Sometimes people staring at you ALL the time gets old.....

.....but I will never get tired of the kids here! They are so sweet. They just run up to you and grab your hands and walk with you and stare at you and it is so endearing. I can only say so much to them because they don't speak much english and I don't speak much swahili (yet) but we still have fun. I like to dance when we pass shops with music and they like to laugh at my dancing. Pretty great.

Anyways, with all the i-to-i drama about placements, etc, I am not 100% sure that I will be able to continue my work at the church. I am fighting too though, and so is the pastor, David. I should know something about it by tomorrow. I've also asked to be moved to a new placement because all of my Kitaa kids are at school in the afternoon except the two little ones who take a nap. I plan to go back to Kitaa though at least every other weekend to visit and take the kids out places. My new potential placement (which I really really want, but it might not fit my schedule)is at Njoro kindergarten. Two of my friends, Aimee and Emmma, are working there now, but they will both be gone within a fortnight. I went with them this morning and met the teachers and the kids and I LOVED it. I will be able to do my own teaching/lessons for about 45 minutes every day! I know that I will be able to help them out so much which is awesome! The kids are lovely, smart, and hilarious. This placement is about an hour and 20 minutes walk from our house, but on the way home we can catch a Daladala which cuts off about 40 minutes and is very cheap. If I can move my church work to the afternoon then I will definitely stay at Njoro. That should also be sorted out by tomorrow.

I am going to start studying swahili A LOT. I can't wait to be able to talk to everyone here. I love Tanzania.

Times up, more later!

Abby

T.I.A.=This is Africa

TIA is a pretty commonly used acronym around here. Here are some examples of situations in which you would use it:

1. We go out to eat in fairly large groups every thursday night. The average waiting time for our meal is about 2 hours.
2. You have to specially request 'baridi', or cold drinks because everyone likes to drink their soda and beer warm.
3. Today some kids on their way to school walked with me, stared at me while walking, held my hands, and kept reaching up to stroke my hair.
4. Last night at the Falcon I set my phone and drink on the curb for about 30 seconds and when I looked back to get them, only my soda was left.
5. No one here wears deoderant.
6. Today I'm wearing a kenga, a piece of fabric wrapped around my waist and tucked in. I am paranoid that it will fall off while I'm walking down the street.
7. All the women here carry massive loads of fruit on their heads.
8. Mzungu get ripped off a lot.

Yesterdays plans didn't really follow through because there was a massive rainstorm during the night. I ended up just going to my usual church because it was much closer, and didn't take the kids swimming. I think I'll try again next week.

The communication between our in-country coordinators and the volunteers has been very poor. There was a lot of drama this weekend and semi-threatening e-mails were sent to all the volunteers claiming that our staff and their lawyers had been meeting with the government and some of the volunteers might get kicked out of the program and the country b/c they didn't go on safari with the 'art in tanzania' crew. Everyone was pretty upset about the situation (it was all very passive agressive) and tonight we are going to have a volunteer meeting to figure some stuff out and then approach the coordinators about it. I hope we can fix everything up and that things don't get more blown out of proportion.

I'm so glad that a lot of people seem to be reading this!!! Let me know if you have any topic requests!

Abby

Lazy Saturday.....wake up in the...morning?

Marta (and maybe others), I hope you get the title reference of this blog. Mr. Pibb and red vines = CRAZY DELICOUS!

The weekends are much-needed here. During the week days I feel like I am always headed off to a project or to meet people or to run errands. Most nights my friends have to drag me to the Falcon to socialize because I'm so tired. A lot of the volunteers are here for 2-5 weeks so they don't have as many inhibitions about running themselves into the ground because soon enough they'll be back at home recuperating. We do manage to have really nice, relaxing weekends here though. I'm at the internet now, and in a while we're heading to the pool at Keys hotel. The plan is to stay there all afternoon and sleep on a raft in the pool. Its really nice to just lay there and not move or think. One of our Massai guards, Zach, is going to come to the pool at some point so I can teach him how to swim! After the pool I'm heading to Zac and Hayden's for a bit to do some slacklining(!!!) and then I'm going to Claire's for dinner. If I have energy after such a strenuous afternoon, I might go to Glacier, a nightclub/bar with live music, and hang out for a bit....maybe.

