Homepage: my blogs about volunteering in Tanzania

Woooot second blog!

Let me just start by my day in Tanzania again.

Day 3, Camp Tanga 2.0
Date: 04-07-2014
Time: 22:40

YES! I finally unpacked my back! Right now I’m trying to sleep underneath a partly ripped mosquito net at another part of Camp Tanga. It’s slightly less beautiful than the other part of camp, but it’s still pretty awesome and luxurious. There are ‘normal’ toilets and showers with plenty of (cold) water. Also, the nice view of the beach and the sea is the same! And oh my god it’s sooooooo hot! Too bad we cannot open our tent because the chance of letting scorpions, spiders, snakes and whatsoever in seems way too big. Actually.. our tent floor has a lot of holes in it and a few of the zippers don’t work properly so.. I guess we’re screwed. Anyway, today we went to visit the village where we are going to start the project next Monday. It was about a 20 minute walk. While walking I was entertained by Ulu, and 18 year old girl working for camps international. She was so nice! She tried to teach me some Swahili, I sucked haha. I now know kigigi is village and schule is school. Of course I tried to show her something from our beautiful European culture, so we took a selfie. Hilarious. I learned that if you have a camera over here, the kids love you.
After lunch (something close to pasta Bolognese!) we went to the village close to camp. We met lots of cute kids that seemed to really like us, and especially our cameras and sunglasses. One of the girls immediately ran towards me and jumped into my arms. She took my sunglasses and started begging everyone around us to take pictures. She posed like a real model and screamed some random words in Swahili, probably meaning sunglasses or something. And she said Mzungu: I know that word! It means white person. They all shout it at us, in an inoffensive way of course, kinda weird though.
When we got back at camp we moved our stuff to the new camp, the one we’re at now. Oh btw, I drank a Kilimanjaro beer this night (so gross compared to Dutch beer) and I talked a lot with the British people and Aussies about weird Dutch traditions. They find Sinterklaas the weirdest of all: soo racist! Anyway, I spoke so much English today that I’m almost having trouble writing in Dutch. I should probably go to bed. No wait, first I have to risk my life by leaving my safe mosquito net and go to the toilet.. sigh.

Date: 13-10-2014
Time: 11:01

Actually today hasn’t really started yet, so I don’t have anything to write yet. This week though, was a nice one. Let’s start with Tuesday. I went to Groningen that day (another lovely Dutch word for our English speaking friends, keep practicing!) to have a drink with the boards of other student associations. Everyone had to dress fancy, we didn’t have to pay for our wine and beer and the goal was to try and ‘steal’ their board members and other stuff. Anyway, we had fun! And more was about to come, because guess who lives in Groningen.. *pampampaaam* Eva! One of the Dutch volunteers I met in Tanzania! J I was really excited to see her again since it was a while ago! We first had a beer with my friend from Utrecht (that’s where I live, remember?) then we dropped her off at the train station and went to Eva’s place. I changed my outfit into less fancy but way more comfortable and we talked and talked about.. I don’t know, everything. It felt all the same as a good old talk between Dutchies in Africa. Of course I wanted to see a bit more of Groningen so we went to a club. We found out it wasn’t really possible to have an actual conversation because of the loud music, disco lights and screaming people. Yeah, we could’ve known that. We went on to a bar, got kicked out because they we’re about to close so we went to another bar. There a real weird girl from London started talking to us about how badly she wanted to learn Dutch and how much she thought she sucked at it. Pretty funny how the one word she actually did pronounce the right way was kut (please Google that). Anywayyy, she wanted to add us on Facebook but we ignored her request, oops. I think we went home after this wonderful conversation and went to bed. Actually, we talked a lot more and then went to bed. The next morning Eva had to go to a lecture, but we had breakfast at the restaurant underneath her room instead. She dropped me off at the train station and went back to Uni while I headed back to Utrecht for an essay deadline.
Long story short: two months ago I saw a few Tanzanian villages and the school for the first time, this week I saw Groningen for the first time! So, history is obviously repeating itself. Kwaheri!

