wanted to go to our next stop a bit early in the day. So we decided we might as well leave at 10 am, when we had to check out of the hotel anyway. We arrived at the Santa Maria Coral Park a bit more than an hour later. Santa Maria is a bit south of Pongwe on an amazing stretch of beach. Our bungalows have a view of the ocean. We didn’t really do much for the rest of the day other than relax. The others went out in the sun to tan, but I didn’t for obvious reasons. We had a really good and surprisingly cheap dinner, talked and listened to music before going to bed early, because we want to see the sunrise tomorrow.

15/10: Changuu (Prison Island)

Today we are going to Changuu or better known as Prison Island, but first Freja and I wanted to try to find a charger for her camera as she forgot hers in Arusha. We went to a store that seemed the best possibility. They had the camera, but didn’t want to sell her the charger alone. Which is understandable, they were just very rude about it. But we had to get back as we were leaving for Changuu at 10 am. We walked with the guide to the place where we had to take the boat from. Our price was only 20 dollars per person, so we didn’t expect miracles. When we got to the place where they boat was we borrowed some equipment from them. Then we started sailing we sailed for about half an hour before reaching Changuu. We started off with seeing the giant tortoises (turtles is way easier to say!). They were shipped here from the Seychelles in 1919. Some of them are way over a hundred years old. We had expected them to walk freely, but I see why they can’t do that since there have been a lot of robberies over the decades since they came to Zanzibar. After that we saw the prison, though apparently it isn’t the original. Then we went snorkeling. I am not at all good at swimming. I taught myself almost all I know, and that isn’t much. So getting in the water which was about five meters deep, deeper than I have ever been before, was terrifying. But I did it f course, because I believe that you should always try. I mean there is no shame in trying and failing, as long as you tried in the first place. It took even more courage to get away from the boat and every time I tried to really snorkel I could only do it for a couple of seconds at a time, because after that I was too scared that I would get too far away from the boat. So I stayed near the boat, but I was in the water as long as the others. I think that if it had been truly beautiful I could have done more, but it was very dark and green colors, nothing to keep me too interested. Talking about courage and things like that I am reminded of my mother: since I went to Tanzania she has biked 1320 kilometers and that was yesterday. Today I’m sure she has done a lot more. My fear today is nothing compared to the kind of things she has have to overcome in the last two-three months. After that we went to the beach on Changuu. It seems I really didn’t have enough sun scream on. At least now I have serious sunburns on my entire back and legs. So when we went out to dinner that night I could hardly sit down properly. We went to the Serena Inn because on Tuesdays they have a concert of original Zanzibar music and we stayed there to eat though it was really expensive. In the Lonely Planet guide it said that the staff was lackadaisical, but no more for sure. They were very attentive and it was a good night despite of the sunburn, though I had a bit of trouble concentrating on much other than the pain.

 

14/10: Stone Town

We had to take the ferry at 9:30 am this morning. So we were there an hour before like it said we should on the ticket. It took a while, but then we were on the boat in the VIP seating. At first we were like: “it’s cold!” in the good way, ten minutes later we were more like: “it’s really cold!” After about an hour and a half we arrived at the Zanzibar Town harbor. We were the last people to get out of the immigration office, but we did get out with a little help from our new friend. He even drove us to our accommodation at the Garden Lodge. We ate lunch at the breakfast terrace and afterwards we went out to explore Stone Town. We went down along the water’s edge to the old fort and the Forodhani garden. In the old fort we got henna tattoos after that it was already around 6 pm. We wanted to eat at the Forodhani garden because we knew that there would be a market of different foods to choose from. It was supposed to start at 7 pm, but there was some getting started at 6 pm. So I bought myself a Zanzibar pizza and enjoyed the view of the sea. Some brave (or cocky) boys were jumping into the sea, it didn’t seem deep enough by far which is probably why they didn’t dive with the head first. I felt like I was back on the Malecon in Havana again. Back then we were sitting at a hotel and we saw all these people sitting on the wall between the sea and the Malecon road. So we decided to go down and do the same. Once we were down there we choose a deserted part, but immediately a lot of people came to talk with us. We had to go soon after, but I remember it as a really great night. The same happened in the Forodhani garden; a guy came, George, and asked about our nationality and followed up with another question: “hvadhedderdu?” in one word. I was the only one, who got it at first, but we soon taught him all kinds of different things to say in Danish and he was actually kind of good at it. His friend Walex joined us and George even sang some Michael Jackson for us and he was actually quite good. It was nice to talk to people that didn’t want or need to sell us something for once. By then it was getting late and we had to get back to the hotel. Getting back we just talked for a while before going to sleep. A rather perfect day, something we really needed after the day before.    

13/10: Dar

Today we started off the day with a walk the Lonely Planet recommended. We went into the national Museum which was beautiful and I learned a lot. Then we continued the walk along the worst botanical garden I have ever seen. A bit after that a guy drove past us and told us we should be careful in that area. He was right. A couple of minutes later we walked past a side street. There were three boys there, they yelled something but I didn’t hear it, but Freja did and she started walking really fast. They yelled: “fuck you go!” or something when Freja told me I started to walk really fast too. I looked back and one of them was still there. And he had a stick or something in his hand. He kept up the same pace as us. We walked like that for a long time before we got somewhere with other people. But he just kept it up! Then we saw the Hyatt Regency Hotel (Kilimanjaro Hotel) and almost ran in there saying to the guard that there was someone following us. I think he could see we were serious so he let us go on. When we were at the door/entranceway we met some other employees and stood to look back telling them the same thing. In that moment our stalker walked past the gate and wanted to go to us, but the guard stopped him. We could see him pointing at us and screaming. None of us understood what we had done. We went into their café and had expensive cake and juice. Later one of the employees came to us and told us that the guy was literally crazy. That didn’t really make it better at all. We didn’t really want to leave again, but we did as we have to buy tickets for the ferry tomorrow. We asked them to go with us to the gate to make sure the guy wasn’t there anymore. Luckily he wasn’t so we walked to the ferry office. There is only one legitimate office in Dar to buy the tickets, so we went there. Back in Arusha people had told us we should leave our passports at home, Laura and I had decided in the last moment to bring ours in case of an emergency, but the others didn’t. Apparently you can’t go to Zanzibar without your passport. Though if you have a copy you can get a stamp saying it is real. But today is Sunday and tomorrow is a holiday. So what to do? We then went to Sea Cliff Village to look for some things that we need and have lunch. During lunch we called embassies to ask what we should do or when they would be open, but we could only get hold of the French one. We then decided to go back to the hostel to get the copy of the others’ passports and go to talk to the ferry people again. After a lot of talking we figured out what to do as the lady there gave us a number of a guy who could help us once we arrive in Zanzibar. Freja had said as we left the Hyatt Regency earlier that day that she wanted to buy us dinner that night at that hotel. Though we told her that it would probably be really expensive, but she wanted to because it felt like a safe haven for us. So that night we had a fancy dinner. And it was great.

12/10: Dar Express

Today we got up early to start our holiday with a (we thought) 10 hour bus journey from Arusha to Dar es Salaam. We were in Dar about 13 hours later. On the way we saw two movies: Akeelah and the bee and some Chinese thing I think was called viral factor, I never really got the plot of that one, but it was something about a virus. We also saw music videos from the 80’s and some Swahili series. A few bathroom breaks and lunch, otherwise a very uneventful bus journey. Arriving in Dar we took a taxi to our hotel: YWCA. It was a bit difficult to get the rooms we booked, but we got them in the end.

