Wow. Ants. One small ant = weak. Thousands of ants = powerful. I thought i was just being paranoid yesterday morning at about 6am when i got up to use the choo and returned and i put my foot up to the window and saw a couple ants crawling on it. Then i waved my flashlight around the room and saw that thousands of tiny ants were covering nearly every square inch (or centimenter i guess) of cement floor, and had created quite a trail along the perimeter of the wall. I started yelling and did the typical "ahhhheughhhhghghg" and ran outside of my room and just yelled "WADUDU" which means insects right into my sisters' face. I was shaking every inch of my body and literally had "Ants...in my pants." She ran and grabbed a heavenly can of bug spray aka straight up poison (not fda regulated..ahhh breathe it in) which she sprayed all over the floor. I then swept the thousands of ants out of my room after allowing time for them to cease living and then washed all of my clothes. At least it was a Sunday which meant I had no school and really had nothing better to do.
There was no clear source of this en masse ant movement, so I think the only reason was that I had literally just hours before spoken to my parents on the phone while in my room and when they asked about the bugs I said that there were actually more bugs in my place in DC and had a nice little chuckle. The ants must have started organizing their forces at that moment so as not to be shown up by the district of columbia.
I tried to post some pictures but it didn't work again...sooo you'll have to just settle for my cell phone number, which i just purchased. I can send and receive text messages most of the time which is pretty cool. Feel free to send me some love!
+255 (country code) 078 395 1912
Happy new month's eve!
Monday, June 30, 2008
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Ingredients
I'm sure many of you at this point are lying awake at night wondering...HOW in the world does one make Meeshloaf? It is certainly one of those questions that great minds have struggled to figure out for centuries.
Let me put your mind at ease by providing a very simple recipe. Here are some of the ingredients, and as always, please add as much crushed red pepper as you desire.
1 malnourished kitten named Pili Pili (which means hot peppers)
30-162 chickens (kukus)
7-10 children, with at least 3 sisters (dada) and 4 brothers (kaka)
1 large cow (n'gombe)
2 'guard' dogs named Bobby and Peggy (mbwa)... important sidenote: these dogs are cute but are so scrawny they make Lola look like the hulk, i think people just have the dogs to protect from other peoples' scrawny dogs.
Approx. 15-23 buckets in varying colors of red, blue and green (these are useful for bathing, cooking, and washing clothes, although usually not all in the same bucket)
3 charcoal stoves
10 lbs of rice
1 mosquito net
1 Mama
1 Baba
1 Kanga for casual wear (google it)
1 Choo (pronounced Cho) aka hole in the ground toilet.
1 Solar backpack
1 Kiswahili-English dictionary
3 liters of Safari, Serengheti, Tusker, Kilimanjaro, or any of the other awesomely named Tanzanian beers. (kilimanjaro is also the main brand for the huge bottled waters..i wonder if this confusion has lead to any poor decisions on the part of visitors)
The internet here is, much like most of the Peace Corps trainees' digestive systems: fickle. I might be able to read your emails but not respond to them. My last posting was pretty giddy, but it was after my first 2 days of being a student again so I guess you could say I was like a little schoolgirl again. The primary schoolkids here are great at laugh at me and the other trainees a lot when we try to greet them, but the way I handle this is by whipping out the FRISBEE and throwing it to them. (MVP of the packing list so far is hands down the frisbee, so thank you Mr. Benjamin Detofsky for that last minute addition)
Most of these kids look about 5 years younger than they actually are, which has resulted in a FANTASTIC Tanzanian doppleganger of Gary Coleman whose real name is Ali. He's 7 years old but as tall as a 3 year old. (so about as tall as gary coleman) Ali is incredibly athletic, and like most of the kids here, became semi-professional at frisbee in about 10 minutes.
My host family is hilarious. They love to laugh a lot and smile, and so do I, so even if we don't know what the other one is laughing or smiling about, we really don't care--the first night I was there we broke the ice of awkwardness and transcended cultural boundaries when one of my younger brothers who is about 15 asked me to sing a Shakira song. "Meeshie--sing. Shakira!" I feigned shyness and then of course started singing "my hips don't lie" in a Robert Goulet voice about 30 seconds later. Every night since I sing another American song and the 7-10 kids that maybe live there, maybe just hang around sometimes, all sing along. My short wave radio picks up a a lot of stations, and when I help out with the cooking after school I bring it outside and we all sing songs and the best part about them not being able to speak much english is that i can sing in the tune but make up words and everyone is happy.