Tomorrow I'm going to a new church because one of the volunteers is singing a solo! Someone told the pastor she had a nice voice, and he insisted. Not many of the volunteers here seem to hold religous convictions, but everyone has been going to this church for the experience, and the church has been translating the service for them. I think its been really good and brought up some good discussions.

Tomorrow afternoon I am going to take my kids swimming!!! I'll let you know how it goes if we all survive!

Abby

For the pessimists....

If you thought I would get Malaria within a week, tooooooo bad. You lose.

I have been really really busy lately, and not had much time to go to the internet. On a normal day I get up around 6:30 and go running (well, on a good day), eat breakfast, shower, and am at the church by 8:30. It's about a two-mile walk there. At the church I send a lot of e-mails out, type up the pew sheets, type up meeting minutes, etc. I'm there every morning for 4 hours working and then I get FREE lunch (saving lots of $$) and leave by one to walk to Kitaa, which is an hour away. I stay with my watoto (children) at Kitaa for around 3 hours and then head home. I'm always exhausted at night, I think its because I'm walking so much in the heat. Dinner is at 7:30, then people socialize either at the Falcon Crest (bar out the back door) or on the balcony of the big house. I try and go to bed pretty early, like around 10:30, but that doesn't usually happen.

Last weekend a HUGE new batch of volunteers arrived (2 Americans!!!), about 35 people. Our house is full now and I have 4 new roomates. My original roomate, Rachel, is gone now, and I really miss her. My new roomates are really nice. One of the Irish girls was a camp counselor at a YMCA camp in Maryland which is awesome. We sang camp songs together this morning. Right now I'm really excited to meet all the new people, but I don't know if I'll even bother by the end of my time here if they keep coming in such big waves! Dinner is chaotic (and the first few nights there was not enough food!) but we've gotten into a pattern now so its calmed down.

On Saturday, my friends Emma and Aimee are going to come with me to Kitaa, and we're going to take my kids to the pool! Some of the hotels will let the orphans swim for free, which is really good of them. I told my kids yesterday and they are really excited! Hopefully I can teach them how to swim!

It is really hot here.

RIP Heath Ledger :(

-Abby

A volcano erupted on my friends...

True story. Everyone is OK, but they all have lots of cuts and scrapes and ripped trousers from sliding down as fast as they could possibly go. There were five people from I-to-I on the safari this weekend and on the last night they climbed up a volcano at 2am to be at the top for sunrise. They saw smoke coming out but their guides said that they were good to go. When the volcano erupted everyone was kind of spread out and at different elevations, all very near the top. The guides screamed at them to start running and since they were all spread out, the people who were lower down thought that the others were all dead because they couldn't see them. Vega and Helena, a couple on their honeymoon, were closest to the top, and their legs are really torn up from the slide down. When it erupted the guide they were with said, 'Today, we die'. Not very comforting! There were huge rocks and tons of ash flying past them, and it really is a miracle that everyone was OK in the end. Luckily the lava flowed down the other side of the peak. That mountain is now closed (it had apparently erupted the week before as well!).

Yesterday a big group including myself took a day off from our projects to go to Arusha, a city about an hour from Moshi. We went to hear part of the Rwandan trials that have been going on for a VERY long time now. We got to hear a witness being cross-examined. We couldn't figure out if it was for the prosecution or the defense, but it was interesting to hear nonetheless. He was a French guy who was a general stationed in Rwanda. He seemed to have known a lot of people in high places and also to have tried many times to ameliorate the situation there, but all his plans and ideas kept falling through. We didn't get to see the man who was on trial.

I am going to be working at the church every morning of the week except for Thursday. I will be doing stuff like filing, record keeping, typing, printing, copying, and folding the liturgies, and designing and updating bulletin boards with member interviews and Sunday school work on them. I am really excited to start tomorrow! Thursday's, I think, will be my internet/errands/laundry mornings. This morning I did my laundry for the first time, by hand, and it took quite a while, I think around 3 hours. I won't be letting it build up that much anymore! It was fun today but I can see it getting old pretty fast!

I miss everyone!!!! Much love!

