Pole sana for taking so long to post. The internet has been out at the house for around two weeks and we can’t get on the blog website at work (and the internet at work has gone kaput)...very frustrating. There is a lot to report so I apologize if things are a bit disjointed. First thing to report: no dogs. Dr. Tambukwa decided they would be too expensive to keep which I don’t get it since they’d eat leftovers and a flea bath is only 500 Tsh which is less than fifty cents. I must admit I am sad that we don’t have them but maybe it’s better since at night the dogs on the street start a barking chain similar to the one in 101 Dalamatians. Our last Germans left, Monika didn’t get the job she came here to check out which was very sad and the new person looking at the job (who is also staying at the guesthouse) is not someone I care for. We have a Canadian lady staying with us for a month and she is nice although way more energetic than I am (she doesn’t like the idea of lazing around reading/doing crossword puzzles/eating etc. as much as I do). We have yet another German staying with us now...he seems nice enough despite Jenny’s description of him as a heavy smoking, short short wearing beer drinker. Somewhere in there we had an American who will be taking a high up position in Mbeya with Walter Reed and Edward (the country director) at the house too. Busy busy.
Work has been going very well for the past week or two. We haven’t had the time to continue teaching the HIV course because we have been tied up visiting NGOs to assess their nutrition assistance programs. Last week we went to NGOs in Mbeya town, almost all ones that we had visited back in January when we first arrived. We had the opportunity to spend time with the Anglican NGO which we hadn’t visited before and they took us to the home of a woman who was involved in mushroom growing as an income generating activity which was really neat. With KIHUMBE, we went to a school to look for a child to interview and ended up causing a mini-riot of children wanting to practice their English with us. This week we have been visiting NGOs in districts far from here. Monday we went to Tunduma, which is where the Zambian border is, and visited one NGO there and one on the road back. The visit went well but because of transportation issues we didn’t leave until 1:30 and Tunduma is around 120km so we didn’t get home until 8 p.m. Tuesday we traveled to Kyela which is right by the border with Malawi where we visited three NGOs. We didn’t have time to meet with clients because once again we got a late start. Kyela is also 120km or so away and the area is totally different from here...it’s hot, humid, flat, and full of thick vegetation. At one of the NGOs that focuses its work on orphans and vulnerable children we saw one kid who looked like he was two or three but was actually five...apparently he was so malnourished when the NGO started looking after him that he couldn’t even sit up or talk. As sad as it is to think about that, it is amazing what a difference the NGO has made. Yesterday we went another 100 plus km away to a place called Mbarali where we visited another three NGOs. While visiting the organizations went really well, the highlight of the trip might have been when we pulled into the middle of the “town” and say a 7-11 sign complete with the logo. Sadly it wasn’t actually a 7-11 but instead was a restaurant where we later went for a soda and not the slurpee I was secretly hoping for. The scenery in Mbarali reminded me a lot of Ghana...dusty and dry. Thursday we went to Tukuyu where we visited a Lutheran NGO and then we went to a Catholic mission hospital. The Lutheran NGO we had seen before but it was our first time at Igogwe which seemed like a pretty nice hospital. In addition to getting info on nutrition assistance at Igogwe, we got to see the orphanage they run for kids who are up to 3 years old. All of the kids were sooooo cute and there was a sassy little girl who seemed to be the leader of the pack. As we walked around it was obvious that some of the kids were severely malnourished and we saw one baby that I thought was a doll at first. He was two months old and his head was about the size of an apple...I wanted to scoop him up and take him home with me. It seemed like the place was really well run and once the kids are developing well and hit 3 or so, they are sent back home to live with relatives (all of the children are mother-less and many have lost their fathers as well). On the way home we stopped at banana central a.k.a. Kiwira where we managed to buy approximately 15 passion fruit (fruits?) for about 50 cents...40 or so little bananas (or maybe even more) are around 80 cents total.
Friday we didn’t go anywhere and it was nice to be able to rest. Saturday we went to Mwanjelwa, the big clothing market here, with Juliana (the secretary/receptionist from work) and the lady staying at the house (Yasmin). It was a lot of fun to dig through clothes and see a completely different way of shopping. We spent a good part of the afternoon watching shipments of bags from Korea (all used of course) be unpacked...it was a really interesting and entertaining experience. A bunch of clothes in Mwanjelwa had Salvation Army and Goodwill tags on them so I guess they were rejects from there. Today we went to Ifisi with Elizabeth, Mama Martha, and one other doctor to visit their new CTC. It’s a really nice mission hospital that has been set up by some Swiss doctors. On the way there we were pulled over for speeding—apparently they have radar guns here although I am not sure if they actually work or if they just have a set speed that shows up on the screen. They had no problem with the fact that we had too many people shoved in the car...just the fact that we were doing 50 in a 30 (kph not mph). Luckily after pretending we were headed to Ifisi for an emergency they let our driver off with a warning and not a fine. On the way home we got to ride in an ambulance (kind of like a Land Rover with a stretcher and bench seat in the back) which was amusing.
I have a feeling the next few weeks are going to fly by and it seems like we are going to be home in no time at all. This week we have Tuesday and Friday off and also Easter Monday when we are going to go to Juliana’s (I’m super excited...she is cooking for us and I think we are going to get to see marriage preparations take place which will be really cool). Perhaps during our mini vacation we will hike on our days off or maybe we will laze around (last week was super exhausting). I can’t think of much else...we keep buying large batches of maandazi (the donuty cake things they make here) from Juliana. They are tasty tasty and will probably turn us into small elephants. We purchased a bootleg DVD of Tom Hanks movies so maybe we will be spending our days off watching those (we’ve watched DaVinci Code and Philadelphia so far). I think that’s all for now...hope spring has arrived (we have been having SO much rain which means mudddddy showers) and that everyone is getting excited for Easter (candy)!!