First day at project vs. days at Uni

Got some good news again! I shared my blog on Twitter and the people of Travel Active (the Dutch organization that helped me book this trip) liked it so much they asked me to write a blog for them! Such a compliment, asante sana! Some other news is that I booked another trip today. Or actually my parents did.. Anyway, I’m probably going to Egypt this Christmas! And I find it pretty weird that’s actually the same continent as Tanzania. Already tried to convince my parents to just go a bitttt more to the south, something like Tanga – just to mention a random city.. – but no. Still very excited though! J

Ok, back to this blog. This is what I wrote about my sixth day in Tanzania:

First day at project
Time: 20:41
Date: 7-7-2014

Jesus, can I go to bed yet?? I’m so tired! This first day was really tough and it wasn’t even very hot yet! This morning I woke up because of the rain and wind that was blowing that same rain directly through the tent into my face. On the other hand, the rain made work at project a little bit easier because it kept the temperature relatively low.

First we had to walk the 20 minutes to the school again, but this time with an extra challenge: we had to carry our filled water bottles and our tools all the way over! So I felt more like one of the seven dwarfs instead of the queen when we were walking through the village. With my pickaxe and my cement thing. When we arrived at project we started directly with hoeing and shoveling a big pile of rubble in front of the main entrance of the school. Sadly, the Africans weren’t really efficient. At first they forgot which pile of shit had to be moved and which one had to stay. And of course we started with the wrong pile! NICE. So when we were done moving a few wheelbarrows full of sand and stones, they finally figured it would have been a good idea to explain their plans BEFORE we started doing the fucking wrong thing.. But ok, when we finally started doing the right thing it still didn’t go all too well. It was very heavy: never have I ever… been this damn sweaty before in my life. Luckily we had Harry, our pickaxe master. A strong guy from England who seemed to be the only one to be able to hoe more than once every minute.

Working hard was actually pretty nice when I thought of the kids we were making a bit happier (and the thought of getting skinny and tanned – bringing sexy back!). Btw, we started around 9 and around half one we finally had a lunch break. Our lunch was rice with some kind of red sauce with three tiny pieces of onion and a lot of nothing. The good old healthy stuff.

Funfact: going to the toilet is a real experience here. Like wow, it smelled só bad. And of course I’m a lucky woman because it’s that time of the month again! So I could spent even more time in there. Yay! (A few months later, I can actually still smell this when I think about it typing this blog).

After lunch we had to do a different task: plastering the walls. The only thing I’ll say about this is that I found out this is nót my biggest talent. But I liked doing it (also because we were in the shadow), so I guess that’s ok. I had to do this until around half past three and when we were done we RAN all the way back. We didn’t want to walk all the way back so yeah.. we ran. After this run I was even sweatier and smellier (can you even say that?) than I was before. The showers were way to popular so I decided to go to the sea with Ewa, Eva, Elle Cindy and ok too many people to mention. We had to walk through the village again so we were followed by a lot of children and guys. So when we were done chillin’ in the water (swimming is not really possible, way too shallow), they were all waiting for us to come out. On the way back I had to protect my sunglasses, towel and even my hair band thingy with my life, this time for a little girl, Huma. With her one hand she was holding me, with the other a little crab she tried to push into my face – loved it.

Ohhh another funfact: this guy came by on a bike at project today and he had a turtle in a bucket. And I could hold it for a few minutes. The turtle, not the guy.

I’m writing this in the tent of our neighbors btw and they decided it’s time to go to bed, so I should stop writing! I already wrote down the most important things any way. Lala Salama!

My god, I remember this day so good! Really felt so nasty and tired after all the hard work, but god it was good! Really wish that I was still in such a good shape as after all the wheel barrowing and hoeing but nooo. I went to the gym yesterday (seriously have been too busy to go more often) and I decided to join the kick box class. The fuck, I nearly died when we had run and jump and punch for like an hour in a row. Could have done that easily just after Tanzania.. So sad. Ah! I just remember that I got my last vaccination against hepatitis A/B this week, interesting right. I’m protected for 25 years now! So if I decide to go back when I’m like over 40.. I can. That’s cool I guess!

Another interesting activity I did this week is doing a presentation to promote Theater-, Film- and Television studies (now called Media and Culture studies.. L) in front of 200 hundred new students per shift. I was pretty nervous the first time on Friday morning when I thought of the fact that so many people would make their study choice based on my presentation, but it went better and better. So instead of helping kids by building their school, I helped students by talking and trying to be funny about University. Both so different but both pretty cool to do! 

