May 2008

By the time this is posted, two months and half of the research will have been completed in Rufiji, and we’re now in Dar to rest (OK, so now we’re leaving our Dar rest…we’ve been bad at this blogging thing), check email, talk to family and friends back home (JP: Melissa, I was so excited to talk to you last time I almost peed my pants), and drink cold beer. When we were in Iringa, we befriended a man who lives in Dar with his wife. He is Irish and she is French and they’re in Tanzania for a couple years to work, he for TechnoServe (a very cool NGO that just received a huge Gates Foundation grant) and she as a health economist. They are great to hang out with and have insisted that whenever we’re in Dar we have to stay at their house. It sure beats a crowded, noisy hotel. Plus it means we get to cook and listen to music on their very loud speakers. It’s a nice break from bucket showers- even though I admit I kind of enjoy bathing with a 10 liter bucket. And we’re going to have to (oh, our tragic lives) visit and maybe even stay over at the acting Belgian Ambassador’s place. We hitched a ride with his wife when we first arrived in Rufiji (she was tagging along with some of the Embassy’s staff who were meeting to discuss the new Eastern Selous Wildlife Management Project) and she insisted we visit. The Belgian Ambassador also heads up their technical cooperation agency, so it’ll be interesting to chat with him about all we’ve experienced here.

In the village Mtanza-Msona, we share a blue and white, three-room house with a young schoolteacher named Fatuma. The house is the only cement brick and tin roof house aside from the village office building and the school. We like the house but we also share it with a thousand bats, several mice that rotate occupancy on a fairly regular death schedule (not our doing), 4 million flies, geckos, and lizards. We’ve already tried once to get the bats out by plugging holes with cement but they’re sneaky bastards and found another way in. We’re mostly able to keep the mice out of our room at night by stacking papers by the door, but they still make it in sometimes to wake us up by skittering across the headboard, and pose for our headlamps before falling to the floor in shock. They are pretty big mice, dark with big ears. Nick calls them cartoon mice. There are resident geckos in our room that are warmly welcome. They hang out on our window screens patiently waiting for flies and tsetse flies to walk into their mouths. Every time they catch one, we cheer. The flies are so, so annoying, and they are in endless supply here. You’re constantly swatting. Of course now, when they land on us, we’re not as quick to swipe them away as when we first arrived – something to think about when we see flies sauntering calmly into and out of people’s mouths during our interviews.

Mr. Msuya shares the house with us, too, after he left the neighbors shack due to a persistent mouse problem. Mr. Msuya… where to start. Once upon a time we went to the district headquarters in Utete to get official permission to carry out the research in Rufiji. A letter from the Council for Science and Technology in hand, we met a nice official named Abednego who promptly called the Mkongo District Official, Mr. Msuya, back from Dar where he had just arrived that morning, in order to help us with the research. That much you know already. We thought he would come escort us to the villages to introduce us to the important people and help us acquire a suitable assistant. Instead, he waltzed into the REMP library where we were sorting through documents and chatting with a couple people about our research, and offered his service for four to five months in a boastful, now clearly ‘Msuya’, manner. He was going on “leave” from his district duties to help with our research, which is strange considering that he is essentially the government representative for hundreds of thousands of people in the upper Rufiji. Clearly, our research is more important, and we greedily stole him from his service to the country. Actually, after a while, we realized that his assistance might be beneficial both to us (he could facilitate interviews and research logistics, and his English is quite good) and to him (he could learn a lot about some of the most pressing problems facing the people of Rufiji). A partnership was forged, and now we regret not bringing a video camera to document the character that is Mr. Ally Msuya, District Official, a “very important person who people should fear.” He is a 56-year old former schoolteacher from Kilimanjaro (Pare tribe). He was a successful teacher, which you intuit from his interactions with children. He is not cut out for government business here – he readily admits that he wishes he was teaching. He’s perfectly competent, and we don’t need the several testimonies we’ve received about his caring, energetic commitment to the people to understand that he is the kind of representative this forgotten district needs. He has welcomed us warmly, won’t leave us alone with exaggerated claims of danger (invoking 9-11 more than once), weathers our flaring tempers each time he is 6 hours late for meetings or work, flirts to break every firm and angry glare given to us by waitresses, hostesses, and receptionists, at times too impressed with status while at others quick to call an inflated individual ‘a problem’. He’s a wonderful translator and facilitator in the interviews—surely due to his experience as a teacher. He rides his big green “Better” motorcycle throughout the sandy river basin (because the government doesn’t give him a vehicle – the governor of a district with one of the worst roads in the country should be at the top of the list for a vehicle, but instead he’s stuck on his bike, rain or shine) and is known for his armed intervention to kill the old lion that killed 27 people in 2002-2003. He has two wives and 10 or 11 children (we can’t get the count right, and he’s seems a bit slippery with the number), including “the mzungu”, a 7-year old with albinism. All in all, we owe a lot to Msuya. He’s been a great friend and enormous contributor to the research.

Fatuma has been here for a year and she hates it. She’s 21, has a baby who lives with her parents in Tanga, and a fiancé in Morogoro. We can’t figure out her deal, but we’re been told that Rufiji is the destination for those near the bottom of their teaching classes—a senseless strategy: deliver the most uninspired to the very place in Tanzania that needs inspiration. We wouldn’t call Faturma incompetent, but we are comfortable characterizing her as uninspired…and a tad volatile. We love her, though, and will be sending her a care package full of books when we head back to Rufiji in a week, and with our sidekick, Mr. Msuyaa (more on him later), work towards getting her transferred (something she normally wouldn’t even be able to apply for until 2010). We have some justification beyond her boredom: the equally volatile head schoolteacher propositioned her to be his lover when she first arrived in the village and has held her denial against her ever since. We bought Fatuma 6 chickens as a gift for helping us out so much while we’ve been here. She’ll be able to eat fresh eggs or sell them when she wants—a big and one of the only moneymakers here. Unfortunately, we think she might hate them (she said she wanted them, though!). They’ll probably get eaten by baboons soon, or else she’ll just sell them and get the money. Oh well. We like having them around, though even the most passionate animal lover can’t help but hate a rooster that lives within 50 yards from the house. Every morning around 4:30AM he crows once, shuts up for about 45 minutes and then starts crowing until we let him out of their closet, which is usually around 7AM. We took a hilarious video on our camera of the rooster going crazy – please ask to see it when we return.

Fatuma sells ubuyu, which is the dried fruit of the baobab tree cooked together with red dye and sugar. The school kids love it and every morning starting around 7 kids run up to our house yell ‘Hodi!’ followed by ‘Ubuyu!’ That’s it, no ‘Good morning’, or asking nicely for the treat. Fatuma tries to teach them good manners but so far I haven’t noticed any difference. With us, sometimes she is intent on doing everything for us, shooing us when we attempt to cook or clean, and other times she mutters about the misfortune of landing this new role with our arrival. We’re stuck during those bad times. Part of it is that she (and all others here, of course) thinks we can’t do anything. When she’s in a good mood she’s fun to be around, when she’s in a bad mood, world look out (JP: Reminds me of a sister of mineJ, hehe…and Nick when he needs a lollypop or something).