Special shout out to the ladies of Duberstein Group for my amazing camera...I have taken a few pictures which I tried to post and hopefully show up on here..my host family loves it when I take pictures of them, especially my mama!! She got all excited and then posed next to her pink mosquito net which matched her dress at the time. My Baba works for the District Council Government and my mama runs a Duka, or shop, in town that allows her to sport the latest village fashions. No one in my family really speaks english but this has allowed me to practice the Swahili I'm learning every day a whole lot. I go to Kiswahili class from 8am until 5pm, but we have a daily chai break at 10 and lunch at 2, which breaks up the day pretty nicely. It's pretty exhausting but also a lot of fun exercising the language part of the brain again, and I'm really happy with how the language learning is going. As it did with both German and Czech, singing songs is helping me the most. In fact, myself and the 4 other women in my training group wrote a song in Kiswahili and actually sang it in front of the Local Ward Government council (translate: 6 village leaders in a classroom who deadpanned us until the end of hte song when they smiled and clapped..it was a good test of personal will and yet another experience of looking ridiculous in a foreign country) My favorite part about training is that it is done by Tanzanians and not americans in the Peace Corps. We met the country director and staff when we first arrived, but since then have been in the hands of the tanzanian staff members and now our host families, who feed us so much and will do anything for you (if you can translate it!) Also cool is how 3/4 of the villagers in my village of Manzese-A are Muslim, but there are Christians and Muslims living side by side and really peacefully..no one is really that strict in either case, but people just get along great here and lots of Masai come into the village and use walking sticks, own cows, and have really cool gaged earlobes. Most of the conversations get more complicated than the initial how are you and where are you from, so that is when the song singing comes in handy.
I'll try to get back on here in a week. bye byeeee!!
Let me put your mind at ease by providing a very simple recipe. Here are some of the ingredients, and as always, please add as much crushed red pepper as you desire.
1 malnourished kitten named Pili Pili (which means hot peppers)
30-162 chickens (kukus)
7-10 children, with at least 3 sisters (dada) and 4 brothers (kaka)
1 large cow (n'gombe)
2 'guard' dogs named Bobby and Peggy (mbwa)... important sidenote: these dogs are cute but are so scrawny they make Lola look like the hulk, i think people just have the dogs to protect from other peoples' scrawny dogs.
Approx. 15-23 buckets in varying colors of red, blue and green (these are useful for bathing, cooking, and washing clothes, although usually not all in the same bucket)
3 charcoal stoves
10 lbs of rice
1 mosquito net
1 Mama
1 Baba
1 Kanga for casual wear (google it)
1 Choo (pronounced Cho) aka hole in the ground toilet.
1 Solar backpack
1 Kiswahili-English dictionary
3 liters of Safari, Serengheti, Tusker, Kilimanjaro, or any of the other awesomely named Tanzanian beers. (kilimanjaro is also the main brand for the huge bottled waters..i wonder if this confusion has lead to any poor decisions on the part of visitors)
The internet here is, much like most of the Peace Corps trainees' digestive systems: fickle. I might be able to read your emails but not respond to them. My last posting was pretty giddy, but it was after my first 2 days of being a student again so I guess you could say I was like a little schoolgirl again. The primary schoolkids here are great at laugh at me and the other trainees a lot when we try to greet them, but the way I handle this is by whipping out the FRISBEE and throwing it to them. (MVP of the packing list so far is hands down the frisbee, so thank you Mr. Benjamin Detofsky for that last minute addition)
Most of these kids look about 5 years younger than they actually are, which has resulted in a FANTASTIC Tanzanian doppleganger of Gary Coleman whose real name is Ali. He's 7 years old but as tall as a 3 year old. (so about as tall as gary coleman) Ali is incredibly athletic, and like most of the kids here, became semi-professional at frisbee in about 10 minutes.
My host family is hilarious. They love to laugh a lot and smile, and so do I, so even if we don't know what the other one is laughing or smiling about, we really don't care--the first night I was there we broke the ice of awkwardness and transcended cultural boundaries when one of my younger brothers who is about 15 asked me to sing a Shakira song. "Meeshie--sing. Shakira!" I feigned shyness and then of course started singing "my hips don't lie" in a Robert Goulet voice about 30 seconds later. Every night since I sing another American song and the 7-10 kids that maybe live there, maybe just hang around sometimes, all sing along. My short wave radio picks up a a lot of stations, and when I help out with the cooking after school I bring it outside and we all sing songs and the best part about them not being able to speak much english is that i can sing in the tune but make up words and everyone is happy.
