Hakuna Matata - originally published on January 21, 2007

Student orientation is over today; now it gets less hectic. The past week’s been intense exploring the University of Dar es Salaam and the city with students every day. We are going to Kiswahili class for 4 hours in the morning. He started teaching his US history class last week – 5 students so far. He’s enjoying his experience—quite different from US teaching.

Life in the hood. I’ve already mentioned our neighbor, an American ethnomusicologist who’s lived in Africa since the 1960s. We also had A for dinner one night—she’s a Norwegian linguistics Ph.D. studying Tanzanian court language. We meet her swimming every other day or so.

P.S. Our neighbor has a fabulous collection of pirated DVD’s; last night we watched CASINO ROYALE in Russian with English subtitles. Except the Eng subtitles didn’t match the movie; they were for some other movie.

Food shopping in the hood. We’ve found a veggie and fruit seller who speaks no English. Good for us, although I’m certain we sound illiterate. We bring our newfound Kiswahili vocab and attempt to order fresh, locally grown tomatoes, potatoes, papayas, mangoes, pineapples, shallots and limes. There’s also great masala spice mixes. Our acquaintances keep asking us, how do you survive here being vegetarian? The meat has made 2 students sick already.

Group activities. As leaders of the group P and I trek around w/our 14 “children” everywhere – I’m mother goose; P follows in the rear of the brood making sure everyone’s safe (the aforementioned pickpocketing incident occurred when I protectively tried to follow in the rear—mistake). I’ve learned to stay in front surrounded by my posse of tall male students. Other recurring director activities: pay large bills for lunchs for 14 at white sandy beaches, swim while students watch my purse, do yoga on the beach & go for long walks. 4 students and I did yoga at Kipepeo Beach on Saturday, and attracted beachgazers interested in our warrior forms. Our students are laidback; they don’t mind sweat dripping into their eyes as we smash into a daladala—one sitting atop the engine, another nested in someone’s lap. We invited 6 Tanzanian women students with them to the beach yesterday, and later last night the whole brood went out to the disco. One friend of mine pointed out that the title of this post comes from the Disney film Lion King – swear I haven’t seen it and am not stealing, but life is good!

Upcoming events: Bagamoyo field trip (coastal city north of Dar), budget balancing (starts in 5 mins actually), P arrives home from Kariakoo Market with an African shirt or two!

For more photos see www.flickr.com/photos/sawtooth

Bayamoyo past, Morogoro future

This week has brought my discovery of the Immigration Office (get paperwork stamped and money paid for students’ residence permits), the New Zaidi (lunch in the Asian Quarter of Dar), scarves at Kariakoo (with our neighbors, some Tanzanian undergrads), seminar tonight with our neighbor, M, and his grad student, K, who told, sang and showed stories of Tanzanian music (especially the infamous Wagogo people around Dodoma).

Last weekend it was Bagamoyo, a historical beach town on the northern coast, one hour from Dar. We first visited the Kaoli Ruins, the remains of an Islamic society dating from 13th century. Then we saw the Catholic Mission and Freedom Village, where missionaries were responsible for stopping the slave trade controlled by Persians between inland Africa and Zanzibar. The Caravanserail museum housed former lodging for slaves and traders. At the College of Art we saw traditional dances; on Saturday we shopped around and chased crabs on the beach.

Happy to meet some Frenchies in town, and the mix of Kiswahili and French together is fun! Swimming in the pool is X, a Tanzanian student who works at the French Embassy. I also met a Tanzanian French prof at the University of Dar es Salaam and interpreter. Before she left for Addis Abbaba, to do work with the African Union at a meeting this week-end, we talked about French and Francophone Literature and she said I should meet C, the French assistant and Dr. H, who teaches courses on phonetics and civil servant French. Tomorrow we are having C, who hails from Normandy and has lived in Tanzania for 5 years, over for dinner.

Coming on Friday: a trip to Morogoro, 3 hours away from Dar, and close to the Uluguru Mountains, where some of the oldest forest in Africa exists—the 25 million-year-old Eastern Arc Mountain Chain! It’s home to the yellow baboon, blue monkey, wild pigs, antelopes, the Usambara eagle owl and the Uluguru bush-shrike. We are taking a Hood bus from Ubungo Junction Friday afternoon, to arrive in Morogoro early evening, then going for a hike past a German colonial settlement called Morningside up to Bondwe Peak.