The Princepessa Treatment

Yesterday was great! After having trouble falling asleep (the neighbors down the street were blasting Mariah Carey, go figure), I awoke to Kitty at my door. I quickly changed out of my PJs and into my uniform (khakis and a Hanes). We walked over to her house which is very modest by US standards but I imagine fairly nice by Tanzanian standards. I couldn't even count the number of family members living in the house but I got to meet her mother-in-law, her sister, and her two adorable girls. She had prepared lunch of rice, this corn meal bread that is very typical of Tanzania, and a stew with beef. The beef was still on the bone, which is pretty normal.

Kitty's five-year old daughter demanded to be served the same thing as me and eat with spoon, knife, and fork (which apparently is not customary). She didn't do much eating, mostly ran around the table, spilling rice everywhere, and yelling, "NO speaking Kiswahili" to any family member that utter anything not in English or just staring at me. She goes to an international primary school where they only speak English. She loved practicing her English with me and would always giggle with surprise when I pulled out any of the five words I know in Kiswahili. After lunch she insisted on playing with my hair, such a style she gave me! Thank goodness I did not cut it all off, she had quite a good time with it probably because she just didn't know what to do with all of it.

After lunch and the salon, I went back to the hostel and laid down to read. The jet lag has finally set in. I'm currently reading The Fate of Africa, a history of Africa after independence. I was supposed to meet up with T-Man and the rest of the crew to head over to the Professor's house for dinner but I wasn't sure what time, and being cellphone-less I thought it might be good to head over to the project house where they live. I've been hesitant to get the cellphone situation covered because taking a taxi into town is intimidating considering how poor my language skills are. I walked across campus and was greeted by many. There seems to be hundreds of different ways to say hello in Kiswahili and twice as many appropriate responses. The commonly heard "mambo" is actually "street talk" and I only heard it today when walking with one of the students.

I met up with the crew to head over to the Professor's house for dinner. We piled into a taxi whose exhaust must have been hooked up to the ventilation system because none of us could breathe, not really knowing where we were going. Potholes are nothing for these taxi drivers. We went through streams and holes two feet in diameter all in a ten year old Toyota. Our directions said, "Turn at Californa"--notice the lack of "i." The Professor's house was gated, a little oasis compound with beautiful citrus trees and a wonderful patio. His wife served homemade pizza--I can't even make pizza from scratch. It was super delicious even though the power went out while she was cooking. Pizza was just the appetizer, a traditional Tanzanian dish of beef (sans bones, meaning it was much more expensive) and bananas. The bananas were more like potatoes and we amazing. The meat is literally "free range." The hospitality was divine and we laughed over the opening scene of The Terminator. I ate so much yesterday that I haven't been hungry all day.

Came back to the hostel after dinner and was exhausted but couldn't fall asleep (again). Using I start up one the classic time-to-PTFO movies but it was so quiet outside that I thought it might be nice to just listen to the crickets and stare up at the mosquito net (read: daily reminder to NOT get malaria) until 3 AM.