9/10, 10/10 and 11/10: The last of Swahili lessons

I started out this day with Swahili for one hour before going to the CHE group. It wasn’t all that interesting since we just let Chrissie and a new member, Felix, handle the rest of the interviews or questions for them, since we didn’t want to overwhelm them with too many people. After we were done we went back to the office where I had more Swahili lessons. So now I am down to missing 17 hours. No way that is going to happen in two days, but I’ll try to get as close as possible. PJ is going to get married in November! He hadn’t told me, but Victoria asked him when the end of contribution was. His fiancé and he have actually lived together and least year they had a baby, though it died before it could breathe its first breath. This kind of relationship is not normal here so it was about time he proposed. Although he doesn’t want to be married before he is thirty. The next day I didn’t go to the field again because I had one lesson from none to twelve, breaking for lunch and then from one to three pm. The others had a chicken seminar today with half of the women and the rest next Thursday. The reason I didn’t have more lessons in the afternoon is because there was a social at the office where people had to make their national dish and I couldn’t concentrate on Swahili while everybody were talking, rather loudly, about interesting things. As I was just reading a book with PJ, so we quit early. I got to taste food from the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Denmark. It was all really good, but I had to go home to wash clothes for the vacation. Friday was another day of just Swahili. From nine to twelve and one to four. So I got down to missing eight hours. The reason there wasn’t time for more today is because I had to meet Iddi for the gift he had promised me. I got a shirt for my dad, a dress for my mom though I didn’t think that she will wear it and flip flops for myself. After we said goodbye and good luck I had to meet my fellow travel mates to buy the last for Zanzibar. After that we went home to pack as we had to get up early the next morning for the bus to Dar! By the way my computer broke, which is the reason why this is uploaded to the blog now.

8/10: “Why this?”

After not nearly enough sleep I got up to go to the office. Today there was another dirty day, but as I still need some 24 hours’ worth of Swahili I did that instead. I only got three hours done (21 to go) because in the afternoon I had to buy the bus ticket and call all our hotels for the trip to confirm that we are coming. It didn’t take so much time so I could also relax a little. In the evening we went to the maasai café for a sort of goodbye party, as I won’t come back really after my vacation. I didn’t know half the people there so fast had the text travelled. So there wasn’t so much goodbye over it, but it was still really nice. In the evening we drove home with Imma, our taxi driver, and one of the first things he said was: “why this?” Something he always says when there is some kind of problem and it sounds so fun that even though there is a problem we still laugh. The problem tonight was overbooking, but we got him in the end!

5/10, 6/10 and 7/10: Mt. Meru

We started off on Saturday morning by meeting at the office with all our stuff, waiting for Iddi so that we could go to the mountain. He was going on Swahili time (though not the actual Swahili time) so he came a little late. But then we were off in a dala dala with everything. All nine could be there with the stuff on the roof and some people in the back. One of which was Patrick Jr., I didn’t know that he was coming or in what capacity because he is usually an assistant guide, but we already had Iddi and Maasai - Ernest. I later asked him and he said as an assistant guide, afterwards I heard an argument about it, apparently Iddi didn’t tell him he would be a porter, though a summit porter. This means that he goes with us to the top. It took some time before we were ready to start the climb up the mountain. On Mt. Meru you need a ranger as it is in Arusha National Park. Arusha NP doesn’t have predators, but the buffalos can still be really dangerous. Our ranger is Gideon; he has been up some 46 times in seven years. He has the funniest laugh so even though what he is saying isn’t funny, you still laugh with him; it is kind of like a Disney villain, but one of the nicer ones of course. Starting the climb we took the ‘right’ route and not the ‘wrong’ route, which is the shorter more forested one. It took some 3-4 hours up in beautiful terrain where we got close to giraffes. On Meru you only sleep in huts and in Miriakamba, the first camp, there are also showers and western style toilets (though without flush) so it ruins some of the authenticity there was on Kili. But it was very nice and not as overcrowded as its bigger neighbor. This time I insisted on an introduction to the crew, they seemed completely lost as this is obviously not the norm. We have Gideon the ranger, Iddi and Ernest for guides, Rafael as cook and another Rafael as waiter; Julius times two, Isac, Dastin, Ally from my Kili climb and another Goodluck for normal porters and Patrick as summit porter. We had a very nice view of Kili and a good dinner and then we went to sleep. The other volunteers with me are, some of them you know; Freja, Maria and Erik from Denmark, Alessandra from Italy and Marco, Robert, Stefan and Judith from the Netherlands. Marco wanted to see the sunrise in the morning. I didn’t have a special wish for that as I knew we would see it the next day. This meant however that Iddi came knocking on our door and windows too early in the morning whispering “sunrise.” Marco didn’t even wake up as he had on earplugs. As I have said Nasoro isn’t going to join us, but as he had another client up I met him. He didn’t come out at first and I couldn’t understand why, I had already said hi to my cook from my Kili climb, during dinner he came into the dinner hut. I figured out what it was he had changed places with the cook so now he cook is the guide and the guide is the cook. Though why he would be ashamed of it I’m not sure. I means it is still honest work, though I get it could feel like a sort of degradation. But he is doing well, the next morning he gave me a water bottle they didn’t need and before we left to go further up I waved goodbye. That’s probably the last I will see of him for a long while. The second day was beautiful, though with too many stairs, for my liking and this time it was real stairs. On the second day of Kili every time I reached one top there was another waiting so I never knew exactly how high I was going or where the next camp was. The second day of Meru was very different because you can almost always see little Meru the top we were going to summit by the end of the day, though the camp was further down. It seemed an immeasurable distance to all of us. But we got slowly closer. It took some 5 hours to reach saddle hut. By the end Marco and I started talking because we were kind of bored and that helped, besides, it looked like it was just a walk in the park for him. After he showed the slightest inclination of wanting to visit Iceland I was off on a long speech about the wonders of Iceland, both hidden and in plain sight. Then magically the camp appeared. Then we had a lunch break before setting off to little Meru, a climb that took about an hour and a half both ways. I was wearing my Ranum Efterskole sweatshirt and it took Marco almost all the way up to find my name - I hid it well. It was stunning, but it was getting late and we needed dinner early so that we could get some sleep before setting off towards the summit at 1 am. We got up at midnight to take on all our layers and eat a little. The day before Robert hadn’t been feeling so well and he had thought very seriously about going down again. He was still with us though he still felt bad. But now Judith also started to feel very bad with her stomach as well. Despite of this everybody started the climb at 1.15 am. Om Kili the way to the summit is very basic; up and in the same direction and soil almost all the way. On Meru you go up and down and through dirt and rock. There was one point where people had to climb down a rock face. At this point we had already split the group because Judith needed a lot of breaks if she was going to make it, and she really wanted to. Here some people were scared because it seemed one misstep meant certain death. But we continued. They told us it would take 4-5 hours to reach the top we were there 8.30 am. It is an amazing summit because you climb a lot of the last part so you reach a very pronounced summit and in good weather you can see for miles (or kilometers) around. I just stared at Kili for some time. A little later Robert made it. He had done it for his wife whom he met 20 years ago on this day. I don’t think he could have done it without her. When we went down Judith and Stefan, the last of our group, were almost at the top as well. So everybody made it. Judith had gone all the way puking, though it was a really unwise decision to continue all the way I really admire her perseverance. The fast group was down 11.30 am, it took her 12 hours in total. After we returned to saddle hut we had breakfast and a nap, though I couldn’t sleep because there was so much to think about. After Stefan and Judith returned we had to get moving, everybody said that we wouldn’t be able to make it down to the gate before it closed at 6 pm, if we were going to walk all the way, but some of us wanted to try. We were off around 2.45 pm and in Miriakamba an hour later. It went really fast, but Gideon was behind us somewhere and we couldn’t start the next part without him and his gun. Luckily it only took him half an hour more. While we were sitting there waiting someone was shooting something for the television there was some porters taking something that looked heavy on their shoulders then they started walking like they were going to the next camp. Two minutes later we saw them walking down again, then they took their bags on and went do0wn the mountain again. We didn’t really understand what was going on and the first thing I said was: “fake porters!” very up roared of course because porters are some of the people here I have the most respect for. After Gideon came we hurried on down the mountain, reaching the gate a couple of minutes before 6 pm. As the rest of the people were taking a rescue car down we had to wait for them. We waited and waited, it was 9 pm before they came. We spend the time listening to nice stories from Hassan too long to tell about here. I was home and in my bed a little before midnight, after being up a whole day. Many people have and will ask me what I would recommend and what is easiest since I have done both Meru and Kili. I really like them both, but I think if I was going to do one again (and I will) it would most likely be Kili. But Mt. Meru has a very close second place.