Fatuma is an amazing cook though. Her coconut rice might be the best thing in the world and Jess’s new favorite dish. We eat lots of rice, ugali, greens (like potato leaves, cassava leaves, pumpkin leaves, and spinach), okra, and beans or peas. The farmers have just started to harvest crops so vegetables are slightly easier to find these days than when we first got here two months ago. Then, one could really only find corn meal, rice, dried beans that give you dangerous gas, illegally harvested fish, and chickens that die on your doorstep. We had to bring most of our food from Ikriwiri, about 90 kilometers away (You might ask, What do people here eat, then? And we respond, Good question!). Chickens: Whoever you buy the chicken from brings it over with its legs tied up, squawking and wings flapping. Once it’s drained and the feathers are plucked, it looks less like a live chicken and we, the consumers, feel a little more at ease. We know that many reading this have had intimate experiences with their food, including their meat. We both feel that it is important, both for personal development and health and for future food and environmental security, for us all to attempt to resurrect more direct relationships with our food. Chickens have taught us a little bit –or, rather, they have contributed to a mountain of unresolved questions about human and non-human life. The meat is tasty but because the chickens are older and have actually gained some muscle living lives outdoors, it’s tough to chew. Here they eat the roosters, not the hens, and they also call the roosters ‘cocks’. The first time we ate chicken here, Jess was watching them pluck the rooster when the guy who helped slaughter it turned to her and asked if I she had ever had ‘fresh cock’. She couldn’t answer the question because she was too busy cracking up. So now of course we have taken every opportunity to use the word cock: ‘Wow, look at that big cock’; ‘Mr. Msuya wants a big cock for dinner’; ‘Mr. Msuya, you’re like a big proud cock’…and the list goes on.
The fish we’re less fond of because they taste exactly like the muddy river from which they’re hooked and netted. So we stick to the veg. And coconut rice. Jess will dream about that for the rest of her lifeJ.

Every morning we get about 10 minutes of nice, quiet, morning time just as the sun is rising, in between crowing sessions and before kids start crying and all the radios turn on full blast. Mr. Msuya wakes up and immediately turns on his radio. He doesn’t adjust for his own ear, but rather cranks the familiar black box to deafening, crackly levels. It’s never a clear radio station either and every minute or so fades out to white noise. The transistor radio culture is a mystery – making noise, in general, is a mystery. If there is cultural protocol, we have yet to understand it. Even if somebody happened to be bothered by, say, loud sex in the middle of the night, let alone a blaring radio, he would never say a thing. But, the thing is, we’re pretty sure it takes an earthquake to bother people. (NP: A story from Uganda. I had found an old, beat up, stringless junior guitar with mouse crap in the body up at the station. My dad sent some nylon strings, and I happened to get it in working order to bring down to camp. One day we had an early return to camp from the gorillas, and were all looking forward to a restful afternoon. The ranger that week was an older guy we named after the oldest gorilla in the group, Matu. He caught sight of the guitar, snatched it and started playing a 10 second riff that he had learned in a barracks somewhere in East Africa. After about (no joke) 2 to 3 hours of the same riff, I heard a mumbled, “Stop!” from one of the tents. Tibenda had had enough, and I was shocked. The man didn’t stop. I don’t think he heard Tibenda. It remains the sole incident in all my time over here when someone voiced their annoyance about noise. Granted, I usually don’t say anything, either, because I’m terrified of breaking some cultural taboo, which, again, I’m not sure even exists.) Anyway, Africa is not a quiet place, and you just have to get used to it. Around 7AM the school kids start singing and running to school. They run in two lines from the village center, past our house, to their school. It’s nice to hear their songs in the morning. We went out one morning to watch them, which surprised many of them and broke their rhythm and enthusiasm. There are 300 students at Msona school, which goes up to Standard/Grade 7. Three hundred students are taught by 5 teachers: the head teacher, the English teacher who never says anything, Fatuma who hates being here and just spent the last week in her bed instead of teaching, an older teacher who is drunk all the time, and Mr. Saidi who’s probably the most responsible out of the bunch but he can’t really teach 300 kids on his own. Today there were no teachers in the school and all the kids just left. Most of the teachers were outside watching the troop of baboons in the field eat discarded corn husks. There are about 30 baboons that occasionally wander past our house and the school and Mr. Msuya and Fatuma like to throw old cassava root, interspersed with curses and laughter, at them. Everyone hates baboons here because they steal chickens and eat crops. We just heard today that sometimes people set a trap with of food mixed with cement to kill them. There’s got to be a better way to do it. There’s also a juvenile vervet monkey hangs out around the village. She is a ‘pet’, meaning someone stole her from her mother and then sold her. Sometimes she comes around our house to hangs out on the backyard wall. She’s afraid of us, for good reason, but one morning we were able to get close to her by bribing her with bananas and coconut shavings. We want to groom her and remove the collar they put on her – she’s a village monkey for life, though she does seem to have some foraging skills.

Several of the folks here stop by once in a while to say ‘Hi’ and then struggle through a half English, half Swahili conversation. Two guys, Moshi and Mashaka, swing by the most (Mashaka means “Worries” – we’ve interviewed people with names that translate as “Bad”, “Not good”, “I don’t care”, and “Scandal”, but also “King”, “Gift”, and all the other good things in life). Moshi works at one of the safari camps in Selous and knows a bit of English, and Mashaka is a fisherman and one of the first villagers we interviewed. Ramadhani is an older man who has brought us bananas as a gift and just likes to check in on us to make sure that ‘no one in the village is annoying us’. Mtou is our most permanent fixture. He’s the local traditional doctor and botanist. We’ve hired him to help round up interviewees and visit farms to take GPS points and notes. He’s hysterical, and one of the nicest guys we’ve met. He doesn’t know much English, just a few words and sentences, but when he hears Msuya say a word he knows (and some he certainly does not know), he immediately repeats him and affects that he knows exactly what the conversation is about. His favorite word is ‘specialist-ee for’, which he no doubt learned when someone said that he is a specialist for traditional medicine. He has taken the word to new heights: “That lady, specialist-ee for sister”, meaning “That woman is my sister”. More intuitively, it’s used like “Shrub, specialist-ee for snake bite”. “This stick, specialist-ee for build house for chicken.” Another thing that everyone says is ‘nani’ which means ‘who’ but they use it in a way more like ‘what’s its name’/‘what’s your name’. For example, “Bring me that, nani” or “You, Mr…Nani, come here”. It’s how we say “like” way to much. Just like…like that.

