The Morality of Molarity

I have now finished the first two weeks of school. Well, I have been going to campus with the intention of going to class for two weeks, but the majority of my courses just started last week and we’re still working out the details for the Kiswahili class. All in good time I suppose. As far as I know at the moment, I will be taking Soil Mechanics, Engineering Geology, Basic Analytical and Physical Chemistry, a chemistry practical, African Women Writers, Economic History of Tanzania, and Kiswahili, of course. Coming from the quarter system where four courses can be quite the load this seems like a lot, but most students take seven or eight classes so I’ll give it a shot. Just another component of my efforts to blend in. Ha.

The schedule itself is a bit mystifying. It’s kind of a miracle that all of my classes fit together. Most students have every class for every semester laid out for them by their chosen degree program, so they are generally spared from piecing together their schedules. But as I am taking classes from four different colleges, it was kind of a toss up. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t so disappointed when a physics class didn’t end up fitting into my schedule. I went for African Women writers instead. In addition, classes don’t exactly follow the same-time-per-day pattern that I am accustomed to at Seattle U. For example, my history lectures are on Monday at 11am and then on Wednesday at 7am in two different lecture theatres. The seminar times have yet to be decided. With seven erratic class times to sort out, I think I will be walking around with my timetable for a few more weeks before I have it all committed to memory.

Classes themselves are… different. In my soil mechanics class I mentioned in the last post my professor continues to reference god’s omniscience at least once per lecture, and to single me out whenever he mentions something having to do with colder climates, usually by calling me “our lady.” On the bright side, a couple more girls have showed up. In my geology class I really am the only girl, though the class only has 25 or 30 students total so it’s a bit less intimidating. It seems like it should be a pretty good class, except for somewhat of a dueling professors situation. There is a second, more senior professor that shows up periodically to “oversee” and “assist” the relatively young professor actually teaching the class who I like quite a bit. Not only does this younger professor try to encourage class discussion and participation, he’s also quite easy to understand. On the other hand, this additional professor tends to mutter into the board in a heavy accent, blatantly interrupts the younger professor to explain things (more often than not to discuss concepts we had finished about ten minutes prior) in a different way, and answers any questions the younger professor poses for the students himself. The Tanzanian social and academic hierarchy basically means the younger professor just has to let this other guy do whatever he wants, though some frustration was clearly visible. I wasn’t surprised when one of the other students told me the class hadn’t liked this older professor in a previous courses and is hoping he will show up to GY252 as infrequently as possible. I agree.

My chemistry class will be quite the experience for a number of reasons. It has about 250 students so there is not a lecture hall on campus large enough to accommodate everyone. This means I need to get there early if I want a seat, otherwise it’s sitting in the aisle or standing along the wall with 50 or so other students. With such a large class it can also be a bit difficult to hear, and I generally have to listen extra carefully anyway because the professor has a pretty heavy accent. He has particular trouble with his “l”s and “r”s (very common in Tanzanian English) and getting “molarity” from something that—to me—sounds like “morality” is even more difficult in the rustle of 250 other notebooks and bodies. From what I’ve experienced so far, UDSM doesn’t seem to cap classes at a certain capacity or to offer multiple sections of classes that are sure to be enormous (like this first year chemistry course required by multiple departments). Granted, their online registration program is still not up and running for this semester, so I guess I should be hoping that I don’t get shut out of the class after attending lectures and tutorials for a week and half. The practical is also a bit of an adventure. There are over 50 students in my section and the strategy necessarily adopted for taking minibuses of pushing one’s way into any available bit of space also seems to be applied to waiting for and using lab equipment. Combined with the fact that the lab coat doesn’t make the already warm lab (especially the air-tight room housing the analytical balances) any more bearable, I have the feeling the chemistry practical will not end up being my favorite four hours of the week. All part of the experience I suppose. I have, however, met some very nice chemistry classmates. Even though they are also new to the campus as first year students, they have kindly helped me to find various classrooms, push my way around the lab, and procure copies of the lecture notes. There are so many students that the chemistry library ran out of books, so a thick stack of lecture notes will be my text for the first half of the semester. At least it only cost me about two dollars!

Finding course material actually seems like it could be one of the bigger challenges of my semester. The campus bookstore only stocks ten to twenty copies of only some of the books used for classes, so when they run out (remember the vast majority of classes have at least 50 students) or never stocked what you were looking for in the first place (I’m zero for five at this point) you’re just sort of out of luck. Basically we make a lot of copies and I think I’ll need to hunt around some bookstores in the city center for a few novels. My geology professor actually gave us electronic copies of a couple books which has been great for me, though it poses new challenges for the half of our class who don’t have computers. Though making copies involves tracking down who managed to get a copy of what and is therefore rather inconvenient, at least it’s not expensive. Really, there is simply no way the most of the students could afford to pay hundreds of dollars each semester for textbooks.

I think the class that I am most eagerly anticipating at this point is African Women Writers. Not only is it my only class taught by a female professor, but I think it will be fascinating to learn about feminism from an African perspective and to observe how my classmates react to the course material. Though the class is for third (meaning final) year students, I got the impression that this class is likely the first exposure to feminism for many of them. While I’ve encountered women’s development and empowerment groups in the five months since I left the US, I’ve certainly never heard them use the word feminism. Given the eastern African male-female dynamic and a misunderstanding of the word in general, feminism isn’t a popular or positively viewed concept in this part of the world. So I can’t wait to hear what my professor and fellow students have to say. One challenging aspect of the class, however, will be the professor’s comments about the United States. I’m not sure where she has been or for how long, but she has spent enough time in the US to think she knows a lot about American culture and to make several blanket statements that I felt are misleading or simply incorrect. Thus far we have only had one lecture, but in that hour she told the class that feminists in America are most concerned about abortion, that lesbians hate men, and that American Christians are okay with sinning by staying together before they are married because they believe they can simply repent. She made these statements at various points in the lecture to illustrate the differences between American and African cultures (lumping all African culture together was her method for comparison, not mine). Unfortunately none of these statements were accompanied by an explanation to contextualize them at all and so I felt like the professor was basically saying, “look how absurd America is.” I suppose that could have been her objective if she truly doesn’t know anymore about these issues than what she abruptly shared with the class, but I guess my initial take on her personality and the fact that she is a feminist literature professor made me expect a bit more critical thinking. Of course, there is plenty of Tanzanian culture that I do not understand or have not yet been exposed to, so the students probably didn’t receive her comments in the same way I did. At this point I’m just curious to see what the professor will say in the future and if there will be any way for me to share my own perspective as well. I didn’t quite feel comfortable enough to raise my hand just yet…

While almost everyone has been friendly and helpful, I am a bit unsure of how the actual friend-making process will go. Thus far, the vast majority of my conversations with people have felt like very one-sided sessions of me explaining the differences between the US and Tanzania. This is certainly fair, and I might be asking a Tanzanian exchange student in the US many of the same questions, but I kind of feel like this enhances my strangeness rather than making me seem like any other student. I guess I wasn’t expecting to continue to stand out so much. Really, it has only been two weeks so I suppose I just need to be patient. Improving my Kiswahili will also help me to make friends as all conversations outside of class (and many in class as well) are in Kiswahili. I’ve had a few small conversations in Kiswahili with classmates so far, but my language skills (and confidence) are still lacking enough that I usually address people in English. If I want to make non-awkward friendships or join study groups, this will have to change.

