Cake!

After a late night of soccer I hit the snooze button about twenty times until I realized that I hadn't heard from Jeran yet and as a psuedo-hostess I should probably locate my "guest." It poured last night so the streets were more like mud than pavement. Every four or five steps I'd slip--think ice skating but with mud. I headed into town on the dalla dalla and sat next to the cutest kids that wanted nothing to do with me. Aparently loss of coordination isn't cool here. Wear it mzungu.

Jeran had already left his hotel and according to the attendant had headed for the post office. After meeting up we went over to Pira's--the MINI grocery store where all the mzungu get ripped off, especially on Cadbury or anything with a non-Arabic label. Highlight was picking up the requirements for Funfetti cake (label half in English; half in Arabic), which is the activity for the day. Very exciting..."Are these eggs raw?" "Yes." "Have they been cooked?" "Yes."

Dragonaires and Soccer...Again

Another awesome Friday filled with brick-oven pizza and Euro2008. After a day of dissection and research for my INT199 paper, I was certainly ready for a night at Dragonaires. Jeran gave me a ring just as Al Jazeera was starting the 10-minute loop of news again. I think the Tanzania air has gotten to me or I've just become a total space cadet. I mis-read my messages and thought he was arriving on Saturday for some reason. Nevertheless, I caught a cab down to his hotel and gave him a tour--albeit a short one considering the size of Morogoro--around town. We met the guys (Dundy, Will, and T-Man) at Dragonaires and I surprised them all by ordering a Safari. I opted for the mixed vegetable and splurged on a large instead of a medium. It was certainly well worth the food coma that followed.

Afterwards I headed to Bird-Man's to watch the Turkey-Croatia match. A snoozer for the first 90 minutes of play, the match picked up in extended time--and the stoppage time that followed. My genius has finally been confirmed...at least according to a Norwegian saying that proclaims anyone that can explain the off-sides rule to a woman and have her understand it a genius. I got double points from Bird-Man for being a women and being able to explain it to T-Man. Thank goodness for that.

New Friends and Company!

On my way up to the hostel to prepare the usual PB&J for lunch--the concept of which is mind-blowing to the Vet students whose lunch is continually stiff porridge--I was approached by another mzungu girl. I was super excited at the prospect of a new friend and even better a new friend that spoke English. She asked if I wouldn't mind reading over a letter for her; she insisted her English was not so good. Like any good CMCer I was all over the cover letter she gave me. We ended up having lunch together and exchanging phone numbers. She knows of a pool so one of these days (in the next two weeks before she returns to Switzerland) I'm going to go with her and grab pizza at Dragonaires afterwards.

Last night I decided to give up on the half-pound of pasta with red sauce and grab some CHICKEN (I know, big step) and french fries...or rather Freedom Fries, at SUASA instead. I had the 700-something page The Fate of Africa with me to keep me entertained but luckily Bird-Man was there. He let me join him and it was nice to eat dinner with someone other than the Al Jazeera anchors. He was also kind enough to extend an open invitation to watch the soccer games with him--which I imagine I'll take him up on this weekend.

And last but certainly not least, I'm looking very forward to a friend of a friend's visit to Morogoro. While there is a "dearth of tourist activities" here, hopefully he'll be easily entertained by Euro2008 matches and big weekend meals out. My Swahili tutor offered to show me some new spots in town as well. Should be a fun weekend!

"Course Practicals"

So I guess it's about time I started to talk about the whole work thing...That is what I'm here for, right? I've been with six Vet students at the University partaking in what they term "course practicals." From what I've gathered, while school is in session the laboratory component of courses is rather limited and the students spend an intense (by Tanzanian standards) 10 days working in the lab and the field. Mind you, everything is still on Swahili time--which means that 8:00 sharp really means sometime around 8:20 or 8:30.

The students are hilarious and can't seem to get enough of the mzungu. They assume that I know the answer to every question when really they know a whole lot more than me. (Mom, you were right...I definitely need to take Microbiology) I've been very impressed by their facility with all sorts of bacteria and viruses. They certainly know their stuff! They are so welcoming and insist that I do everything they do. They love to talk about the States and were completely blown away by the cost of education. One asked how we pay for it. Another responded, "Don't you know, white is the color of money."

