A Day in the Life of a PCV

Most of my scribblings in this space have been topical--discussing various aspects of my experience here in Tanzania.  Today I want to take my readers through a typical day, to provide some idea of the life we live.

I've always been an early riser, but now I have an extra incentive to be up before 5:00 a.m.  Our house is on the school campus, meaning that we share the school's water supply with 470 boarding students and several teachers.  We are fortunate to have running water piped into our house; the students must fetch water for bathing and laundry by carrying a bucket to an outside spigot.  They are wakened by a bell at 5:30, but there are always early birds up before that time.  From the time they get up until the start of classes, the demand for water is constant, and the water pressure so low that it usually doesn't reach our faucets.  So, I get up early to beat the rush and fill pots of water to heat for our baths and a pot to boil for coffee, tea, and drinking water.

On weekdays, after breakfast (usually a peanut butter sandwich), I walk over a gully on a log bridge to the classroom area, to sign in at the office.  On the way, I pass students cutting grass with grass whips or sweeping the dirt paths with brushes made of reeds.  They always seem to have a smile for me as they say, "Good morning, Madam!"

I see other teachers, and we greet each other in the usual way, with a handshake.  Then, we chat and wait for the morning assembly in the quad.  The students are a colorful sight in their uniforms.  Along with black trousers (boys) or skirts (girls), each class wears a different color sweater:  blue, purple, red, or green.  On Mondays and Fridays, assembly starts with the scouts proudly playing their newly acquired drums, fifes, and cymbals, raising the flag and accompanying the students as they sing the national anthem and school song.  Then follow various announcements and dismissal for the first class of the day.

I teach first-year math to 3 classes of almost 50 students each.  Some students are good in math, but most of them struggle.  Between classes and after them I do teacherly tasks such as writing lesson plans and marking homework.  I also spend time chatting with other teachers.  Casual, one-on-one conversation is an important way for us to learn about the culture of each other's country.  

Today, after my first class, I walk back to the dorm area to see if the workman who needs to connect some pipes for our grant-funded rainwater harvesting project has arrived.  This is a construction of gutters, pipes, and water tanks that will direct rainwater off the roof of a dormitory building into two 5000 liter holding tanks for the students to use for bathing, laundry, and cleaning.  Water is scarce in this area, and additional supply is sorely needed.  The construction is nearly finished, only needing a workman to spend a couple more hours here, but he has not appeared, yet again.  I trudge back to the school office to ask the headmistress if perhaps the school handyman could finish the work, or if we should wait a few more days for the gutter installer to show up.  She will try to call him, and we decide to wait one more day. 

We have a tea and snack break at 10:40, then there are more classes until lunch at 2:40.  Today is Thursday, so lunch is beans and rice, with a side dish of mchicha, which is similar to spinach.  Tea and lunch are provided to teachers and school staff five days a week.  It's a nice perk, and very convenient.

Occasionally I teach a late class on Monday or Tuesday.  Wednesday is Math Club when the school schedule allows, but on days when I have neither class nor club I leave campus after lunch to shop at the market for ingredients for dinner.  We don't have a refrigerator, so I buy food almost every day.

At home, I relax for a while by working a Sudoku puzzle and reading a book on my Kindle.  We buy internet time approximately 4 days a week, so on those days I spend time catching up with the rest of the world on our laptop.  Then, Mark takes his turn to listen to music and watch episodes of TV shows stored on the computer, and I have a glass of box wine while I cook dinner.  I hear students outside the kitchen window, laughing and shouting.  The hubbub dies down when they go to dinner themselves.  They have study time after dinner, so it's quiet until 10 p.m. when they return to the dorms and bed.  Mark and I are usually sound asleep long before then, tired from the early start to our day. 

Cycle of Life

In the year and a half we have been in our small town, some Tanzanian friends have borne babies and some have gotten married. I have blogged about both those events, so, I guess it rounds out the cycle of life to report on the funeral we attended a couple of weeks ago.

Mrs. Mbwambo, the wife of a teacher at our school, had gone to the town of Lushoto to visit their daughter at her boarding school.  On the return trip, her bus collided with a truck while trying to pass a smaller vehicle.  She had a badly broken arm and was taken to a good hospital in Moshi.  She was treated and seemed to be on the road to recovery, but she died suddenly of complications.  She was 42 years old.