I suppose if I really get to feeling lonely I could give Baraka Luther a call. Now, I don’t actually know him, but as I was walking home one day this week he approached me, held out a small piece of paper, and said, “here please.” Thinking it was a flyer for some group or event I took it and said asante, only to read a bit further down the road that it had his name, phone number, email address, and the message, “I need to be friends.” Uhhh… Had he specifically been waiting for me to walk home or does he have a supply of these notes that he just hands out to people who look interesting? Being approached like that made me pretty uncomfortable. I generally feel quite safe in my neighborhood during the day (and I haven’t yet been out at night), but that incident made me aware of just how much I stand out. Baraka is probably just looking for a friend to practice English with, but feeling like I’m being watched or at least noticed by everyone I pass is a bit disconcerting. Needless to say, I haven’t felt tempted to call or email him yet.

Giraffe or giraffes? Zebra or zebras?

My Google search has been inconclusive about the correct way to pluralize the words giraffe and zebra. Your thoughts? You can see what I’ve chosen below. But yeah, my trouble with these words means I’ve recently seen some cool animals!

Let’s see, it’s just after 6am as I write this and my shirt is already damp with sweat, which means I am in Dar es Salaam. I’ve been here for about five days now. Weather wise, it’s pretty miserable and I want to cry every time someone tells me that things have only just started heating up. By February I may have melted into a puddle; the humidity will have done me in. Aside from the nonstop sweating, Dar seems like a nice place to spend the next nine months. My baba wa Tanzania (Tanzanian host father) is an auditor for the University of Dar es Salaam, so we live in a house owned by the university about ten minutes walking distance from the main campus. The university area is really pretty and there are lots of large trees providing necessary shade. And around here, with trees come monkeys!

The semester technically started on Monday, but most lectures don’t actually get going for at least another week. However, it’s difficult to know which lectures those might be as my soil mechanics professor not only showed up to give out the syllabus on Monday but then he actually started teaching on Tuesday. That is really the only class I’ve had thus far, and it has given me an interesting taste of what is to come. Of the approximately 100 students in the class, I am one of just two girls. And as if I wasn’t already glaringly obvious, in class the professor singled me out as someone who had seen natural ice. While I was embarrassed about being called out (not that my face could get any redder than it already constantly is) it did make me realize that the majority of these students probably have never seen any ice or even frost on the ground. I was momentarily floored. A bit further into the lecture the professor also said, “Only the almighty god knows exactly how old the earth is, but scientists estimate about five thousand million years.” Yep, new perspectives. Even coming from a Jesuit university back in Seattle a comment like that wouldn’t fly in an engineering class. While most of the foreign students are taking specifically Africa centric sociology and political science classes, I think my general science courses will be just as much of a cultural experience.

My host family situation seems pretty good. My host mom and dad are big tennis fans, so over the weekend we enjoyed watching a French tournament in the evenings. Aside from the fact that I am more or less stuck to their leather couch (yes, quality furniture), it feels a lot like watching the grand slams with my family back in MT. My host family is actually very culturally westernized. They have each studied or lived abroad and their three children are all living and working in the US or Europe. This is a bit disappointing in some ways as my host family will not contribute so much to my Tanzanian cultural immersion, though I will be honest and say that am grateful I won’t be witnessing a typical Tanzanian husband-wife relationship on a daily basis. From what I have seen so far my host parents seem to have a lot of mutual respect and a true appreciation for each other, rather than the master-slave dynamic that, from my experience, seems more prominent in this part of the world. There are, of course, some notable differences between my Montana home and my family here. For example, here our water has been out for the majority of each day, there are two women (one who lives with us) who do all of the cooking and cleaning, if we turn on too many lights or appliances the electricity starts to cut in and out, and there are a bunch of feral cats hanging around the side of the house that live on garbage and lizards. Thanks for the warning host father, but don’t worry, I had no intention of attempting to cuddle with our feline neighbors.

I think the real reason the heat and humidity here in Dar are so uncomfortable is that Iringa, where I spent the last month, is located 1600m above sea level and had a blissful climate. Sure, it was hot out in the sun during the middle of the day, but I was spending my nights in light sweatpants comfortably curled up under a thick blanket. This also allowed for refreshing morning jogs through the bush and fields in the hills surrounding the campsite where I was staying and studying (we were actually 12km outside of Iringa town). Really, I immensely enjoyed my time at Riverside Campsite. The language school was really well run and I feel like I learned a lot of Kiswahili. We even had a Tanzanian cooking class that included slaughtering a few chickens. Now my challenge is to continue to use the Kiswahili I acquired and therefore not lose it. My host parents are so comfortable with English that I only rarely overhear them using Kiswahili for their own personal conversations so it’s not surprising they automatically choose English to speak with me. The women who work in the house don’t speak any English, but the woman who I interact with most often barely speaks above a whisper so I rarely feel like I understand her (even when it’s something simple like “Do you want some chai?”). She also seems to want to make any conversation as brief as possible (understandable I suppose since my lack of comprehension makes our exchanges painfully awkward) but it leaves me without much Kiswahili in my day. I realize I just need to be patient. Hopefully we’ll develop a more comfortable relationship over the next couple weeks.

Anyway, not only did I really enjoy the language instruction at Riverside, but the food was great (fresh salad at lunch and occasionally we even had something resembling pesto!), the campsite staff was friendly and willing to listen to us struggle through our terrible Kiswahili, and there was the most wonderful (though generally also quite dirty) dog named Polly that liked to accompany/lead other students and me on afternoon walks and hikes. There were usually six or seven students in addition to myself, of varying levels and from several countries. Most were Christian missionaries but within that general category there was a lot of diversity, so I generally didn’t feel too out of place and we all seemed to get along quite well. In addition to socializing at mealtimes and during study breaks, it was great to have people to go on mini adventures with on the weekends. The Saturday after my first week of study five others and I did a day safari in Ruaha National park. Not only was the trip affordable only because we organized such a large group, but the Swiss German guys in particular had wonderful senses of humor so seeing elephants, lions, giraffes, and zebra was only the tip of the entertainment iceberg. Then the next Saturday my friend Toni and I took a morning trip to an archaeological site and Tanzania’s version of the Grand Canyon. For being what my guidebook called “one of Africa’s richest Stone Age sites” I found the stone tools only reasonably interesting, but the huge sandstone pillars, rock formations, awesome bugs and lizards, and always entertaining minibus rides certainly made the trip worth it.

