Just a quick little post here, since looking at my blog I'm intimidated to try to read my last monster of an entry. I came in to Njombe (apparently I actually am allowed to publish the name of my banking town, because PC admin agrees that I ought to be allowed to post my mailing address) to catch some friends on the way back from their PEPFAR training, the week after mine. For some interesting and very pertinent views on PEPFAR, I recommend checking out Joshua Levens' blog (see my sidebar for a link).
When I told my headmaster I was going in to town this weekend, he advised that I leave Friday morning in case there was a problem at the bank. The fact that I have classes doesn't seem to have any bearing on the Tanzanian school cultural ideas of whether I should be at school or not. I stuck around because I wanted to teach, and because there was a little party for teachers on Friday afternoon. As it turned out, the party was a going-away party for one of the teachers who is going to the Tanga region for either school or a better job. There were a lot of tears because she has a lot of friends in the staff here, but also because our school already has a substantial shortage of teachers. Despite this, the headmaster helped her get this opportunity because he knows it will be very good for her. There were a lot of long-winded speeches reminiscing about her time at my school, but the headmaster's added on bits about how we will be okay without her, everyone just needs to do their part.
I've been a bit frustrated in my classes. The A-Level students study lots, but the mostly take a self-directed path in their out-of-class studies and homework is a bit of an oddity. I've been assigning a fair amount of homework or practice problems, but with no way to collect it, and no time to grade it even if I could collect it, I'm beginning to think that most of the assignments don't get done. I came down a bit hard on my physics kids, and I'm making them do some assignments as a prerequisite to participating in the labs, but I've had lots of kids come in asking math and physics questions about topics very different from what I'm teadhing. While I'm happy that they're taking some responsibility for their own studies, I wish they'd at least try the problems I'm assigning to them. I'm also finding that many of them have big gaps in the knowledge that should be well-established. So those are the challenges I'm working with right now. I've got one month left in the school term, and then I get a big vacation where I hope I can get better organized for when I start teaching again. That's all for now. Siku njema, take care everyone.
Sunday, January 28, 2007
Saturday, January 20, 2007
So, apparently the post didn't go through last time, I'll try again.
I never know what to say when I've got the time pressure on in an Internet cafe, so I've decided to try to write some blog entries on the computer at school and take them in on diskette. I remember bringing a disk or two to college. I never used them. I never thought I'd use them again, but hey, they work great for text files.
4.1.2007
I was supposed to start teaching yesterday, but I should have known from training that no one would show up to class. There's a strong cultural precedent of not hurrying back to school after holidays. I've only seen 1 of the other 3 A-level teachers (the O-Levels have break until Jan. 15). So, I opened the door to my classroom yesterday, but the students who were here were mostly studying in one of the other classrooms. A couple came to ask me some questions, which was nice and led to me giving a mini-lecture/sermon-on-the-benefits-of-factoring-polynomials to the 20 or so students studying. Today, however, they surprised me by actually showing up to class (I asked the 3rd-mistress, the highest ranking person who isn't traveling when she thought they'd start coming to classes, and her guess was next Monday). So, I gave the lecture I had prepared for yesterday and I've started working on the one for tomorrow. Apparently a quorum of physics students are here and they're OK with starting classes.
At end-of-term breaks, one of the reasons students are late to return to school is that their parents need to collect the school fees, which takes time. I've heard that many schools cope with this by giving the students who do show up on time chores to do (cleaning, gardening, etc.) so that the majority of students don't fall behind in the first week. This seems horrible to me. I agree that maybe it would be best not to teach new material since 80% of the students may not be there, but it really seems like they are punishing the students who come on time. I think, at my own end of term, I will try to have the students come to my class and we will have review problem sessions, which the kids (I'm told) are generally quite enthusiastic about.
I also hung some things on the walls of my office (a world map and a cut-up old calendar of American art that I found in my house). I'm amazed how much nicer it feels to do work there now. Next step is to get some things up around my house... Also in my office I set up a chess set that I found in my house, and already a student and a teacher have shown some interest in it, so I'm hoping I can teach some people some games. Many people here play what they call draughts, which is the British name for checkers (I think), but the rules are a little different, basically the kings have super-powers. I've only played once so far. I'm going to try to follow the example of the volunteer I shadowed during training and collect bottle caps for chips and teach a group of kids poker. I think it would be a good cultural exchange, and maybe help develop some critical thinking skills, which in general need all the help they can get.
