Challenging day turned into a blessing

I just want to say that right now as I am sitting at the internet cafe, I have a perfect view of Mt. Meru right in front of me. It is so big and beautiful, absolutely breathtaking. I have not seen a glimpse of Kili yet because it is right behind Meru but they said on some days when it is clear out you can. Next time I come I will bring my camera and upload a picture of Meru. It is the second tallest mountain in Tanzania and in all of Africa it is the third tallest. I am so blessed to be surrounded by so much beauty. But even with the beauty, there is so much poverty.

We were driving to the bank today and in town there are families who line up tents on the side of the road underneath the trees and they live there. Their tents are a piece of cloth or dried leaves held up by either mud or four sticks in each corner. Most of them have gardens and they sell their goods right there where they sleep. I don't think after three months that I will even be use to this sight. I am blessed. We are all greatly blessed!

So today was my third day at the school and I am not going to sugar coat it, it was horrible for the most part. The children were wired up and fighting/not listening to anything we were telling them. One little girl who is four has an older sister who is on vacation from school this week so she is at the school in out classroom. She was mocking every command we would give and deliberately do the opposite of everything we said. She would also instigate fights. By 10 AM I was so frustrated and just wanted to quit for the day (after two hours).

But during "tea time," I was able to have time to check out the class binder. In this binder is a photo of each of my children and their backgrounds. When I have more time to write on here I will tell you about some of our children, but today I will tell you about Samwely, or Sam. Samwely is the child in the class that smiles the brightest and hugest smiles you could ever imagine. It is beyond beautiful, even with the rotting teeth. Everyone of my kids have rotting teeth. Anyway, I had noticed the last two days that he didn't seem to always follow commands even though he was such a good helper at other times and that he was always clapping and giving me a thumbs up sign when he did something right to receive praise and recognition for his act.

We didn't really receive any background or learning accomplishments of our children so went into the classrooms rather blindly. All of the kids are special needs and they do not understand Swahili most of the time, let alone try to teach them English. So I just assumed Samwely was not understanding me or listening to me when I would give him a command in Swahili. I learned today from the binder that Samwely is deaf. He wasn't ignoring the rules, he just couldn't hear me. So after "tea time" I grabbed a puzzle with the ABC's and some flashcards of numbers and I took him one on one to see how much he had previously been taught or picked up. He is so bright! As soon as I pointed to the "A" and made the sign for it he went directly on to B and then C and then D. The rest of them he could not do without me showing him but once I did his fingers automatically made the shape so I know he is at least a little bit familiar with them. We worked on spelling SAM and made him a sign for his name. We worked on basic commands and also numbers. After the hellish morning I had, this was so uplifting and I finally felt like I was accomplishing something.

For lunch we had the norm, rice, beans and veggies. But yesterday.... we had meat which we were so excited about because it is rare to have here. I ate all of it except for one piece that had a lot of bones in it. After eating we asked her if it was beef and Mama Mary said, "No, goat." BARF. Now, I like goat, I have had it before and it was good. But the thought of me knawing meat off of a goat bone really grossed me out and my stomach was upset for the rest of the day. YUMM.

Tomorrow we are waking up at 9AM to leave for a four day safari! We are going through the organization so it is so incredibly cheap. Well I have to run to a meeting about the trip so I will hopefully have lots of pictures and stories to report back soon!! <3

St. Dymphina Special Needs School

First of all, I am finding this so incredibly hard to write because I cannot figure out how to express the feelings I am having and the impact of my surroundings. I will try to do my best, but I will still not be satisfied in the end. 

This morning I met with Aliza, the house manager, and she showed me how to get to my placement, St. Dymphina Special Needs School. We left the volunteer house and walked to the Oil Com (what is supposed to serve as a gas station). This is about a 5 minute walk if you are walking fast and it is where we can meet the dala dala if we need it. So we hopped onto a dala dala, the ride was pretty short so it only cost 200 shillings (about 12 cents). From there we walked about a mile uphill to the school. Not only uphill, but the roads here are dirt with gravel and huge jagged rocks jutting out everywhere. I have never been more thankful of the solid/flat/paved roads that we have in the US. The walk did wonders for the cramping that was already in my legs from Saturday’s waterfall hike.