Another noteworthy event during my time at the campsite was Tanzania’s general election on October 31st (I know, exciting Halloween right?). After witnessing three weeks of vigorous campaigning (mostly by CCM, the main and previously only party) that included women clad in special green and florescent yellow kitenges showcasing the current president’s face and trucks with huge speakers driving through towns and villages spewing political slogans, the political fervor reached it’s climax on the day before election day. All rallies and campaigning were forbidden on election day itself, so that Saturday was everyone’s last chance. I was in town checking email and exploring Iringa a bit so I got to experience many of the day’s events. While I was eating lunch someone even asked me if I was one of the election observers from the European union. No… I actually sat down in this out-of-the-way restaurant before the CCM rally formed outside thinking I could escape the craziness for a bit… I think the highlight of the day was watching the political parades go by from my seat in an internet cafe on Iringa’s main street. Vehicle after vehicle (cars, minibuses, lorries, motorcycles, anything with wheels and an engine) went by stuffed with people who were dancing, singing, yelling and of course trying to make sure they didn’t fall off their ride. Again, it was mostly CCM, but the main opposition party, Chadema, put together a pretty raucous 15-vehicle parade of their own. And apparently it paid off as they won in Iringa. CCM still took the vast majority of the country’s parliamentary seats and Kikwete is still president, but the opposition gained enough seats in a variety of regions to start getting experience in the government and develop into a more legitimate opposition party. As Tanzania has essentially had a one party system since independence, everyone I talked to (both Tanzanian and wazungu) seemed to think pretty positively of this election.

I had about four free days between the end of my fourth week of language study in Iringa and my arrival in Dar, so I decided to visit my friend Toni from the language school in Mbeya where he is now living and working. I had a hard time deciding what to do with these free days, but going to Mbeya ended up being a wonderful choice. Not only were there things I wanted to see in the region, but I had a phenomenal time staying with Toni (who is Swiss) and a German couple who he was sharing the house with. Mbeya seemed like my last chance to enjoy a bit of nature before coming to Dar, and so with the help of my hosts I made the most of it. Mbeya itself is really dry and dusty, but the day after I arrived we hiked to a crater lake in a lush jungle environment about half an hour out of the city. On the recommendation of some locals (though advised against by my guidebook) we decided to make the journey from the rim of the crater down to the lakeshore, which made for a great but mildly terrifying adventure. It was certainly the steepest “trail” I’ve ever been on. The most entertaining and also the most humiliating parts of the experience were the Tanzanian guys who recommended we go in the first place. As we inched ourselves along in our hiking boots, they were basically running up and down the mountain in flip-flops or barefoot. At what was probably the most difficult point in the descent we had to lower (and then of course climb back up half an hour later) ourselves down and across a wall/cliff by holding onto roots and hoping our feet would first find and then not slip out of a few sandy footholds cut into the side of the mountain. And in my state of trying to conceal my fear I forgot that most Tanzanians don’t have any concept of sarcasm. One of the guys asked us how we were doing and I said, “Hamna shida. Ni rahisi sana.” (No problem, it’s very easy.) First he gave me this puzzled and incredulous look, and then replied, “If it’s easy, then let’s go!” and continued running down the path. Ha. I think another ten minutes then passed before we successfully descended the next 20 feet of “trail.”

Despite the thrilling nature of our adventures in the jungle, the most enjoyable part of my time in Mbeya was hanging out with my wonderful hosts during the evenings. After enjoying some German food for dinner, we played cards for a couple hours and drank South African wine. Under the Germans’ careful tutelage we played rummy the first evening and then a couple rousing rounds of canasta over the next two nights. Canasta is definitely my new favorite card game, though it will be a challenge to play in such good company again.

One of the main reasons I chose to spend my few free days in Mbeya was so that I could then take the train into Dar. The Tazara line runs all the way across Tanzania and then into central Zambia. For months I had been hearing what a fantastic trip it is; a great way to see the countryside and it even goes through a game reserve just outside of Dar. That, and the train’s schedule matched my necessary arrival window in Dar. Well, that was all in theory. It certainly wasn’t a bad trip as I met some other friendly travelers and saw a few giraffe, warthogs, and buffalo out the window, but I can’t say I’m too eager to get on the Tazara again any time soon. First the train arrived 17 hours late in Mbeya meaning I spent a sleepless night at the train station and then the Tanzanian women with whom I was sharing a compartment when the train eventually arrived were, from my cultural standpoint, less than wonderful traveling companions. For example, at this point I know enough Kiswahili to know that they were talking about what they had seen me doing at the train station (are reading and chatting with a couple people really gossip-worthy activities?) and one of them thought I was like a sick person because I went to sleep as soon as we finally got on the train (apparently their night at the train station included an ample amount of sleep). At one point they were discussing whether they thought I could speak Kiswahili or not, but they never actually said anything directly to me except a few simple greetings which most foreigners have down. Of course, I should have just pushed through my shyness and insecurity with my language skills to start chatting, but the desire to have a good view out the window and to get out of the stuffy compartment meant I spent nearly all of the journey’s waking hours at a table in the dining car or next to a window in the area between train cars. By the time the 27-hour trip ended and we got to Dar the train had somehow lost another five or six hours and thus arrived about 24 hours late. This meant I went straight from the train station to the orientation day I had missed the first half of. In addition to not having showered for over two days, I fell down a couple stairs while dragging my huge bag around campus. I sure know how to make a first impression! But I shouldn’t complain as I really did receive a nice welcome to Dar from the international student office and many other students. All things considered, I’m expecting an interesting but positive experience here this year. Plenty to look forward to. And the moral of the story with the train: if you have a set arrival time when traveling in Tanzania, just give yourself a day or two extra for the journey.

Montana kuna ng’ombe wengi kuliko watu, lakini mimi si mshamba.

Montana has more cows than people, but I am not a redneck. Yep, I know how to say that in Kiswahili. And that was after only six days of class! The best part is that before meeting me, my language teacher had never heard of Montana much less had any idea about the stereotype of Montanans being rednecks. And redneck wasn’t exactly a word I was expecting to add to my small but growing Kiswahili vocabulary. Tunku, my teacher, just offered it up more or less out of the blue. Who knows what I’ll be able to say after a full month of lessons…

Well, another six weeks have gone by since my last post and I’ve crossed two borders. I left Zambia for three weeks in Malawi and am now at a language school in central Tanzania attempting to beat Kiswahili into my head for the majority of my waking hours. It has been a moderately good adventure. I say only “moderately” not because it wasn’t enjoyable, but because I don’t really have any thrilling tales of daring expeditions. And really, that’s just fine by me. Malawians are incredibly laid back, so much of my time was spent wandering around various towns and beaches, meeting and chatting with random people. Yeah, tough life.

After a phenomenal sendoff in Chirundu (which included a hilarious talent show put on by the kids from the parish and lasagna dinner—entirely from scratch!—prepared by my housemates), I left for Lilongwe, Malawi. While there’s not a ton to do in Lilongwe, I enjoyed spending time in a big city, mostly because of food. Not only was I finally able to buy a bar of chocolate, but there was a phenomenal vegetable market near my hostel. I welcomed broccoli, cucumber and green pepper back into my life with open arms. Unfortunately, I also had the poor idea to get a haircut. It had been over a year since I had even had a trim, and I thought hairdressers in Lilongwe would have a broader range of experience than just plaiting. I was wrong. Though he told me otherwise, it became obvious rather quickly that the guy who cut my mine had never touched mzungu hair before. But my hair wasn’t maimed too badly and it was certainly an experience to have it cut by a guy wearing a T-shirt with a huge eagle curving around the side of an American flag.