I was just about to write about the lack of rain: it rained everyday I've been here until this past Monday, and aside from a tiny drizzle this afternoon, I haven't seen it rain since New Year's, except it just started now and it sounds heavy enough that I'll miss my umbrella--which I've been so good about keeping with me--on the way home.
I did get an answer to one of my questions about technology here: they do use oxen form plowing extensively, I just have been in the wrong places at the wrong times to see the heavy planting times, and now the little that's being done, I'm told, is done exclusively in the early morning starting before sunrise. Still no clue on things like washboards, clothes wringers...
More neighborhood observations starting with corrections about Ulanzi, the local liquor. Ulanzi comes from bamboo, and is extremely easy to get. You simply cut down a large bamboo stalk and attach a shorter, but slightly larger diameter, collecting piece of bamboo to catch the Ulanzi that will bubble out over the next 12 hours. Then you drink it. Not to talk to much about Evils of Society or anything, but there is one teacher who I have noticed by far more often than any other teacher in one or another of the local Ulanzi Dens (what I call them in my head, "bar" doesn't really seem to fit). The other day I found out he lives in the one house on campus that confused me. All the teachers have housing provided, but this one house is dingier than all the others. It doesn't have glass in the windows, only wood shutters, and the kitchen is a mud hut outside. I've been in now, and I think there's supposed to be a kitchen room inside that seems to be given over to a little pig and some chickens. His wife is very nice and gave me a cat to help me out with my rat--which ate my peanut butter!!!--and then gave me a bagful of tomatoes from her garden. They also have one of the cutest kids I've seen here, which is saying a lot. The kid insists is probably about 5 and insists on greeting me every time I walk by, which is generally adorable.
The cat is another story. It scratched me plenty when I tried to catch it, I ended up carrying it to my house in a piece of cloth.
5.1.07
So, the cat scared the rat plenty but was scared to death of me. As soon as I let it go in the kitchen it ran into a corner and then climbed up into the rafters. It wouldn't come done when I was there, even when I put milk out for it and waited very patiently. It then mewled pitifully whenever I left for the last couple days. It ran away this morning and went back to its mother. The rat was already back as of this evening, but I'm beginning to think the cat may be more trouble than it's worth (also I would have to cook for it, I did feel a little bad trying to feed it my left-over and rather spicy curry fried rice).
I had a pleasant surprise after class today, a couple kids came in to check out a textbook, and they took a good interest in the chess set, so I told them how to play and then coached them through a game against each other. I think they liked it pretty well, I hope they come back for another.
This morning was one of the most beautiful days I've seen in a long time. I was looking forward all morning to taking a nice walk in the afternoon, but by the time I was done teaching it was boring. It seems to be a rule that the sunnier the morning is, the more it will rain in the afternoon. Similarly, though rarer, it seems if it rains in the morning the afternoon will be nice. Anyway, it cleared up for a little in the early evening and I tried to do some actual exercise (really my first since hurting my foot in training). I'll blame my pitiful jogging performance on the altitude, I just hope I keep it up and improve. Anyway, I got back home just in time. I started cooking dinner and I heard the wind carrying me this sound which I realized the sound of the downpour on the aluminum roofs across the valley. About 10 minutes later it got to my house, and was quite impressive. Watching it come was gorgeous, as the sun was out too and the rain was very visible. I got a picture or two...
6.1.07
Today was another of those gorgeous mornings, and I was determined to take advantage of it (being Saturday). I did some household chores after getting up, packed my self a lunch (PB, honey, and banana sandwich. The honey I have is amazing.), and set out around 9:00. I've walked East for about 2.5 hours before, there's pretty steep mountains to the north, and the way south looks pretty boring (and roadless) for a while after the bus stop, so I decided to head West, trying to check out the path towards Lake Nyasa. I'd only been as far as Mlangali (about 45 minutes), so it was mostly new. It's very pretty, the rolling hills get bigger and bigger going towards the Livingstone Mountains, and the landscape is mostly cornfields or grass with frequent groves of eucalyptus and the occasional pine grove. It actually reminds me a whole lot of Northern California, though a little warmer in general.