3/10 and 4/10: Soon

Today I had another 2.5 hours of Swahili in the morning so down to 24 hours missing, that I will need to do in a week. I was supposed to have more lessons in the afternoon, but as everybody had to give the money for the Mt. Meru trip before 2 pm and I had to give it to Iddi after that there was no more time. I got it and then meet Iddi, who told me that Nasoro won’t be with us because the lady who is climbing Mt. Meru with him is doing it in four days so will go down on our second day, we won’t have the cook either because he is with Nasoro. We talked everything through again about who needs what and things like that. Afterwards I went home to relax a little bit. On Friday morning a guy walked with me all the way from Sakina to Mianzini, which is twenty minutes of the normal thirty to work. I didn’t know him, but he just kept talking to me, he seemed nice enough it is just like the always want something from you. When I arrived to work we went to Amani to do post loan interviews with the rest of the group that did not get the third loan yet. In the afternoon we went to Mshikamano whom we will meet at Rehema’s home from now on. We gave them the third loan. In the evening we had the meeting with Iddi. We meet our second guide Maasai (it is a nickname, but try to guess which tribe he is from). Everybody got most of the stuff they need and the rest they will get tomorrow morning before going to the mountain, it was nice to have everybody in one place so that we could talk about it and get everything under control so that no one felt unsure about anything. Then they drove us all home so that we could rest before tomorrow.

2/10: Gustav’s birthday!

Today it is Gustav’s birthday! We are going to celebrate it tonight by going out to dinner. We started off the day by going to the CHE group, we needed to do four post loan interviews, only three were present, but it took so long to do them that it was okay we didn’t need to do that one more, as I was already late for my Swahili lesson as it was. This means I only got about one and a half hours of lessons today, which is not enough in the big scheme of things. Though it was really interesting to listen to all the women and hear about their businesses, it is incredible how big the gap is between some of the women, one had 300 chickens that produce a lot of eggs for her to sell, so she turns over a big income, another who sells solar power and something else I forget and also gets a big income, but then there was one who owns a shop, that has very little income. They have all gotten the same amount of loans, but they use it so differently. My Swahili lesson had to end at 3 pm, so down to 26,5 hours, because then Iddi was coming to pick me up so that we could go to his office and talk about the Mt. Meru trip, what to bring, when to meet and so on. He is going to be our guide with Nasoro, Nasoro is climbing Mt. Meru now, so we would meet him at the gate or on his way down and then he is going to go up with us again. There might also be the same cook and some of the same porters, like Jackson! We planned to meet all of us Friday evening to discuss everything and so that everyone will be comfortable about the trip and get all their questions answered. Then I had a lot of texting to do to tell everybody, we are none now, about it. I did that after meeting Camille, Laura and Freja at Africafe for a milkshake. Afterwards we went to Damacus to celebrate Gustav’s birthday. Damascus was on the Lonely Planet map, but there was nothing at the site of the map showed us to point us towards Damacus, it turned out that it was in a completely different direction, but close. There we got it birthday ready for Gustav and when he came sang him a birthday song. The food we were supposed to cook ourselves, so we could decide, it just took a long time. It was really nice and there was a guy playing the guitar, so we got home a bit after we are usually back, but it was still before 11 pm, and as we don’t have a curfew so that shouldn’t be a problem, but it seems it was. But then they should just give us a curfew, if they are going to make a big deal out of it. But other than that, it was a good day.

30/9 and 1/10: Never be idle

On Sunday I had been speaking with Camille about which part of Switzerland the new volunteer might be from, it turns out he is from the French part. This means that he does not speak English, which makes it a bit difficult to communicate though of course I speak a bit French, but I am not home all day, but of course the children doesn’t care which language he speaks so that won’t be a problem there. Today at the Riverside group we talked to them they were supposed to bring books and things so that we could do bookkeeping refresher training, but of course they didn’t, but I just hope they bring it next time. We had a lot of things to do at the office, but not so much time before my Swahili lesson, as it was right after lunch, after Sunday I still needed 33 hours and after today I’m down to 30 hours. I also had a lesson Tuesday which means there are 28 hours left. On Tuesday as Chrissie is in Zanzibar and Gustav was feeling unwell I was the only volunteer to go to the field, which didn’t really matter so much as none of the two groups had prepared what they were supposed to. In the first one there was only one person present because the others had to go to a government thing because the want to learn how to and get support to plant mushrooms. I had lunch at Elizabeth’s place, which was really good. I met her 4 months old boy, he was really cute. Otherwise I have been busy planning Mt. Meru and Zanzibar and having all the Swahili, so there is plenty to do, but as Thomas Jefferson once said: it is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing. 

28/9 and 29/9: Swahili weekend

This morning when I was going to my Swahili lesson I saw one of my Kilimanjaro porters! I think we were both really surprised, I mean it was on my Sakina road, so not just around town. I had long given up seeing any of them again; as I thought that when they aren’t on the mountain they are probably in Moshi. But there was reggae Jackson. He was on his bike and he saw me first and slowed down and then I saw him and I am sure we, or at least I, had the biggest smile on my face, and then we just said: “hi” and he moved on. But I saw him. I don’t know why it matters so much, but it made my day. I mean I never really talked to him when I was climbing Kili in the first place, but we went through this thing together that I think I will always look back on as one of the best things I have ever done. Then I had my Swahili lesson. Which wasn’t a whole lot of fun, PJ doesn’t make it as fun as Victoria tried to do, but I have still learned a lot, though most of it seems to go in and out in the same breath. I had three hours and then lunch and two and a half more after lunch. A lot I must say, but I need it. So after Saturday I was down to missing 36 hours. On Sunday I met Freja and Camille at the Mt. Meru market, I knew what I wanted: postcards and small gifts for my Icelandic cousins, a Kilimanjaro bracelet and a painting with Kilimanjaro on it. I got all of that, which is good because I really don’t have time to come back later with all the Swahili. Then I had another lesson for some three hours (though in truth only two as I was a bit late), but I was feeling unwell so we couldn’t do it for the originally planned four hours. Then when I got back I moved officially into Laura’s room. This is my last weekend in Arusha, it’s a bit weird, but with Mt. Meru and Zanzibar that’s all there’s left. 

27/9: Nafisa

Today we went to the Amani group first many of them were quite late and they were supposed to have a business plan ready, but it seems something was lost in translation last time, so they didn’t have anything. Then we went to a business visit to Nafisa’s business. She has a kerosene business, she goes to Kenya and buys it and sells it here, and it seems she makes quite a profit on it. After lunch we went to Mshikamano, by then it was so warm out that no one could concentrate and we just wanted to be done with it, but we got through all six post loan interviews/application reviews. Though it was only half done, which means we have created more work for us in the office for later. But it was just so hot! Then I walked home and just relaxed for the rest of the day. I even bought an ice cream in Sakina supermarket and it was wonderful to get something cold. Another thing is that Laura’s boyfriend sent her a DVD player and 30 DVDs, so we have been watching movies this week.