Our neighbors have a bunch of kids that always yell to us, “Bye-bye Mzungu!” We’re still trying to teach them that first you say, “Hi”—and also that our names are not Mzungu—but none of it ever really sticks. The only other thing they know in English is, “What is my name?” to which we tend to reply, on days when we’re not in a playful mood, “I don’t know.” Of course, “What is your name” is the correct way to ask the question, but it’s often of no use to try to teach a group of mutually confident kids who respond to spotless Mzungu-Swahili by laughing and running ten meters as if they’re provoking a drunk man who has lost his motor functions (which they do here, too). Some of the really young ones are totally freaked out by us and scream – eventually, you might get them to chill out. Our two favorites are Aggi and Ally. Aggi is one of the school teacher’s kid and we’re not sure where Ally lives but he’s always finding his way to our kneecaps, smiling the greatest smile in Mtanza-Msona.

A couple weeks ago Msuya, Mtou, and we took the motorcycles to the farms in a place called Baweni (translated as something like “wetland”). It took us about an hour the first day to get there, through sand pits and mud holes. We fell off only once in a sand pit that day but the second day we bit it twice in these awfully sticky mud holes. Falling off wasn’t all that bad but pairing it with relentlessly biting tsetse flies who attack at full force as soon as we slowed down made it terrible. Those flies hurt. Essentially they are like deer flies, but they sometimes carry sleeping sickness – though, here, we are told they don’t. They are why the people here don’t keep livestock. Baweni is an interesting place, open to the massive sky and far enough removed from the already remote village center of Mtanza-Msona to give you a feeling of great isolation. You drive (or, for most, walk) through thick miombo wood and grassland, first on a fairly clear road which then turns to grass and sand and mud. Eventually, you emerge into an expanse of rice paddies and small mud houses. Nick and Msuya did interviews and Jess and Mtou walked to farms through flooded and muddy rice fields taking the GPS points and notes and meeting farmers, all the while trailed by a line of little kids. Two of those little kids stuck around for a whole day and made sure that they got to carry the umbrellas. One little boy, Shukuru (which means ‘to be grateful’), hung out with us all day and at one point saved Jess from getting lost and wandering through the huge rice fields. He’s a bright and cheerful 8 year-old who has never been to school. He and Jess spent one afternoon writing words—he would point to something he wanted to know, Jess would double-check the Kiswahili word in the dictionary and then draw a picture and write the word underneath. Then he’d grab the paper and start copying. He would have continued all day if we didn’t have to leave. Shukuru is an orphan who lives with his old grandmother at the farm. We’ve always discussed sending someone here to school, and as we spend more time discussing livelihoods and development and drawing a picture of the village, the value of education becomes clearer and clearer to us—not only to individual children, but for the future security of everyone here (and everywhere, for that matter!). Oh, how we take our education for granted. Taking a quick look at the data (100 2-hour interviews so far), the village is comprised of an adult population with an average educational attainment equivalent to grade 6, and that’s in schools chronically deficient in resources and creative lesson plans. Clearly, this translates into a dangerous lack of confidence, vision, independence, and innovation as household leaders and members of a community. In more than half of the interviews we’ve labored over questions like, “If this community government had the money, what would you suggest they invest in to help Mtanza-Msona prepare for future droughts?” A pretty straightforward question posed by an expert in Kiswahili (Mr. Msuya, we’ve said, couldn’t be more Tanzanian if he tried) to those who know the land and their lives better than anyone, yet more often than not we’re met with blank stares. Some simply don’t understand the question, while others, it seems, have never been asked their opinions about things. Whatever confidence a visitor might lack in dictating what is best for the security of people far from where he or she grew up is strengthened by a quickly-assumed conviction that poor education in an integrating world will lend to stagnated or worsening health levels and less than happy lives. How do you build a society of individuals that value leadership as an honor and duty rather than a path to hard cash?

Anyway, after meeting his grandmother and talking with the both of them, we decided to semi-adopt Shukuru and pay for him to go to a school in Dar es Salaam. He’s going to come with us the next time we go to Dar and we’ll spend a day shopping for his school gear and then drop him off at a boarding school. Because he used to be a head teacher near Dar, Mr. Msuya has many connections with the schools, so we’re pretty sure we’ll be able to get Shukuru enrolled midway through a term. It’ll be fun to go shopping with him, and hopefully he’ll enjoy being in school. We had originally asked him why he wasn’t in school, and if he wanted to go. He said, yes, and disappeared, reappearing one hour later with his grandmother in tow. He’s got a kind of initiative lacking in many young kids here, and we’re excited to open a few doors for him. He used to live in Dar so we aren’t worried about him having culture shock moving from an isolated farm to the craziness of the big city.

Mtanza-Msona is a small village (425 households) but many of the people farm far from the main village, so it seems like the place is huge. Baweni is farthest hamlet from the village center (15km), and others cross the river by canoe to get to their farms. The canoe crossing can take up to an hour and a half depending on the strength of the river, and after arriving on the other shore, one might have another 10km hike ahead of him or her. One visit to the farms—plagued by pests (this year termites, last year mice, every year elephants, birds, those devil baboons, and the errant killer lion), scorching sun, more frequent droughts and the errant killer flood, a paucity of modern inputs, and hot and malnourished farmers—and you’re acutely aware of how hard these folks work. That said, there is the odd comment – which we’ve heard from more than a couple smart Tanzanian NGO workers and public officers – that ‘these people are lazy.’ What we think is going on is that the youth population is the problem—they don’t like to farm and can often be found lounging in crooks of trees listening to the same ‘bongo flava’ songs throughout the day. We wonder how the introduction of modern pop culture in Tanzanian society, at least as far as the radio and maybe a visit or two to the Dar clubs and pool joints, is affecting cultural norms that once stitched together small communities and dictated productive effort. It’s got to be tough to be a young guy wanting to dress like the young Tanzanian rap stars and live the lives of the Africans in the Premier League that he sees on the satellite TV owned by the churlish head teacher when you know that your family’s two acres of corn require weeding today, tomorrow, next year, and fifty years from now. How does one make sense of the cultural revolution happening in a stagnant, traditional rural Africa?

How do you organize your community when there is no culture of dutiful leadership and public service, efficiency, and innovation and when the central means of subsistence requires the population to be scattered, unorganized, and incommunicado?

The research has been going well, although not without frustrations. We seem to be able to hit a stride for three or four days before coming to a screeching halt. Jess had to do several of the interviews because Nick got malaria and had to stay in bed battling a 102° fever. The medicine now for malaria is really strong and he started feeling better after only one day. It’s not fun to be sick or have to care for someone sick when you’re this far from home. Nothing feels in control, and if things got bad the closest, good hospital would be 8 hours away in Dar es Salaam. And we’d have to go on a motorcycle. My fingers are crossed that neither of us get really sick while we’re here (that one’s for you, Maria and Jeannie).