When a person passes away here, all their friends, neighbors, and family members gather at the person's home every day until the funeral.  We went the day after we heard the news, with a group of other teachers.  Men wear their everyday clothes for the condolence call, but women wear a kanga, or two, for the visit and for the funeral itself.  Kangas are colorful and versatile pieces of cotton fabric that can be wrapped around the waist to wear as a skirt, wrapped higher up to make a sarong, or worn as a shawl.  In this case, women usually wear one as a skirt and another as a shawl.  Kangas have slogans printed above the lower border.  (Mine says, "Mtoto kwa mzazi hakui", which means, loosely, "To a parent, a child doesn't grow up.")  We saw several kangas at the funeral with the slogan meaning "All is God's work."  We wondered if they were made especially for funerals. 

We walked to the Mbwambo home on the other side of our small town.  We could identify the house from a distance because it was the one with the open-sided tents set up in the yard, a sound system playing hymns, and at least 50 people visiting.  We made our way to the porch where the widower sat, shook hands, and said "Pole sana" (very sorry) to him and to anyone who looked like a relative.  We then sat with other mourners under a tent and listened to the hymns for an hour or so.

Friends, neighbors, and family contribute to a "condolence fund", and we did as well, along with all the other teachers at our school.  The bereaved family uses the money to finance funeral expenses--not just a coffin, but the tent rental, sound system, and food for the mourners, who may spend all day at the home.  Close friends and neighbors take time off work in the days before a funeral, to spend time with the bereaved family.

Two days after our condolence visit was the funeral itself, which was also held at the home, in the front yard.  Mrs. Mbwambo was a grade school teacher, a member of her church choir, and a long-time member of the community, so hundreds of people attended the service.  People began assembling in the morning, but we and many others arrived a little before 2 pm.  Lunch was served before the service began, with 3 buffet lines set up on the property. 

The Christian service began after lunch, and many parts of it were familiar to us.  There were prayers, eulogies, and a sermon.  (Sermons in Tanzania tend to be lengthy.  Parishioners expect a pastor to speak for as long as he or she has something to say.)  Three different choirs sang, each more than once.  Then it was time for final goodbyes.  The casket, highly polished wood with ornate brass fittings, had been closed, but now was opened so mourners could file past for a last look at the deceased.  This was a highly emotional event.  The widower himself and his children were relatively stoic,  but female relatives and friends were wailing and sobbing.  Some had to be helped back to their seats.  After the last viewing, the casket was closed and carried away, to the accompaniment of one of the choirs.  Many people followed the casket, and others just got up and moved around.  We expected that the next stop would be a cemetery, so we were surprised to learn that she was to be buried beside the house.  I actually think that is a nice alternative, here.  Cemeteries generally seem neglected, with towering weeds and wind-blown trash.  By burying a loved one near the home, the family can maintain the gravesite regularly.

We found the condolence visits and the funeral very touching.  The whole week underlined for us the importance of the community in this culture.  People are closely involved in their neighbors' life events, and participate in them fully.  

Theft!

We've been warned about crime in Arusha, and we do our best to protect ourselves, but recently the malefactors got the upper hand.

We go to the city a couple of times a month to visit the bank and shop for goods we can't find in our small town.  We come back with such things as olives, canned tuna, plum jelly, paper towels, and our liquor of choice.  We take a backpack with us for carrying our purchases easily.

Arusha's sidewalks are always busy with vendors, walkers, and people standing around conversing, so we normally walk single file.  One day last month, we had done some of our shopping and were on our way to another store when the sidewalk became exceptionally crowded with young men.  I was in the lead and I picked up my pace a little to try to outstrip the mass of people.  I didn't realize this was a setup, with the goal of filching things from the backpack Mark was wearing.

The crowd cleared suddenly and Mark caught up with me, saying, "Check the backpack.  See what's missing."  One of the zippered compartments was gaping open.  After a quick inventory, I realized that the only thing stolen was a plastic bag holding a small package of raisins.  Tanzanians don't eat raisins, which can only be found here in one or two shops that cater to Indians and Westerners.  I'm sure that the thieves expected us (old white people) to be carrying something more valuable--electronics, perhaps.  It gives me wicked satisfaction to think of them inspecting their booty and saying the equivalent of, "What the heck is this?"

Malaria Program

Malaria is a serious problem here.  One Tanzanian dies of malaria every 5 minutes.  It's the #1 child killer, with 1 in 5 under 5 years old dying of malaria-related diseases.  It is especially dangerous for pregnant women and their babies.  The women are susceptible to certain strains and may become dangerously anemic.  Without treatment, the disease can be passed to the child and contribute to low birth weight and other problems.

