Karibu! (Welcome!)

Sorry for the delay in posting my first real update, and my first real blog post ever. I’m going to try to do my best to keep it interesting, even though it shouldn’t be too much of a problem judging from my experiences so far. I’ll try to organize it into little sub-posts, both to keep my thoughts organized and to keep the reading process from becoming too much of a chore. Please comment away and feel free to share the link with anyone who’d be interested in keeping up with me. I also have to apologize for the cheesy 80s song reference in the blog title...except not really, because it was meant to be.


Speaking of karibu, mine here was nice and uneventful. After a full twenty-six hours and fifteen minutes of travel, I landed at Kilimanjaro International Airport to be greeted by a customs official and a masked ministry of health official handing out immigration and swine flu forms, respectively. My newly acquired resident’s permit gave me a VIP pass to skip the enormous line for the visa office, and all three of my giant checked bags arrived as planned. My next task was to meet up with my driver, a man named Carol, for a ride to Moshi. The scene outside of baggage claim reminded me of the stereotypical mob of depression-era photojournalists outside the city courthouse. A semicircle of at least fifty drivers with signs called out names in surround sound. It literally took a few awkward minutes for me to investigate all the signs until I found Carol leaning over the crowd from the back with my sign. Carol turned out to be a great guy—he was hired a few months ago by Duke after working for a while as a taxi driver in town. He really enjoys his new job because he gets to practice his English…and I get the sense that he enjoys driving as well, since he navigated the tricky highway from the airport at night impressively well.

The Doctors' Compound, where I live in Moshi, reminds me of the Others’ town on the show LOST. A grid of dirt roads connects a group of about thirty houses meant for the crowd of international health care workers stationed at KCMC (Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre—where I work). The houses are definitely a throwback, but they are definitely luxurious compared to how most people live in this country. Running (almost clean) water, a bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, living room, and garage are the highlights of my half of this house. The power is routinely switched off for a few hours several times a week, but overall it’s not too different from my previous living situations…just no TV, internet, or air conditioning/heat. Oh yeah, and did I mention I have a huge backyard with an amazing view of the mountain on a good day?



Speaking of the internet, I think it has been the most discussed topic so far among the ex-pats I know. If more of the Tanzanians spoke English, they would probably think we are nuts for being so obsessed. There are hookups in each of the houses, but apparently today has been the only day in the past three plus weeks it has worked. Wazungu (politely, white people) who are fed up with this have started ordering portable pay-as-you-go Vodacom modems like hotcakes. There’s also a trans-oceanic fiber optic cable on its way that is supposed to revolutionize the internet here eventually, but that’s neither here nor there (picture it somewhere between Moshi and the Indian Ocean).

Mama Beatrice, from now on officially the patron saint of housekeeping, has been working twice a week to clean up my place. I try to stay pretty low maintenance, but it’s customary here to hire a house mama to do things I would easily mess up (i.e. laundry and tying up a mosquito net). Beatrice doesn’t speak a whole lot of English, but she has been extremely nice and has a knack for finding things to straighten up that I would have never thought of.

Within my first few days here, my co-worker Malavika proposed that a group of us hike up to the first hut on Kilimanjaro. We packed up our gumption and lunches before grabbing a ride with David (a pediatrician from Seattle), his wife Diane and son Anders, and two neighbors/friends named Sarah and Aaron who work at a nearby NGO. The 45-minute drive took us down the highway through a barren outback-type area, then up through a few tiny mountain villages surrounded by banana trees. As soon as we started to see crowds and signs for the national park at a big intersection, the Land Rover suddenly refused to shift gears. After an embarrassing push with some bystanders and a rolling start (think Little Miss Sunshine), we took off again. About 300 feet short of the gate to the park, the clutch stuck once again and we pulled off to the side. An hour of head scratching, crowd gathering, mechanic friend calling, and mysterious fluid testing later, we headed back down the mountain so as to not chance more car problems in the dark after a hike. With my limited car knowledge, I ducked out of the crowd of 15-20 checking under the hood for most of this time. Two little kids, one boy and one girl, had been running around looking curious, so I decided to take out my digital camera and share some pictures with them. Unfortunately most of what I had was from Germany, and they didn’t seem to understand where this was. Still, they were pretty impressed by the pictures of animals from the Berlin zoo, and I managed to get a picture of my two new friends before the rest of the party almost left without me.