I walked for almost 3 hours, and was about to turn around when I arrived at a village having some sort of celebration. I went up to check it out and was promptly invited to a seat with the village government, elders, and church officials (it was some sort of church-related event, I'm still not sure what exactly). Having a Mzungu (white person) at a celebration seems to add something, I suppose. Actually, they already had one Mzungu, Father Volker, who had driven in to preside and watch, and is planning on returning tomorrow to deliver a special mass for them.
There was lots of dancing, which I got some pictures of and later took part in, which everyone in the village LOVED. After I danced one song (not hard dances, step step step wait, step step step wait...) they gave me a drum and lots of smiles for that song, and then they gave me a flail/brush-like thing made maybe from the tail of some animal, which I waved around a lot but I'm still not sure waht I was supposed to do with it. Most of the music was either cassette tape (I think they were running a generator for the special occasion) or vocals with drums, but for a couple of the songs they brough out some of the most obnoxious instruments I've ever heard: bush kazoos. A couple of the women had short pieces of bamboo with a notch cut in the side and a piece of plastic rubber-banded on to one end which sounded just like a kazoo, and then some of the men had some small gourds with a notch in the neck that they blew through, the bottom half-chopped off to let the sound out, and the same pieces of plastic rubberbanded to the top, making bass kazoos. It was the first time I've heard kazoos in coordinated harmony, and was pretty cool, but it did sound like you would imagine a kazoo choir would sound like.
After the music and many long-winded speeches, there was a little feast in a community barn, and then luckily (because it was getting sort of close to dark) Father Volker gave me a ride home in his land rover. I got to learn a little more about him: he's a priest and Benedictine monk from Germany, and he's been here since the early 1970's. He said that Benedictine monks started Christianity in this valley about 70 years ago. He works with churches in 11 villages around Mlangali, as well as his big church in town. I know that he was instrumental in building my school in the late 1980's and in adding the A-Level buildings 2 years ago. He's also helping us build more classrooms now. I don't know quite how far-reaching his influence is. I've heard from a friend, Conor, who's site is about 25 km away (though a 2-2.5 hour bus ride... I haven't been there yet but I have pretty low expectations for the roads. That's an average speed of like 6 mph) that his mkuu (headmaster) got in a fight with some German Missionaries and chased them away. There are other German missionaries in the region, so I don't know if it's Fr Volker he's talking about. I'm looking forward to talking to Volker again, there's lots I want to know from him. When he started working here there was no AIDS epidemic, and though I haven't seen obvious evidence yet, it statistically must be pretty prevalent and I'm sure he has some experience.
Thursday, 11.1.07
I felt like a Peace Corps Volunteer Extraordinaire today. I organized a lab for my physics class, and after class about 6 students came to my office where a few of them played chess and the rest were looking at a couple world maps I had up (one was a great one National Geographic put out a few years ago of night satellite pictures, so you can see the lights of cities and fires and things) and talking about the world and asking questions about America and Tanzania and development. I think they may have been skipping another class to be there, but I won't worry about that just yet.
Also, I hung out it the staff room for a while and talked with a teacher who has been visiting his family for most of the time I've been here, and he seems pretty cool, I think I may get another good friend in him. I also got advice on the music stand I'm going to have made. I drew up some nice specs (taking Tools is coming in handy) and was going to go the the carpenter-fundi I've seen in town, but apparently there's a handy old mzee (old man) who lives near the school who will give me a good price.
I do have to say admit that my feeling of coolness came down a little with dinner. I steamed some pumpkin leaves and stalks with some onion and tomatoes--which has been on the menu for the last several nights running as I have a massive pumpkin vine--and instead of the rice supplement I've normally been accompanying it with, I decided to make some fried stuff. The onion rings turned out very well, the french fries were OK, I don't think I got the oil quite hot enough to really finish them well, and I also fried some cassava. I've tried several times to cook the cassava I was given, and I just can't do anything to it to make it taste good. Anyway, I ended up throwing out half of my dinner and eating a couple of bananas. The onion rings were great, but the grease on the french fries just started making me sick and I'm tired of the pumpkin greens. I think tomorrow I'll switch stuff up and do another little Italian food night.