Lilongwe also introduced me to the incredible Malawian friendliness and kindness that I would experience throughout my time in the country. I was shown where to buy a notebook in the market by a guy named Malawi (yes, the awesome names continue) who approached me because he could tell I was an American by my Chacos; I was guided through the industrial area by another random guy when I made a failed attempt to see the tobacco action floors (they weren’t trading that day); and the morning I got on a bus to leave Lilongwe someone not only showed me who to buy a ticket from, but found me a seat and stowed my bag for me on the most crowded bus I have ever experienced. As a solo female traveler my guard is always up really high and I wish it weren’t only men who are talkative, but I really was floored by how far out of their way these guys went to help me out without my asking.

After Lilongwe I headed to the lake. Lake Malawi (called Lake Nyasa in Tanzania) really is incredible. The water is astonishingly blue and clear, there are tons of brightly-colored fish that are not shy around snorkelers, and plenty of birds—including amazing fishing eagles—taking advantage of the abundant fish populations. I also spent plenty of time just sitting on the lakeshore watching fishermen glide by in their dugout canoes.

The highlight of my trip was my time on Likoma Island. Likoma has great walking and hiking, the water and beaches are even more pristine than on the mainland, there are hundreds of baobab trees, and Likoma is actually much closer to Mozambique than to Malawi so there is a spectacular view of mainland Mozambique. It was so nice to walk around by myself and feel completely safe. Well, I guess I was rarely actually alone as the locals are probably the friendliest people I’ve ever met. In my first day on Likoma a man explained the island’s electrical system to me and I discussed Shakespeare with a high-school-age boy (the only literary conversation I’ve had with a local). I was also escorted halfway back to my hostel by a group of girls who I’m guessing were about eight years old. They spoke about as much English as I spoke Chewa (meaning about 10 words), but they eagerly grabbed my hands and led me along the lakeshore road for a while until they all gave me several hugs and ran back home. Another day I inadvertently attracted the attention of several children who had been bathing in the lake so I was then followed around for a while by a bunch of naked kids. As you might imagine, it was both awkward and hilarious.

Getting to and from Likoma was probably my biggest adventure in Malawi. Unless you have the funds and desire to charter a flight from Lilongwe, the only way to reach the island is to take a trip on the Ilala ferry. The Ilala is basically the only large-scale form of transportation on the lake so in addition to carrying people it carries an incredible amount of cargo. Most of this cargo is small dried fish but there are also enormous bags of maize and, of course, many live chickens adding to the katundu (the Chewa/Nyanga word which I have become very familiar with meaning “a lot of stuff”). This meant to get on and off the ferry my luggage and I had to crawl over piles of cargo in addition to squeezing/pushing my way through all of the people either sitting with their stuff or also trying to force their way through the crowd. Very few of the ports have piers, so all of the loading and unloading is done with small boats while the Ilala is anchored a bit offshore. The whole process is incredibly shagalabagala (disorganized, my favorite Kiswahili word) and takes several hours at each port. When we reached Likoma Island’s harbor I clambered over several bags of maize, waded through the kernels from a bag that had split open, and then followed my bag (thrown by another helpful Malawian) into one of the Ilala’s two lifeboats that was loaded well beyond its stated 22-passenger limit to go to shore. I also ended up soaked from the waist down because there were some pretty significant waves coming in while we were wading through the surf onto the beach. Though boarding the Ilala five days later wasn’t really any less chaotic, I certainly preferred the ordeal in the daylight.

I also spent a total of about a week and a half in Nkhata Bay, before going to and after coming back from Likoma Island. It was both a nice and strange town. It is a really popular place for backpackers which has resulted in the typical touristy things like overzealous curio vendors and unnecessarily expensive restaurants, but I was not expecting the relatively large population of rasta “beach boys” who were quite eager to chat up a new white girl, i.e. me. There were a couple times where I had to psych myself up to leave my hostel because I was so sick of being hassled. However, in addition to meeting several other travelers at my hostel, I did make one reasonably good (though certainly also awkward) local friend. First he was the guy who, though I already knew where I was going, led me to my hostel from the bus so he could collect his commission. Then the next morning as I was headed into town to do some exploring he caught up with me on the road, told me he had been waiting to meet me again, and proceeded to “escort” me around town. Yeah. I wasn’t thrilled. However, after he wasn’t deterred from showing me around even when I had told him about my serious boyfriend back in the states (a lie I have become quite good at) and rather pointedly said I wasn’t interested in paying a tour guide, I enjoyed spending some time with him. The language barrier didn’t allow for much conversation with any depth and there were plenty of awkward silences, but I learned quite a bit about life in Nkhata Bay. I also ate a few meals at his house where I unsuccessfully attempted to cook nsima, ate many whole dried fish, carried a bucket of water on my head (and didn’t spill!), watched a couple Bob Marley videos, sang “head, shoulders, knees and toes” with the kids in his compound, and met his brothers, friends and neighbors. Certainly a series of positive experiences.

As a final note, another aspect of my travels I have enjoyed is seeing Obama’s face everywhere. And I mean everywhere. He is on T-shirts, shopping bags, hats, chitenges (the cloth that women use for wrapping around their skirts and heads, making baby slings, or any number of other purposes), and, my personal favorite, holographic belt buckles. I also saw a couple advertisements for Obama brand whiskey, “the winning spirit.” Most people are quite keen to talk about him as well. After “Are you married?” or “Do you have a boyfriend?” the question I am most often asked is “What do you think of Obama?” And then people tell me how much they love him.

Baadaye!

Crocodiles of God

Hello everyone. Sorry it’s been so long. This will be my last update from Zambia as I am leaving for Malawi on Monday. After a couple days in Lilongwe I’ll be spending the next couple weeks on Lake Malawi before making my way to a language school in southwestern Tanzania. Do a Google image search and be jealous.

I suppose I should start with the waterwheel. It is in the Zambezi aaaaaand… working! Well, for now at least. It has actually been in the river for several weeks now, but has been functioning with varying degrees of success. The rotating joint is really the only thing that has been causing problems, but it appears we finally have something that works. I suppose I shouldn’t speak too quickly, but it has been working without even a minor leak for almost two weeks and I would like to be optimistic. We are hoping to find something that works for at least six months at a time or, ideally longer. The current design of the joint is actually also the simplest we have tried to far, which makes me feel a bit better about the sustainability of the project as a whole. I still have my doubts, but knowing we don’t have to commission the manufacture of heavy, complicated, and expensive joints in Lusaka is encouraging.