26/9: Fourth social

On Thursday we started off by visiting Paulina from the Amani group’s business. She has cows for milk, beans, chickpeas and she is doing quite well, but she is supporting an entire family of children and grandchildren so much of the money goes to that. After meeting her we went back to the office to work on the September report and now we are almost done, so we just need to add the finishing touches on Monday and then send it. As Chrissie will be in Zanzibar next week, it’ll just be Gustav and I until the next volunteer come sometime that week, so it is good to be done with most things. I was supposed to have a Swahili lesson today, but as PJ was in Moshi yesterday and today and left there too late, he didn’t show up. This is really irritating as I need so many more lessons in so little time I wanted to do a lot this week, now I won’t have time for anything else this weekend. In the evening it was social time, we went to the Mt. Meru hotel for a pizza buffet. The pizza wasn’t really all that interesting and it took them a long time to make, so that was nothing special, but it was fun as usual to meet all the others and talk about anything. So far we are five people for certain for the Mt. Meru trip next weekend. As Laura hasn’t been feeling all too well the last couple of days we went home after dinner, Laura had been given a letter to give to the family. A new person is coming. On Sunday. And he is going to use my room, so after two months in the same room I will move into Laura’s room, it’s going to be a bit weird, since we are used to being alone in our rooms. But it is only for two weeks until Zanzibar, where we will share a room anyway. He is from Switzerland, a year younger than me and apparently he has difficulty understanding. 

25/9: Fortunata

Today we went to the CHE group. As the last five women are finishing their loans we wanted to do post loan interviews with them. But as there was a funeral most of the women did not show up. In fact only two out of the ten women came and one of them just got a new loan. Fortunata was the only one there that is finishing her loan today. Her business is that she makes a nutritious porridge and she is making a lot of money on it, but she needs to expand her business as she is able to make 100 kg a month as it is, but there is a demand for 200 kg. In the afternoon we had a meeting with the chairwomen, though in truth only one of them was the actual chairwoman, but the rest represented their groups. It was a good meeting and we got a lot of positive feedback from the women and some things that we could do better, which was the real reason for having the meeting. To know what we can do better, that is also why we have made an evaluation survey we want to hand out to the women next week. 

23/9 and 24/9: Business visits

Today we went to the Riverside group and gave them their new loans. One of the women, Hadija,  had asked us to find a price for a scale, but this time she said she wanted to buy sardines instead so it is a bit difficult to be sure that they invest in what they put on their applications for the loan. We also visited Hadija’s shop and there is a lot of space left for stock. There was also a woman who came in asking for soap, Hadija didn’t have any and made a call. Less than ten minutes later a guy came with a box full of soap. But either way most of the women seem to benefit a great deal from the loans. In the afternoon I had a Swahili lesson, so we are down to 41,5 hours now, I want a lot of lessons this week and during the weekend so I won’t be so stressed during my last weeks in Arusha. But we’ll see. As the others were still on their safari I had a quiet day when I came back from the office and I started writing all of my Swahili into a new book where it can all be at once. On Tuesday we went out to Tengeru as usual, first to the Tupendane group. With them we did forecasting and planning training and Clementina, the chairwoman of the group, came up with the idea that for next time they should all come with a business plan that we can look over and see what would be most profitable. In the afternoon we visited the Ikusura group, we also asked them to come up with business plans for next week. Then we visited a woman called Helena she has many things, animals, vegetables, fruits, chicken and a shop. In her shop she pays 40,000 for an employee a month that she also supplies with food worth 45,000 a month, her rent is 30,000 and for electricity she pays 5,000 per month. She told us that the income in her shop is 120,000 a month. This did not seem profitable to us, but as her bookkeeping books were apparently locked away somewhere we could not check it. After I got back I was meeting with Camille, Freja, Laura and a new member to our Zanzibar group; Sofie, to plan a bit more and change dates for some hotels and of course add one more person. I was about one hour late as the visit to Helena’s house had been longer than I thought it would, but we got everything done and now we are just missing a place to stay in Dar, as we can’t get hold of the place we wanted to stay. 

21/9 and 22/9: Relaxation

Today I planned to meet with some of the other volunteers; Nienke, Sarah, a German vegetarian working with human rights and Genna an Australian here for her medicine studies, at the Ilboru Safari Lodge pool, which we did. It was a lot bigger than at mt. Meru hotel, but not as luxurious, a lot cheaper though. There weren’t so many people so we could just relax and swim a bit, though it took two hours before we could actually swim, because it was being cleaned - very thoroughly. We ate lunch there as which was nice. Then I had to get back around 3 pm to talk to Iddi. Because I am planning a mt. Meru trek, for five people his first price had been 490 USD per person, which was too much I said, and then it was down to 470 USD, still quite a bit of money, so he came today to talk about it. I said that there were some of the people who were still unsure because of the amount of money we had to pay, but that they all later wanted to climb Kilimanjaro as well, so I think I made it sound like an investment to have a lower price. He then went back to Moshi to work a bit on the numbers. On Sunday he wrote me a new price: 395 USD, which is a really nice price for three days, so I am hoping the others will want to come with this price. So far it is Gustav, Marco, Freja and me, originally also Genna, but she has figured out her host brother or something has his graduation the same day that she has to go to. I am hoping I can find some other people, who will want to join, so that we can keep the price down. Today I also washed, not all my clothes, as there was too much, but quite a bit, but I think I will do it again in a week’s time, because it is too much to do all at once. Other than that I just relaxed. 

18/9, 19/9 and 20/9: Working, working

Today we were giving out loans to five of the women in the CHE group. We didn’t really do much else other than count the money out for them, in Swahili, and give it to them. Later today we had to visit the market in Tengeru to do business visits with some of the women from the Tupendane group. We had planned it to be from 3:30 pm, but the others moved it forward, but as I had a Swahili class from 1 to 3 pm, I couldn’t come. My class was nice, though PJ expects too much of me. in the evening I met some of the other volunteers who had just had an African workshop at Via Via and we had some dinner. That took a really long time to get ready and then she overpriced us at the end. I had another Swahili class the next day so that’s another four hours down, only 43 and a half to go… in three weeks… I will be busy. Though I feel I have been busy enough this week. Otherwise it was an office day, we started off by having a meeting with Glory, who is the leader or something of PA in Tanzania, she was one month behind as to where we were, but other than that the meeting was very productive. We also finalized the survey, which has come out really well. Then we had sports day, which was football/soccer, we won the second half, but lost the game 2 to 6 goals. It was really fun; I would just have like it to be earlier so we had more time before it got dark. On Friday a big group of volunteers set off on a four day safari, among them are Laura, Camille, Freja, Gustav and Marco. It was a short working day today because Chrissie had to go early to catch the bus to Nairobi and Elizabeth had to go to the hospital. We did some forecasting training with the Amani group, but not so much with the Mshikamano as we were there quite early. So I was home for lunch time and played a bit with the children and otherwise relaxed, as I was quite tired.

16/9 and 17/9: Working again!

Today I had to start working again; I hadn’t really looked all that much forward to it, but it was good. We started off by visiting the riverside group; they will receive the 3^rd loan next week, so we went over their loan applications with them and listened to what they wanted and all that. There are only four women left in this group, one of them haven’t been so good at coming to the training sessions, so the others had previously said that they did not want her to get the full amount, but now they are okay with it. Not sure how vise a decision this is, but we want to respect their choice. Around lunch time I had a lot to do, as I had to fill in a lot of stuff for my later travels to Kenya, so that I can visit some of the Plan projects. I first had to go to a store to print out the papers, then I had to go back to the office to fill them out, then back again to the store to get it scanned in again. A lot of hassle all in all, but at the end I could send the papers onwards. After that we got some office work done, and then it was time for a Swahili lesson. Two and a half hours, at the end I met my new teacher; PJ, whom I will have because he has a lot of time and I need a lot of lessons.  On Tuesday we started off by visiting the Tupendane group where we did business visits with one of the members; Witness. Witness owns a fruit and vegetable stand, she is doing okay. Today there was a funeral for a very important member of the community, so after lunch we went straight to the Ikasura group because no one would be there anyway so we just needed to collect the money. That meant we were back early and could get some office work done. We are creating an evaluation survey that we will hand out to all the women and hear from them what they think about everything relating to their loans, their skills, their training, us etc. Then I had to go met up with Camille, Freja and Laura to plan our Zanzibar trip and to book all the rooms. It was really fun, we got almost hold of every hotel we wanted, we ate cake and had milkshakes, only downside was how much my phone charged me for making all those calls, but I had fun while doing it! We had to call Imma, our regular taxi driver, to take us home as it had gotten dark. We like Imma because he plays very loud music, something we don’t get anywhere else, but sometimes you just need very loud music. 