Over the last two weeks we’ve been bumming around Dar es Salaam and hiking in the Usumbara Mountains, but all those adventure stories will have to wait for the next posting. Now, we’re rushing to pack and catch the bus to Rufiji for our final month stint. This time we’ll be in a village called Ndundunyikanza. Say that five times fast.

Pictures

Mama lion.


My favorites!


Ruaha mountains as the sun sets




Twiga!




A bunch of silly zebras.




The five lion cubs.




Ruaha entrance... The Great Ruaha River flowing under the bridge




Ruaha River





Our broken down Land Rover (don't tell Dad!)

Bits and pieces

The place where we are staying, Hurume Baptist Center (actually isn't owned by Baptist anymore but they haven't done anything about replacing the sign), is also home to the Spring Valley Girls Secondary School. Secondary is basically high school so there are 150 girls from the age of 14 to 17 living and going to school here. They are hilarious to watch - and listen to. Nothing is spoken below a shout and no one is too far away to talk to. No inside voices. There are usually two or three of them wandering around together ('the wolf pack') laughing and saying "Wewe!" (you) in a tone similar to how we would say "you crazy!" except that it's a bit more high pitched and shouted. Even though they act like young girls, laughing and goofing off, they look older, more responsible. They've probably been taking care of their younger siblings since they were old enough to walk. Many families in Iringa are set up so Father is working (or at least away from the house), Mother is working around the house and/or running a small duka (shop) outside the house, and the kids are taking care of each other- the other day I passed a girl no older than 4 or 5 and she had her younger sibling, who looked like a newborn, slung across her back.
The girls at the Spring Valley School are in charge of things like cleaning the common dining area or hauling buckets of water from the rain barrel to their bathrooms. They walk across the grass, chattering away, with buckets full of water balanced on their heads. I want to learn to do that too! It's so practical- once you figure out balance and finally trust yourself. Once in a while we'll hear them when they're in their classrooms singing (especially after dinner) or cracking up about something. And recently they’ve taken to dressing in jumpsuits, singing, and running one grueling lap around the compound, the frontrunners lying on the ground every 20 yards to wait for the stragglers who like to speedwalk. It's fun to have them around- they're a constant source of entertainment. In the afternoons they have a break and visit Bibi Candy's duka. Candy doesn't have too much stuff in there - packets of cookies or juice - but sometimes she'll be making chips and eggs and in the mornings she fries up bunches of maandazi. Maandazi are like doughnut holes but larger and not sweet. Well, there is a little sweetness but mostly it's just a crispy outside covering a warm doughy center. I think about my mom every time I have them because I know how much she loves doughnuts, or just bread in general:) They are so good and the ones here are the best I've tasted so far. At 5 cents apiece it's easy to buy a bunch but hard to finish them all…and then feel sick. Munching on maandazi is a great way to break up the morning Swahili lessons- which are going really well. I've been in class for 18 days and I've learned a ton. I think that by the next Tuesday, when we’re off to Rufiji, I'll have a grasp on the language and it'll only get better in Mtanza. I'm glad that I've taken this course, even if just to get the basics before going somewhere I won't be able to speak English. Learning a language is interesting- you'll go through the day's lesson and understand what you're being taught and then you try to practice on your own and realize you don't have the vocabulary to complete a decent sentence. So far my sentences have been Swahili littered with English nouns (and half the time if you throw an 'e' on the end, it'll be the Swahili equivalent, especially if it’s a new technology of some sort). It's also fun to finally be able to catch part of a Kiswahili conversation and understand the gist of what they're talking about.

Hurume Baptist Center is about a mile from the town center and the road goes through houses and small shops. Daladalas race down the road throwing up dust (or mud as was the case for the first three weeks of the month, when it didn’t stop raining) and laying on the horn. Coming from town, they often cut the engine and coast, holding onto the overworked door to make sure it doesn’t fall into the gutter…or onto a child carrying a baby. There are two little calves that are always picketed on the side of the road- one white and brown, and the other the reddish brown. Nick has decided that he wants to adopt the reddish brown one because she's the prettiest cow he's ever seen. And I agree with him, she is a pretty cow, but I think we should start with a dog first! Once we get closer to town, the groups of kids start giggling and if one is brave enough they'll yell 'Wazungu', meaning 'white people' (or something of the sort – we’ve also heard it derives from something meaning “person who wanders overseeing plantation workers i.e. slaves) and then all the rest of them will chime in. They don't just say it once, either. It turns into a kind of song and can continue long after you've passed. I think it's funny, and kind of cute. If it gets annoying (with older children or, yes, adult men) Nick will sometimes ask, ‘Nini?’ (What?) or respond, 'Wafrica' (Africans). The older ones look confused, and the little ones usually get really quiet and then start cracking up. Or you just greet them in Kiswahili and they get confused that you know the language and hush up. Sometimes we'll get a 'Good aftanoon, SIR' (and it could really be morning or evening but it doesn't matter) or a 'Teacha!'. Many of the younger kids will greet us with 'Shikamoo' which is a respectful greeting reserved for your elders and is responded to with 'Marahaba'. I don't really know what the translation is- I don't think there is an English equivalent. I like saying 'Shikamoo' to the older people, especially the women, because their faces light up and it's as though you've unlocked a door. They are surprised that you know the word, much less use it—and it feels that because you have, you become respected, as well.

The market in Iringa is constantly bustling and there are tables and tables of fruits, vegetables, and dried fish. A while back we went to buy ingredients for guacamole. After talking to my dad about his upcoming week in Mexico, I had a sudden urge for Mexican food. Avocados are just now in season and they are huge- the size of a softball, maybe a bit larger. We were able to find ripe avocados, tomatoes, onion, and limes. Perfect! Just smushed it up and added a bit of salt and it went wonderfully with our dinner. My craving was curbed- although now a margarita is sounding pretty darn good, too...

Recently we went on a safari to Ruaha National Park! It was so cool. It’s the rainy season so the park was lusciously green. We were told that during the dry season (after May) there is no grass and most of the trees drop their leaves. That’s best time to look for large animals because they all congregate around the river or watering holes. Still, this time, we saw tons of zebra, giraffes, elephants (even a teeny tiny baby one), kudu, hippos, and lions. The bird watching was amazing too. So many different species- and all so colorful- it was hard to keep your attention on any one thing. Ruaha is the largest national park in Tanzania and has mountains as well as flatter grassland areas. The river is fast flowing and muddy- it actually flows into the Rufiji River, where we are going to be in two weeks. There’s been so much rain here the past couple weeks that the Ruaha River was overflowing its banks and parts of the road had already been washed out. These things aren’t expected until next month so it’s kind of catching everyone by surprise.

