Holiday Part I

I have just arrived back in Tanzania after a great holiday and adventure. This post as well as my next one will likely seem more like a travel journal rather than a volunteer blog post. Moving forward in my placement, I will be staying in Dar es Salaam and will not be returning to the village, but will write more on that later.

My holiday started in Kigali, Rwanda. I piled into a bus with several other VSO volunteers bound for the Kigali Peace Marathon. I was quite impressed with the city and as always, shenanigans with the other volunteers proved to be great fun. The Rwandan tourist board will tell you that Rwanda is “the land of a thousand hills and a million smiles” and my visit there did not disappoint. The landscape is beautiful and the people that we encountered were all friendly and helpful. Shenanigans aside, I also took an afternoon to visit the genocide memorial which was, as expected, a sombre and reflective experience.

And his tongue is not even stuck out all the way....

After my weekend in Rwanda I was off to Nairobi for a few days. Although I did not have a lot of time there either, I had an excellent time and visited a few attractions. First on the list was the giraffe sanctuary where guests are able to feed the animals and ladies can get kisses from the giraffes. Sounds fun huh? In reality, although it sounds sweet, it’s actually fairly disgusting. Giraffes are sloppy kissers and as you can see in the photo, they have really long tongues. I suppose I can now say that I was kissed by a giraffe.... but really: is that something that anyone needs to be able to say? I must admit though, sloppy kisses aside, they are beautiful animals.

Feeding time

Next I visited the elephant orphanage, which turned out to be a rather special place. The Elephant orphanage was founded by David Sheldrick in 1977 and they take in, as the name would suggest, elephants (as well as other animals) who have been orphaned for a variety of reasons. The most common reason is poaching. It may surprise some people to learn that poaching is not only still very much a problem, but it is actually on the rise. The main market driving poaching activities these days is China. I think that the work done at the elephant orphanage is quite noble and they have excellent, committed individuals on staff to care for the elephants who are eventually re-introduced into the wild.

Can you spot something in this photo that isn't baby-sized?

Caring for an elephant is not an easy task. They rely on milk as a source of nutrition for the first 4 years of life and as such the staff must be with the elephants around the clock to deliver feedings every 3 hours – caretakers even sleep with the elephants. I would imagine that this is a special job... although it is probably a bit stinky of a job too. Most people know that elephants are quite bright, they are in fact one of the five smartest non-primate animals (can you guess what the other 4 are? If you would like to know, I will list them at the end of this post). In addition to being bright, they are also very social animals. Caretakers spend the night with the elephants not only to accommodate feedings, but also to fulfill their social needs. Elephants, like people, can actually die from loneliness. If that didn’t make you say “awwww” then I would venture to say that you might be a sociopath (and you can find a brief assessment here, if you are curious: http://kevin-goodman.com/?p=1245).


My final stop on my sight-seeing day in Nairobi was the zoo. Now I would not have expected to want to visit a zoo in Kenya.... because all of the animals that you can see there you can also see at the parks in the actual wild! There was one key attraction at the zoo though – they care for orphaned animals and I was told that I would have the opportunity to snuggle a baby cheetah.... and who wouldn’t want that???? So I went to the zoo and was guided about and it was, as expected, not exciting. I was getting impatient about the cheetahs! Unfortunately everyone had lied to me and snuggling up with a cheetah just wasn’t in the cards for me. Apparently they had an “incident” a few years back and they no longer allow guests to interact with the animals. They wouldn’t tell me exactly what the “incident” entailed, but I’m sure we can all use our imaginations (remember what happened to Roy of Seigfried and Roy?). Although I was disappointed in regards to the cheetahs, there were a couple amusing things to be seen in the zoo:

Walking around like he owns the place

Makes the same sound as a donkey

The first picture is of a baboon. The zoo has several of baboons exactly like this one that they keep in cages. The baboon in the photo is not one of them. He is a wild baboon who, like me, decided to spend the afternoon wandering through the zoo. He probably likes to visit now and again in order to taunt the other baboons and feel good about himself. Or maybe he is visiting his baboon wife who was captured and who he misses dearly. The silly looking animal in the second picture is a Zdonk.... yup you read it right. It is, similarly to a mule, the product of inter-species breeding – in this case a cross between a donkey and a zebra.

Following my fun times in Kenya, I was off to Zanzibar for some fun and sun before continuing my journey onward to Cape Town.... which I will write about in my next post!

Miss you all,

V

* The five smartest non-primate animals are: elephants, crows, dolphins, octopuses and pigs. I find the octopus to be a particularly interesting creature if you’re curious to give them a google and learn more about them.

Mt. Kilimanjaro Marathon

Beautiful Mt. Kilimanjaro

Vervet Monkey!