I wish that photos and words could begin to describe St. Dymphina Special Needs School. I fell in love as soon as I walked into the school, but I was also very quickly overwhelmed. I didn’t bring anything with me today because I wasn’t sure if there would be a safe place to store it, but soon I will take my camera to take some photos of the building and the kids, and possibly a video. 

The building is concrete and everywhere you look there is a part of the structure unfinished. The floors are pure dirt and there is dust everywhere. The playground consists of two swing sets, both of them metal and rusty, one of them is so rusty that the metal has eaten through it and it is no longer safe to swing on. There are four classrooms. One for the little bitty kids, one for the middle kids, one for the autistic kids and then the professional classroom that is the older kids. The classrooms are all painted with murals, the ABS’c and numbers, so they are relatively nice. 

First thing in the morning they line up and we sing Tanzania’s national anthem. Well, they do, I do not know it and may not ever know it considering it is in Swahili. Next we all sing a song in English that has them practice their social skills by interacting with each other and us. The words are pretty funny and maybe once I learn it better I can write it on here. After this they had a bathroom break. The bathrooms the children use are squaters and they do not use toilet paper. I kind of expected this but it is still bazaar. 

After this they break up into their classrooms. For about 45 minutes Mama Mary, who is the owner of the school and a certified special needs teacher, gave us an orientation and tour. She told us the history of the school and how she started the school in her home with one classroom. The school is not funded in any way by the government so all advancements are made by donations. Mama Mary is very passionate about working with special needs children and told us how people always ask her why she is spending her life making no profit off of all her hard work and she tells them, “If I can help a child in need, I will be blessed in the eyes of God.” She told us there were two special needs teachers that we certified in Tanzania, her and one other woman in Dar. When we asked she also told us that 92% of special needs children in Tanzania are not in any type of school. And that if they are in a regular government school with no special needs program, the school will not transfer them to a better placement after realizing their needs, because they are receiving money for that child and do not want to go without it. So the children will get passed from one grade to the next and will graduate not knowing how to read or write. 

Their are two speech therapists volunteering the same time as I am so I chose to be with the littles children so that they could use their skills with the older children that are closer to learning English. My children, as far as I know, are from ages 3-7. Usually in pre-school, Tanzanian children are learning English very well and understand the concept of counting and letters. But in a special needs school, they have a hard enough time learning their Swahili, so none of my children speak hardly any English. Most of them can barely color with crayons. But there are a few I have seen that are pretty bright. 

I have a few children with down syndrome in my class, a little boy with dwarfism, and the rest I am unsure of right now. Once I learn the background stories of the children I will be sure to let you know! They all have hard backgrounds and life’s because a disability in Africa is not understood by the people, even the parents most times. All the toys they have are old, broken and dirty. They play mainly with blocks on a straw rug on the floor, this helps with their dexterity, etc. We played for about an hour and then it was “tea time” for us and “porridge time” for them. I have never liked hot tea, but it is rude to not accept so I choked down a FULL cup of lemongrass tea. Although, I did politely refuse a second cup. After tea I went back to the little kids classroom and the teacher had them all sitting at a table coloring, some of them will not color and those that do scribble. She also uses the dot method to try to teach them to trace numbers and letters. There is one child out of the six than can do this. 

The teachers at the school have no certification but have a little bit of training from Mama Mary. I didn’t quite know what to do during this time because the children do not speak English and the young girl who is the teacher does not either. So I just walked around praising the kids and clapping for them. 

For lunch the children all gather and we go back into Mama Mary’s house for our lunch with her. I am not sure what the children ate today but we had a surprisingly good meal. We had white rice, beans, a pea and carrot dish with a ginger sauce and a green bean and carrot dish that was so very good. I am surprised I enjoyed it so much because I have been in a rut the last few days because I have been needing something so familiar and have been craving Western food. Yesterday I felt that if I ate rice and beans one more time I would go crazy. We ate it and I did not go crazy, my craving just got worse. So when I saw the rice, beans and veggies today for lunch I was not so excited, but it was good! Needless to say I think tomorrow night we are going to go out for dinner at McMoody’s. It is a Tanzanian restaurant that serves Western food. Hamburgers, pizza, chicken strips. I cannot wait...!!!!! Mama Mary kept telling us to eat more and more and more and I ate until I was stuffed. Tomorrow I would like to see what the children eat. I am assuming they eat rice and beans. They have to eat soft foods because most of them have poor facial/mouth muscles from their disabilities and lack of talking. 