I suppose I should explain the basics of our waterwheel-driven spiral pump. The waterwheel uses the power from the river to turn two spirals of polypipe that scoop up river water. Each time the wheel turns, the water is forced further down the coil and compresses the air that is also present in the spiral. At the innermost coil the air is so compressed that the pressure is high enough to force the water up the bank and into a large tank from where it then flows to a series of washbasins. (I post photos once I find some decent internet.) The volume of water being pumped is also less than we would like, but it has been great to see people using the basins for washing, bathing and collecting water. We (i.e. the welders, though I did use the grinder once and didn’t grind off an appendage!) are now in the process of constructing a much larger waterwheel so that we can pump water to the roof of the parish house, about 30 meters. (The current version has between 15 and 18 meters of lift.) I made about 85% of the decisions and calculations regarding the modifications of this design from previous waterwheels, so hopefully it will not be an epic failure. Unfortunately I will not be able to see it in the river before I go, but maybe that means I will be spared the heartbreak of seeing it not work at first and by the time I return a year from now it will be flawless. As the Zambians say: at least…

In other exciting news, there are puppies at the parish house! We have no idea what kind of dogs they are, but they are super cute. They have only been here for a couple days and are still pretty timid, though they enjoyed chasing some children around the yard yesterday afternoon. They will be killing snakes (the real reason Fr. Michele wanted dogs in the first place) in no time. Their names are Luna and Pluto. I randomly suggested calling them Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers—Fred and Ginger for short, of course—but apparently in Zambia it is quite insulting to give a dog the same name as a human (insinuating that the human is like a dog I guess) and there is a Fred just down the road, so those names were vetoed and we went for the space theme instead. In all honesty, after hearing the no-giving-dogs-human-names rule I was a bit unsure of what we could call them since there appears to be no limit to what someone can name their child. In addition to the names I shared in the last post, I have since heard: Gearbox, End, Medicine, Urgent, Geography, Motorola, InBetween, and Diesel. Diesel’s last name was also Diesel, but the Nyanga or Tonga word for it.

Aside from hanging out with children and working on the waterwheel in Chirundu, Justin and I took a trip north into the central province before he returned back to the states. Justin has a friend serving in the Peace Corps in a village outside of Serenje, so we got a taste of village life for a couple days. The bucket showers, pit latrine, water source that was 400m away, and general sense of isolation (Marcus was actually close to Serenje relative to some of the other volunteers) gave me a more real perspective on the Peace Corps. It would be both an incredible and challenging experience. Luckily I can think about it for a couple years before applying. One of the many advantages of finishing college in a less-than-timely manner… Anyway, the highlight of the trip was celebrating the full moon with a bunch of children at a nearby farm. We taught the kids the hokey pokey as we danced and sang around a fire and they taught us a song about a man who was taken to the witchdoctor because he killed his daughter for marrying her cousin. Yes, this trip was a big dose of culture. Then we played versions of kick the can and duck duck goose before heading back through the fields to Marcus’ hut where we unsuccessfully tried to get a mouse out of the house before going to bed. All under the light of the full moon. Fantastic.

As this is my last post from Zambia, I feel I should share some of my general observations from the summer. I feel an appropriate place for me to begin is food. As I mentioned before, the parish house employs a Zambian woman, Christine, to cook during the week, so aside from cooking for ourselves on the weekends and Christine’s pizza on Thursdays we do eat lots of Zambian food. The basis of all Zambian meals in nshima, and as I have no idea how to describe it I have stolen this description from my guidebook which says it is “a thick, doughy maize porridge that’s bland but very filling.” Thank you Lonely Planet. I think the adjective “gluey” is also appropriate. Nshima is usually eaten with one or two sides of vegetables, beans, or meat when it’s available. As the parish is not hurting for funds we almost always have meat for our main meal (lunch); sometimes chicken, but more often some form of red meat. Now, by red meat I don’t mean beef. I mean meat that is actually quite boldly red in color, usually sausage. The most offensively red sausage comes from a meat producer ironically called The Real Meat Co. Ltd. Real meat? I think not, though I do like that a hippo is included among the edible animals of their logo. My favorite part of the meal is usually the vegetable, which is either cabbage or rape, a dark leafy green that is delicious and nutritious though it sometimes makes for strange-sounding statements or questions. I’m certainly used to it by now, but being asked “What did you think of the rape today?” was initially a bit disarming. Dinner is more simple and starchier than lunch, usually consisting of rice or pasta and some sauce that often contains potatoes. As we have bread and tea/coffee every day for breakfast, there is never any lack of carbs. Once we actually ate bread, rice, pasta, pizza, regular potatoes and sweet potatoes all in one day. Ugh. Despite any tone I may have used in my above description, the food certainly isn’t bad. It just lacks variety and generally contains at least twice the amount of oil and salt I would prefer. I’ve heard Tanzanian food, especially around Dar es Salaam, generally has more flavor, so I’m hoping that is actually true.

I have really enjoyed learning some Zambian English this summer. (I have basically failed to learn any substantial amount of the local languages.) So, here are some words and phrases that have taken on new roles in my vocabulary: Zambians use “this/that side” to indicate a place or direction regardless of how far away it is. It is usually accompanied by a vague sweep or flick of the hand. They also refer to each other as “this/that one.” I was rather taken aback for the first couple weeks because calling the girl standing right next to you “this one” seems really rude, though now I also use it regularly. To say “and so on” or “et cetera” Zambians say “what what,” “flip flops” are “tropicals,” and if someone says “we are leaving now” you still have some time whereas “now now” means you should be ready to go. In my first week in Zambia someone told me their last trip to Lusaka was a nightmare because “the robots were broken” which had me astounded (robots?! in Zambia?!) and thoroughly confused until this person saw the look on my face and explained that “robot” is the Zambian word for “traffic light.” One of the habits I have not picked up on, however, is the tendency to add a “y” or “u” sound to the end of words ending in consonants. Words in Bantu languages almost always end with a vowel sound, so the consonant-heavy English can be difficult to pronounce. The additional “y” and “u” sounds makes for some minor, though amusing transformations to words. For example, “disease” becomes “diseasey,” “childhood” becomes “childhudu,” and (my personal favorite) “dogma” becomes “doggyma.”

Many of the Zambians I have befriended this summer are happy to tell me about their culture, especially traditional beliefs. The Zambians who have shared the following beliefs generally good-naturedly make fun of them, though it’s good to keep in mind that for many villagers these ideas a parts of their cultural reality. Perhaps most relevant to my work on the waterwheel, I learned that there are two kinds of crocodile: crocodiles of god and crocodiles of people. Crocodiles of god are harmless, whereas crocodiles of people refer to those sent by a witchdoctor to attack a specific victim. Luckily for me, both types of crocodiles are supposedly afraid of mzungus. And crocodiles are not the only ones who fear white people. If someone has a dream about a mzungu it means they have been visited by a ghost, or if you see an albino on the street it’s best not to look at them and you should pull the collar of your shirt up to your mouth and spit lightly until they’ve passed. No one could really explain to me why you should spit into your shirt, it’s just something you do… Anyway, while the fact that Zambia is a “Christian nation” is codified and I have never been in a more zealously Christian place, witchcraft still plays a major role in most communities, especially villages. Witchfinders charge huge amounts of money to come to a village and determine why someone’s child or animal died, why their hut burned down, or to rid an area of evil spirits. Then they do a few chemistry tricks to prove one of the villagers was practicing witchcraft which results in anything from this person being fined, shunned for a while, or even run out of the village. Traditional voodoo belief also suggests things like burying a child’s heart underneath one’s shop improves business, and until only about a decade ago twins born in villages were killed because they were seen as unnatural.