Malaria is somewhat less prevalent in our community than in other areas of the country, due to our high altitude and dry climate, but it is still a major health problem.  I have information on malaria and a DVD of a Swahili-language movie with a malaria theme that was given to us by the Peace Corps, so one of the teachers at our school and I decided to hold a malaria information session last Saturday. 

Of course, no enterprise here takes place without bumps along the road.  I had given the DVD to my teacher friend for her to preview.  She liked and approved of it, so we planned the program.  On Friday, she brought the DVD into work and showed it to one of the other teachers who share her office.  Then she had to go to class, and the other teacher said she would put the DVD into my friend's spacious handbag, which she left on her desk.   We planned the event for Saturday morning at 9:00.  My friend arrived somewhat late, and distressed, as she could not find the DVD.  Not in her purse, not in her office, not in her home.  She went to the house of the teacher who had been looking at it, and was told that it had indeed been put in her handbag as promised.  Then she commenced calling the other teachers who shared her office.  Finally, one of them reported that she had seen a new teacher take the DVD out of her purse.  Well, we didn't have this teacher's phone number.  We ended up calling the vice-principal, who not only gave us his number but also called the man himself.  Luckily, he lives nearby, and he gave the DVD to a messenger who finally delivered it to us.

A couple things to keep in mind.  Foremost, this is a communal society.  People are used to sharing things as a matter of course.  In my classroom, students pass pens pencils, erasers, and rulers back and forth constantly.  Often, these things do not get back to their original owners.  But it's polite to make a request before taking something.  So, my friend was distressed and worried about the event because it interfered with our program, but she was not as furious as I would have been about someone taking something from my purse.  The other thing is that people are generally not confrontational here.  She simply talked to the culprit quietly and got it back.  I managed not to say, "Where I come from, that's called STEALING!"   

So, we finally recovered the DVD,  and were able to start the program at 11:00.  I had been entertaining the students who had arrived earlier by playing music and showing photos that we had stored on our laptop, but we were all happy to get started.

Forty-four students, mostly girls, participated in the program.  We watched the movie, then had a discussion about malaria in Tanzania, disease prevention, malaria in pregnancy, and the myths and superstitions surrounding the disease.  (For example:  sleeping under in insecticide-treated mosquito net makes a man impotent!)  Students loved the movie and enjoyed and learned from the discussion.  I hope that it will help them protect themselves and their families from this disease.

Buying Electricity

Paying for electricity is done differently in Tanzania than in the States.  Here, we pre-pay for the service instead of getting a bill after the power is used.  The way it works is that when power is purchased, the buyer is given a receipt with a 20-digit code number which must be keyed in to a meter attached to the house.  That will re-load the meter with the appropriate amount of Kwh, which are shown on the meter's digital display.

Sounds simple, doesn't it?  Nothing is simple here.  There is no local office of the electric company where one could make payments in person.  However, there are several ways to make the purchase.  One local bank allows customers to do so through an option on their ATM--the closest thing to internet banking I have seen here.  Unfortunately, that is not the bank where we have our accounts.

Many people do not have bank accounts or credit cards at all, so there has arisen an industry of financial services.  The industry leaders are MPesa, Voda Money, and Airtel Money.  The idea is that a person gives an agent (usually the owner of a small shop) some cash, and the agent deposits it in an account with one of these companies, and links it to the customer's cell phone.  Then, using the phone, the customer can pay bills or transfer money to other people.

I have used one of these agents before.  This shop works as something of a clearing house.  I give them my money and they run it through their own account (I don't know with which company), and then forwards the receipt to my phone.  Last week, I went to pay for more power, but that particular shop was jammed with about a dozen customers, so I decided to "save time" by going to another recommended vendor.

The new shop took my 30,000 shillings (That's less than $20.  Not much, you say, but about 9% of my monthly Peace Corps stipend.), and put it in an Airtel Money account for my phone.  This was the first time I had used that service.  When I tried to access the account, though, the password was rejected and the account locked.  The agent kindly helped me call the company's customer service line and I was told that the password would be reset in 72 hours and then the account would be unlocked.  Those 3 days came and went, but by that time the entire Airtel Money system was down, and it remained down for 5 days.