After lunch the professional class works on bead making. I talked about in an earlier post how they are teaching the older children to make goods so that they will be able to support themselves when they get released from the school. They have a small store where they sell their products. The rest of the children do different things after lunch every day and today’s activity was they sat on a straw rug under a tree and listened, or tried to listen to a book being read. I got to spend some good cuddling time during the story. Sammy, the little boy with dwarfism loves to hold hands, and Lucina (down syndrome) loves to sit in my lap. 

For now on the school bus (a metal jeep with way too few seats) will pick me up from the Oil Com stop and also drop me off there after school. Today I got to ride the bus back and those rough rocky roads are even worse under a dala dala. I have hear horror stories from other volunteers of these dala’s tipping over because of the terrain. The ride was so bumpy that my body came off of the seat multiple times. I do not know how their tires do not pop and their tires rims do not bend. Or maybe they are, and they still drive on them. 

Sammy also has horrible rales when he breathes, so bad that you can hear them sitting across the room. Mama Mary said that she isn’t sure how long this has been going on but that if he needs to, they will try and take him to the hospital. I will take my stethoscope tomorrow and try to see what I can hear, hopefully it is just a cough and will go away. All of the kids have runny noses and drool, and for someone who is not a germ freak.. I have used a LOT of hand sanitizer today. 

Something I have noticed a lot already is that in Africa, nurses are basically doctors. Mama Mary knows that I just finished nursing school and is already asking my opinion about Sammy. She also called me over during outside play time to tell me about a boy who they say has “chiggers” which they pronounce “jiggers” and they say he itches all over his body. Tomorrow they want to undress him so I can take a look at his skin and see what I think. In my mind, it is probably not chiggers... possibly scabies? I guess I will take a picture and see if I can figure something out. But really he needs to just be seen by a doctor. I tried to explain to her that I am not a doctor or even a practicing nurse.. but they just do not see it that way here. I feel a lot of pressure and have a feeling I will keep being asked to take a look at different children. I wish I had more experience. 

Something very cool is that tonight I did take some stitches out of a fellow volunteers foot. Pretty neat. 

For dinner we had “Chips Miaye” and “Chips kuku.” Chips are french fries and Miaye is eggs. So “Chips Miaye” is an omelette type egg with french fries cooked into it. Pretty strange but not too bad if you eat it with hot sauce. “Chips kuku” is fries with chicken. We have had this twice in the three days I have been here. It is definitely a nice change from rice and beans though. I just realized today that the chicken, after cooked, still has hairs on it. But I still ate it, this is how desperate for familiarity I am! 

Karibu Napuru Water Fall

Yesterday we woke up at 6 AM to travel to Karibu Napuru Water Fall. We walked about 15-20 minutes to the Sakina Market and were planning on picking up some food there to take with us for lunch but it was closed. About 22 of us went and we had four “tour guides” but really they were friends of Marks. When we were all at the market the guys flagged down a dala dala and we got one all to ourselves. Which is good because there were all together 26 of us. I think at least four to five people were sitting on laps and two were inside of the dala but hanging outside of the window. We rode this way for about twenty minutes. Even though I am not a claustrophobic person.. dala dalas are so packed that I can’t help but have anxiety. Especially with the insane driving. 

The hike was around 7 km total, mostly uphill and I am not sure how I made it out alive. I was usually in the back of the pack with some other girls and one of our guides, James. It was nice to take the journey slower, for one I wasn’t completely out of breath and dying, and two, we were able to stop and take pictures whenever we wanted and not feel like people were waiting on us. To get there we had to walk through Massai villages and the further you go the less Swahili and more “Massai” language they speak. As we walked through one village there were at least 20 children trailing behind us. When we stopped to take a break they sat down on the hill beside us and waited. When we started walking again, so did they. Almost all of the little boys have machetes, some as young as four years old. When they jump around you off of a raised hill by the pathway you can’t help but worry they will chop off one of your arms or legs by accident.  It takes some getting use to. 