Vanwege een raar foutje met deze site krijg ik steeds geen toeging tot het posten van mijn blogs. Hopelijk werkt het nu wel.. Hierbij dan ook een aantal blogs die ik tussendoor nog heb geschreven en al online staan op mijn eigen blogsite.

Day: 13
Time: After lunch
Date: 14-7-2014

Oops, I didn’t write for one day again. Ah well, I didn’t do much yesterday anyway. It was kind of a hangover Sunday, because I only slept for like 3,5 hours. But Saturday night was epic! Elle, Katherine and me had drinks for hooours. We were looking forward to that night all day, but once it got to the point we expected the party to start, it ended up pretty boring. Everyone was talking at the same time so we couldn’t hear each other nor the music. So the card games didn’t really work out either and at some moment we decided to just go and watch the football in the village again. Then the 3 of us talked for hours about the most random shit. And even when Elle went to bed, Katherine and I talked for some 4 hours more :’). No but seriously, we had such a good conversation! About things that bothered me, things that bothered her.. Yes, I think the vodka helped us into a real philosophical/emotional mode. Anyway, after our epic convo we had a sleepover in her tent, because all her tent buddies were on a safari. I was planning on doing that next week btw, but their story’s weren’t too exciting so we’re going to take a look if we can find something else.

But ok, I woke up around 7:45 on Sunday and I just sat in the sun the entire day. Today on the other hand was a pretty good day! We didn’t do project work at the school but we went into the village and helped the mama’s with seaweed harvesting! This ended up for us to walk pretty far into the sea. And wow!! We saw so many beautiful and awesome sea animals and plants. I had a starfish walk across my hand and I held a living fish J (so proud of myself..). Oh, we have to get back to work now! I’ve got nooo idea what we’re going to do so.. to be continued I guess!

Time: 10:39
Date: 16-1-2015

Wow, I remember that Saturday night so well! I bet it sounds pretty lame when you read it here on my blog, but really it got pretty intense and I think I might have learned some good lessons that night. So thanks for that!

Also I feel really useless at the moment if I think of all the cool things I did in Tanzania. Right now typing this blog is like the most useful thing I’m doing. Or at least it feels that way. Since I still have the beautiful mark of the knife that accidentally ended up in my leg, I can’t really walk or bike. So I have to stay at home most of the time, and if I want to go somewhere it takes sooo much more time than it should! And the problem is that sitting still and not doing anything all day are the two things I absolutely hate. Don’t get me wrong, I do like watching series for a day or so. But after that one day I just feel like I have to go and do something again. And now I have to sit and be bored for like two weeks.. Where nearly half a year ago (!!) I didn’t just do awesome things, we helped people while doing it.

I mean, this sea weed harvesting for example. the harvesting itself was interesting a few times, but the walk back was way better! With a bag filled with sea weed (and sometimes a lost cockroach) on our head we walked back through the sea for like twenty minutes. Seeing the most beautiful fish and scary unidentifiable things. I don’t get that hobbling from my couch to the kitchen.. and that’s not even it. Because normally the mama’s from the village would do this pretty heavy job. And to them all the sea life wasn’t that interesting any more at all. To them it was just work, trying to carry the heavy, dirty bags back to the village to sell them later on. They had to walk back and forth for like at least 20 times to make sure they had enough. But we were with so many that just going back three times was enough! So the mama’s had time to do something else while we did their job way faster, simply because we had more man to do it. And we loved it (ok, accept for the cockroaches hiding in the bags).

NEXT

This one is especially for the peeps who want to know what happened to my leg this week.. And for the ones who are still interested in my Tanzanian adventures of course J. Enjoy!