7/9 to 13/9: Kilimanjaro

I started out late from Arusha on Saturday because we had to pick up the two guys going with me up Kili from the airport. I thought they were Italian but then I heard their names: Carlos and Pablo, and I asked my guide, Iddi: “They are Spanish, right?” They are. That night we slept in Mama Clementina’s hotel that is a charity hotel supporting young girls through their education. After a good night’s sleep we headed for the office to make the last payment and arrangement and to meet the rest of the crew. Then we set off for the Machame Gate that would be our starting point on our Kili trek. There we had to wait a long time while we were registered, the last money was paid and the bags and other things were weighed. We meet our two other guides here: Nasoro and Seba. Carlos has tried to reach Uhuru peak once before, so he knew all our guides, though Seba had been a cook before. It was finally time to start our trek, so we began, leaving Iddi behind to do the last paperwork. This first stage of the trek was about four to five hours through the rainforest. It was incredibly beautiful, you could really see it was a rainforest because there was moss everywhere, and I got my fresh air to breath. We just walked along and talked about all kinds of stuff, like we would continue to in the next few days, but that I no longer remember. The trek was about a 1200 meter gain in altitude from the gate at 1800 meter to the Machame hut, where we would be sleeping, at about 3000 meter. So the path was steep in places, even with stairs made of wood in quite a few places. Because all the climbers had set off at different times there wasn’t any queuing as there would be the next couple of days, which was really nice because then you could really experience the magic of the rainforest. The Machame hut is at the edge of the rainforest, and just before we arrived we walked through a mist, the trees had also gotten smaller so it added to the mystery that is Kilimanjaro. We were sleeping under the trees so we had cover from the wind. I can tell you, the food was really good and much more varied than I have gotten used to, so during the time on the mountain I got known as the one in our dinner tent always eating the most, if there was only one piece left, I got it. The next day we set off sometime after 8 am in the line already formed on the way to the next camp. It started out the steepest part (though I seem to remember it continued for quite a while) so it was good that there was a line and that we always had to stop and wait for porters to overtake us. It was a beautiful day as we walked along a ridge leading us closer to the mountain, so we could see a lot of things surrounding us. Sometimes when we had just reached one top, we could see tiny people already on the way to the next one, so we knew which way to go. This trek was only some 3 and a half hours, so we reached the Shira cave, the next camp, before lunch and had a nice warm one there. In the afternoon we walked a little more to the Shira hut which is a camp for a different route up Kili. This was just an hour both ways so we had time to enjoy the scenery and the splendid Kili. The altitude was now around 3800 meters, the sunset over the Shira mountains was quite incredible. The next day, day three, we had to walk up to a place called lava tower at around 4600 meter I think and then down from there to the camp which was about the same altitude as the Shira cave, because we had to get used to the altitude, but not get too much at once. When we reached the lava tower I had a bit of a headache, but it got better as soon as I sat down and had some lunch. From there it was only, mostly, down. This stage took some five to six hours. I really like the next camp, the Barranco camp, because you can see both where you came from and where you are going and it is this piece of flat land that is just stunning. What we could see of the beginning was the breakfast (Barranco) wall, one of my favorite parts of the route. Because it is a wall, a very easy wall to climb, but it meant that we could use our hands as well, so it was really fun. On top of the breakfast wall we could see the summit, or at least close, and feel that it wasn’t long at all now. From there we still had a long way to go before reaching the last camp at Barafu – a lot of valleys to cross. At one point we stood quite high up and we could see we had to go way down, before going higher than we were already, though I had started to hate going down only to go further up again, we did it – pole pole (slowly) and were eventually at Karanga. A camp that I was supposed to sleep in, because I had booked seven days, but as Carlos and Pablo had to do it in six, to catch their plane on the same day as going down, I wanted to do it with them and continued with them to Barafu. Both Carlos and Pablo are 42 years old, engineers, from Madrid and good friends. Pablo has a wife and three children, one girl around 12 years old, one boy who is eight – almost nine, and a little girl that is one year and some months. Carlos has a fiancé. Pablo’s little girl is the same age as the guide Nasoro’s daughter. This next part of the stage was some of the hardest, a kind of test for the summiting as there was a lot of fog so that we couldn’t see all that much and it was just up and up. But miraculously we reached Barafu after some six hours in total and got a good night’s rest (not so much sleeping) before attempting the summit. We had decided to start later than usual. Most climbs start at midnight, this is what Carlos did last time, and one of the contributing factors to him having to come down before the summit. We started around 2:30 to 3 am this meant that we could see everybody higher up on the mountain because of all of the flashlights, but it also meant we were alone on out stretch of the mountain. So we went in our own tempo with Nasoro in the front, we had a few short breaks along the way to get some warm tea and rest a little bit. Then the sun came up, most people would see that from the summit, but as we were climbing towards the west, we had a splendid view of the sun behind us. After the sun had gone up we did the rest of the climb in the daylight, which was a big help because then you could see that there wasn’t so much left. Though of course there still was some two to three hours left. As I wasn’t taking any altitude medicine the further up we got the more you could feel it, it was like a pressure in the head. Then we reached Stella point at 5700 and something, from there we could see the actual summit, but it was still quite a way to 5895 meters. When we reached the summit the headache had started to get worse, it was really nice to be there and have done it, but I was like: yeah, let’s get down again now. As soon as we started going down the headache lessened. It was so much fun going because we (or at least Nasoro and I) were practically skiing down through the rock debris. Which was nowhere near as hard as going up where every step took effort, here you just have to move your feet fast and avoid the rocks and you’d be fine. It took six or seven hours up, but only one down to Barafu again. After a good warm lunch we had to go further down to the next came, which took some three hours. But it wasn’t nearly as much fun as there were a lot of stone steps and things that were easy to fall over after a long day. We eventually reached the Mweka hut, we were going down via the Mweka route which is only for descend, Machame is only for ascend. I had a few blisters on my feet, but otherwise I was fine, though my mood could have been better. The next morning the crew was singing and dancing for us and afterwards we gave them their tips. The night before we had learned that there were more porters with us than we had originally thought there would be. Something we could have avoided if we had been introduced to them in the beginning, which I wanted to, but there never seemed to be time for it. There was a cook, a waiter/porter named Adam, who was the only one except the guides that we really talked all that much to and nine porters, I don’t remember all their names, but there was: Jackson who was always listening to reggae music, Ibrahim whom I thought was younger than me but turned out to be 21, he was carrying my bag, Goodluck who seemed charming, but was missing one of his front teeth so maybe he did not have so much good luck. I don’t really remember more of their names as I only heard them that one time, but I remember their faces. Then we went the last two to three hours down, it was better than the day before as there were not that many stones and only a few big steps. Then we reached the end of our trek and signed out, we drove together back to Moshi town where I was staying at a hotel called the Kindoroko Hotel. Because I paid for seven days, so I got to spend my last night in a hotel, with a hot shower and cable TV. So I spend the rest of the day eating lunch, taking showers, watching movies, and sleeping. I remember that some five or something years ago I made a list of things I wanted to do – a bucket list, the only thing that I originally wrote on it, that I wanted to do all those years ago, that has anything to do with this trip, was to climb mount Kilimanjaro. How is that for a dream come true? It exceeded all of my expectations and so much more. Just do it!

