The Tickle Monster Attacks

My new friend and hostel-mate, B--just like GG but nice, and I started out at the Genome Science Center--where I usually work--but Bess quickly realized that she couldn't do much work without her laptop which was at the lab at the Regional Hospital. We decided to walk into town instead of taking a taxi or a dala dala which gave me a chance to see parts of Morogoro that I had only seen from the road. Surprisingly we didn't get harassed too much!

When we got to the hospital, Kitty had some samples that she was culturing so I got a chance to help her with that. Before culturing we took a count of the white blood cells in each sample using a hemocytometer. After a week of “internet research” just wearing gloves was exciting! Of course, the power went out about every minute and a half and we had to continually interrupt the process. Everyone at the Hospital lab was excited to see me again and inquired about my recent whereabouts, etc.

After a semi-exciting day at the lab, I was ready for a quiet dinner and game of Scrabble with Bess. Bess came for her four-week stay much more prepared than I did—she not only brought a travel Scrabble set, she also brought candy and cards! Around 6:30 I still hadn’t seen her but figured she was still working at the lab but I soon found out that Kitty had invited us over to her house for palau. What a treat!

We spent a wonderful—and very high energy—evening helping Kitty cook, entertaining her two daughters, and even having an impromptu photo shoot. The girls were mesmerized by Bess’s camera—which is pretty impressive—and insisted on many, many pictures. “Two by two. Girls only.” FLASH! “Now two by three. He in.” FLASH! With only a year of English, Kitty’s oldest daughter (5) has a really remarkable grasp of the language. Like her teacher at the International School she gets very angry if you speak Swahili around her. “YOU SPEAKING KISWAHILI!” she’ll shout in an angry tone. Bess brought caramels and the girls went wild. A couple hours of tickling later—not to mention a FABULOUS meal with salad, palau, watermelon, bananas, and beans—we headed back to the hostel exhausted.