On our evening drive, we went up one road looking for lions and were standing up out of the pop-top roof when we came around a corner and not 10 feet from the side of the road was a female lion lying on the grass. The driver didn’t see her but because the road was a bit sunken down, the lion seemed to be almost eye level with me but all I could do was point and say ‘Ahhhh, stop!’. She didn’t even move once we sidled up next to her. Her golden eyes just watched us and any time someone made a move her eyes would get even larger and she would lift her head. Even though I had expected some of the animals to be habituated to cars and humans, I really didn’t expect this. Because of her lack of concern, we think that she might have been hurt (we did notice a small wound on her shoulder) or just plain exhausted from a hunt. We spent quite a while around her and as we were leaving, Nick saw two lion cubs peaking over a rock behind the mom so of course we slammed on the brakes and sat watching the cubs. They were young enough to still be curious of us and kept watching us as they played and posed on nearby rocks!

The park is also home to about 100 wild dogs who are further from the main safari-ing area… maybe we’ll be able to go back and see if we can find them. Nick’s on a mission. We stayed in green metal bandas right next to the river and were woken up at night by passing hippos. We met the misty morning early for a sunrise game drive. The colors were amazing and we came upon bunches of baby lions. There were no parents in sight. One set of cubs was playing on the rocks and a second group of five was lined up on a flat rock intently watching us. We got quite close to these five too and at first they were curious and then slowly, one by one, put their heads down and closed their eyes (see picture). There were zebras all over the place and most of the time they were around giraffes or eland antelope. Our guide told us that the giraffe was chosen as the Tanzanian mascot because ‘they are polite’. Even though they look odd with their long necks and plump eyelashes, they are so graceful. We frightened a couple hippos who quickly took off toward the river, their little legs carrying massive bodies and heads. We pulled beside a retired male lion next to the river who began to roar when we were out of sight. All in all, Ruaha is an amazing place and highly recommended—and we only saw a tiny eastern sliver of the park. Our Land Rover broke down on the way back. The fuel filter was leaking, and so we sat at an angle on a hill for a while waiting for a goop to harden to the filter so that diesel could make it to the engine. One of our safari guys, David, hitched a ride to the next town to arrange for a taxi, and just when he got there about an hour later, the car fired up and we proceeded to travel top-speed to make up time and acquire mobile service to call David. So it goes on these roads…



Even if you were out of Tanzania or didn’t have access to a radio, newspaper, or television this month, you would be tipped off to the fact that President Bush visited here by some special garments found in town. Some women are walking the streets clad head to toe in special -edition ugly beige plaid fabric with George’s big head and silly grin haloed prominently on their butts by Tanzanian and American flags and Kiswahili and English messages of welcome. I tried to buy a shirt made out of this fabric, but was DENIED by one of the hundreds of seamstresses in Iringa, who said that she’s saving it to make herself clothes. I will find some in Dar. Guaranteed. And I will ultimately spill something on it at a party back in the states. President Bush should have been a goodwill ambassador to Africa. He loves it here—the dancing, the photo-ops, the Kiswahili greetings (he said “Vipi mambo” to a crowd in Arusha, assuring five hundred articles about it in the next two weeks and refreshing his positive African legacy). He has given a lot of money to Africa – though many are still quick to ask where that money is directed and how it is spent – and most seem to like him, except for those recently detained for plotting to blow something up (e.g. him) during his visit. And you can always find a guy or two at a bar who loves him for being so quick to fight. I don’t know exactly what to say about U.S.- Africa relations. There’s a lot of potential for investments in better infrastructure and public capacity, lots of resources to sustainably develop to fund education and health initiatives. And, at least in relatively stable countries like Tanzania, we’re likely to see quite a bit more attention of countries other than China (who is everywhere, buying up everything). Then again, Kenya was, up until December, a relatively stable country, and though some things are finally being signed in Nairobi, investors are surely doubting the long-term security of their investments and hitting the road. Either way, defining our collective role in Africa is a tough thing to do.

More when we get back from the first month in Mtanza! Best wishes to everyone. Oh, and we have news that just isn’t bloggable…we’re sure it’ll find its way to you soon.

Iringa in February

For the first time in a month, I can truly say it's chilly out. It's been raining all day and the temperature has hovered around 70 degrees (I know that doesn't seem chilly when it's 30 back at home!). We are in Iringa which is about 1500 meters above sea level and the 7 hour bus ride from Dar first has you sweating and shrinking from the sun to trying to find a beam and putting on a long sleeve shirt. The cooler temperatures are a welcome relief.

Happily, we've only had to spend a few days in Dar the past couple weeks. The people at Safari Inn now know us well and the receptionist, who's face up until recently has never shown emotion, finally acknowledges us with a smile and 'Karibuni' (Welcome). My favorite person at Safari is the man who serves breakfast (Nick says Greg will remember him - same guy). He rattles off in Swahili to Nick asking how we slept, how our last trip was, and what we'd like for breakfast. I usually just sit there and smile while Nick responds- they talk too fast for me to understand! Then he looks to me and asks, 'Toaste, juicee, black tea?'. Yep, he even remembers what we order for breakfast. Then he laughs and hustles off to the kitchen.

One hot afternoon we randomly came across a casino in the basement of a business building. I'm no gambler but a couple beers help out- especially when they're free (even when they cost more than what we had on our electronic slots cards at the time). Guess that's how they get you. We learned how to play some kind of poker game from a couple Indian guys and while we did well for a bit, we didn't end up on top. I had a card with 10,000Tsh (about $8) for the slot machines so I went to play those after the poker game wiped out our other 10,000Tsh. I really have no idea how to play those things- there's just a bunch of buttons and lights flashing. So, I just pressed buttons and all of a sudden the lights go crazy and I end up winning 46,000Tsh!! That's when I called it quits and cashed out with a big grin on my face!

A couple streets down from Safari Inn is Kisutu Street where there are several Hindu temples and men on the sidewalks threading flowers on string for necklaces. It's a really quiet and refreshing street to walk down away the crowds everywhere else. We had read about a shop on this street that made paan. Paan is a bunch of ingredients like coconut, nuts, syrup or honey, fennel seeds, and other spices that are placed on a bettel leaf and rolled up. You put the whole thing in your mouth and chew it but only swallow the juices. After all the taste is gone then you spit out the pithy part. We got a couple that were filled with coconut, berry syrup, fennel, I think some kind of nut, and other spices I couldn't determine. It was so good! Hey Mekha, why haven't you represented and made us some paan!? The bettel leaf is described as a 'mild narcotic' but really it only makes your tongue tingle. It reminded me of the toothache plant that is found all over Central Texas. The settlers used to chew the plant's leaves to numb their mouths when they had toothaches or any kind of dental work done. I remember my sister and I used to pick off those leaves and chew them, enjoying the tingly mintiness that overcame our mouths and tongues. That feeling, paired with the great taste of the insides, made the paan a hit and I want to try another that has different ingredients next time.