I would say it was about a km or more before we got to the sign for the Water Fall entrance. To get there it was 2.5 km and to get back to the sign it was 2.5 km. It is by far the most strenuous thing I have ever done in my life and probably ever will. The way there was all uphill walking on rocks, large stones and loose gravel. When we finally got to the downslope part of the hike we took a break at a small Massai house. We weren’t sitting there for long when a line of children linked by hands were being led through this mountainous area blindfolded by two men. They were all chanting/singing. The guy in front had a whip and the guy in the back had a tree limb. Every once in a while the children would scream and they would get threatened or the guy with the tree limb would place it a kids face and tell then “Duck duck!” so they would think they were about to hit a tree. Before we knew what this was, we were very worried about the kids. But Kiko and James explained to us that the kids were being taught a lesson for trespassing on a shortcut without paying the owner. They said this is a common thing they do to teach them their lesson and that no one will actually get hurt. I felt better once I saw our guides and also the two men leading the children, laughing.

The slide down the mountain was so very treacherous and it had been raining all morning so the dirt steps (that couldn’t possibly be considered steps) that were leading us down were wet and muddy and incredibly slippery. Being myself, I did not assume I would be doing any sort of hiking, and I don’t even own hiking shoes.. so I only brought mu worn down Pumas with absolutely no tread on the bottoms. After I fell once and wiped out going down these steep muddy steps, James moved in front of me and held my hand the whole way down showing me the best places to step. Even with his help I still managed to fall twice more. It was a terrifying experience. Once we finally got to the bottom (this took at least 20-25 minutes) I was sooo very glad for my life. With every step I took down my feet were slipping. We sat and took a break by a stream for a bit and looked for monkeys and saw a few! I tried to take a video of it and I am not sure if it worked out well or even if I got the monkey in the shot. 

You can see the monkey's head sticking out by the banana tree! Kind of!

From here we walked through a stream to the waterfall and this waterfall was HUGE. I heard it was around 200 ft tall or more. By the time we got the the fall we had quite a group that was following us. Some boys who looked in their teens and lots of little boys, of course with their machetes. Way too soon we started back. I would rather have paid a helicopter to come drag me out of the waterfall then to go up those horrid muddy steps. 

We sat down by the stream again before we headed up the steps. I had a pack of Tanzanian coconut flavored cookies with me and opened them up. One of our guides little brothers went with us on this trek and his name was Frank. I am in LOVE with Frank, he is 11 years old I think they said? He was sitting by me as I was eating my cookies and we shared. Someone asked him who is favorite singer was and in the cutest accent ever he said “Justing Bieber.” I started freaking out! I told him that I loved Justin Bieber too and pointed to Frank and announced that he was my friend. Franks eyes got so big and he says. “You are Justin Bieber’s friend?!” In complete awe. I started laughing and told him no, unfortunately I do not know Justin Bieber, and that he, Frank, was my friend. His brother Kiko had Justing Bieber’s “Baby” on his phone and I think we heard it about 6 times throughout the day. No complaining from me! 

I figured I would have more tread using my bare feet so I went up barefoot with James’ help again.  After we got up the steps, it was all down hill from there but it was decently steep with lots of loose gravel and we were slipping all over. My legs had surpassed jello and turned into complete stiffness and I could barely bend my knees to walk down. 

We finally got back to the town and sat down outside to wait on our dala dala. James and Kiko bought avocados from a little stand that a young girl and her two little bitty siblings were working and we passed some around. I got slightly depressed when I saw children pulling around water bottles that they had made into toy cars tied to a string and they were pulling them around. Some kids were playing by kicking an empty water bottle around on the ground. 

We finally caught our dala dala and squished in. Kiko and James invited us to a birthday party they were having that night for a brother but by the time we got home and showered we were way too tired to go. I am so sore I cannot go up and down steps with grabbing my pant leg and helping pull my leg up. It is a problem! But James offered to take me to see his university in Arusha where he is studying Forestry in August. I think that would be so interesting. Today, us girls plan to relax... go to the internet cafe, possibly change over some money and look for a converter. I would also like to get a cd that I can burn some of the Justin Bieber songs I have on my computer to give to Frank, but I looked and when I switched over my songs to my new computer I didn’t switch all of them, so I only have 6. I think it would still be worth it though. 

