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
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9. You begin to experience nausea, vomiting, fever, and sweating on a 48 hour cycle.
ReplyDeleteJust thought I'd add one to your list Abby. I'm likin' the blog.
It snowed horizontally here in St. Louis today. The wind was blowing so hard my monitor was shaking on the second floor. Usually just the bed shakes on the third floor when it blows like this.
ReplyDeleteDeb took Madison swimming today. At the Richmond Heights pool.
Thanks for the news.
Dave E.
what?? people are getting in trouble because they DIDN'T go on safari?
ReplyDeleteHello,
ReplyDeleteWe are planning to join a volunteering program with Art In Tanzania. Please, if you could give us some advice about their fairness that would be cool. If it's not worth it, we would join another volunteering NGO.
Thanks
jaime@gnome.org