Last week we blindly made our way to Utete, the district headquarters of the Rufiji district. I say blindly because of the 30 or so numbers we had to the district offices in Utete, none of them worked. Any place we called in Dar to get information or other numbers to Utete had nothing to offer us, either. And email was definitely out of the question. So, we just showed up. Since we couldn't get ahold of anyone, I was really expecting to find a tiny little town with a one room district office. In fact, Utete is quite large and there is a huge old German boma building that houses the district offices, WWF, and REMP/IUCN. We were able to root through the REMP library and borrow tons of technical reports, notes, papers, and maps about the Rufiji region - especially Mtanza-Msona village, our research site (maybe one of two, but we're not sure just yet). A district executive officer, Abnegdego (Nick says to Greg: he used to teach English at Lutheran in Morogoro), cleared our research and called another district official, Mr. Msuya, who had just driven the 4 hours to Dar on his motorbike, to come back to Utete and take us to Mtanza-Msona. And he came! And we felt bad. "Ah, it's my job!" I thought that if they had phone numbers that worked, then this sort of thing wouldn't happen:) Mr. Msuya, Nick, and I hopped a bus to Kibiti where we were to catch another bus that would pass through Mtanza on it's way from Dar to Mloka. We missed the Mloka bus by half and hour and had to sit in Kibiti for four hours until we found a car and driver to hire and take us out to Mtanza. Mr. Msuya, the happy and proud district official, was "outraged" by the "conundrum" in which we found ourselves, especially since the other bus, who he had called earlier, didn't wait the half hour for us (full of, no doubt, 80+ sweating and swearing passengers). It took about 4 hours to drive 40 miles on quite possibly the worst road I've ever been on. First of all we were in a Suzuki Jimmy that had no shocks whatsoever and had definitely seen better days. Nick and I were smushed in the backseat, hanging onto the 'oh shit' handles so we weren't thrown through windows. The road was full of potholes, mudholes, sandpits, villagers walking or riding their bikes - some 90km or more on the road - and huge piles of red dirt (see below about these piles). It was a long, dusty ride and when I finally got out of the backseat I had to do a full body scan to make sure the shaking and cramped legs were only temporary.

Mtanza-Msona is a farming/fishing village on the Rufiji River. Crops are grown on the river deposits to the south of the river. The village itself is on the north side of the river, so most families have houses in the village and temporary shamba (farm) stilt houses in their fields. During growing seasons or busy planting times, the family will move out to shamba in order to protect their crops from wildlife pests - wild pigs, baboons, elephants, and vervet monkeys. On the way to Utete I had watched a vervet monkey rip ears of corn off a stalk and shove the kernals in its mouth when the farmer's back was turned. The whole way to Mtanza, we saw baboons along the roadside. The village of Mtanza-Msona is near Mtanza Lake, where most of the village's fish come from. They normally don't fish in the Rufiji since there are crocodiles and hippos, and because the muddy water flows very quickly.

Mr. Msuya knows everyone in Rufiji. He is their district officer, but he really does know everyone, at least all the people with official positions in the villages. He introduced us to the Mtanza head village officer and organized absolutely everything (we are "important guests to be taken care of" - going through the official channels can pay off). We found accomodation in a little brick and tinroof two-room house. Mr. Msuya has made it his mission to ensure that this little building is in tip top shape for us when we move there in March. He's having a bed made, thatch mats placed in the ceiling, all the holes patched, and mosquito screen placed over the windows. We're in very competant and dedicated hands! We didn't stay the night in Mtanza, but in Mloka. Mloka is probably the biggest village in the area- it has generators for electricity- and is closest to the Selous Game Reserve. Mr. Msuya also knows all the safari lodge owners so we went to visit a couple of them. One was right outside the reserve and their deck overlooked the wide Rufiji River. It was an amazing sight, especially after spending so much time in Dar or other cities. This was my first look at wild Africa! There were tons of birds and unfortunately we didnt any of the resident hippos. The second lodge we went to was actually inside the park and somehow Msuya was able to get us in the reserve for only 5,000Tsh. The safari camp we were going to was only a couple km inside the boundary but we saw a huge herd of impala, a giraffe off in the distance, warthogs, baboons, hippos chilling in the river, and even an elephant!! I was so excited about the elephant. It was only one, a young male. He was eating on the roadside not even 25 yards from us. This elephant could have crushed our Suzuki and us in one shove and stomp. Our driver immediately backed up and then shut off the car while Mr. Msuya put his hands out the window and clapped to let the elephant know we were there. The elephant stopped eating and raised his trunk in our direction trying to smell us. He didn't seem too worried and after a couple minutes, turned and walked across the road so we were able to pass. I know this was a young male, meaning a small elephant, but he was huge. Great big floppy ears, thick tusks, and just so tall! I wished I could have sat there all day watching him.

We had a long trip back to Dar that day- tiny little car on a bumpy road, scary minibus racing to Dar, and then a daladala in the crowded city traffic. It may have been long but it was very successful. It was good to see the village and get a few things organized before setting up shop there. I'm looking forward to being there for four months.

Back in Dar we postponed our trip to Iringa by a day in order to go to a outdoor music festival. It started at noon and was to go until 6pm. We got there a bit after noon and were literally the only people there. The stage wasn't even set up! We were told noon is really more like 2pm in 'Africa time'. So we waited... and waited... and waited. It was 6 hours before we heard one strum of live music. By that time it was getting dark and the stage lights kept losing power so after a game of frisbee and a few too many mosquito bites, we threw in the towel! It really was a shame because it had been a nice sunny day, good beer and food, and the music would have been awesome. There were Tanzanian musicians lined up but also Oliver Mtukudzi from Zimbabwe. Nick has some of his music and was really looking forward to hearing him live. Maybe next time??

The next morning, we were on the bus to Iringa where part of the road goes through Mikumi National Park. Here is where I saw two giraffes right on the side of the road eating off a tree. They reminded me of a couple a deer. I was so surprised I almost jumped out of my seat. We saw tons of elephants, impala, pigs, and I think I saw some buffalo in the distance but they were too far to be sure. It's hard to grasp that they are wild, not caged up in a zoo. When the only interaction you've had with an animal is over a wall in a cage or the television, seeing them in their real habitat is amazing and a bit surreal. And just seeing them isn't enough. I wanted to be dropped right there on the side of the road so that I could watch them for days. I wanted to follow them and watch them interact. It made me think of Nick and his year with the gorillas, or his year with the capuchins, and just how amazing that experience must have been. I know he talks about how it can get exhausting and sometimes boring, as anything can, but it must have been at times a rush and in the long-run extremely fulfilling.

So it's Iringa for a month, now. We've settled into the Baptiste Centre where Nick stayed 7 years ago. Today was my first day in Swahili school- I'm the only student for two teachers! I'll be fluent in 4 weeks. Ha! Yesterday we went to Nick's homestay house to visit with the father and two daughters. The mother was in Dar but will be back in Iringa this month. The oldest daughter remembers Nick but the youngest doesn't since she had turned 1 while Nick was here in 2001. They have a nice house in the hills outside of town and I'm looking forward to visiting them more while we're here.