July 1, 2011

I have only been in Tanzania now for three days and it feels like so much longer. It is probably due to our three day journey to get here, but I am finally settled in the volunteer house! 

Yesterday morning we woke up at 3:30 AM and got ready to leave our hotel in Dar to come to Arusha. I took the LAST hot shower that I will most likely have in the next three months. It wasn’t even a good hot shower. Africa unfortunately does not get to know what water pressure actually feels like. So we packed up all of our luggage and headed out in the city of Dar at 5 AM when it was still pitch dark. This was slightly intimidating but the city was mostly still sleeping so there were very few people out. In Tanzania there is “Mzungu time” which means “White people time” and “Tanzanian Time” which means NO time. No one wears a watch or has clocks. People can be hours late for something and not even realize it. When meeting someone, you rarely give a specific time and if you do, they most likely will not show up at that time. Maybe I should have been born Tanzanian? This would fit in well with me! When you are trying to take transportation it is not as fun. Our bus was about 45 minutes late to leave so we didn’t head off until around 6 AM. But it was so nice because while we were standing there waiting on the bus in the complete darkness with hardly anyone around us, the call to prayer started sounding chanting somewhere off in the middle of the city but it could be heard from miles away. It was so beautiful to hear. Before we left our small bus stop, we stopped at the HUGE bus stop in Dar. Not exaggerating, there were at least 60 buses there waiting to leave town. Complete chaos. Drivers will hit you in this country and have no problem with it. They honk their horns incessantly. So these 60 huge buses were trying to line up in two rows in one parking lot with around 1000 people or more milling about looking for their bus. By the time everyone got on the bus it was about an hour later.

The bus ride was supposed to be eight hours long but ended up being twelve. We stopped a total of 3 times, with the last being an unexpected one. The first stop was a “bathroom break” but when we stepped off the bus we realized there was no building. The men lined up along the road facing the trees and the women walked in different directions out into the trees. We decided that we didn’t have to go all that badly after all. During the ride they gave us a free drink (mine a coke.. obviously) and Glucose crackers, which pretty much tasted like animal crackers. After five hours of driving we finally stopped at an outdoor market/barbecue, WITH a building labeled “toilet.” By this time I was about to pee my pants. So funny story... all they had were “squatters,” holes in the floor that are like toilets and that flush, only not. I took off my sun glasses, hung them on my shirt and proceeded to squat. As I was standing up my $40 sunglasses (in slow motion) fell off of my shirt and into the hole of the squatter. There was no rescuing them. Even though I am upset about the long gone aviators.. it is still a pretty funny story of my first ever squatting experience.

Next, our bus broke down. So we stood on the side of the road by a house for around an hour. Thankfully they were able to fix it! We arrived in Arusha around 5:30 PM and by the time we got to the house it was packed! Every Thursday night is Social Night and all the volunteers (even the ones at the homestays) meet at the house and they make us a VERY large meal. Lots of fruit, beans, rice, lots of vegetables, and two or three different types of meat. It was slightly overwhelming coming into the house with no sleep and meeting 50 plus people. Not going to lie, when I laid down to go to sleep, I was slightly homesick and I never get homesick. Before I went to bed I took my first of many, many, MANY freezing cold showers. You would think that in Africa where it is hot that this could be nice... it is NOT. The shower is in a room with a toilet and sink, no mirror and no shower curtain. In addition to the cold water there is one trickle of water that runs down from the shower head. Which makes it almost impossible to get washed off and rinse the shampoo out of your hair. Since there is no shower curtain, the bathroom floor is always soaked and always tainted black from the layers of dirt that run off of your body. Bathroom= disgusting. 

*I will put up pictures of the volunteer house soon! I forgot to take them*

This morning we woke up and had orientation, ate lunch, had a short Swahili lesson and then went on a 4-5 hour walking tour of the city/town. In town there is what are called “Dala dalas,” they had the same transportation system in Haiti, but they are vans that are 100-800 shillings one way to ride which is SO incredibly cheap, around 10-60 cents. People cram onto these buses like nothing you have ever seen. There are 14 seats yet sometimes 30+ people cram into one dala dala. There is no such thing as personal space in Tanzania. People are sitting on laps of strangers and some hang out of windows. INSANE. This makes getting off of the dala dala at your stop very hard to do. A girl here was telling us that last week she was on one and they wouldn’t let her off at her stop so she had to take it until the next person got off and walk back about 10 minutes. I am very nervous about these buses. They are color coded and all I know is that the yellow ones take me home. Or near home. From the closest bus stop it is ten minute walk to the volunteer house. 