Abby

St. Margaret's Church

I've found a church, which is so exciting! It is called St. Margarets, and it is affiliated with the Anglican church but the service is non-denominational. There were around 40 people (sidenote:I am a really bad estimator) at the service, mostly mzungu, and I felt very at home and comfortable. The service was pretty short, but they have a slightly different kind of service on each Sunday of the month, and this on was the 'Short Family Service' so I think there will be more of a sermon on other weeks. After church I met a LOT of people (I wish I had a better memory for names!) including the pastor David, his wife Elaine, and a guy named John from Iowa who is student teaching at the international school, and some other random people. Everyone was so nice and welcoming! The Pastor and his family invited me over and then gave me a lift to the potluck. In the car on the way I was telling them that I was looking for a morning project that was not on the other side of town, and coincidentally they have been praying for someone who can help in the office doing 'administrative work' for the church! I am going to meet with David tomorrow and try to work out a schedule. I would love to be able to work at the church in the mornings and at the orphanage in the afternoons! It was great to find such a good church community so quickly!

Kitaa Hope Orphanage

Kitaa is about a 25 minute walk from the volunteer houses, and is the only placement on our side of town. It is run by an independently wealthy woman, Mama Esther, and as orphanages go, it is very nice. Each child has their own bed (although I've heard they still like to pile together to sleep), if they are old enough they go to school, and they have a lot of toys available to them (not very nice toys, but toys none the less). I have not seen all of the kids together yet, but I've met 9 of them and I think that is all there are. They are beautiful, energetic, smart, funny, and full of personality. I have only been there for a few hours each day because I was meant to go in the morningtime only, but have now been switched to the afternoon. I will be looking for another project to work with in the mornings, but since Kitaa is so far from the rest of them it might be hard to get from place to place quickly enough. We have played a lot of card games (which I always lose since I don't know the rules), played ball, and just hung out. I am going to start planning some more structured activites (at least for some days) next week. I am also hoping to take them swimming if another volunteer is available to go with me. Some of the hotels will let orphans in for free! At this point I feel comfortable with the kids and I know they like me (they climb all over me all the time!) but I sometimes feel at loose ends because it is so unstructured. And now here is what you've all been waiting for....pictures!!! I am terrible at remembering to take them, so this is a very limited sample, but here they are.

Edit: Ooooook so if anyone knows how to post pictures on blogspot, let me know, that would be great. I apologize for being technologically impaired.

Moshi means smoke

I think the reason that this town is named Moshi is because of the clouds that are around Kilimanjaro for most of the day. I guess its possible that they are referring to the smoke from the rubbish piles being burned, but not very likely.

Moshi is a fairly small town, but also a very busy one. Our volunteer houses are in an area called Soweto, which is about a 20-25 minute walk from the 'downtown' shops, restaurants, and markets. The volunteer projects are scattered throughout different parts of Moshi. My orphanage is about a 20 minute walk from home, while others are walking over an hour to get to theirs. The whole town seems fairly stereo-typical to me. The shops are little one-roomers and when you walk in, everything is behind counters and you point to what you want to look at or purchase. Outside on the sidewalks there are venders sitting on the ground selling shoes, fruits, vegetables, and jewelry. There are also a lot of men with sewing machines on the sidewalks. You can buy fabric, bring it to them, and then pick up your clothing item the next day. Three girls from my house and myself have just had skirts made and I am very excited to wear mine. The fabrics are beautiful. Everything here is very inexpensive. Venders get excited when they see Nzungu walk by and will try to call us over to their booths or stores, and often raise their prices (until we bargain them back down). Deli Chez and The Coffee Shop are two restaurants that we frequent. We have met there around lunchtime every day so far. The menu at Deli Chez has many different options including Indian, Pakistani, Chinese, and American foods. Everything has tasted very good so far. Yesterday I had a toasted Banana and Bacon sandwich, and I recomend it! At the roundabouts in town, lots of businessmen hang around. These are usually boys around my age who will relentlessly advertise whatever junk they are selling, especially if you humor them and chat. They try to sell things at about %400 profit, but are very offended when you let them know that you know it is a rip-off. One of them got very angry with me when I told my friend that it was a rip-off, and accused me of ruining his business. I tried to make it into a joke, so now we are rafiki. It was an interesting experience.