Iringa is great. It's smaller and feels friendlier. We wandered around the market and found mama lishes tucked away in a market building. These food spots are aways down tiny walkways winding around spices, beans, and grains for sale in big baskets. You arrive at a dark area packed with mamas racing around cooking food with their babies slung to their backs, smoke in the air, drunk guys sometmes asleep at their individual wooden benches, sunlight finding its way through the roof in slivers to light the vats of bubbling oil and potato. They are quick and agile with their cooking pots and easily speed through the skinny paths dishing out rice, beans, ugali, chicken, chips, and greens to hungry customers. There are many stalls full of handmade woven baskets and shops with stacks of batik fabric where tailors are out front on their Chinese (or Indian?) sewing machines making shirts, skirts, and blouses. They even have sewing machines where you hold a handle underneath to spin the intricate embroidery into the fabric. I had been wondering how some of the clothes have these amazing embroidery on them- it never crossed my mind that they did it right there. I watched a lady embroider the entire length of a shirt with a thick spiral design in less than two minutes!
For now I'm listening to Tanzanian bonga flava music (reminds me of Belize!), eating fresh bread with local honey that still has little pieces of beeswax in it, and watching the rain come down. Something tells me this month in Iringa is going to be great...

Pictures

Lipstick fruit

Seaweed grown for use in cosmetics

Vanilla pods on the vine

Our bungalow in Zanzibar

Posing chicken

Dar es Salaam

Dar es Salaam

Dhow boat

Numero Uno

Hello from Africa!! As most of you know, we were heading for Nairobi to visit a friend of Nick's and take care of some logistical issues, but were sidetracked when the Kenyan presidential elections resulted in riots, ethnic violence in the city's slums and some western cities (the challenger's home region). Today, largely non-violent protests resume as Kofi Annan has arrived to mediate discussions between the two men and their parties. Sad stuff in a country many believed was beyond reverting to ethnic violence after yet another corrupted election. We had to do some last minute rearranging and ended up buying plane tickets fron Nairobi to Dar es Salaam - so we were able to bypass Kenya completely. Hopefully things settle down soon, for the sake of Kenya and the rest of E. Africa, already feeling the effects of stagnant trade (food prices are up in Tanzania, and fuel is short in Uganda and Rwanda). It would be great to finish out our time here by heading north to spend some time in Kenya. On the flight to Dar we passed right over Kilimanjaro. It was incredible! It's so flat and wide at the top and was covered with snow.
_________________________________________________
(Jess)
Jennie was right, I am in for a wild ride. This place is just insane. The cities are overcrowded, dirty, hot, humid, and full of trash (which local editioralists make note of often...so it's not just tourists that find it incredible). It's shocking at first and then you just feel guilty for coming from such a priviledged, developed-country life. I really don't like Dar. It's grimy and you can't walk around with out getting hassled by taxi drivers (there are so many of them!) or sweating up a storm and getting a layer of dirt everywhere.

We went to the fish market one day and ended up at one of the mama lisha (feeding lady) tables. We sat on skinny wooden benches and were given fish soup. I'm all about fish soup but when it shows up as a chunk of white fish with the skin still on in a watery grey broth, I'm a bit skeptical. I felt so stuck. On one hand, if I didn't eat it I'd offend the really nice lady cooks but if I did eat it, I might contract food poisoning and then that's the end (I don't know what my stomach is prepared for and not). But I gave it a shot...the fish was juicy and tender and the grey water broth was actually limey and salty and tasted amazing. I ate it all. We only spent 4 days in Dar until taking a ferry to Zanzibar to wait out research clearance. The ride was supposed to take 1.5 hours but one of the engines broke so it took 3 hours. And we were stuck inside the boat where it was hot and smelled bad. I never though 3 hours could last so long. One lady passed out on the ferry ride back because it was so hot and the ride was so choppy the boat was being flung all over the place.

We were met in Stonetown by a bunch of taxi drivers and in the rush to get away from them we took off into town sure that we could find our hotel. Stonetown is a maze. Ryszard Kapuscinski writes in his book, The Shadow of the Sun:

"Immediately upon leaving the hotel one enters the narrow streets typical of old Arab towns. I cannot say why these people built in such a cramped and crowded fashion, why they pressed together this way, practically one atop another. Was it so that they would never have far to walk? Or to be better able to defend the town? I don't know. But one thing is certain: this mass of piled stone, this accretion of walls, this layering of balconies, recesses, eaves, and rooftops, somehow secured, as though in an icy treasury, a corner of shade, a tiny breeze, and a bit of coolness during the most terrifying noontime heat."

For us, after seeing the same shop a dozen times, we finally got 5 young kids to show us the way. Commissions are the name of the game in Zanzibar, and you have to beat back hordes of young men that want to whisk you to the best deal in town so that you'll bear an inflated room rate to pay their commission. Reservations are key. We didn't last too long in Stonetown. It's a cool place but I think over the last 5 years or so (Nick uses 2001 as a reference), tourism has ballooned and Zanzibar is having growing pains. People are nice but it's the kind of nice where you're unsure if they really just want to talk to you or are trying to get something out of you. In the evenings there's a waterfront park where dozens of food stalls set up. They all cook the seafood caught that day (or maybe not...be sure to smell) - you can get calamari, lobster, barracuda, shark, octopus, prawns, and more. Take two environmental students you get two cautious, dubious...hungry...hypocritical students eating fish from the Indian Ocean, hopefully not raised hypoxic from reefs by dynamite. We washed our food down with a glass of sugar cane juice. They strip the sugar cane stalks, run them through a press to squeeze out all the juice and then mix it with ginger and lime. One evening we found a tucked away local bar and had beers overlooking the water. We met some local artists and talked with them for a while then they took us to the best place for local food (after Nick was threatened to die by gunfire by a drunk and stoned guy who thought he was making fun of him for being drunk and stoned--they're friends now). Through several alleys and then a really skinny walkway it opened up into this huge garden-like backyard (seemingly impossible in Stonetown) where everyone was sitting at benches eating ugali (for those who don't know, it's boiled, thick cornmeal that you pull off, roll into a ball, and sop up beans or sauce) and beans. It was perfect. The food was amazing and the atmosphere even better. We shared the table with three Maasai. I am in total awe of them. Every time we see them they are usually alone. They seem so independant, confident, and ancient. And if Melissa really thinks she's as tall as a tree, she should meet a Maasai. They, men and women, are just massive. And rail thin. I like how they still wear their tradition dress- robes tied around their shoulders, beads around their neck, wrists, and ankles, and always carry a walking stick. There's definitely a lot of history there, and I learn more about what really sets them apart as so distinct in a country that lost much of it's tribal identity in the socialization programs beginning in the late 70's. They seem like people to be respected, and if by chance you end up on their bad side, all the luck to you.

