Today at the office……

Hello folks,
I’m just reporting on my first month here in my village. So far so good, I’m not having any trouble keeping busy. I’ve met all of the Officials within the district of Mbarali. I’ve had lunch with the Officials in the Rujewa and Ubaruku wards. While visiting the 4 area schools I’ve met 2 headmasters, 2 principals, between 20-25 teachers who introduced me to over 3,000 very eager students. While during an analysis of my Village I’ve accepted over 20 invitations to breakfast, lunch and or dinner, received 4 marriage proposals, a kitten, and a chicken as housewarming gifts. I gave the chicken away because it didn’t lay eggs. I kept the kitten and named it Killer so that it wont forget what it’s job is. In my spare time I’ve had a lot of cocktails with 5 catholic priests, (2 Italian, 3 Tanzanian) help start a garden, distributed mosquito nets to the women and children, assisted with voter registration, attended 2 weddings, 3 funerals, and gotten kicked out of a nightclub. Needless to say I’m enjoying myself, having a great time and helping out where needed.

I would like to thank you all for your emails, phone calls and packages that you have sent me. It means a lot to me that you would take time out of your daily routine and think of me. It means more to me than you know! Sometimes i just need to talk English and not Swahili..thank you!
Love,

Shani C.

Where am I ?

Its Tuesday....a regular day. I woke up to children playing, the African sun shinning in my window, a nice breeze blowing in across my bed. Yes, this is the life, I roll over and decide to get up around 8:30 and have my warm milk with sugar, yummy. I walk to town and chat with the store owner who has named me her best friend; we laugh and talk swahinglish for a while. I'm back home now, it's around 3pm, I did some work earlier with the Village Executive Officer, had chai in town, and came home for a mid day nap. Nothing out of the ordinary, I drank way too much chai and water so I have to pee like 9 times in an hour. I proceed to walk across my nice private courtyard where my newly built choo is. I switch on the light because it's almost dusk....Ahhh...I’m doing the pee dance because I waited until the last minute, as usual. I proceed to take the lid off the choo, pull up my skirt, squat, and I feel as if someone is looking at my goodies.....on the inside of the choo peeking back at me, wondering why I’m bothering him in his home, is an orange and black snake. Now at this point I have to pee really badly and if you know me, you know I can't hold it. When I have to go, I HAVE to go. Within a time span of oh, about 10 seconds, I look at the snake, he looks back at me, he puts his head back down, I put the lid back on the choo and pee in the middle of my yard...yup! While I was enjoying my fantasy world, brand new house with electricity, computer access, private courtyard, house help...I forgot where the hell I was...AFRICA! This was a definite jerk back to reality. I went to get the maintenance guy, and explain to him how this snake was big, ferocious, and taking over my toilet. He gets the biggest stick he can find and marches over to my choo, he creeps open the door carefully and asks, "nyoka iko wapi?" Where's the snake?...I say lift up the lid and it's in the hole....he looks at me like I’m a 5 year old kid and says "hamna shida" no biggie, everything's cool as long as he doesn’t come out. "COME OUT!", How can I live my life knowing that there is a snake somewhere near where I have to squat and pee.....I mean I got over the squatting and peeing because the choo is really nice, I got over the monkeys in the farm, I got over the lizards that hang onto my window, I even got over the bats, but come on now. Becky can only take but so much!
Well, it's Tuesday night and I’m sitting in my bed typing this blog, and planning a late night squat in my yard in case I have to pee. I've decided to give the snake time to pack up his things and find another place. I mean it was short notice, I can’t' just expect time to find somewhere else to live in a couple hours, times are hard for everyone these days. I figure I will start using my choo again by Friday,

The moral of this story is, never forget where you are and if you do, just pee in the yard.

Love From TZ,

Shani