Can you imagine customers of a financial service in the U.S. tolerating not being able to access their money for that amount of time (short of a natural disaster, like a hurricane)?  I'm sure many people here were in great difficulty.  Happily, my compulsive nature led me to try to make this purchase 10 days before our meter was due to run out.

Finally, a week after my first attempt, my password was reset, and the day after that I was able to use the account to make the purchase.  There was much rejoicing in our household when I finally loaded the new Kwh on the meter.

However....that night we had a thunderstorm and lightning fried our circuit breaker.  The next morning, while stumbling around in the dark, I heard a rustling noise from the pantry.  By the uncertain light of my flickering flashlight, I found a mouse circling the inside of our washtub.  I roused Mark from bed and unlocked the door to let him quickly rush the trapped mouse outside.

Later in the morning, the school handyman repaired the circuit breaker.  So now life is good again, and I am grateful to have power at all.

Iringa and Onward

Iringa seems to be a prosperous town.  Of course, that impression was probably reinforced by the fact that we stayed in an area near some middle- and upper-class homes.  But, still, it is cleaner than most cities in Tanzania, and we ran into far fewer beggars and hustlers even in the market.

We stayed at the Neema Umaki Guest House, part of the Neema Crafts center, where disabled people can learn a trade and find employment.  There is a workshop and the products made therein are sold at the gift shop.  A restaurant, with food designed to appeal to Western travelers, has deaf waiters.  (Customers write what they want on a piece of paper and hand them the order).  And the workers in the guest house have disabilities of various kinds.  This is very unusual in Tanzania, where those with physical challenges have very few opportunities for training or employment.

The Neema guest house hosted guests from several different countries while we were there, but it was at a local pub where we met 3 people who are in Tanzania as part of Korea's version of the Peace Corps.  Two of them are teaching in secondary schools (biology and computers) but the third is teaching Tae Kwon Do to police officers in Dar es Salaam.  We thought that was fascinating.

We did some sight-seeing while we were in the Iringa area.  First, walking distance from our hotel, was Gangilonga Rock, which means "the talking rock" in the tribal language of Hehe.  In the late 1800s, Chief Mkwawa, who led insurrections against the occupying German rule, used the rock as a place of meditation.  It was there that he learned that the Germans were coming to try to capture him.     

The second place we went, somewhat outside of town, is a spot where prehistoric rock paintings were discovered in 2010.  (Discovered, that is, by a Western scholar.  The local villagers have known about them all along.)  Although there are many more, and more elaborate, rock paintings a couple of hundred miles north of this location, these were fun to look at, with their identifiable zebras, giraffes, and even, perhaps, an elephant.

The road from Iringa to Dodoma is still under construction.   Only about half of it is paved, but it is graded, and reported to be much better than in the past, when it was very rough.  It winds through low mountains, and there are many hairpin curves--with no barriers on the side of the road.  Along the way we must have seen hundreds of baobab trees, with their massive trunks to hold moisture in the dry season, and high, small branches out of the reach of herbivores.

Dodoma, the capital of Tanzania, is a planned city with wide boulevards.  We treated ourselves to lunch at the New Dodoma Hotel (a very snazzy place indeed!)  There, we met an Italian pediatrician who has lived in this country for 30 years.  Turns out he knows a couple of our Peace Corps colleagues, and was eager to talk about the area.  He ended up taking us in his car to see the University of Dodoma, which is brand-new, modern, and enormous.  His particular interest was in the almost-finished diagnostic hospital that is going up on campus.  We were impressed by the building, but all three of us wondered where the funds will come from to run it on a daily basis.

While walking around the city, looking at impressive churches, mosques, and government buildings, we saw a small guest house.  The sign proclaiming it the "Chinese Safari Lodge" included a painting of the Statue of Liberty.  Even in the booming capital city, Tanzanian quirkiness abounds.

Leaving Dodoma was an adventure.  We bought bus tickets for a trip leaving at 8:15 a.m. the next morning.  We arrived at the bus station before 8:00, only to find that the bus had already pulled out.  Helpful young men at the station (there are always "helpful" young men at bus stations)  beckoned us to a taxi and told the driver about the situation.  We confirmed the price (5000 shillings, or just over $3) and jumped into the cab, which went racing through the streets.  We caught up to the bus, which pulled over at a bus stop.  Leapt out of the taxi and ran to the bus before it could leave.  Climbed aboard only to find two men sitting in our assigned seats.  The bus company had sold our already-reserved spots!  Luckily, there were a couple of extra on the bus, so everyone ended up sitting, not standing, for the trip.