This post is long delayed. At the end of February I visited Moshi, home of Mt. Kilimanjaro. Kilimanjaro is the world’s tallest free standing mountain and is comparable in height to the Canadian Rocky Mountains. I was a little disappointed flying into the Kilimanjaro airport (which is the nicest airport that I have seen thus far in this country, by the way) as it was a bit overcast and I could not spot the mountain. Driving into the hotel the bottom third of it became visible but the rest of it stayed hidden in the clouds. On arrival to the hotel I forgot about the mountain for a while.... the hotel was great! There was a well stocked bar, comfy lounge chairs and a nice pool. Even better than all that.... there were tortoises and monkeys! 

3 Little Tortoises :)

I was the first to arrive to the hotel, but I was meeting up with several other VSO volunteers and staff. The 2012 Kilimanjaro marathon was taking place over the weekend and a few volunteers were running the full or half marathon. The rest of us would be joining the 5km “fun run” and cheering on those who were doing the serious running. 

The VSO Kilimanjaro Marathon Team

Once the rest of my VSO family arrived, we lounged by the pool for a while before making our way into town to register for the marathon. Moshi not only has the cleanest airport that I have seen so far in this country, it also has the cleanest streets. Moments after I voiced this observation we found out why the streets were so clean. Fellow Canadian volunteer, Robert, tossed an inconsequential piece of rubbish on the side of the road as we climbed into the car. This is not something that Robert would normally do at home in Canada, but living for the past several months is Dar es Salaam has conditioned him to accept this sort of behaviour. Moments after the rubbish hit the ground there were 2 not so official men in shiny shirts flashing badges and pamphlets at Robert telling him that he would have to either give them 50,000 shillings (just under $30 CAD) as a fine for littering or he would have to go to the police station to explain himself. It was quickly decided that we would accompany Robert to the police station rather than pay these guys off. Upon learning that Robert was living in Dar es Salaam the gentlemen at the police station immediately understood the reason for his infraction and let him off with a warning, a smile and a handshake. 

Another Monkey.... With her Baby!

The Kilimanjaro region in Tanzania is known for their excellent coffee in addition to their beautiful mountain. So following our run in with the police we decided to enjoy some lunch and coffee at a place that is aptly, if not originally, called “The Coffee Shop”. I had a cappuccino and a bacon and avocado sandwich. Mmmmmmmm how I miss cappuccinos. I bought 2 kilos of coffee while in Moshi, and I have my French press here in the village, so I’m not deprived of good coffee..... but there certainly isn’t a Starbucks in the village so this was a real treat for me and I knew that I would be back at “The Coffee Shop” before leaving Moshi. 

The night before marathon day was a loud one. I was woken during the night constantly by the hotel’s resident dog who felt it necessary to bark almost without a break for at least 2 hours. When he finally finished barking I think I figured out what he was barking about as I was once again awoken by booming thunder and flashes of lightning. In my frustration at being woken I thought of those in the group who had to wake before me to do some actual running (the runners started quite a bit 

before the “fun runners”) and tossed them a little pity before going back to grumbling to myself about not being able to sleep.  After waking and having a small breakfast our fun run crew set out only to find that the bus that would be taking us to the starting line was stuck in the mud. We learned that earlier that morning the runners had to take the public dala dala to the race. While we certainly had good intentions, and we considered taking the dala dala ourselves, it didn’t work out that way. It turns out that the main street that we were standing on was right on the marathon route so we opted for grabbing a few cold beers and cheering on our VSO team of runners as they passed us and then, once the bus was out, just heading over to the stadium to greet them at the finish line.

As always, it was a great reunion with my VSO family filled with many drinks, shenanigans and laughs.

Miss you all,

V

Those of us who did not make it to the race.... and 2 guys who seemed happy that they were not the only ones in the bar at 8am

Village Wildlife

Tiny colourful bird

There is a lot of wonderful wildlife unique to Africa, and of course going on safari to see lions and elephants and hippos is exciting, but there is plenty of wildlife right here in my own village as well. There are lots of bugs – not nearly as exciting as hippos but I’ve gotten used to it. The other day I put on a shoe without checking it first (I think the first time I have made this mistake since arriving in Tanzania) and sure enough there was a critter in it.... looked like a grasshopper. This surprisingly didn’t make me scream like a little girl. Instead I just made sure to shake out the other shoe before putting it on (if you’re wondering, it was empty). There are also apparently snakes. I have not seen any snakes yet and I hope that I remain lucky and don’t see any in the rest of my time here, because that WILL make me scream like a little girl. I have a rule – I do not like any animals with more than 4 or less than 2 legs, and I especially dislike the less than 2 category. There are also lots of birds – ranging from huge and ugly like the storks to tiny and colourful like birds I don’t know the names of. 