5/9 and 6/9: Amani

Today was office day and we actually did a lot, because we looked over the Friday group’s, the Amani, application for the third loan and what they should be given. We also looked at the cash flow because the model we have for it now is really complicated so we are trying to figure out how to build a new model that is simpler to understand for Elizabeth and future volunteers. We also wrote down what we have been doing for the last two weeks and made a plan for the next week. We were still at the office at 5 pm, and we had planned a social because there wasn’t anything for 6 pm. At Maasai café of course, because we just cannot keep away from the pizza. I brought Gustav to meet the rest and another Dane came as well that have started this week on the same project as Freja and Camille. Theresa who has just returned from climbing Kili came as well, I haven’t seen her in some three weeks and it seems like an eternity. The pizza was good as usual as was the conversation. I had been looking forward to Friday all week because now we were finally going to try to give out a loan and talk to them about our concerns and things like that. We talked through everything and in the end they got the money that they had asked for or the maximum of 300,000 tsh. In the afternoon we went to another group, the solidarity group or they are called that in Kiswahili at least. We had given them book keeping training last week and this week we checked their books, most of them were surprisingly good. But one person earns maybe 40,000 a day and another only a couple of thousands, so there is a really big difference. We also did a business visit with the chairwoman of the group Rehema, who sells tea spices. All in all it was a good day. When I got back home it was time for more washing as I don’t want to deal with it when I get back from Kili. Tomorrow I will go to Moshi and Sunday, Sunday it begins. I am looking forward to it with a mix of excitement, clarity, dread and happiness. I know that no matter if I make it or not I will come back an experience richer, wiser. And no matter what it will be so good to get out of the city and into the fresh mountain air for a week, so that I can breathe freely.

4/9: Dentist

Today a new member arrived on the micro finance team; Gustav who has Danish parents, but has lived almost his entire life in Sweden, except when he did his bachelor in London. He will be here for two months. We went to a group today; CHE, five of the women have finished their loans and last time we interviewed one of them, but the others weren’t there. They were today so we did four post loan interviews and it was really interesting to learn what they had used the loan for. One of them bought a cow, a male cow, that hasn’t brought her any income yet, so she used her other businesses to pay for the loan, but when she sells it she will get some 900,000 tsh. Another sells beans in Nairobi, another yet has been sick so she hasn’t really done all that much. It was a good day in the field all in all. Then in the afternoon I finally went to the dentist. I got in pretty fast and I had the same experience that I have had when I was in Tunisia and a guy in a market spoke Danish I couldn’t believe it, but he really did, he was fluent. The dentist wasn’t fluent but he spoke some kind of Scandinavian. He has studied in Oslo, which means that while he was trying to fix my braces I kept repeating to myself; he studied in Oslo, he studied in Oslo, he studied in Oslo interspersed with the occasional I hate my dentist. In the end he fixed it, for now, though it isn’t all that pretty but that doesn’t really matter because it is facing into my mouth. As this was in Njiro, we, Laura was with me, went to the Njiro shopping complex afterwards, we will definitely return because they have a big supermarket that is cheaper than Sakina supermarket, tons of restaurants, a cinema and all kinds of other stuff.

2/9 and 3/9: Micro finance continues

This week we are visiting the same groups on the same days. So today we visited one group: Riverside. They have a problem with one of the people in the group and they don’t know what to do about her, she hasn’t really shown up to the meetings we have with them and therefore she hasn’t had any training from us. But then right when we were discussing her she showed up, so the rest of the group has agreed to support her, but not let her get a bigger loan than last time. They will finish their loan next week, they really have two weeks left, but they want to finish earlier. After we got back I had a Kiswahili lesson, and then I had to go to town to Skype a bit with my sister, but the connection was really bad so we couldn’t do it for long. After that we met up with some of the others to have dinner at Khan’s barbeque that I had heard was really good. It was, but I had eaten too much cake before going so I wasn’t that hungry anymore, which was a shame because the cake hadn’t really been all that good. The next day on Tuesday we were in the field all day visiting two groups. The first one to do some savings training and a business visit, the woman we visited was doing really well. Much better than most of the other women and she doesn’t really need the third loan, but that is when we have to figure out what our goal is; for the individual women to be financially independent or the entire group, because this woman can help the others if they need it. We met the second group in a church made of concrete, and we talked and discuss what problems they had. When we got back to the office I had another Kiswahili class, which means ten hours down, 50 to go. By then it was getting late, so it was time to get home. 

31/8 and 1/9: Painting the day care

Today we started painting the day care as we wanted to do. We couldn’t paint and do all of what we wanted with the ceiling because it is simply too high up for us without any kind of ladder. But our landscape on one of the wall became really good, better than I even imagined it could be. It starts in one end with water, turning into a beach with palm trees, then some hills and at the end some trees and there are flowers and butterflies and a sun. We didn’t even use all that much of all the paint we bought or time we had. So we ended up talking a great deal and hearing more about Camille and her family and discussing different things, it was really fun. On Sunday we met again this time to go to the Mt. Meru market and then have lunch; it was great and also nice to have a weekend in the city without stressing around. Next weekend will be Kilimanjaro so there will be a bit more to do. 

30/8: Field day, night sky

Today we had another field day. We visited two groups of women who both seemed to be doing quite well. In the first group the talked a lot about the third loan criteria because five out of ten of them have paid back the entire second loan and is now waiting to see it we will loan money to them a third time. They wanted to meet with some of the other groups to get idea from them and I think that is a really good idea. The second group haven’t loaned as much in the first or second loan as the other groups, today we gave them books for book keeping and we told them how they should do it. Laura and I have planned to paint the day care during the weekend so when I came back we wanted to buy paint and things like that but we couldn’t find anything, but we will look again tomorrow, because apparently we didn’t look the right places though it was Salim that showed us where to go. After dinner we started cutting out stars and clouds that we are planning to tape or something to the ceiling to get a night and day sky as the ceiling is divided in two. Two other volunteers will be joining us in our effort; Freja from the hot springs and her new roommate Camille. 

29/8: Third social

Today was office day. I had to come to work at 9.30 am, I was still not really doing anything two hours later and I have a Kiswahili class at 2 pm, so maybe I will get two hours of actual work done today. But it was okay to have a bit of time to do what I wanted I looked over a lot of the micro finance stuff in their drop box that I know have on my computer as well and I could check my bank account and be pleasantly surprised. Which was nice as I had been dreading checking it for a long time. Scratch that we didn’t work at all before my Kiswahili lesson, not at all. But just before I was about to go to the lesson (here are two supervisors one has been on maternity leave (Elizabeth) and just come back and the other is leaving this Friday because she (Diana) was here when the other was gone) Diana came with the translated forms we needed to go over. I am down six hours of lessons now so 54 left! It is always fun to have the lessons because Victoria teaches in many different ways. Afterward I went to Africafe to Skype, I got in touch first with my mother and then my sister got home and then we conference called my father as well and it was really good finally being able to talk with them and not worry about how much money we are spending doing it. But there was a lot of background noise and despite how good the carrot cake and strawberry milkshake was, I’ll do it a quieter place next time. And maybe try adding the video to see some familiar faces. Then we went to my third social this one at the Maasai café, pizza again, it was wonderful. We talked to some of the same and bit of other people, the last two socials have been really nice because we could all just talk and enjoy the evening. 