There were 24 of us in here at this point. This picture does not do justice of how crowded it was! We were on laps!

It was so funny because in our dala dala they play music and as we were all crammed into this dala dala driving through Arusha... thousands of miles away, they played Justin Bieber! Not joking! We made many stops in town. We went to the ATM to take out money and at most ATM’s there are guards with big guns that guard them. People needed to get phones so we stopped at a Vodacom. They have a ShopRite in town and I bought a 1.5 L water bottle for about 50 cents. 

Dinner was a little rough for me. It was the same as lunch pretty much and consisted of plain noodles, beans and vegetables. With all this walking and eating plain food I could possibly be in better shape when I get home! Or not.. we shall see. 

June 29, 2011- Dar Es Salaam

       After 25 hours of travel time, we are now in Dar! As the plane was starting to land I was so incredibly nervous. I was worried the airport would be chaotic and that due to language barriers, we would have a hard time going through immigration and getting our visas. I was also worried about finding somewhere to exchange currency and finding a taxi driver who would not charge us an insane amount for being “white.” Oh yeah, and if our luggage would end up in the right place at the right time.

Sleeping in the London Heathrow airport while still guarding our bags. Very little sleep, very uncomfortable.

I am so happy to say that EVERYTHING went so smoothly! Thinking back, it seems like I had nothing to worry about. But of course not worrying at all could be considered reckless. When our plane landed we walked down onto the runway by the use of stairs that they attached to the plane doors. I was definitely surprised to see palm trees everywhere. We walked into the airport, waited in line for our visas, and then found our luggage. Next we walked outside and easy as can be, there was a currency exchange right there. As soon as we were at the counter, a taxi driver came up and asked us if we needed a ride somewhere. How much easier could it be?! Although, I must say... Amanda and I may not be the best at haggling for the best price. I am way too timid to haggle. 

The distance from the airport to our hotel was around 11km and it took us over an hour to get there. Traffic is insane in Dar! Anytime there would be a stop in traffic, our taxi driver would turn off his engine and then restart it once cars started to move again. I thought back to drivers ed that unless you were going to be stopped for X amount of time..not to turn off your engine because starting it again would use up more gas. Obviously he was trying to conserve gas, but after turning on and off his engine at least 20 times, I am not sure he did. He was very nice and gave us a crash course in Swahili, he also told us that it is much easier to understand English when Europeans are speaking it than when Americans are. Driving through Dar you see people everywhere. There are so many people sitting or standing by the side of the streets. People walk in and out of the traffic like it is nothing and drivers will hit you if you are in their way. Case in point, our driver almost ran over a lady on a narrow street and didn’t even slow down. She ended up sliding by with just her arm being knocked. Driving is done on the left side of the road and is insane. With my all of the time “passengers anxiety”... I made it without having an anxiety attack but did let out a few gasps. What can I say? I am a sissy. 

We saw a picture of our hotel online previously and when we finally arrived today... it was NOT the same hotel. Our hotel is the Econo Lodge and is smashed into a large concrete building that connects to many other buildings. To get there you take a small side street off of the main street, all very busy. And then all of a sudden there is a door opening with the “Econo Lodge” written on the wall. Once we walked in and saw other tourist and that the inside of the building was quite nice, I felt much more at ease. We arrived to our hotel around 9:30 AM and check in time for hotels around here is not until 2 PM. Luckily they were able to get a room cleaned for us and we were shown to our room by 10 AM. 

This is the view from our hotel balcony in Dar

   Once we had showered and settled in, we gave in to the major jet lag we were feeling and tried to get some rest. Our room was pretty hot, considering we are in Africa and just have a ceiling fan. Thank God for the fan! So we opened up the balcony door and windows and slept for about two hours. Then we got ready to meet up with Sarah who works for IVHQ and lives in Dar. She offered to meet us at the hotel and to show us around. She has lived in Dar for three years but is actually about to head back to the states for more schooling. Since she is leaving, she is currently training a guy named Mark to take over her position.

