So now is the time to answer all of your questions! This is the email that
tells you everything you wanted to know, (and didn’t care to know!) about living
in Africa!!First, though, a disclaimer……
The volunteers here at CCS live like kings and queens. I am not kidding. Everything I tell you about my own personal living situation might sound really different from the US, but it is a great deal better than any of our neighbors here in the village have!
Food:
The food we eat at the CCS house is fabulous! When they described it, it sounded like a hoity-toity restaurant that caters to the rich and famous. “All locally grown, seasonal, organic vegetables and fruits, along with fresh meat that is absent of any and all chemicals and steroids.”. Can you imagine! Actually, the food is very earthy. Breakfast is just bread and fruit and peanut butter, so I start each day with a peanut butter sandwich. The peanut butter is not like home, though.
It is runny and gritty and threatens to glue my mouth shut each morning. I think
it is how peanut butter is supposed to be. Two days a week, the cook gets eggs
from some of our neighbors, but I have not tried them yet. Every other one has
already been fertilized so you know these are the real things! Coffee is instant
so I have pretty much given up on that. I do miss good coffee!! And the milk is
unpasterized, whole milk, for those that drink it. (Not me!)
Lunch and dinner are pretty much treated the same way. There are usually two
or three casserole dishes made of potatoes or pasta, beans, and vegetables, sometimes
with a bit of meat mixed in. There is alway Ugali, which is the main staple of
the Tanzanian diet. Ugali is like the stiffest, blandest mashed potatoes you have
ever had. It really has no taste, but tastes like whatever you eat it with. The
typical way to eat it is to scoop a dollop up in your right hand, (very important- do not eat with your left hand!) and use it as a type of spoon to scoop up a stew.
I have had it several times and I like it.
The best part of the meals is the avocado and the fruit. We have fresh avocado at least once a day and it is soooo good! But the bananas, watermelon, pineapple, and mango are really amazing!!! Several people have given me mangos as gifts and they are like tasting heaven! The Tanzanians do not really do dessert, so except for the fruit, there is nothing sweet to speak of. You can buy candy bars at a few places in town, but it is too hot for me to eat chocolate!
Needless to say, our neighbors are not starving, but live on a very limited diet.
They get quite a few fresh fruits and veggies, and many of them own chickens and
livestock, so that is where they get their meat and dairy. I have not seen any
cheese at all, and needless to say, there is no such thing as fast food!
Weather:
It is unbelievable hot.
Money:
In Tanzania they use Tanzanian Shillings for currency, but most places will
also accept US dollars. However, things cost more if you pay in US. There is aproximately
1,020 shillings to the dollar, but for the sake of description, I will use only
US dollars. Prices are, for the most part, extremely low. An example of my daily
expenses:
Internet- $1 per hour
Beer- 70 cents per large bottle
Samosas for lunch- 30 cents apiece
Dala dala ride (bus)- 20 cents
Diet Coke- $2
Wait a minute!? Did I say $2 for a diet coke!?!? You bet I did! Anything sold
to a muzungu (white person) is at least twice the price, and since no self-respecting African would drink diet coke, they charge extra!
Everything and anything is negotiable, pricewise. No one would ever expect you
to pay the first price they quoted you, however there is a mzungu price and a local price. When someone tells me the price of something, I look at them and say “Muzungo bei….hapana!” which means ‘white person price…no!’. Then they laugh and give me a lower price.
It is fun, but when it comes to serious souvenier buying,
I take one of my new african friends and let them do the negotiating for me.
That has worked out beautifully because my Swahili is nowhere near good enough to
go into the market!! Any time I go in, I get surrounded by merchants shouting at
me, which is a little tiresome after the first few times, so it is best to take
a local friend. They just chase the merchants away!
Weather:
It is unbelievable hot.
Bathroom/Shower Facilities
Remember how I said we live like kings and queens? Well, we do. Keeping that
in mind…..the facilities are not what we are used to!! The toilets are the same,
but there is no water pressure, so they don’t really flush. As a result, you have
to put all toilet paper in a trash can. It is interesting. Most homes and businesses,
however, have a latrine of some sort. The guys won’t let us go in the one at Deo’s,
so I have no idea what they are like. However, at the school I am teaching at,
there is just a bucket with sheets draped around it.
The shower is a shower. But, due to water pressure, only a trickle comes out.
So we have a large bucket in the shower stall and I wet my hair with the water running
out, and as the bucket fills up, I shampoo. I use a beautiful handmade wash cloth
that the Carter women gave me to scrub everything, and when I am done, I dump the
bucket over my head. I have to say, it does the trick!
Brushing teeth, we simply have to use bottled water. One guy has already messed
up and brushed his teeth with the tap water and as a result, spent a good part of
the evening in discomfort. We do not drink the water.
Weather:
It is unbelievable hot.
Transportation:
We have a CCS van that takes us to and from our placements each morning, and
we stuff it full of people!!! It is a 12 person van, and we routinely have 19-20
in it. There are very, very few seatbelts in Africa! However, since 99% of the
roads are dirt with HUGE pot holes, we rarely get over 30 mph, so it is quite safe!
In our free time we have three options. Walk, Dala-dala, or taxi. The Dala-dala
is also a 12 person van, but they routinely stuff 25-30 people inside. The rule
is, ‘there is always room for one more!’. When they go down the street, you will
often see people hanging off the sides and men sticking out of the windows. It
is hysterical! I have not been on one yet, but I am planning to take one back to
the house after this email so I will let you know how it goes!
The taxis are their own form of amusement! The other day when we were in the
market, our Tanzanian friends agreed to help us get a taxi. As soon as we walked
up to the taxi stand, we were surrounded by me yelling at us and holding their respective
car doors open. Anton, one of our friends, said, we will go to the next one, so
we walked down another block. He put us in a taxi and off we went.
Here is where it gets really interesting!!! Now, here in Tanzania, people drive
on the left-hand side of the road….kind of. Seeing as how all of the roads are
dirt, and littered with HUGE potholes, (did I mention that they are HUGE!!?), the
general rule is to drive on the best part of the road. It very often turns out
that they best part of the road is the sidewalk. I am not kidding. So we get in
this taxi and take off towards Rau. The driver is going about 30 mph and veering
wildly all over this wide, wide dirt road. Women with huge baskets of bananas on
top of their heads are getting out of our way quickly as we lurch down the road.
The ashtray falls out of the door, the window is rattling like crazy, and from the
back of the cab, all I can hear is this loud ‘chucka-chucka-chucka’. After our
third foray onto the sidewalk, and our first into someones actual front yard, I
started laughing uncontrollaby. The funnist thing is, this is not unusual in the
slightest!!! We made it home safely, and it was the most delightful ride of my
life! Oh…and it cost $2.
Weather:
It is unbelievable hot.
Well, I hope that has answered some of your questions! Life here is wild and
crazy and lonely and frustrating, and, most of all, fullfilling. Thank you all
for your emails….they are lifting me up!!!! I love you!!! Anna