So the other day I was reading when I saw a shadow through my curtains. It looked like an arm and it kind of startled me. I went over and opened the curtains and guess what? It WAS an arm! An arm of an awesome monkey! He was just sitting on my window sill. I startled him and he jumped down and I wanted to go grab my camera before he took off so I looked at him and with my eyes I asked him politely “Would you mind staying right there just so I can get my camera? Please?” He looked back at me and although I saw maybe a moment of consideration flash over his face, he unfortunately decided against it and took off, but not before shooting me one last “I’m not into paparazzi” glance over his shoulder.  So although I didn’t snap a photo of him, I have included a photo of another monkey who looks a lot like Maxwell (by the way.... I named him Maxwell).

Blue balled vervet monkey (actually called this)

I always found it funny how often visitors to Canada marvel at the squirrels as they are just regarded as commonplace pests to most who have been around them for any length of time. I guess that might be kind of the same feeling towards the monkeys here..... but I don’t understand how. I mean they’re monkeys! Who doesn’t love monkeys and all their crazy monkey business???? 

Anyway there is a reason that I was especially pleased to make the acquaintance of good old Max. Several months ago I was told that there were monkeys living in the village so I went on a bit of a hike to go meet them. The village is not very large, so I did not have to hike very far, but much to my disappointment I didn’t spot even one monkey – even though I was told that there was a whole family living in a small wooded area just behind my house. I told one of my neighbours about my little hike and about my disappointment and he looked at me straight faced and told me “Oh, well you didn’t see any monkeys because we killed them.” I laughed, because he must be joking, right? But he didn’t laugh with me, he just gave me a bit of a confused look. “Wait.... you’re serious?????” I asked. And sadly he was. The monkeys are seen by many as pests as they get into people’s gardens and generally cause all sorts of monkey mischief.... so the solution is to off them. I don’t think monkeys are pests. I think they’re awesome and silly. So I’m very happy about Max and I hope that he doesn’t suffer a similar fate as the village monkeys before him.....

I have also been dealing with other wildlife. Remember the lizard in my house? Well I guess he is a she because she had babies. They’re cute and all, but I really just don’t want lizards in my house. It seems that the young ones aren’t yet aware that there is a widely followed lizard rule that if they decide to enter someone’s home, they must stay on the walls and ceiling. No wandering around all over the place.... floors and ceiling. That’s it. 

I was on my computer the other night and I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye, I looked up and there was a little lizard sitting on top of my folded laundry on the desk. That’s right, not on the ceiling and not on the wall, but on my laundry. I’m not into the rule breaking so I had to do something about it. Turns out baby lizards don’t move as quickly as the adults and I managed to catch him inside my glasses case and set him free outside. I really felt as though I had done something good that day. Not only did I catch a lizard, which is tricky in itself, but I also gave the little guy a life of freedom in the great outdoors. Mostly I was just happy to know I wouldn’t have any surprises the next time I put on a shirt. 

Now I don’t know that much about lizards, but I can share with you something that I have learned (without the aid of Google): It turns out that when a lizard has a baby she doesn’t have just one. The very next day I spotted 2 other baby lizards. I give up, they can live with me. 

Miss you all,

V

A bunch of big birds in a tree

Big ugly stork - at least as tall as my waist

Adventures in Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam

Saying thank you before the vodka.... we were in a convent after all.

It’s been quite some time since my last blog entry, and that is because I have had a very busy month, so this entry may be a bit on the long side. It started on December first when I packed up my bag and traveled to Dar es Salaam for VSO’s annual volunteer conference as well as a celebration of VSO’s presence in Tanzania for 50 years.  Those of us who are living in more rural areas, like myself, were flown in a few days prior to the commencement of the conference, I assume because VSO understands that since we are isolated a few extra days in the city would be useful in order to run errands and do some shopping. We flew Precision Air into the city, and as it turns out, the name is not exactly entirely descriptive of their service – our flight was delayed by more than 4 hours. Apparently precision air is notorious for these sorts of delays. The thing is though; they are the only Tanzanian airline that uses European audit standards, so when flying within Tanzania, one must really consider carefully what is most important to them. We arrived in Dar quite late and were picked up and taken to our new home for the next week and a half – A catholic conference center out in the middle of a shipping yard. The good news is that there was a bar. Seeing as we arrived several days early for the conference about 8 or so of us made a last minute decision that our weekend would be much better spent in Zanzibar rather than hanging out in the convent.  

The view from bar #1

 There is a ferry from Dar es Salaam to Stone Town that takes about an hour and a half and is actually an unexpectedly pleasant ride. Once you get though the chaos of actually boarding the boat and the unease caused by the fact that sick bags are handed out as soon as you take your seat, it is very comfortable and even shows a movie for the ride. Cast away was the movie of choice for this leg of the journey..... good movie, but I’m not sure it’s an entirely appropriate choice for a boat ride to an island.....  