Today we inoculated mice, and by inoculated I mean gave them a shot with some nasty parasites. If they aren't handled correctly they bite you and--apparently--this hurts. I tried to explain the similarity to my late hamster Maybel but the concept of a hamster and a pet made very little sense to them. Silly mzungu. When I asked what they had named the mice they were at first puzzled. I thought they didn't understand but when I asked in Swahili they answered, "Moja, mbili..." or "One, two...". One student, whose name means Thunderstorm in Swahili, said, "Let's name this one Obama." I named mine McCain and another one was bestowed with Hillary. Incidentally, we later dissected Hillary. Thunderstorm was my partner for the dissection and insisted that I do all the cutting and poking. We found a tumor in poor Hillary :( along with all the normal organs; we proceeded to do organ smears. My favorite was the squash smear of part of the brain--a true moment of hilarity when students from the other group showed me their George Bush brain...it's even better when you hear it with an accent.

I washed my hands like forty times before lunch.

Mikumi Safari

I finally got out of Morogoro for the day. T-Man, Dundy, Will, and Bird-Man were heading to Mikumi and invited me along for the ride. I had the opportunity to learn ELISA with the vet students but opted for the impromptu safari. We headed to load up with petrol (about $20 each) around 8 a.m. It took about an hour to get to the National Park but the drive was smooth and picturesque. Every 10-15 minutes we passed another village, each one abuzz with people and plastered with the usual VodaCom advertising. And then, Mikumi! Lonely Planet (I finally took a look at a guidebook) describes: “Mikumi, part of the vast Selous ecosystem, is Tanzania’s fourth largest national park. Within its 3230 sq km, set between the Uluguru Mountains to the north and the Lumango Mountains to the southeast, Mikumi hosts buffaloes, giraffes, elephants, lions, leopards, crocodiles and more, and chances are high that you’ll see a good sampling of these within a short time of entering the park.” Entering the park was another $20 (SO CHEAP!) and the weather was perfect, breezy and warm. Just to give you an idea of what kind of equipment we were working with…
Mom don’t read this part…To check out the animals or take pictures we just roll down the windows and sit out on them.

We entered the park—wishing I could still pass for 16 and save $5—and within minutes saw some giraffes. The park is massive and apart from the occasional Land Rover, surprising not packed with people. While the scenery is evocative of the San Diego Wild Animal Park, this is a real-life, no-joke park. No trams, just animals and grounds for them to wander. Every animal spotting was a thrill.

T-Man drove the Land Cruiser toward the hippo pools while Bird-Man was on the look-out for bird species to catalogue and record in his notebook. He’s a well-equipped bird watcher with USSR binoculars and a sweet camera—bird watching, I learned, is really quite an art. The hippos were AWESOME. They stayed in the water the whole time we were there but you could still see how massive they are.

Dundy insisted on exploring and by exploring I mean cheating death and getting as close to the crocodiles as possible. I was sure he was going to get eaten.

Don’t forget the baboon and the impala spotting. This is literally on the side of the road. We didn’t have to get out of the truck to take pictures of them or anything!

After some quality safari time we decided to break for lunch. I had a hamburger—for some reason having my second hamburger ever sounded really good—and fries (yes, T-Man, FREEDOM fries) at an over-priced hotel restaurant. The hotel was totally safaried out with posh little houses facing out to the plains and mountains, think the London millionaire meets Tanzania national park. While we were eating baboons were playing in the tree right in front of us! Too bad I didn’t want to share any of my fries.

Ready to see some elephants and simba (lions) we got back on the road, and what do you know, ZEBRAS!

We searched for a few hours but no luck on the elephants and lions, although Bird-Man had some excellent luck with his bird spotting. Around 5:30 we headed back out of the park and back towards Morogoro. On the road back we had our elephant spotting and like true tourists we hopped out of the car to snap some shots. The boys fell asleep on the ride home and after the requisite half-pound of pasta with tomato sauce I headed over to Bird-Man’s project house to close out an awesome day with more soccer. I couldn’t have asked for a better day to mark two weeks in Tanzania!