I really do love this town. Everything is pole pole (laid back, basically) and there is not a lot of rush to get anything done at any certain time, which is very different from home. The people are very friendly, and the kids looooove to talk to the nzungu (and I love to talk to them!). Today as I was walking to town, two little boys came up to me and I asked them 'How are you?' and one of them kissed my hand! It was adorable. Today was my first day walking places alone, but I felt very comfortable and safe. I have not encountered or heard of many bad people here.

My friend Hayden (he works for a skydiving company and is from the UK) has Malaria....I hope I'm not next!

The traffic here is insane, the opposite of pole pole. I think that cars change these people's personalities. I might need to change my quiz to 'How long until I am hit by a car' because it may be more likely than malaria!

Kwa Hari, Abby

Hellow everybody arround the world

Like the title? It came up when I put my cursor in the title box and I thought it was fitting. And funny.

To answer my mom's question about my bed, it is very comfortable and has a mosquito net draped around the whole thing. It is kind of like a princess bed.

Claire is with me right now, we have once again run into each other at the internet cafe. I am way to distracted to write now.

Coming soon.......details about Moshi!!! And my project!!!

Volunteer House

Ok, since its hard to know where to start and I'm always running out of time, I'm just going to pick a topic each time and talk about it. Let me know if there's anything you particularly want to hear about (other than the obvious ones like my project)!

There are two i-to-i volunteer houses, a big one and a little one, connected by a windy garden-y thing in the backs of the houses. I am staying in the smaller house and am rooming with an Aussie named Rachel for the time being. She is only here for two more weeks, and new groups of volunteers come in fairly frequently, so my roomates will differ a lot. There are 4 bedrooms in my house, three of which have bathrooms with showers! I would need about 5 showers a day to get rid of all the dust. Jackie, Ceci, and Emmy are the three house cleaners/cooks that I know so far, but there are others around who are also helping out. They cook delicious breakfasts and dinners every day as well as washing the floors every day to clear the dust. Probably the coolest thing at the house is the Massai warriors that guard the gates 24 hrs a day. Zach is my favorite guard; he loves talking to the volunteers and is always happy to see you. Yesterday he became the first Massai with a facebook account! The houses are very clean and much nicer than I had expected. The big house has a beautiful second floor balcony where you can get a perfect view of Kilimanjaro in the mornings and evenings. The balcony is where we have our group meetings, which will happen every other week.

Out back of the house is the Falcon Crest Hotel, which is really just a bar with some nice outdoor seating. It is one of the main spots we hang out at in the evenings. There are so many volunteers here right now that we take up most of the tables. Around 17 new volunteers arrived yesterday and Saturday. The majority of them are from the UK, and so far I am the only American. Everyone is really nice and fun to talk to. I really really love it here!

I did start at my project today, but I am out of time so that will be something to write about in a couple days (I'm sure by then I will have more to say too!).

-Abby

Rushed...once again!

I'm back in an internet cafe with less than 5 minutes left again. I have been doing so much in the past couple days! Yesterday while I was out with Rachel we went around 'downtown' (I have no idea if thats what they call it) and did a little shopping and I tried to familiarize myself with the area. It is very stereotypical-looking to me; all the shops are tiny, the streets are crowded with people, men sew with foot-powered sewing machines on the sidewalks, and the cars will run you over if you don't move fast enough. I love it. The children are adorable. They look at you and point and say 'Nzungu!' or sometimes 'Good Morning' regardless of the time of day.

AHHH no time left!!! More later!

I AM IN TANZANIA

Yes, I am in Tanzania, but I only have 6:39 remaining on my computer time, so this will be brief.

After around 24 hours of flying and airports, Claire and I made it safely to JRO airport where we split up and went to our respective volunteer houses. The flights went smoothly besides having to buy a new ticket in Nairobi because they claimed we didn't have one. But I am safely here now. I am in an internet cafe with a girl from Australia named Rachel who I am sharing a room with. She has been very helpful in giving me tips and answering all of my questions. We have been out shopping today and I am trying to get a phone in order so that I can contact Claire and other volunteers around Moshi. Sorry that this is so short, I will write much more later!