The replacement adventure for the afternoon was a hike along the Moshi River [edit: not the real name...scholars maintain that the this was lost hundreds of years ago...] with Aaron and Malavika. This was obviously slightly less exciting than Kili, but we got to see the rocky river, cross over the infamous and treacherous “Bridge of Doom,” wander around the golf course, and tour through a few of the poorer neighborhoods in Moshi (complete with satellite dishes). We also stumbled upon the Precious Blood Sisters (?) home and what we thought was a police training facility.


The next day provided yet another hiking adventure: the hash. A big tradition among the ex-pats here, this is basically a hike where two “hares” go out ahead of the group and mark a path with flour. This path ends every once in a while at an X, and everyone must find where the trail picks up again somewhere in any direction. My first time doing this turned out very nice, as about 40 of us hiked along the forest line near a village on the lower slopes of Kili. The challenge of finding a broken flour path turned out to be easily fixed, as you usually just follow the group ahead of you or ask someone where the parade of white people went. Naturally this was followed by a sunset cookout with a view of Mt. Meru (Kili’s K2) in the distance. As if I wasn’t already on overload, we met a bunch of people from the states, Holland, Norway, France, and Australia, some of whom will actually be here for a while.

Suddenly getting used to 6:30 sundown (thanks, Equator) here has been tough, but the nights have made up for it. The full moon has been rising right over the mountain since I got here, which was especially cool the one cloudless night we spotted the snowcap on top of the mountain in the dark. One night earlier this week when the power was out, the moon was so bright I looked out the window into my backyard and honestly thought for a second it was covered in snow.

Finally, Thursday night we went to a going away party for my friend/co-worker/official awesome host Brandi and one of the other doctors from KCMC. This included my first trip to the boss’s nice house, along with a gigantic African feast of chapati, samosas, rice, beans, goat meat, and many things whose name will take me much longer to remember. It was slightly better than the first meal I managed to cook at home...which actually wasn't bad. I have also learned that Sprite is actually better here, but I’ll refrain from commenting on how the Coca-Cola Company basically owns this place.


In the meantime, here’s some bonus material…

Plus / Minus:
There are definitely some downfalls and challenges to living here, but it’s never too hard to look at the bright side…

+Great people (Tanzanian and ex-pat)
-N/A

+Relaxed pace of life
-Things take longer to get done, stores/restaurants closed at odd hours

+More paved roads than I imagined
-The dirt roads make up for it

+Cheap electricity bill, Blokus parties
-4 power outages so far

+Lots of recreational reading
-No internet at home

+Amazing views, landscapes I’ve never seen
-Trash problem, since all of it is eventually just burned

+Corn flakes and milk, Stoney soda, El Rancho (Indian food), Chapati
-No Jersey Mike’s franchises (yet)

+Easy to feel productive when boiling water
-Need to boil drinking water

+Lots of space and furniture
-Little use for extra space and furniture

+Open air windows with screens
-Paranoia about velociraptors and chupacabras in my garage because there is no screen

+Convenient living in doctors’ compound
-Isolated and hard to get anywhere else without a car or taxi, especially after dark

+Fewer worries about the creatures I’ve found in the house (1 small lizard, 3 small spiders, 1 cricket, weird ant/gnat/fly hybrids); Impossible to fall out of bed at night
-Sleeping under a mosquito net

+Minimally leaky bathroom
-Shower designed for a 4 foot tall child


Teams:
After my first trip downtown, I decided to keep a running list of the American professional sports attire I spot while here. My goal is to find all 122 of the teams in the four major professional sports (I already have two throwbacks!)
LA Rams
Boston Bruins
Boston Red Sox
Chicago White Sox
Denver Broncos
Oakland Raiders
Washington Nationals
New York Jets
Charlotte Hornets
Philadelphia Flyers
New York Yankees
San Francisco 49ers
Dallas Mavericks
Minnesota Vikings
Pittsburgh Steelers
New England Patriots
Tampa Rays
Los Angeles Dodgers
Chicago Cubs

Vehicle slogans:
Dala dalas (think crazy overcrowded taxi-vans) and taxis here have some uplifting and randomly entertaining English slogans plastered on them. Here’s the Greatest Hits list so far…
Swagger
It’s My Style
Don’t panic
Peace be with you
Respect
No way!

This week's soundtrack:
Coldplay - Strawberry Swing
Green Day - Homecoming
Spoon - I Summon You
The Rolling Stones - Get off My cloud
Iron & Wine - The Trapeze Swinger
The Clash - Straight to Hell
Bob Marley - Small Axe
The Black Keys - I Got Mine


So there are two or three posts in one for you. They’ll definitely be more manageable in the future. Keep an eye out for updates on hash #2, a trip to the circus, and what’s going on at work.