It is traditional beliefs such as these that make me question what development is or should be and how to go about it. I certainly believe that preserving culture is important, but I hate to see people made vulnerable and so routinely taken advantage of because of their beliefs in witchcraft or—another frequent source of conflict—the feudal chief/chiefness power structure. In my opinion, one of the best ways to counteract these oppressive structures seems to be education, but despite the current president’s “commitment to education” there are still thousands of children (especially girls) living in remote locations who don’t go to school. And lets just say there isn’t much of an emphasis on critical thinking in the schools kids are going to. Ahhh, pangono pangono (slowly slowly)…

Goodness, I think that’s enough. Ha. You may have thought that several paragraphs ago…

Zambia, goodbye for now.

Hitler, Stalin, Diablo and… Elevator

I have heard and learned many new names since I’ve been here; both familiar western names and local names that take me a few tries to pronounce them correctly. It is pretty common to name people after other significant figures in history or cinema (the youngest girl—18 months—at Mudzi Wa Moyo is named Cleopatra), or to make names from seemingly random words that for one reason or another are appealing. Nothing compares, however, to some of the names in Lusito, a community about 30km away from Chirundu that we visited earlier this week to have dinner with two more Italian priests. While I did not have the pleasure of meeting these individuals, Fr. Mauritzio told me that in grade 11 there is a Hitler who is best friends with Stalin, and the school’s roster also includes a Diablo and, my personal favorite, Elevator. Hats off to the parents of Lusito. They’ve got style.

Other exciting events of the past week have been the arrival (and departure) of several more houseguests. We have welcomed countless more Italians, but more noteworthy are some of our new animal friends. Fr. Paolo had his first mass in his new parish last Sunday, which was a major celebration that involved him bringing home the lively offering of two chickens, a duck, and two goats. The birds when into the chicken coop with the rest of the poultry, and after a few skirmishes with the turkeys the duck finally started behaving. That is, it stopped causing trouble for the other birds. However, on its second or third morning here the duck made a break for it when Christine opened the door to feed them. She ran back to the parish house where most of us were still finishing breakfast and told Father Michele, “The duck has escaped! I’m going to the compound (their word meaning neighborhood) to look for it.” Miraculously she got it back, and it quickly had a few choice feathers removed to deter any future flight attempts. The goats stayed in what used to be the dog kennel and enjoyed the leaves of several trees around the parish house that we fed to them. Then, their time came. Fr. Paolo decided there wasn’t much sense in keeping live goats around the parish (they were both male so milking wasn’t an option) and so he arranged to have them butchered. Ironically I suppose, the event took place just outside the parish house during lunchtime and hearing their final bleats reduced the appetite of some of those gathered around the table. Our freezer now has a small supply of goat meat and their carcasses are, for some reason, still hanging in the tree by the chicken coop. Poor poor dead goats.

I am now sharing a room with Barbara, a 20-year-old Zambian girl who is staying with us at the parish house while she writes her grade 12 exams and transitions into Mudzi Wa Moyo. I’m not sure about the details or how long she will be staying, but I have come to really enjoy spending time with her. While it’s great to hang out with the girls at Mudzi Wa Moyo and other girls who I have met around the parish, it’s nice to get to know someone my own age. My impression is that the majority of women in Chirundu in their early twenties are already married, have children, and are therefore less interested in meeting some random foreigner. This is understandable, but has left me in the company of lots of 14 and 15 year olds. Among other activities, Barbara and I have bonded over being the only non-Italian speakers in the house, washing mountains of dishes, folding paper cranes, and good naturedly poking fun at Justin’s perpetually red nose and tendency to lose track of personal belongings.

Living with Barbara has also given me more of a Zambian cultural immersion, which has been both enjoyable and somewhat uncomfortable. In Zambian culture members of the same sex often walk around with linked arms or holding hands and in general there is less of a sense of personal space. I am still a bit surprised when Barbara grabs my arm or sits pressed up against my side as we are eating. Also, since Barbara has moved in I sort of feel like I have a shadow. This is somewhat attributed to her feeling out of place around so many Italians, but also because Zambians are generally very social. This is taking some getting used to for me. I just hope I don’t inadvertently offend her or anyone else as I work to come out of my solitary American bubble of personal space. We’ll see.

Zambians (or Barbara at least) also have a higher standard of cleanliness. She used the washing machine once but has since gone back to vigorously hand washing because she didn’t think her clothes were clean enough. She has also instructed me that we should sweep and mop our room at least once per day. We always sweep out a considerable amount of red dirt/sand, so while I think once every two or three days would be satisfactory I understand where she’s coming from. I have taken to thinking of it as the daily dirt removal, DDR for short. I think my DDR could become a big step up from the currently known and loved videogame. The object: keeping a Zambian house clean during the windy season. It would include activities like dusting, mopping, and the ever-popular watering the dirt driveway (which does keep the dust from blowing around for an hour or two). You could do all of the motions yourself with a Wii and it would be more exercise than bowling! DDR Zambia: Sure you can dance, but can you sweep?

A few days ago I experienced two of the most agonizing and hilarious hours of my time in Zambia so far. I finally agreed to have my hair fully braided and so I now have 14 little cornrows curving around my head. I have never been able to see so much of my own scalp before. I am certainly impressed by my hair’s transformation, but unlike almost all of the girls here who rebraid their hair on a weekly basis this will probably be the first and last time I do it. Not only am I skeptical about whether showing so much scalp is actually a good look for me (though all of the girls at Mudzi Wa Moyo have assured me I am much more beautiful now), but it really really hurt and I lost tons of hair. Despite the pain the experience was also ridiculously funny. At one point there were four different girls pulling on my hair and always many more gathered around me jabbering to each other in Nyanga laughing at my face as I winced through the particularly painful points. That, and everyone ended up covered in numerous stray hairs that had been ripped from my head. Now the trick it to put plenty of sunscreen on my head so that my scalp is not subjected to additional torment from sunburn.

This week also included what has to be my most embarrassing moment of the trip. We just had a whirlwind visit from the bishop and his entourage of Italians, and while setting the table for dinner last night I tipped over a stack of small plates and several smashed on the floor. Yep, classic Hannah move. Luckily the Italians all had a good sense of humor and no one was impaled by chards of plates. I guess it wasn’t that bad, though everyone sure got a glimpse of a very red blush from me.

Unfortunately there has not been any progress on the computer classes. Justin and I have talked to Fr. Michele several times about starting something in the afternoons, but he has so many projects going on that I’m not sure if we will ever get it going. We’ll see I suppose. Sadly Christine and I have not had any more lessons since the last post either. She is in the process of adding another room or two onto her house so she has been spending much of her free time watering cement blocks.