26/8, 27/8 and 28/8: Micro finance begins

Today, on Monday, I started my micro finance project, it wasn’t all that I expected but it is only my first day. There is a lot of people that have been doing micro finance that are leaving this week and last week so it seems we are going from a really big group to only two people or something like that, so there will be plenty to do for us. Today we visited one of the women groups that we are working with to see how they are doing, this is done once every week and it is also when we collect money from them and so on. After that I had my induction into the team and we were talking some but there wasn’t really a lot to do for me since I can’t help with the monthly reports and things of that nature yet. Later I met the hot springs group for a trip to the Mt. Meru market and then a goodbye dinner for Marscha at Maasai Café. I haven’t introduced you to the hotsprings group yet, there is three from Denmark; Laura, Freja who’ll be here for four months and I, four from Holland; Marscha, Nienke, Marco who just finished his bachelor in medicine and Robert a fifty year old out travelling the world and Emily from the US, more specifically Pennsylvania who is a hospitality major and dance minor at college.  You all know about the market so I am going to go straight to the Maasai Café – they have amazing pizzas I was savoring every bite. It was so good. We might be going there for the social on Thursday and that gets no complaints from me. When we were done eating my second cousin from Iceland, Bjarni, and his three friends joined us. It was really nice to see a known face and listen to Icelandic again though they were speaking quite fast and most of what they were saying was negative things about Denmark and Danish people, though Bjarni kept reminding them that I understood and said that they had gotten used to no one understanding them. I just found it funny and they seemed nice. They had to leave during the night and I had to get up early in the morning so we didn’t get to spend a lot of time together. On Tuesday we were out in the field all day visiting two different groups, but what we did most was wait. We didn’t get back before five, but we spend maybe an hour at the most really working. It was nice to see more of the groups and the individual women. The leader of the second group had a really big garden with tons of different vegetables and other things. She seems to be successful, which is what we want for them. Most of the micro finance team is leaving this week and only I and another will be left next week. A Japanese girl made a farewell dinner to the second group as well because she has been doing this for five months and have started to really care for these groups, so she wanted to show her appreciation. As we got back late I just walked home afterwards to relax. The next day on a Wednesday we visited a group we call the CHE group though nobody seems to know why. Only three out of around ten women showed up, they were all claiming sickness, but apparently that happens quite often. I don’t think that they are all that serious about the loans if they don’t even show up to these weekly meetings. Five of the women had their last payment for the second loan of 200,000 tsh today, only one of them showed up so we could only do one post-loan interview. But it was nice to listen to how it went for this woman with her loan and what she did with it. It seemed like it has been really helpful to her, also all the savings and book keeping training seems to have helped her. It is good to know that some people are appreciative of the help that we give them and that they are moving towards something better. After lunch I had an hour (really only half an hour) of Kiswahili and we did question words that will all be really helpful to me. In the afternoon I went to town because I was planning to Skype with my family, but tomorrow will be better for that. I also visited the Tanzanite experience about tanzanite and it was really interesting to learn about and I really want one, it is just really expensive so I think that will have to wait until I have more money to spend than on this trip. After dinner at home Laura and I had a long conversation with Patrick and Grace we talked about a lot of different topics like poverty and drugs trafficking, it is good to get their perspective. We have also promised to paint/decorate the day care room of the house so we will take a weekend at home next weekend and do that and relax a little bit. In our minds it looks great, but we are both not the most creative people so we will see, but no matter what it will be fun to do.

24/8 and 25/8: Maasai village and hot springs

Today we went to Robert from PA’s very own Maasai village. I had kind of decided not to go because I had already seen one, but everyone kept saying that this one was very nice, and we would be there longer so I thought maybe I would get a better look into their lives. On the way there I saw Kilimanjaro, and I kept thinking: challenge accepted. Just two weeks more, then I am almost there! The village wasn’t really all that I had expected, but I think it was because almost no one was at home. Robert had also expected more people. We walked around and saw the village, the empty village, and we saw some dancing and things like that, but nothing really that I haven’t seen before. Other than Robert’s house, it is not a Maasai hut which is round and has a straw roof. His is square with one wing, a tin roof and two rooms inside. He hasn’t decided if he wants to come back here and live one day, but judging by that house – he isn’t really fit to live like the Maasai anymore, he needs a city. We also had lunch there and then we went back later in the afternoon and then we really needed a shower/a bucket bath. It is kind of weird but everybody is always saying that it feels like the best shower they ever had, because they are so dirty, but at the same time the thing that people complain most about and look most forward to when they get back is a real, warm shower. On Sunday we also had a day trip planned, this time to the hot springs. I wasn’t able to go the last time because of the influenza thing that I had. I also think this was a nicer group to go with, though we had to pay more. I was really nice there with the trees and water and just relaxing. Maybe not worth all that money, but I went for the social aspects than the actual hot springs anyway. All the people I went with a staying for two month or more except one, so most are going to be here until I go to Kenya so that is really good to have people I know here for the rest of my time. The person who is leaving is Marscha from my induction; it is kind of weird how I haven’t really seen her so much, but the others from my induction a lot, even though she is really nice. She will have her goodbye dinner on Monday; I think that Grace doesn’t really approve of us having eating out so much the last couple of days, since I didn’t really do it a lot in the beginning. But it is good I think to go when it is for something other than just to eat out, but also to say goodbye. My second cousin from Iceland and some of his friends might also be coming to Arusha on Monday, as they have to take their flight out of Kilimanjaro airport on Tuesday, but I don’t really know when and things like that, but they are all invited. I am sure that it could be really fun to be many as well. In the evening Laura and I made play dough for the children for tomorrow and it was surprisingly good, since we hadn’t tried doing it before and we only had a cup to measure with. My first day doing micro finance is tomorrow, I am so excited!

23/8: Moshi

Today I had to go to Moshi to pay half of my Kilimajaro trip and their office is in Moshi. It was an hour and a half in a big dala-dala, not what I had expected but okay. I asked a lot of questions to make sure that everything is alright and it all seems to be in order so that is good, though I have to pay to stay in a hotel the night before we start climbing, because we start on the 8^th of September. The other people I am going with a two men from Italy, I think one of them at least have tried once before but had to come down because of altitude sickness. This probably means that they are even more determined to make it this time. They might only be doing it in six days, but I will be doing it in seven no matter what and I will still have a guide and porters and all that. After I paid we went to see where Patrick is staying. He is staying with Grace’s sister in a nice, but small house, where I might have stayed but there is no room for me so I don’t understand why they thought of that. It is in the neighborhood where Grace and Patrick Sr. grew up, they meet in primary school. So that was really nice to see, I also got to see one of the abandoned train stations. Patrick said that there haven’t been running any trains since the 70s or 80s so it is a very long time and all the tracks are still everywhere. This is really a shame; I mean it could be so much easier to go by train in a country like Tanzania than by bus everywhere. It could be cheaper for everyone, there would be more room and better for the environment. I didn’t see Kilimanjaro all day! Which was a real shame, but I will see it someday. When I got back to town I bought some really expensive lunch in Africafe and then went home before we would meet for the goodbye dinner, so that I could go with Laura. The dinner was really nice Chinese food and it was not that expensive, which was nice. My lunch cost more. 

22/8: Second social

Today we Laura and I had the children together, we started out painting their hands on the wall because Grace wants to have something on them and that is the first step. We also played ‘stop dans’ and ‘stole dans’. In the first one you have to listen to music and freeze when it stops and if you move you are out. In the second you also listen to music but this time when the music stops you have to hurry and sit down. I think they really liked both, at least the seemed to be enjoying themselves and we only stopped when some of the parents came and lunch was ready. Afterwards we went into town. I had to get some money to pay for my Kilimanjaro trip first and then we went around clock tower and to the Mt. Meru market. We could be there longer because there was a social tonight. This time it was at Via Via, my guidebook said that it has the best soundtrack of any restaurant in town, but I am not so sure. We had traditional Tanzanian food so it was not everyone that was bothered to come, but we wanted to come for the social aspects and not the food. It was really nice because there was some people I was sitting with where we did not all know each other so well, so that made it easier to talk across the table and everybody joining in the conversation. We had to wait a long time for the food and we didn’t stay all that long but it was worth it. We agreed to meet again tomorrow night and have Chinese at the Chinese Dragon as a goodbye dinner for Michael, a German who has been here from May and will stay in East Africa until January. He is also going to Kenya with PA so I will meet him there again. Which reminds me: I haven’t actually made it official yet, but I will only be staying in Kenya for one month as I have decided that I will not need any more time there than that and that I would like to be home earlier in December.

21/8: Dirty Day!