We arrived in Singida about mid-day.  Checking into the guest house, we met 4 South Africans who were touring East Africa on their BMW motorcycles.  Now, BMWs are huge, sturdy machines with comfortable rides, but still...  Buses and trucks give no room to smaller vehicles of any type here, and regularly force them off the road.  Ironically, the South Africans thought we were brave for taking buses around the country.     

The next day, after our experience in Dodoma, we arrived at the bus stand 30 minutes before our bus was due to leave....and sat there for the next hour and a half until it pulled out.  You just never can tell.  Guess that's why the Peace Corps training emphasizes that we must be flexible and patient.      

That was the last leg of our trip, and we arrived back at our Tanzanian home tired, but happy that we had seen so much more of the country.

Mbeya, Tukuyu, and Njombe

Our school holiday started in early December and ran for a month, and we decided to use the time to see some more of Tanzania.  The southwest part of the country is said to be very pretty, so that was the area we chose.  It's far from where we live, though, and we didn't like the idea of spending more than half of our vacation on buses, so we started by taking a low-cost flight to Mbeya.

Mbeya is within a couple hours' drive from the borders of both Zambia and Malawi, and it gets a lot of traffic from both travelers and commercial transport. Major roads into and out of the city are congested, but the central city is very pleasant and walk-able.  The altitude is high (about 1700 meters, or 5500 feet), and the surrounding area is lush with plant growth.  It rains 9 months of the year, and the region grows bananas, tea, avocados, and maize.  Cows and goats are fat, unlike in our region, where their ribs are visible even after our shorter rainy seasons.

From Mbeya, we traveled south to the town of Tukuyu, where we hired a guide to take us to the local sights.  Mark wanted to climb to the rim of the Ngozi Crater, an extinct volcano 2629 meters high with a lake in the middle.  Now, I don't have a lot of confidence in my athletic ability, and was originally against the hike, hearing that it was steep.  However, climb we did, through the rainforest, listening to birds and unseen monkeys announcing our progress.  I felt like I was in one of those old movies set in Africa--"King Solomon's Mines" or such--as we clambered over rocks and tree roots, hauled ourselves up by holding on to branches, and teetered along narrow paths next to scary drop-offs.  But we made it to the top and down again, dirty, sweaty, with me puffing like a steam engine, but unscathed.   

                                                        Inside the crater       

The next day our guide took us on a somewhat less challenging hike to Daraja la Mungu (the Bridge of God), a natural bridge formed eons ago after volcanic activity. Upriver from the bridge is the Cooking Pot, where fast-moving water plunges into a hole, comes out a few meters away, then flows into an underground cavern.  It finally emerges several days later.  After this excursion, we went to a local garden restaurant and ate "kitimoto" (pork) for the first time in a year and a half.  (The strange thing about the word is that "kitimoto" also means "hot seat" in Swahili.  No one can explain why it's the word for pork).  The meal was excellent--the meat grilled and served in a tomato, garlic, and onion sauce.  We went back to the hotel after our excursions and collapsed.

The Bridge of God

Near Tukuyu is a village called Bagamoyo.  That is also the name of a town on the east coast of the country from which slaves were shipped out of Africa.  The village was named after the coastal trade center because it was a point where captured people were held for a time during their long trek from central Africa to the coast.     

We moved on to the low-key town of Njombe a few days before Christmas.  Njombe, still in the region of lush growth, has a Duka la Maziwa (milk store) that sells fresh milk, yogurt, and cheese.  Such an amazing thing to us!  In our region, fresh milk and cheese are only available in Arusha at stores that cater to Westerners.  (We don't buy it even there, as our electric service is so erratic that we haven't invested in a refrigerator.)   Njombe also has a lovely waterfall just off the side of the main road into town.  But the most interesting thing I saw there was not part of the town.  The guesthouse we stayed in had a TV turned on in the dining room.  Gospel videos were playing as we ate breakfast, and we watched 2 videos of groups singing "Silent Night" in Swahili.  The first one featured an African female singer and had still shots of a white Madonna and Child in the background.  I found that discordant.  The second video was more moving.  A group of singers stood around African men dressed as shepherds, who were crouched around a campfire and were looking into the dark sky.  I feel that depictions of Bible stories should be personalized to the population, to make the message more meaningful.

After Njombe we went to Iringa, Dodoma, and Singida...but that's a blog for another day.