As for the waterwheel, we made a trip to Lusaka on Thursday to buy new seals for the joint and most of the materials for a bigger wheel. Shopping in Lusaka was quite the ordeal. Browsing on your own and then quickly checking out it not an option in the hardware stores. In each store there is a wall full of samples of all the products they theoretically have in stock. You then tell someone behind the counter what you would like, they make a list of all of the items and their prices, send someone off to get you what you want, and then you go see someone else to pay. After paying you pick up your items at the door where someone else checks that you have everything on your list. The process involves at least four receipts with several stamps. There is also a 16% tax, but least we didn’t have to do any haggling. Our trip to Lusaka also included picking up two more Italians at the airport and several other errands, so by the time we were on the road for the two hours back to Chirundu Justin and I were sharing the back of the pickup with seven suitcases, 100 liters of gasoline, a box of books about Catholicism, groceries, and all of the materials we bought for the waterwheel. Despite the close quarters and statistics about traffic casualties in third world countries nagging on my mind, the trip was actually pretty enjoyable once we got out of the heavy traffic and smog in Lusaka. It was a clear night so we had unobstructed views of the stars and we munched on a few tasty shortbread biscuits we had picked up at the grocery store.

Typing Lessons and Dead Hippos

Yesterday I went to Zimbabwe for a bit. Really it was just long enough to show that I had left Zambia so that I could reenter and thus get my visa extended. Luckily Chirundu and Zimbabwe are just a river apart so it was more of a beautiful morning walk back and forth across the bridge than a frustrating bureaucratic experience. Unfortunately the Zimbabwean side is a game park so we couldn’t walk around and explore while we were over there. Then again, we hear the hyenas howling from across the Zambezi every night so I wouldn’t want to go very far into the bush on foot anyway.

We’ve had quite the week. It started with the departure of over half the people staying at the parish house: the Italian family, Lisa, and Levy. To commemorate their leaving I made pumpkin pie for our last big “family” dinner. We didn’t have any nutmeg, we ground the cinnamon from a few cinnamon sticks, and pie crust made from margarine is certainly not the same, but all things considered it wasn’t that bad. There are about 20 pumpkins in the kitchen that don’t seem like they are being used for anything so I anticipate the pie will be repeated a couple more times before the summer is over. We were down to just Stefania, Justin, Fr. Michele and myself for a few days before the arrival of Fr. Paolo, a Zambian priest with a great sense of humor who will serve the Chiawa parish and its outposts. Though not as boisterous, out mealtime conversations are still lively.

We hit a bit of a snag with the waterwheel. We were thinking we could get it in the river this week and then learned the seals on the rotating joint we recently attached are leaking and therefore unusable. We organized a trip to Lusaka to buy another set of seals and look at other bearing options, but the morning we planned to leave the man who does the driving for the parish and who was going to take us, James, ended up in the hospital being treated for ingesting some sort of extremely dangerous poison. James said he was in a bar and someone slipped something in his drink when he went to the bathroom, however Fr. Michele has heard from other sources that there was some fight with his wife that may have led to a suicide attempt. Apparently suicide is alarmingly common in Chirundu and it’s usually done with some sort of animal or insect repelling poison. Regardless of the specific details, thankfully James is going to be fine. Hopefully any remaining issues (which may include a police investigation) will also be worked out.

The day after we learned about James also had sort of an eerie feel. We woke up to a couple gunshots and saw that someone had killed a hippo on the riverbank just below the parish house. For much of the morning we could hear people hacking away at it with machetes because it was so large that it had to be taken away (presumably to people’s kitchens) in pieces. There is still an enormous bloodstain that marks where the hippo was butchered.

On the brighter side, I am teaching Christine, the parish’s cook, how to type. We haven’t moved much beyond the home position for each hand, but she is really enthusiastic about it so we’ve had a lot of fun. It really makes me appreciate learning to type when I was young because I can see how hard it is for Christine to make her fingers stay on the right keys after a lifetime of never moving them in this way. She has a really good attitude though, and when she accidentally skips over one of her fingers she laughs and says, “This one is resting! No resting!” Christine has a phenomenal laugh and she occasionally throws herself onto my shoulder when she is particularly amused. It’s a challenge to find time for these lessons because we are both busy during the day and Christine goes to school in the evenings, but hopefully in the next two months we will have worked through enough together that all she can really do is keep practicing. I don’t know where she’ll find a keyboard to practice on, but she seems pretty committed so I like to think she’ll work something out.

When Fr. Michele found out that I was teaching her a bit, he threw out the idea that I could teach computer classes at the school. They haven’t had any since one of the long-term Italian volunteers left a month ago. I don’t see myself as much of a computer wiz so I’m pretty wary of volunteering to teach full classes. However, given my understanding of the direction the world seems to be going, knowing how to type and use a computer seem like skills that in some ways are just as important as reading so I guess my instruction would be better than none at all. We’ll see…

Hannah Montana in Chirundu

Mwachoma buangi! Good evening from Chirundu, Zambia! Sorry that it has taken me so long to get the blog going. I’ll try to be better about it in the future. I also apologize that there are no photos. My internet is unfortunately not allowing me to upload anything.

I have been in Zambia for about three weeks now. Most of my time has been spent in Chirundu, where we are working on the waterwheel. That work is going fairly well. We attached a new rotating joint at the outlet pipe last week and tested it in the banana pool. The pontoons are watertight and it is ready for the river. The only issue that remains is getting the river ready for the waterwheel. A few months ago the Zambian government decided to open two more gates in the Siavonga dam, so the Zambezi was a few meters higher in Chirundu than it was when they built the first waterwheel last year. This means the pipe from the shore to the water tanks was well under water and caused some trouble with the anchor and chain as well. They closed these gates again just a couple days ago and the water level immediately went down, so we should be able to use the previous pipe and just have to make a new anchor. We are currently searching out a few parts, but hopefully we will be able to get it in the water in the next week or so. We have heard rumors that they might open even more gates sometime in the future which would throw a serious wrench in the works, but I guess we’ll just hope for the best. It would be nice to design a system that would not be disrupted by significant changes in the water level, but I think Father Michele (the Italian priest serving at the Chirundu parish where I am living) wants to get something working again as quickly as possible. Certainly for good reason, because though I haven’t seen any crocodiles too near Chirundu, Fr. Michele said they killed several people last year.

Aside from working on the waterwheel I have been getting to know Chirundu a bit, which mostly means meeting tons of kids. The parish is connected to a hospital, girls orphanage, and a relatively large school so there are always tons of kids around. Someone told me in my first week that “Zambians are a joyful people” and I believe him. Everyone is very friendly and we spend the majority of any conversation laughing. My popularity is greatly supplemented by my relatively long blond hair, which is often an irresistible plaything. The smaller girls who don’t speak as much English don’t even ask, they just grab my hair and start trying to braid it like their own. Hopefully I won’t be bald by the end of the summer.