Special shout out to the ladies of Duberstein Group for my amazing camera...I have taken a few pictures which I tried to post and hopefully show up on here..my host family loves it when I take pictures of them, especially my mama!! She got all excited and then posed next to her pink mosquito net which matched her dress at the time. My Baba works for the District Council Government and my mama runs a Duka, or shop, in town that allows her to sport the latest village fashions. No one in my family really speaks english but this has allowed me to practice the Swahili I'm learning every day a whole lot. I go to Kiswahili class from 8am until 5pm, but we have a daily chai break at 10 and lunch at 2, which breaks up the day pretty nicely. It's pretty exhausting but also a lot of fun exercising the language part of the brain again, and I'm really happy with how the language learning is going. As it did with both German and Czech, singing songs is helping me the most. In fact, myself and the 4 other women in my training group wrote a song in Kiswahili and actually sang it in front of the Local Ward Government council (translate: 6 village leaders in a classroom who deadpanned us until the end of hte song when they smiled and clapped..it was a good test of personal will and yet another experience of looking ridiculous in a foreign country) My favorite part about training is that it is done by Tanzanians and not americans in the Peace Corps. We met the country director and staff when we first arrived, but since then have been in the hands of the tanzanian staff members and now our host families, who feed us so much and will do anything for you (if you can translate it!) Also cool is how 3/4 of the villagers in my village of Manzese-A are Muslim, but there are Christians and Muslims living side by side and really peacefully..no one is really that strict in either case, but people just get along great here and lots of Masai come into the village and use walking sticks, own cows, and have really cool gaged earlobes. Most of the conversations get more complicated than the initial how are you and where are you from, so that is when the song singing comes in handy.
I'll try to get back on here in a week. bye byeeee!!
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Mzungu Meeshloaf
Well hello there! I have learned about a dozen new greetings in Swahili, but so far my favorite is "Mambo?!" which is an informal "hey" or "what's up" and then you respond back "Poa" (cool) or "Safi" (clean) or "Freshie" (fresh). Since the internet in Kilosa town is scarce, let me just say that Tanzania has been amazing thus far. It took about a day to get to Dar es Salaam, but it was pretty much a blur and we were welcomed in very warmly by everyone at the Msimbazi Centre Wednesday night in the city. We stayed there for 3 nights and got introduced to the country staff and received our sweet medical kits. (The chew it yourself pepto tablets have already come in handy) At this point I still knew no Swahili and was pretty confused when everyone greets you and says hey Mzungu!! and you have nothing to say back. On Saturday we got on a bus and went a few hours to Morogoro, the 5th biggest city in Tanzania. No high rises or anything, but a gorgeous town settled at the base of a mountain, and we got to do some intensive language classes and then pretty much relaxed and enjoyed the training site at St. Thomas center before we headed off to roughing it for the next 2 years! Monday we left for Kilosa, which is where I am now. I am staying in a village called Manzese and living with Mr. and Mrs. Kapeya Kondo. I really like my family a lot and although they do not speak much English (Baba, or the father, can speak a few words), the many kids that either live there or just hang around ( I can't tell which yet) are great teachers and like looking through my books and showing me things and teaching me new words. The smallest child, Harifa, is only 5 and I gave him a ball to play with yesterday and he loves me now and I can understand some of the things he says since he speaks in simple sentences. The family dynamic is incredible...my sisters definitely do most of the grunt work around the house, but I have helped out with some of the cooking already and have been eating great meals since I got here! Rice and beans are the norm, but there are lots of meat and fish and potatoes in stew form, so there is pretty much something for everyone to eat. There are a bunch of vegetarians in the peace corps group but they seem to be doing well.
Mzungu Meeshloaf. The word Mzungu is great. It's not an insult, but some people get annoyed by it. Picture about 30 kids screaming MZUNGU at me and then running to hug me as I walk home up the mountain. they all smile and say HOW ARE YOUUU? The kids say it to any white person they see, but the word actually means "one who walks in circles" because way back when many Africans thought the same white man was walking in circles through all the villages in the country because they had never seen a foreigner before. I'm running out of internet time here but I''m going to try to write more tomorrow and post some pictures of my family!
love and miss you all!
kwa heri!
meeeeesh
p.s. everyone here calls me MEESHIE and i love it. take care!
