Eau De Choo

To begin with, I am seriously considering a change to the name of this particular blog. Why, ask my loyal following (all half dozen)? Because, dammit, I’m going to live near a town called Mafinga, and I just...I just think there are too many good jokes to make about a town that sounds like “My finga”. For instance, the title of my blog could be “Pull Mafinga”. I’m just sayin.

Had my first try at being sick in Africa. It was awful, but I can do better. If thou be dhaifu of tumbo (weak of stomach), maybe skip a paragraph or two. In the lovely language of Kiswahili, they have an alternate expression for diarrhea (harisha). They say, “umeendesha” (you have been driving). Why do they say this, you ask? Because, when a certain person has diarrhea, their bodies tend to sound like a revving car. I found this expression odd. Then I laid in bed one night for nine hours, listening to my very own running of the Kibaoni 500, and remembered, once again, that funny expressions/stories stop being funny when they start being about you.

Had another example of that today. After we returned from town today (today being Saturday, when I wrote this particular part), and we found out that the local bus (which we call Rasha Baby, because it has Rasha Baby written on the back. (We’re not that creative. Sometimes we are. Not now.)) was broken (I asked “how do you break a bus with no brakes?” It might have brakes. I’ve seen it stopped. On hills...) and we had to walk back to town, one of my friends almost had her hand taken off by a passing motorcycle. And I realized in that moment that if I read a story about a PCV losing an arm while waving to a pikipiki driver, I would laugh a little. And that doesn’t make me a very good person. So one of two things need to happen: A. I need to well up with sympathy and squelch snarky comments whenever I hear about funny tragedies...and that ain't gonna happen. SO B. I need to invite, initiate, and help to propagate lots of good jokes if a humorous tragedy should befall me. Hold me to it folks.

Listening to a West Wing episode while I wrote this (this is the first of two West Wing references, the other...is hidden. First person to email me with the second gets a handwritten drawing in the mail! My money is on Vicky). Heard one of my favorite lines: “what percentage of things exploding do you think have been anticipated?" Reminds me of another saying I used to love as a kid: “eat right. excercise. die anyway” I’m becoming fatalistic. Or realistic. Or serene. Probably not. But I’m trying. The sheer reality of the situation is this: we are trying to change lives and systems that have been in place since time immemorial, and change like that takes lifetimes. It is a bit humbling to be put into a situation in which we are able to control so little, and expect to move the ocean so very far. So what do we do? Whatever we can, I guess. Stay tuned.

My little brother here drives me batty, and scares me a little, because he loves my things. Loves them. Loves to play with them, use them, maybe pee on them and claim ownership (not the last. yet). It borders on the obsessive, and it absolutely crosses over into the annoying, and I guess the real story here is that most of the people here like me for me, or at least like me because I’m different and funny. But sometimes it becomes about what I can do for them. Or what I can give them. Or sometimes, what they can use me for. And those moments are completely understandable. They are also completely excruciating. So I want to tell my little brother: “you need to not like vitu (things) so much.” Then I realize...easy to say when you’re the guy with all the vitu.

So the last part of this blog post is the text of the speech we are going to be giving on Wednesday. I also have it in Kiswahili, but not in digital form. I’ll post it later, i think. This speech was written by myself and a women named Rebeccah Steele. I’m rather fond of it, so if you don’t like it, save the constructive criticism until I return (you’ll have forgotten by then. Nimeshinda! (I have won! (I love parentheticals. This is a parenthetical to the 3rd degree. In the course of two years, how high can I set the bar? We shall see))). On Wednesday I will be sworn in as a Peace Corps Volunteer. I thought about applying to join the Peace Corps in August of 2008, during a particularly rocky time in my life. It is because of fortune, luck, and the love of a great many good friends and family members that I made it here. So this is the part where I say thank you. Thank you. Thanks for giving me a bed to sleep on, food to eat, music to listen to, encouragement, jokes, love, hugs, kisses, and wacks upside the head. If you came to the Beer Olympics, listened to me talk about Prospect Park, taught me how to harvest a turnip, or simply care about me, thank you. I’ve never done anything alone in my life, and I never will. When I’m living the good life alone in the village, I won’t be alone then either. I am where I want to be, and I am doing what I’ve always wanted to do. Thank you all. I love you, and I miss you. I hope you like the speech.