The girls at Mudzi Wa Moyo, the orphanage, are particularly keen to make friends. They have some sort of system where individual girls (sometimes two) each choose a foreigner to be some sort of special friend. Then they write very sweet and absurd love letters of a sort. As I was walking to the market on my first day in Chirundu we ran into a girl from Mudzi Wa Moyo who some members of our group met last year. Our greeting lasted less than 30 seconds, but she was particularly careful to get my name. Less than 24 hours later I received a letter in which she told me she loved me and offered a bit of spiritual guidance. As the orphanage is run by the sisters and multiple masses per week are compulsory, all of the girls are at least somewhat religiously inclined. My friend, Esnart, however, is particularly religious (what are the odds…) and in her latest letter she invited me to join her in the Jehovah Witness community as well. We’ll see how this goes.


While the letters are a bit uncomfortable, I really do enjoy hanging out with the Mudzi girls. They have taught me how to play netball, a sport kind of like basketball but the court is divided into thirds and there is no dribbling or backboards. Actually, there aren’t any nets either, but that just may be their court. Basically you pass a ball back and forth down the court and try to shoot it through a metal hoop. It was a bit of a trick to learn as the girls are much more comfortable speaking in Nyanga than in English so their explanation of the rules had some significant gaps. Mostly I learned by making lots of mistakes as I played, which was good for a laugh all around. Netball is also a reminder of why I have avoided contact sports since middle school. There are apparently no rules in terms of fouling and so their defense tactics have left me with a few bruises. At one point one of the girls grabbed both of my arms and held them behind my back so I couldn’t get the ball.

Perhaps not surprisingly, I have not escaped the Hannah Montana thing in Zambia. I have been asked a couple times if I know her. I suppose I really should try to befriend Miley as I hate to keep disappointing people… One girl even put a Hannah Montana sticker on a letter she wrote to me. Classic.

I have been to mass six times since I have been here. Once in English, twice outside, and last Sunday in a church with a thatched roof and mud brick walls. Fr. Michele serves numerous parishes in the region; the farthest away from Chirundu involves driving several kilometers through the bush on something that barely constitutes a road and then crossing the Kafue River in a large dugout canoe. Vehicles are few and far between in some of these areas, meaning there are usually a large number of people looking to hitch a ride to the main road in the back of the parish’s pick up. On the way back from mass last Sunday there were 30 people (including a couple babies), who knows how many kilos of grain, and several chickens in the back of the truck. I have now idea how it all fit in the first place and how no one fell out as we bumped along through the bush. As the above description probably conveys, going to mass in all of these villages is a good way to see the area and meet lots of people, though two masses each Sunday can be rather taxing.

It is philosophically challenging to live and work at a Catholic mission. In addition to my discomfort with evangelism in general, women are so clearly marginalized in Zambian society that it is even more difficult to go to mass here than in the US and see that there is essentially no place for women in leadership roles within the service. That is, unless a woman is the only person in the village who can read. I had a conversation about this observation with Levy, a seminarian living at the parish house, and he attributed it largely to the lack of education for women. (Well, that, and the whole inherent-patriarchy-within-the-Catholic-church can of worms that I won’t open any more than I already have.) Even though women are generally more supportive of the church by going to mass, it is currently uncommon to find a woman who can read in most of the villages, so even though groups within the church may consist primarily of women they will likely chose a man for leadership positions. Levy also told me he made an effort to allow girls to serve at the altar as well as boys, but he met resistance from both parishioners and other church leaders. Though frustrating, I suppose not allowing alter girls should be the least of anyone’s worries in a country in which marrying a woman 40 years younger than him was not political suicide for the president and where most village headmen must have at least 3 wives to be respected. While all of this is certainly disheartening, Levy said things are changing “slowly, slowly.” At the very least, I am grateful for Levy’s candor in discussing these issues with me.

Despite my misgivings about being so connected to the mission, the hospitality I have experienced at the parish is incredible. Fr. Michele welcomes lots of visitors and volunteers, mostly Italians (he is from the Milan diocese), which means my cultural experience has been almost as much Italian as it has been Zambian. There is currently a whole Italian family staying here. One girl, age 7, and two boys, ages 10 and 12. The whole family is very sweet and hilarious. The boys speak the best English of the five of them, though between my Spanish, their English and plenty of charades we communicate fairly well. (And I’m picking up a few Italian phrases. Not what I expected from this summer…) It’s pretty funny to watch them interact with Justin who doesn’t have my Spanish advantage, and the language barrier has been enough to make me laugh until I’ve cried a couple times. There is another Italian woman, Stefania, living here who will be volunteering in the lab of the mission hospital for six months. We share a room and she speaks very good English. I thoroughly enjoy her company and am glad she will be around for the last month or so that I’m here after Justin leaves. While Father Michele and Levy are beyond great, living with just two priests could be a bit much. A German woman, Lisa, also just arrived and will stay for a week or two.

One aspect of the Italian influence that I have enjoyed most is mealtimes. In true Italian style, we sit around the table laughing, talking and eating for an hour and a half at minimum, though usually longer. There were 15 of us around the table at one point, though over the past week many English speakers have left so most conversation is in Italian, but Father Michele and Stefania are good about filling in the rest of us. These mealtimes also feature a surprising amount of Italian food. I swear the family brought more food than clothing, so we have been enjoying various types of sliced meat, cheese, olive oil, and a bit of wine. The parish employs a cook, Christine, who is both wonderfully friendly and cooks delicious Zambian food, but on the nights that she is off the Italians have cooked a couple delicious pasta dishes and risotto. Most importantly, I have not yet begun to crave good chocolate (which is a good thing because I don’t think anyone is selling it in Chirundu) as the family has been very generous with the numerous bars they brought with them.

Eleven of us, including Fr. Michele, took a trip to Livingstone last week to see Victoria Falls. It was quite the journey. We rented a minibus that has clearly seen a lot of use and was quite the adventure as many of the roads are as much potholes as they are pavement. After 8 hours my butt was sufficiently numb but I was exceedingly grateful that the trip was not made in the back of the pickup, which is how we get everywhere else we need to go.

The falls were incredible. They are enormous. There is a lot of water at this time of year, so despite our use of raincoats and ponchos we were almost completely drenched by the spray. We stayed to watch the sunset before stopping back for dry cloths at the Holy Cross convent where we spent the night and then went to—you guessed it—an Italian restaurant for dinner. The next morning we drove through a wildlife reserve before embarking on the long journey home. We had very good luck and saw giraffes, warthogs, water buffalo, pythons, countless baboons (though I also see those on my morning jogs in Chirundu), impala, and a rhino. I am still in awe of the giraffes. They are one of the neatest and strangest animals I have ever seen. I feel like I’m off to a pretty good start on the wildlife viewing as I also saw numerous hippos, elephants and even a couple crocodiles when Justin and I went 50 km down the Zambezi to check out another couple sites that would like waterwheels. And there are monkeys in the trees around the parish house on an almost daily basis.

Anyway, I think that’s about it for now. Congrats, or thank you I suppose, for making it this far. I realize this post became somewhat of a novella. I’ll try to update more frequently and make them shorter. Take care, all!