Mzungu Meeshloaf. The word Mzungu is great. It's not an insult, but some people get annoyed by it. Picture about 30 kids screaming MZUNGU at me and then running to hug me as I walk home up the mountain. they all smile and say HOW ARE YOUUU? The kids say it to any white person they see, but the word actually means "one who walks in circles" because way back when many Africans thought the same white man was walking in circles through all the villages in the country because they had never seen a foreigner before. I'm running out of internet time here but I''m going to try to write more tomorrow and post some pictures of my family!
love and miss you all!
kwa heri!
meeeeesh
p.s. everyone here calls me MEESHIE and i love it. take care!
Monday, June 9, 2008
Something to satisfy the empty stomach
So I'm not sure how long I'll be able to keep up the meeshloaf/meatloaf metaphors (sorry to ruin the surprise if you didn't pick up on the connection), but I'm hoping I'll have enough up my sleeve to last for the 27 month duration of my time volunteering in Tanzania. Plus, it entertains me to think about how much it might annoy some people after the initial "aww, I miss that Meesh and her wacky sense of humor" phase wears off.
First thing's first. I would like to take the space to acknowledge the well known Olympic Gold Medalist in speed skating, Joey Cheek....not for contributing all of his winnings to needy kids in Darfur, but for utilizing his creativity and knack for useless word combinations to come up with the term MEESHLOAF last summer while dining in the fine kitchen of 1453 Harvard Street...where dreams are made and then squandered due to excessive napping caused by the lack of light. I will miss that place. So yes, in July 2007, the word Meeshloaf was born, and despite all the other profound and remotely relevant titles I could have named my blog, I came back to this and decided it was the most appropriate fit for me...and for you, my avid readers I left behind. Plus, Meatloaf is just plain delicious, and also the singer of "Paradise By the Dashboard Light", a Santoro family favorite.
Cutting to the chase...it is 1:48am and in typical me fashion I am getting this blog up literally less than 5 hours before I need to check out of the hotel and begin the trek to Tanzania. For those of you who don't know or have short term memory loss, I am leaving the country to serve as a Health Education Peace Corps Volunteer in Tanzania for over two years. I don't really have the time at this moment to give you the textbook definition of what I'll be doing, but I promise to keep you updated as I'm doing it as frequently as possible.
Here's what I know:
1. I am currently sitting in a Holiday Inn lobby in Washington, DC where for the past two days I have gone to pre-departure training, which rekindled my love of ice breakers and impromptu group skits.
2. I have to check out at 5:30am and go to a government clinic to get some immunizations and start taking anti-malaria pills. The first thing that comes to mind when someone tells me they're shipping me off to a government clinic is pretty much a hatch scene from LOST, circa Claire's abduction by The Others in Season 2.
3. I fly out of Dulles at 3:30pm. We land in Frankfurt Wednesday morning deutsch time, then head to Zurich. From Zurich, we fly to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and arrive around 8pm.
4. My mailing address from June 11 until August 20 will be:
My name
P.O. Box 9123
Dar es Salaam
Tanzania
....aaaaand apparently it might actually get there. we will see what happens, but please be adventurous and try because I would love to receive actual written mail and do not want to have to write myself fake letters so that the other campers think I'm cool. (read: Danica from Wonder Years' character in the 1990 made for TV movie, Camp Cucamonga) http://www.netflix.com/Movie/Camp_Cucamonga/60035492
5. I will most likely not be able to get in touch for at least a week once I land, but i WILL be purchasing a cell phone so I'll be sure to put that number up once I have it. And you will have to call me, since it would most likely cost a small fortune for me to make an international call.
6. Once I land, myself and the 48 other people in my training class (we are all either health or environment trainees) head out to about 300Km outside of the big city of Dar es Salaam (henceforth shall be known as just Dar), to a district called Morogoro. We will stay at a hotel for 2 nights and get more shots and initial survival language training, until we go to the small town of Kilosa nearby and move in with our Host Families and new homes where we will be living for 10 weeks during Pre-Service Training (PST...does not mean pacific standard time, but that would be cool) So I will be living in Kilosa until August 20, at which point I will hopefully be sworn in as a volunteer and then assigned to the site where I will call home for 2 years.
