Moshi

Hujambo!

I am at my volunteer "home base" in Moshi, which is really like a private gated house in California. It is beautiful and is nothing like the surrounding area. Right outside our house is a dirt house. I feel a bit out of place, but it is nice to have electricity and modern things. Most people do not have electricity or running water. Sadly even, they are not aware of simple things like dishwashers and clotheswashers. One of the volunteers was reminiscing about how much she missed clotheswashers, and one of the maids overheard her and was amazed that such a machine exists.

Moshi is a nice town in Tanzania; in fact, it is the cleanest town in the country. The Chagga tribe live in this region, and today we learned about some of the tribal customs here. Tanzania is made up of about 120 different tribes, and each tribe has many sub-tribes. The tribes are mainly patriarchal, however there are some matriarchal tribes too. Apparently the current government is struggling between finding laws that balance the tribal customs with modern day human rights laws. For instance, in many of the tribes, when the man dies, the tribe gets his assets instead of the wife and kids. While this worked in the olden days, today many people are corrupt and don't take care of the wife and kids. It is interesting to learn about their different customs. They have many cool handshakes here that have been fun to learn.

We have gotten used to what they call "AFT" or African Flux Time, which basically means that you are never late, even if you show up for an appointment the next day;) People are very laid back, and more focus is spent on building relationships and social interactions with people, rather than hurrying off to do something. Another interesting tidbit is that they have no sense of distance or time. If you are asking for directions someplace, they will keep telling you it's just over the next hill, even if it is an hour walk away! For example, this old man was telling us about how his truck broke down in the middle of the country side, and a Maasai man walked with him to the nearest place where he could get help. The Maasai man kept telling him it was just over the next hill....6 hours later he arrived at the destination! However, he thought this was a good things b/c if he had known how far away it was, he wouldn't have moved and he may have had to wait for 3 weeks for the next car to pass by. He explained that Africans are very positive people and they never want to discourage others. I was quite impressed...I think we could learn a lot from their culture.

Oh, I forgot to tell you all about something funny that happened on the safari....(for those of you -and you know who you are-who make fun of my amazing story telling abilities, I am hoping that I will do it justice, but if not, take my word for it that it was pretty funny at the time). So we were at a visitors resting site near the entrance to Serengeti, and we were all up on a hill looking out at the view, and some British chap around 25 asked this woman (who was in her upper 70's) to take a picture of him. She proceeded to take a pic of him on his digital camera from about 5 feet away and asked him if it was good. To my amusement, he responded with, "Yes, it is a wonderful picture, but I'm not actually in it." lol, this kept me and my German companions entertained for awhile.

Anyways, that's about all for now. Hope everything is going well back home.
tatanoana baadaye!