Anyway, this whole week has been extremely busy. I've been trying to get some stuff done around the house (laundry, some more 'moving in') and I've been preparing about 1 hours worth of new physics material everyday (on fluid mechanics, which I've never studied--it's pretty cool), as well as trying to sort out what math homework problems to give, and trying to get some work together for my kids to do next week while I go to Iringa for AIDS training. And I was sick a bit in the beginning of the week, marking the fourth time I've had giardia in the past 20 days, though on the plus side I seem to be developing an immunity to it. Which is actually very nice, because it's really unpleasant. I have no idea how I managed to get giardia 4 times. The only two possibilities I can think of are that the drugs they had me take didn't really kill it off the first three time, or that somehow my drinking water got contaminated, so this time I re-sterilized my drinking water buckets and started reboiling and filter water.
Friday 12.1.2007
Today was a holiday, Zanzibar Revolution Day. Luckily, one of the other teachers mentioned it to me yesterday, so I slept in a little and didn't show up in the classroom at 730 expecting to teach. Instead, I did some cleaning in the morning and then climbed a nice little mountain by my house that I've been wanting to climb because there's a cell phone tower at the top which is what keeps me in contact with other volunteers and the little bits of contact with America I get. It's also a big mountain to the Southwest, so I was hoping I could maybe see Lake Nyasa from the top, but all I could see was the bigger mountains in between me and the lake.
Tomorrow, bright and early, I'm heading in to town to start making my way to the AIDS training I have for a week. To summarize life now, things are busy, which is nice for the most part, but two years still sounds like a much longer time than it did before. However, it's hard to believe that I've been at site for almost one-and-a-half months, making me 1/16 done.
Saturday, 20.1.2007
I've just completed my PEPFAR (President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) training seminar. It took place in Iringa, which is, I think, my favorite Tanzanian city so far. It's up on top of a hill, very pretty, not too hot, not too big, but big enough to have a nice market and some very nice shops (very safi dukas as we PCVs semi-correctly call them) and some really cool things going on.
For example, we were lucky enough to meet a guy named Bill Lloyd (I'll post a link to his website when I get it) and his son, both from DC, who were in town for a couple weeks delivering 70 computers to schools in the area. He's started an NGO (Non-Governmental Organization) in his free time where he accepts donations of computers from a lot of sources, fixes them up, and gives them to churches, schools, and community centers in America, and now also in Tanzania (this is his second computer-bringing trip to Tanzania). He also is hosting a Tanzanian student in his house and takes him to the community college where he teaches IT stuff. We were thrilled to meet him, especially since he was so happy to identify people in country here who can help him find good homes for these computers. He was very happy to give me a good MS Office tutorial and some ethernet cables so, if I get a router, I could set up a nice little LAN.
Now, I think this entry may have gone on long enough. The week has been really motivating, now I'll have to see how well my time can be managed as I try to start a Health Club and start organizing computer activities in addition to all the teaching. Step 1: get a housegirl to cook and do laundry!
until next time,
Gregor
I never know what to say when I've got the time pressure on in an Internet cafe, so I've decided to try to write some blog entries on the computer at school and take them in on diskette. I remember bringing a disk or two to college. I never used them. I never thought I'd use them again, but hey, they work great for text files.
4.1.2007
I was supposed to start teaching yesterday, but I should have known from training that no one would show up to class. There's a strong cultural precedent of not hurrying back to school after holidays. I've only seen 1 of the other 3 A-level teachers (the O-Levels have break until Jan. 15). So, I opened the door to my classroom yesterday, but the students who were here were mostly studying in one of the other classrooms. A couple came to ask me some questions, which was nice and led to me giving a mini-lecture/sermon-on-the-benefits-of-factoring-polynomials to the 20 or so students studying. Today, however, they surprised me by actually showing up to class (I asked the 3rd-mistress, the highest ranking person who isn't traveling when she thought they'd start coming to classes, and her guess was next Monday). So, I gave the lecture I had prepared for yesterday and I've started working on the one for tomorrow. Apparently a quorum of physics students are here and they're OK with starting classes.