7. I'm going to learn Swahili. Or Kiswahili. Or at least find out when I should say the Ki and when I can leave it out.
As you probably guessed, I'm feeling extremely excited but the slaphappiness is starting to simmer down as I realize my wake up call is for 4:40am, and it is now 2:15. I can't thank you all enough for the wonderful goodbyes and send-off parties. I appreciate all of your encouragement, advice, words of caution, and just plain old love that was heavily present along the east coast this past month. I'm really lucky to have friends and family that would put their livers and hearts through so much distress, just for the sake of a long farewell. It was truly inspiring.
The next serving of Meeshloaf (ha ha) might not be for a while, so grab a snack, check often and tell others, because at the dinner table of the world wide web, there's always an extra plate.
First thing's first. I would like to take the space to acknowledge the well known Olympic Gold Medalist in speed skating, Joey Cheek....not for contributing all of his winnings to needy kids in Darfur, but for utilizing his creativity and knack for useless word combinations to come up with the term MEESHLOAF last summer while dining in the fine kitchen of 1453 Harvard Street...where dreams are made and then squandered due to excessive napping caused by the lack of light. I will miss that place. So yes, in July 2007, the word Meeshloaf was born, and despite all the other profound and remotely relevant titles I could have named my blog, I came back to this and decided it was the most appropriate fit for me...and for you, my avid readers I left behind. Plus, Meatloaf is just plain delicious, and also the singer of "Paradise By the Dashboard Light", a Santoro family favorite.
Cutting to the chase...it is 1:48am and in typical me fashion I am getting this blog up literally less than 5 hours before I need to check out of the hotel and begin the trek to Tanzania. For those of you who don't know or have short term memory loss, I am leaving the country to serve as a Health Education Peace Corps Volunteer in Tanzania for over two years. I don't really have the time at this moment to give you the textbook definition of what I'll be doing, but I promise to keep you updated as I'm doing it as frequently as possible.
Here's what I know:
1. I am currently sitting in a Holiday Inn lobby in Washington, DC where for the past two days I have gone to pre-departure training, which rekindled my love of ice breakers and impromptu group skits.
2. I have to check out at 5:30am and go to a government clinic to get some immunizations and start taking anti-malaria pills. The first thing that comes to mind when someone tells me they're shipping me off to a government clinic is pretty much a hatch scene from LOST, circa Claire's abduction by The Others in Season 2.
3. I fly out of Dulles at 3:30pm. We land in Frankfurt Wednesday morning deutsch time, then head to Zurich. From Zurich, we fly to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and arrive around 8pm.
4. My mailing address from June 11 until August 20 will be:
My name
P.O. Box 9123
Dar es Salaam
Tanzania
....aaaaand apparently it might actually get there. we will see what happens, but please be adventurous and try because I would love to receive actual written mail and do not want to have to write myself fake letters so that the other campers think I'm cool. (read: Danica from Wonder Years' character in the 1990 made for TV movie, Camp Cucamonga) http://www.netflix.com/Movie/Camp_Cucamonga/60035492
5. I will most likely not be able to get in touch for at least a week once I land, but i WILL be purchasing a cell phone so I'll be sure to put that number up once I have it. And you will have to call me, since it would most likely cost a small fortune for me to make an international call.
6. Once I land, myself and the 48 other people in my training class (we are all either health or environment trainees) head out to about 300Km outside of the big city of Dar es Salaam (henceforth shall be known as just Dar), to a district called Morogoro. We will stay at a hotel for 2 nights and get more shots and initial survival language training, until we go to the small town of Kilosa nearby and move in with our Host Families and new homes where we will be living for 10 weeks during Pre-Service Training (PST...does not mean pacific standard time, but that would be cool) So I will be living in Kilosa until August 20, at which point I will hopefully be sworn in as a volunteer and then assigned to the site where I will call home for 2 years.
7. I'm going to learn Swahili. Or Kiswahili. Or at least find out when I should say the Ki and when I can leave it out.
As you probably guessed, I'm feeling extremely excited but the slaphappiness is starting to simmer down as I realize my wake up call is for 4:40am, and it is now 2:15. I can't thank you all enough for the wonderful goodbyes and send-off parties. I appreciate all of your encouragement, advice, words of caution, and just plain old love that was heavily present along the east coast this past month. I'm really lucky to have friends and family that would put their livers and hearts through so much distress, just for the sake of a long farewell. It was truly inspiring.
The next serving of Meeshloaf (ha ha) might not be for a while, so grab a snack, check often and tell others, because at the dinner table of the world wide web, there's always an extra plate.
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