 

Stone Town is a bustling city, and I will spend more time there next time I visit Zanzibar. This time though we were off to Jambiani to visit Ishwar, a fellow VSO volunteer who had kindly arranged for accommodations for the group – a cozy house right on the beach. Once we settled in we immediately found a bar to have some pre-dinner drinks at prior to an excellent sushi meal. 

At the beach bar in Jambiani

After dinner we went out for a quiet drink at a beach bar. One turned into two, turned into three, turned into “shoot.... we need to get back to the beach house, we have a car coming at 5:30am to pick us up!” A few of us had booked a trip to go swimming with the dolphins and early morning is the best time to go. We made it back in time, but not in time for my head to hit the pillow first. Swimming with the dolphins in Zanzibar is not like swimming with them in Cuba or Florida or Mexico. They do not drive you out to some “research facility” where they have you hop into the water for a series of photo-ops with the poor caged animals. Instead you hop into a boat and head out into the open water in search of some dolphins. 

Hammocks at the bar: a great idea

It is actually very beautiful and peaceful (just perfect after a night of many drinks and no sleep)..... That is until the tour guide spots a dolphin, stops the boat and like a drill sergeant shouts “EVERYONE OUT, NOW! EVERYONE IN THE WATER!”..... But then, once you are in the water... Dolphins are swimming with you! It is all peaceful and right and good again! It was a really beautiful experience. As an aside, I’m sure you know that dolphins communicate with one another in a fairly complex way (much like humans) but did you know that scientists are actually working on a translation devise that would allow for two way communication between dolphins and people? How cool is that? One day I might be able to talk to a dolphin and ask him questions. Maybe the dolphins know something about the aliens. I could ask them about that.  

A nap was in order once we returned, but we were up in a few hours for a proper (and expensive) coffee and a massage. Ahhhhh...... I really needed this! Life can be tough sometimes in the village. For those of you who read my blog regularly, you may recall how pleased I was at the luxuries I found in Mwanza. Well Zanzibar offers many, many more luxuries..... and all of them are beachfront. 

Not sure if he's looking to sell the whole tank or just the fish inside...

After another sleepless night (it’s just so easy to lose track of time with that sea breeze...) it was time again to head back to the ferry and make our way back into Dar. Now some of you may recall that my first impressions of Dar were not entirely positive. My second impression of the city was far more positive – that’s what living in the village will do to you I suppose. Sure, the traffic is still horrendous, the streets are filthy, and it’s hotter than you can imagine, BUT, there are also supermarkets and a movie theatre (I got to see the new Twilight movie.... while drinking a margarita!) and restaurants that actually stock the items listed on their menus – and more than that, they are excellent restaurants. Also, being the optimist that I am, I can even find a positive in the bumper to bumper traffic. Since the traffic is so bad, industrious vendors walk up and down the streets selling their items. You can buy anything from electronics and DVDs to home decor to clothing to food... and even pets (see photo of dude with a fish tank on his head). So one really could make the most of their time stuck in traffic and do the weekly shopping. Seriously – you can get almost anything from these guys on the side of the road, and all from the comfort of your own car. I actually started to feel a bit spoiled while staying in Dar – a feeling that I certainly did not expect to feel in Tanzania considering how spoiled we all are at home in Canada. 

Room part at the convent - good times with good people

The conference was quite enjoyable. The purpose of the annual conference is to come together and share ideas and experiences and hopefully take some new knowledge back with us to our placements. It is also an excellent opportunity to socialize with other volunteers and It was really nice to see all my crew again - we definitely had a good time. Towards the end of the week we were invited to the Canadian high commissioner’s residence for a cocktail party where VSO was recognized for 50 years of work in Tanzania. On the way there one of our busses broke down and I think the reaction of the group as a whole speaks to how we have adjusted since being here. Nobody grumbled at all. We simply got off the bus and waited for the other one that was just behind us and when it pulled up we all crammed in with the other volunteers dala dala style.

At the residence of the Canadian High Commissioner with some of my BFAs (Best Friends in Africa)

Taking a boat to a beautiful beach in Dar

After the conference I spent a few more days in Dar with some friends enjoying the city and the beach..... and then unexpectedly decided to return home for the holidays, which was a great decision. It’s COLD at home though! It was so nice to see family and friends at home and also to enjoy the comforts of mom’s cooking and gingerbread lattes. I didn’t tell many people I was coming home as it was a very last minute decision, so I got to surprise quite a few people which was fun.... I hid in the trunk of my mom’s car to surprise my BFF and sat up and shouted “Surprise” when she opened it.... I got a pretty good reaction from that.  

Returning to the village was tough. Not only was I tired after several days of travel to get here, but I also came down with a cold. Coming back one really needs to re-adjust all over again and I wasn’t entirely prepared for that feeling, but I’m all settled and back to work now.... and back to boiling water. Speaking of which, I need to go boil some now.

Miss you all,

V