Day: 11
Time: 8:58
Date: 12-7-2014

Maybe I should write once every two days instead of trying to write every day, seeing I don’t really have enough space left in my journal and I’m too lazy to write every day. Yesterday was finally Friday, felt so good! At project I sawed pipes of steel again and worked at the mud house. After project Eva, Heather, Ross, Michelle and I played football with some of the school kids and our favorite African boys Bravo, Mickey, Duma, Saidi and Aloki. They were so damn fast and good, omg! Luckily I didn’t fail like completely (just almost completely), I even managed to score! I think I still have some of the skills I gained long time ago at RKDEO. Today it’s Ewa’s birthday so yesterday we had a party. Together with Katherine, Elle, Ewa and more we played hearts and turned it into a drinking game. Later on we played ‘truth or dare’ and ‘never have I ever’. I had to go into someone’s tent and act like I was praying, Muslim style.. And yeah, I had to produce the sound of the mosque myself. Such fun..

Oh wow, Ali is talking to me at the moment, I think that guy might not be 100%.. 

Anyway, I don’t have an hangover today so that’s positive + we had pancakes for breakfast, helloooooo. We’re going to town in a few minutes. Btw I find it pretty scary to write about other people, what if they read it! (haha oops, maybe I should not write a blog..). But I can write that I’m starting to get a bit annoyed by some people talking aaaall day without really saying something. You know what I mean? Just shut uuup. Ah that reminds me of yesterday morning! I got up early to see the sunrise. Felt like a good idea, but when I stood outside with my camera ready, it started raining fucking hard. We ran back to our tent but it was difficult to open the tent with this major stress or something so we ended up in our beds, soaked and without seeing the sunrise. So sad.

Time: 11:50
Date 10-1-2015

Whooooo it’s 2015! Sounds like a good year J. Hope It’s going to be as awesome as 2014, that’s going to be hard though.. I already managed to do something pretty fucking stupid. Most of the people who know me, might not know this yet so hold your horses.. I found out that cutting chocolate with a knife is not necessarily the best way to start your day? What now? I hear you think. Well, this is what happened. I tried breaking a piece of chocolate but the chocolate was too hard so I thought hmm maybe it will break when I chop it with a knife. And so it did! But strong as I am, I did not only hit the chocolate.. The knife went all the way through the chocolate, through the box into my leg! YES, that hurts a lot! And of course it started bleeding as fuck so I freaked out a bit, called the alarm number and went to the hospital. The I got some sutures (is that the right word?) and a tetanus shot, so now I’m fine again! The only thing is that I’m not really able to walk, or do anything else than sitting really.. So playing football with awesome African rafiki’s wasn’t really going to happen again this month anyway, but now I can’t even play football with boring Dutch people anymore. Not that I ever play football here at home. But you know, if you can’t do something you really really want to do it even more. Like when you were little and your brother was playing with something you didn’t even like before, you wanted it. Just because he had it.

Well, I hope I had all my bad luck for this year! So now the rest of the year I will be able to see and do beautiful things (without getting knifes in my leg and stuff..). Asante sana!

NEXT

Kiswahili lesson!

This was our first lesson Kiswahili, the language they speak in Tanzania. Would love to say that I still remember most of it.. But that’s not true L. Of course I still remember the ones we used a lot when we were talking to the children.. like: Jina lako nani? And Hapana! *not my sunglasses nooo*. I also remember the funny combination of an English/Australian accent and Kiswahili words haha ‘tuta onana badaaye..’ (me and Katherine even made this into All bananas must die. Why? I dunno)

1: moja                6: sita
2: mbili                7: saba
3: tatu                  8: nane
4: nne                  9: tisa
5: tano                 10: kumi

Ndio                                    yes
Hapana                              no

Ume toke wapi?               Where are you from?
Una miaka mingapi?       How old are you?
Jina lako nani?                  What’s your name?
Jana langu ni..                  My name is..

Nime Shiba                        I’m full
Nime choka                       I’m tired
Nina skanjaa                     I’m hungry
Naenda kulala                  I’m going to sleep

Habari za asubuhi            Good morning
Ninzuri sana                      Very good
kwaheri               bye!
Tabasamu                          Smile
Checka                               Huge
Nakupenda                        I love you/I like you
Usiku mwema                   Good night
Leo                                      Today
Jana                                    Yesterday
Juzi                                      The day before yesterday
Kesho                                 Tomorrow
Kesho kutwa                     The day after tomorrow

Reading this I remember I really really think Kiswahili is the coolest language I’ve ever learned.