We left the hotel and started the afternoon by stopping by a currency exchange bureau. Here I traded in more American dollars for shillings. Tanzanian shillings reminds me so much of Monopoly money, so that when I spend it, it is fun and I forget that it is actual money! 

This is the largest bill in Tanzania, it is worth about $6.50, many places cannot break this high of a bill

This is my favorite!!

For drinking you have to buy bottled water and for 1 Liter of water at our hotel it costs 500 shillings (Tsh) which is about 35 cents! I have now started to think of all payments in how many waters it would be. BEST NEW EVER.. you can also buy a large glass bottle of Coke for 500 shillings as well! I had one today... on my first day in Africa. And it was the BEST Coke I have ever had. I hope to have many many more for only 35 cents!

Next we went to a phone company and bought new cell phones. The company is named Vodafone and is extremely cheap compared to the international Verizon rates they were trying to get me to pay. For international calling, Verizon charges $4.99 a minute and 50 cents a text message. With my new phone it is less than a dollar for minute and sending a text message is 100 shillings... so less than 10 cents. The Vodaphone cost 29,000 shillings which is around $18 or 58 bottles of water. Everything is extremely cheap here. SECOND BEST NEW OF THE DAY.. My phone is free for me when I accept incoming calls and text messages!!!!! And I am pretty sure Verizon has free outgoing international calling. Maybe? Meaning you all can call me!! And text me!!!! So exciting for me. This will hopefully give me a small piece of home throughout my days here! My number is 011255766303878. But just remember that I am eight hours ahead of Illinois. So since it is 9:04 PM here right now, it is 1:04 PM at home. But it is very very good news!

The four of us ended the night walking to an outside Indian restaurant called Badminton International. We ordered about four starters and four meals and shared everything. It was all so amazing. I could eat that food like that everyday. Can’t say I have ever actually had REAL Indian food. With all the food we had, we couldn’t even finish it and it only cost us around $6 a piece. Amazing. 

Tomorrow morning we will wake up around 4 AM to get our bags ready and head over to meet the bus. Best news of the week is that Mark has to go to Arusha tomorrow as well so we will all be traveling together. It is so nice to have someone who knows the area and that is not a female. Makes me feel safer in a way. 

Overall... I am in Africa. I am safe. I am happy. And I am tired. Goodnight! <3

And so it begins!!!

No matter how much I try to let it sink in... I still cannot believe that today is the day I start my journey to Tanzania! I don't think it will actually hit me until we land on African soil.

We will be leaving Amanda's house today at 5:30 P.M. to drive to O'Hare airport. Our flights are through British Airways and the first one tonight leaves at 9:45 P.M. and we are expected to land in London after eight hours of flight. We then have an eight hour layover in London. Our next flight leaves at 7:20 P.M. London time and we will arrive in Dar Es Salaam after ten hours of flight! After flying for two nights in a row, we may be slightly jet lagged at this point!!

Once we get off the plane in Dar we have to immediately get out visas, this will cost $100. At this point, hopefully there will be a currency exchange open at the airport and we will be able to cash in some American dollars for some Tanzanian shillings. We will need shillings to get a taxi from the airport to our hotel, the Econo Lodge. We will also pay for our hotel room in Tanzanian shillings. For an idea of the exchange rate... one Tanzanian shilling is 0.0006 American dollars and one American dollar is around 1600 shillings. 

We will arrive in Dar around 7 AM and unless there is an opening already in the hotel, we will have to hang around until 2 PM to be able to check into our hotel. At 3 PM we are meeting a girl named Sarah who works for International Volunteer Headquarters but who is placed in Dar. She offered to show us around, help us get converters, cell phones, bus passes, etc. and then we will be going to dinner. Our first Tanzanian food in the country! 

So we will leave today (Monday), arrive in Dar two days later on Wednesday. Stay Wednesday night and then wake up early on Thursday to catch our 6AM bus ride to Arusha. This lasts around 8-10 hours.  We travel almost all the way across the country and we hear it is very scenic and that all the roads on the way are paved. Once we arrive in Arusha we will call the program and they will send someone to come pick us up. After that we will be taken to the volunteer house and then on Friday we will start orientation. 