Unajua utokako, hujui uendako. (You know where you are from, you don’t know where you are going)

It all started with an idea and a click of a mouse. We individually decided it was time. Time to serve, grow, and learn. Individually we labored to apply and get through the grueling process to become a candidate. Individually we said goodbye to our families, our friends, and our lives. Individually we boarded planes bound for the unknown. In Philadelphia we began a joint experience, united by a common purpose, and a common trepidation. Internally, we were all shagalabagala (chaos). We had no idea how quickly we were going to get “comfortable” with each other. Our first test of overcoming obstacles was getting through John F. Kennedy airport in New York City. 40 passports...40 passengers packed for a two year adventure. We were dropped off and had to figure it out on our own. With a few small hickups we proudly became a team and boarded our plane.

We flew off into the sky, watching America fade away below us. Our flight was long, the seats were short, and the food was cold, but we will never forget the moment our new friends, our new family members, awoke us, and pointed to the sandy shores below. We had literally crossed over into Africa. An idea that began a continent away was now a reality in Tanzania.
As we landed in Dar the air smelled of fire and felt sticky to our skin. We had finally arrived at our new home.

Nine weeks ago our clothes were clean and pressed; we spoke no Kiswahili, we had yet to taste ugali. We were herded quickly to Msimbazi Center, minds clouded and eyes heavy with sleep deprivation. As the night blurred past, we were hit with our first dose of culture and medication. As the light of day came upon us, our new reality set in. We had to endure hours of information overload, shots, and jet lag, but we were alive and well.

After that first week, we were integrated, we were ready. Little did we know. We had, thus far, only seen one kind of Tanzania, and it was not so different from America. The words might be different, but the cars, the goods, the life, that was similar. We were completely oblivious to what was coming. Nothing would have prepared us for that first night. We were left that afternoon with our bags, a smile, and a “hujambo, sijambo” (You good? I’m good). Nothing else. We were without language, friends, the comforts of home, the simple habits that we had spent a lifetime learning. We were new faces, they were strangers; smiling, but speaking in a foreign tongue and expecting replies. Awkward silence (pause for awkward silence). We were alone that night, alone, and overwhelmed.

Over the next few weeks, we began to grow and learn, even in ways we did not realize. There were fewer Americans, and we all knew that very soon today would come, and tomorrow there will be no more Wazungu (white people). Those first few days we did not want to leave the classroom. What good students we were. But truthfully, we were scared to go home. For home was filled with strangers and strange words and stranger food. It was a perfect trap, because we had been put into a situation where we needed to change to survive. And we did this to ourselves. But then a funny thing happened. With each faux pas: broken beds, buibui bites, phones in the choo, malaria and missed transportation, there were lessons. Haba na haba hujaza kibaba (little by little fills the container). We laughed at ourselves as others laughed at us, and our mamas taught us how to cook, our bibis taught us how to speak, our babas drew us maps and made us flashcards. Our little kakas and dadas taught us how to play. We were embraced as brothers and sisters, and showered with generosity. Before we knew it, the strangers had become friends, and then the friends became family. The weeks whistled by us as we learned how to live, work, and play in this beautiful country. We built permagardens with primary students, held community meetings with the villagers, and grew together as a team. And now, before any of us can believe it, our training is over. For the second time in nine weeks we have left our homes, to travel to a place we have only seen on a map.

Two years from today, a funny thing will have happened. That place on a map will have become home. The strangers we will meet tomorrow will become friends, then family. And we will be leaving the toughest job we ever loved. We will leave behind gardens and nurseries, clinics and health clubs, bee hives and vaccination days. But we will be leaving behind far more than that. We will be leaving friends. Because more than a list of projects completed, marks on a ledger, money spent or money earned, our goal is the learning and growth that happens when two cultures come together. We have a tremendous opportunity to live, as ambassadors of the United States of America, with the people of Tanzania. We have some things we want to teach them, yes. Things that will hopefully improve the quality of their lives. But we have so much more we want to learn, and so many relationships we cannot wait to form.

Some of us may fall in love forever, with this place, with these people, with this life. Some of us may never leave. But leave or stay, we will forever be citizens of two nations, members of two cultures.

So today, we stand here, ready, once again, to go forward into great uncertainty. It will be hard. It will hurt. We may cry. But we will also learn, and we will teach. And hopefully we will dance and sing along the way. We are where we always wanted to be, and we are doing what we always wanted to do. And for that we are thankful. The people of Tanzania have already shown us more generosity than we could have imagined, and we are ready to repay it, little by little.

There is an Irish tale of two lads who encountered, in their travels, a high wall, higher than they believed they could climb. The two lads looked at each other, took off their packs, and threw them over the wall. Now they had no choice but to follow. Today we throw our packs over the wall. We will see you all on the other side. Kawia, tufike. (Linger, you’ll get there)