We went on a spice tour and got to see how tons of different spices and fruits are grown- breadfruit, jack fruit, the lipstick tree, cinnamon, vanilla, cardamon, ginger, cloves, and nutmeg (the seed is absolutely beautiful!). One time when we were getting back on our little bus, there was a young man standing next to it holding a leg-bound chicken in one arm and a machete in the other. He made a motion that suggested he was going to lop the chicken's head off right there. I was kind of freaking out and my brain was screaming 'This is a spice tour!! No chicken killing!'. It ended up he was just passing by so I didn't see the death of the chicken but I'm sure it happened soon after.Then we spent 4 days on the east side of the island in Jambiani. It's a really small fishing village on a gorgeous white sand beach. The tide goes out about a kilometer so there's lots of beach to walk at low tide. The village kids all played on the beach in front of our hotel and constantly called us to come play frisbee with them. All the girls had crushes on Nick and would come up to our room and call out "Nicholas!" and then giggle and run away when he waved to them. The best part of that hotel was that we were able to watch the fishermen come in every evening with their catch of the day. There were so many kinds of fish! Some of them little and some really huge ones. Sometimes they even brought in octopus or really colorful lobster (although one of the lobsters was a female with eggs and I didn't feel so great about her being killed but I don't know too much about the lobster population there). The whole village would come to meet them and they would divy out the fish to every household. At the end they would make the kids line up and they would each recieve a few of the little fish. One evening I watched 3 young boys, each with an octopus, beat the crap out of it with a stick, then raise it over their head and smash in on the beach rock, and then knead it like it was bread dough. They did this for 20 minutes. Then they gave it to our cook and we had octopus for dinner that night. I asked why they had done this and the cook said that if they hadn't, there was no way we would be able to eat it as it would be really chewy and impossible to bite into. We also went snorkelling one day and were brought out onto the reef in a traditional dhow boat. It's such a cool boat- really thin and deep with two balances on either side, made out of mango tree and the sail was made out of sewn together with rice bags. We saw some really cool fish and strange looking starfish. Lots of black spiny sea urchins and even some kind of snake. We had to leave early, though, because of a coming storm and the ride back to shore was a blast. I really thought the boat was going to tip over a few times. Our "navigator" was a retired navigator (uh...) and roped us in to his somewhat less-than-official snorkeling tour on a hunt for water the day before. He picked us up at our hotel at 9am, hammered. Luckily, he had a one-man crew, and that guy (we think) wasn't drunk and was yelping at the storm the whole way back to shore, seemingly in control of the dhow.

I'm definitely into the food here. It all tastes so good. Kind of Indian inspired with lots of coconut, curry and cardamon, but not too spicy. Lots of rice or ugali, and even french fries which I can't really handle. Their 'fast food' here is fries and eggs. Nick says it's really good but I haven't given it a shot yet. I'm sticking to the beans, greens, rice, ugali, fish, and the occasional chicken. It's crazy when you order chicken because you realize just how pumped up the chickens are that you get at home. Here they are smaller and not as meaty- a bit more natural. It's hard to eat just veg so my diet has kind of changed to allow for what's available. And I'm okay with it! I've had tons of mango and pineapple too. I do crave cheese though, pretty much all the time. Kind of a funny thing to miss but when it makes up a large part of your diet at home, it's hard to go cold turkey:)

We saw camels in Zanzibar, a group of Kirk's red colobus monkeys which are endemic to Zanzibar, a whole herd of cattle ambling down the middle of the road with no herder to be seen, three cows in the back of a pick up truck, a lady brought a live chicken in a blender box in a plastic bag onto the bus to Morogoro, and the funniest- a goat in a basket strapped to the back of a scooter. I think I saw a baboon on the side of the road but we were going so fast I couldn't tell for sure, and I know that they'll become second nature when we head south for research.

We just got back from the Sokoine Agriculture University in Morogoro. Nick's been meeting folks, trying to make contacts for the upcoming research. Things are working out well, albeit slow. I think we're going to the 'research village', Mtanza, next week. It's really in the middle of nowhere. We don't even know if there's any place for us to live. Ash would be happy to know that wherever I live, it will be in a mud hut. Tin roof if we're lucky, palm thatch if we're not (depends on how you look at it I guess!). And the bathroom will be a hole in the ground - I'm still trying to get used to the squat toilets. Or we might be living in a tent. At this point, anything is possible. BUT, it's right next to the Selous Game Reserve so there are tons of animals roaming around all the time. Elephants, hippos, crocodiles, lions, baboons - I'm so excited!! I don't think we're going to move there until March though, but then stay for 4 months. We're going down next week to check it out and then go to Iringa for a month to take Swahili lessons and chill out before moving out to the boonies:)

And I can't help but wonder, how is Battlestar?!!

___________________________________________

(Nick)
I wanted to return to Tanzania for a number of reasons that I didn't quite articulate to myself, or Jess, except maybe the one that the people are really nice. I remembered that one ok (people have been great), but I have failed to fully acknowledge that 7 years is a long time, and my contacts, as my memory, are largely inaccessible now. We are officially winging it at this point, as I make new contacts with those who have done research in the Rufiji River floodplain including people at IUCN, Sokoine University of Agriculture, and the University of Dar es Salaam. I know nothing about the region apart from what I've read. I do know that the 150,000 or so residents of the floodplain are the poorest in Tanzania and nearly exclusively dependent on annual flooding of the Rufiji River to maintain their subsistence livelihoods. Also, the floods aren't always coming these days, for a number of reasons, from climate change to upstream development (dams) and erosion. While the details aren't yet drawn in ink, we will be most likely living in a village on the eastern border of Selous Game Researve to ask people about the effects of an IUCN resource governance intervention that began in 1998 and kicked the bucket last year. We're off on Sunday to barge into the village, introduce ourselves, and figure out a living arrangement that will keep us dry and out of reach of maurading male lions.

Of course, we brought too much stuff, and are making our camp in Safari Inn when we head back to Dar every few days. I'm looking forward to Iringa after this pilot trip down to Rufiji. It's cooler there - you don't sweat into your pillow all night, at least (we arrived at the hottest time of the year) - and hopefully my homestay family is still there (if Greg would ever write me back to tell me) and we can eat freshly made pasta and speak Italian to my Tanzanian surregate Mama. Jess has yet to see her first savannah animals other than that brief look at a baboon, but we'll get that out of the way in Mtanza this week, and if not there, then surely on the highway to Iringa that cuts through Mikumi National Park.

Long-term plans include four months in Rufiji, some safariing, a trip to Kigoma and Gombe, to Mwanza to see our friend Menan, and over to Rwanda and Bwindi in western Uganda to visit my friends in Ruhija and at least hear the gossip of the gorillas.