My first four-six weeks will be spent at St. Dymphna Special Needs School. And I have found two really good sites that have given me a preview for what is in store! The first is a blog that is written by some women who have been apart of the growth of the school. 

http://brickbybrickonline.blogspot.com

Here are a few photos of the school as well...

Here is another really AMAZING site. It is a video blog of some girls who went through IVHQ to Tanzania, which is our same program. Episode 9 shows my placement at St. Dymphna and you get to meet some of the children. There is also an episode featuring Cradle of Love, which is the orphanage some of my classmates and I chose to support this past semester through our Legacy Project. We just sent over the check to them for the construction of a new "sick bay" for the children. Our total amount raised was $1,731!! So thank you to everyone who made this possible by giving donations and buying t-shirts!!! 

http://nbtvtoday.com/nbtv-abroad/43-days-in-africa

From August til I leave in October I will be at Ngarenaro Health Centre. It is located in the city center of Arusha and is a very busy maternity clinic. Women from Arusha and far surrounding areas travel to the clinic to give birth. The clinic delivers about 20 babies a day! Here is a picture of the clinic...

So... there it is. My life for the next three months summed up! So in 8 LONG hours I will be sitting on a plane with Amanda about to begin an adventure of a lifetime. I want to say thank you so very much to everyone who had donated towards my trip. I would not be able to do this without you... I have been thinking a lot in the last few days about how I felt in Haiti and a lot of emotions are coming back which I feel will help to prepare me for what I am about to encounter. I am ready to be tested and in the end to be blessed beyond measures. It is a life changing experience and in every hug I receive, every smile I see, every little kid laughter I hear, and in every life I am able to be apart of... I will thank God for the amazing support that lead me to this place in my life. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I love you all more than you can imagine. 

Here we go... In three short days of travel I will be 8,615 miles away from home. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to be changed and to play a small part in the change in others. God Bless. <3

Blessed

So I sent out my official donation letters about a week ago and I do not know what to say other than that I have the most amazing support group in the world. Thank you all so very much. I have been getting so many great words of encouragement at a time when I really need them.

My trip is getting so close!! I have been getting a variety of different reactions when people find out my plans for the summer. But it is hardest when people bring up my safety and what all could go wrong in a trip like this... it brings out fears I have of my own. I try not to worry... because what's going to happen is going to happen and God knows every step I will take. I would never give up this trip for anything. The more researching I do and the more people I talk to who have been... gets me more and more excited. I feel like a kid who is waiting on Christmas but Christmas is still a little over two months away! But I know time will fly by! It feels like just yesterday that I was googling different volunteer organizations and made up my mind to go and that was in August. Back then it didn't seem read! But, as the days get closer and I find out what family I will be living with, what order my placements will be in, what I need to bring, etc, it will become even more real. Below is one of the videos I have found of someone else's experience with IVHQ who travelled to Arusha. It shows a couple different schools and orphanages. You also get a view of the town and what life is like there. Hard to fathom.

A video done by a volunteer who worked in Arusha, Tanzania with IVHQ

On a different note... one of the orphanages I could have volunteered to work at is called Cradle
of Love. It is the only orphanage in the Arusha area that accepts HIV positive infants. As a senior at Lakeview College of Nursing we chose Cradle of Love to support for our Legacy Project. Our goal is to raise $1000 for the orphanage and we are already half way there! I know we can surpass it! The money will go towards adding on a "sick room" to their building. All of the babies sleep together in one large nursery and this way if one of them catches an infection they can be separated to decrease the risk of exposing it to the other babies. Babies with HIV are highly susceptible to becoming sick. We are talking to different businesses, churches, organizations, family and friends, if anyone donates $50 their name will be put on the back of our awareness T-shirts. Our goal is to sell 150 t-shirts. Here is a view of the t-shirts! We are selling them in v-neck womens sizes XS-2XL and also in regular fitted unisex t-shirts (same sizes). If you would like to donate to have your name on the back or to buy a t-shirt for $12 just email me! ablankenship@lakeviewcol.edu. Feel free to check out their website at cradleoflove.com for more information! I will actually get to visit the home and the babies while I am in Arusha. :)



Again I just want to say thank you to everyone. I love you all and would not be able to experience this trip if it weren't for your help!