Today we had a Dirty Day at the Naserian School that nobody seems to have heard about, but it was very nice. We painted the outside on one side of the building, the side facing visitors and not the forest in the back. We were almost there all day and it was a lot of work and a lot of waiting and a lot of sun. I don’t get brown in the sun; I get red or pink, so now I have a very nice t-shirt line on my arm and my neck. Had another Kiswahili lesson after that, not quite as easy anymore, but I did expect that. I learned about how to negate a sentence. So if I take the example from last time: “I am eating now” and negate it, it would be: “I am not eating now”, the positive in Kiswahili is “mimi ninakula sasa”, the negative is “mimi sili sasa”. Because they take the time thing out completely because the add stuff for the past, I didn’t learn the future tense yet for this. But “I was not eating yesterday”, would be “mimi sikula jana”. Before when it was positive the double pronoun was in this order: ni/u/a/tu/m/wa, in negative present it would be: si/hu/ha/hatu/ham/hawa, then you would add the verb but put and ‘I’ in the back instead of the last vowel. Because in the negative past it would be siku/huku/haku/hatuku/hawaku and then adding the verb it the same form. Also learn other stuff as well, but I’m sure this will do for now. So that was two more hours, 57 left to go. I won’t have more classes this week as she is fully booked tomorrow and I am doing something else on Friday. It will also be easier to do it when I am doing microfinance as I will be at the office a lot. On Friday I will be going with Patrick Jr. to Moshi to pay half of my Kilimanjaro trip so that they can book everything for me, though I have many questions for them before they will see my money. Maybe we will also go to the waterfalls, but I would have to pay around 35,000 tsh, which is not bad for something like that, I am already going to a Maasai village on Saturday for around 30,000 tsh and they are planning another hot springs thing on Sunday, but I think I will pass on that one as well and just relax or do some more apartment hunting in Sweden with my sister. I am going to Robert’s Maasai village, which I have heard should be really good. I would probably prefer to bring lunch though instead of drinking goats’ blood and things like that.

20/8: Tampen brænder

Yesterday I got the children to paint their hands on a piece of paper and I think they had a lot of fun doing it. Today I just had a game, we call it ‘tampen brænder’ in Danish and it is where you have to hide something and then another person has to find it, but the only help is that he or she is told if he is getting warmer or colder, warmer meaning closer and colder meaning further away. Suzan didn’t really understand that concept at first, but at the end they had a lot of fun. Laura had her induction today, so it was a good day for me to stay home and take care of a few, or a lot of, university details because my diploma has arrived in Iceland. So my coordinator had to know precisely what to put in the envelope with it, my grandmother had to know to pick it up and send it to my brother, my brother had to know that it was here and what he would be receiving and furthermore I want to apply to a second school in Sweden so I have to figure out if they need something more than the first one. 

19/8: Newcomer

This morning another volunteer had arrived in the house. She’s only one because the other one has some problems with her kidney that the doctors need to figure out what is, before she can come here. For now she has moved her ticket until the 1^st of September. So Laura came here alone. She’s really sweet and it’s nice to have someone to talk to and be able to really speak Danish again. She’ll be here for some three months, two of them in the day care and the last one doing some medical volunteering and then she/they has/have planned three weeks of travel time at the end. I have actually planned a bit of travel myself. Because for every ten weeks that we work we can get two weeks of, I already have a Kilimanjaro week, but that doesn’t really count. Then I want to go to Dar es Salaam, Zanzibar and up along the coast for twelve days before going to Kenya. It actually wouldn’t have to cost very much, maybe half of what the Kilimanjaro trip will cost, if you live and eat cheaply. But of course it is still a lot of money to spent, but I still think it will all be worth it. Laura got here the same time of day that I did and the women who picked her up had said that they would get her at nine to do the induction, only four hours after she got here, so she did not get a lot of sleep. And then they didn’t even come for her! An hour and a half after they called to say that they would come the day after instead, she could have used that time to sleep. Laura had so much planned and so much stuff with her to give them all, I hardly had anything, so I’m sure she will be very popular amongst the children. She had even called Lego to ask for something to bring, we will only work together for two who days because there is also a dirty day this week so we won’t work in the day care then. Today I had Kiswahili again! I only had it for an hour, but I learned some 15 verbs and how to use them in the present, past and future time. Also the different between the pronouns, they have six: ‘mimi’ which means I/my/me, ‘wewe’ which means you in singular, ‘yeye’ which means him/he/she/her, ‘sisi’ which means we/us, ‘ninyi’ which is you in plural, ‘wao’ which is they/them. In Kiswahili they use double pronoun so before the verb they add two things, the second pronoun and the time, the second pronoun is in this order: ni/u/a/tu/m/wa. The present is ‘na’, past is ‘li’ and future is ‘ta’. So if you want to say “I am eating now”, eating being ‘kula’ and now being ‘sasa’, you would say: “mimi ninakula sasa”. Or if you want to say “we were eating yesterday”, yesterday being jana, you’d say: “sisi tulikula jana”.  Easy, right? Just imagine how much I could learn in my last 59 hours. Another lesson on Wednesday!

17/8 and 18/8: Wedding!

Today I went out shopping as I wanted, not with Sheila or Susan as they weren’t home, but Patrick Jr. the one that is ‘in charge’ in a way in my Kilimanjaro climb and might be my guide. Because if I went alone, apparently, I would only get the Chinese jeans or not be able to find the real ones. I got two pairs of jeans and two shirts (who on later inspection might be a bit small). The feeling of wearing jeans again was worth it. I also spoiled myself a little because afterwards I went to Africafe and bought hot chocolate and a chocolate fudge cake, so now I won’t need more chocolate for a while, but it was really good! I went there because I had been told we needed to buy a gift for the wedding, as we had already paid quite a bit for the food I didn’t really want to, but felt I had to. So I had asked the others if they wanted to buy one with me, and I sat there waiting for their response. Some had bought something and others didn’t want to, so I ended up buying what everyone had told me to: a kanga! And it was way, way too expensive, though I got the price 15.000 tsh down it was still way too much and something best left in the past as it was probably unnecessary, but then again it was a really nice night so maybe it was worth it. Now I really want to tell about the Tanzanian wedding, though I think this precise wedding was very western inspired. It was at a hotel in a big ball room with round tables and chairs draped in white with the chairs having different color fabrics around different tables, all in the wedding colors: red, gold and black. Many of us didn’t really understand how they could use black as a wedding color. The middle of the table had a bouquet of flowers there was a kind of bar for drinks and when we came the food was being brought in. we were way underdressed, we had just been told to be in whatever we had, most of them were in the most fancy dresses I have ever seen and these were western style fancy with bare shoulder and everything. When the important people started to come we went to stand by the red carpet leading from the entrance into the ballroom. We had been given a kind of napkin and now everyone was waving it around in the air while dancing to the music. This continued for a long time, until the bridesmaids/flower girls and boys came. They had a special dance prepared so we had to get out of the way. Then at last the bride and groom arrived in an elaborate style. Then they had to introduce everyone and when they mentioned someone that person would stand up and wave. We got there around 6pm and the dinner started at 9pm, so this all took some time. There was a lot of food, but it appeared not to be enough for all, which is very bad at a Tanzanian wedding. Before we got any food the bride and groom had to do the cake thing giving it to each other and then came the Tanzanian ‘cake’ that means bad luck if not present. A goat. A very dead goat, with everything, the head was held up and it still had hair and everything. They then did the same with little pieces of the goat. Then we ate, and it was really good. After dinner the presents were presented by walking up the red carpet with the gift and all the givers while they were dancing of course. When this was all done it was around 11pm and it was still going strong, but as some of the other volunteers had to get up early the next day we decided to call a cab and get home. I didn’t have to get up early, but I still had much to do the next day, like trying to Skype with my sister. We ended up just chatting, but it was still very good to be able to just write and write. I also had emails to send and things to plan and that is basically how the day went, very uneventful, but that is needed sometimes too. And there are coming two people more to live in the house that I live very early tomorrow morning so I wanted to do some things before waking up to find them here. I am really looking forward to maybe finally getting some volunteer friends here, or just people to talk to and do things with, though I do feel bad for them, for arriving on a Monday instead of a Sunday like me. Because they won’t be here before 5am or 6am like me and the children in the day care start arriving before 8am so they probably won’t get a whole lot of sleep.