At end-of-term breaks, one of the reasons students are late to return to school is that their parents need to collect the school fees, which takes time. I've heard that many schools cope with this by giving the students who do show up on time chores to do (cleaning, gardening, etc.) so that the majority of students don't fall behind in the first week. This seems horrible to me. I agree that maybe it would be best not to teach new material since 80% of the students may not be there, but it really seems like they are punishing the students who come on time. I think, at my own end of term, I will try to have the students come to my class and we will have review problem sessions, which the kids (I'm told) are generally quite enthusiastic about.
I also hung some things on the walls of my office (a world map and a cut-up old calendar of American art that I found in my house). I'm amazed how much nicer it feels to do work there now. Next step is to get some things up around my house... Also in my office I set up a chess set that I found in my house, and already a student and a teacher have shown some interest in it, so I'm hoping I can teach some people some games. Many people here play what they call draughts, which is the British name for checkers (I think), but the rules are a little different, basically the kings have super-powers. I've only played once so far. I'm going to try to follow the example of the volunteer I shadowed during training and collect bottle caps for chips and teach a group of kids poker. I think it would be a good cultural exchange, and maybe help develop some critical thinking skills, which in general need all the help they can get.
I was just about to write about the lack of rain: it rained everyday I've been here until this past Monday, and aside from a tiny drizzle this afternoon, I haven't seen it rain since New Year's, except it just started now and it sounds heavy enough that I'll miss my umbrella--which I've been so good about keeping with me--on the way home.
I did get an answer to one of my questions about technology here: they do use oxen form plowing extensively, I just have been in the wrong places at the wrong times to see the heavy planting times, and now the little that's being done, I'm told, is done exclusively in the early morning starting before sunrise. Still no clue on things like washboards, clothes wringers...
More neighborhood observations starting with corrections about Ulanzi, the local liquor. Ulanzi comes from bamboo, and is extremely easy to get. You simply cut down a large bamboo stalk and attach a shorter, but slightly larger diameter, collecting piece of bamboo to catch the Ulanzi that will bubble out over the next 12 hours. Then you drink it. Not to talk to much about Evils of Society or anything, but there is one teacher who I have noticed by far more often than any other teacher in one or another of the local Ulanzi Dens (what I call them in my head, "bar" doesn't really seem to fit). The other day I found out he lives in the one house on campus that confused me. All the teachers have housing provided, but this one house is dingier than all the others. It doesn't have glass in the windows, only wood shutters, and the kitchen is a mud hut outside. I've been in now, and I think there's supposed to be a kitchen room inside that seems to be given over to a little pig and some chickens. His wife is very nice and gave me a cat to help me out with my rat--which ate my peanut butter!!!--and then gave me a bagful of tomatoes from her garden. They also have one of the cutest kids I've seen here, which is saying a lot. The kid insists is probably about 5 and insists on greeting me every time I walk by, which is generally adorable.
The cat is another story. It scratched me plenty when I tried to catch it, I ended up carrying it to my house in a piece of cloth.
5.1.07
So, the cat scared the rat plenty but was scared to death of me. As soon as I let it go in the kitchen it ran into a corner and then climbed up into the rafters. It wouldn't come done when I was there, even when I put milk out for it and waited very patiently. It then mewled pitifully whenever I left for the last couple days. It ran away this morning and went back to its mother. The rat was already back as of this evening, but I'm beginning to think the cat may be more trouble than it's worth (also I would have to cook for it, I did feel a little bad trying to feed it my left-over and rather spicy curry fried rice).
I had a pleasant surprise after class today, a couple kids came in to check out a textbook, and they took a good interest in the chess set, so I told them how to play and then coached them through a game against each other. I think they liked it pretty well, I hope they come back for another.
This morning was one of the most beautiful days I've seen in a long time. I was looking forward all morning to taking a nice walk in the afternoon, but by the time I was done teaching it was boring. It seems to be a rule that the sunnier the morning is, the more it will rain in the afternoon. Similarly, though rarer, it seems if it rains in the morning the afternoon will be nice. Anyway, it cleared up for a little in the early evening and I tried to do some actual exercise (really my first since hurting my foot in training). I'll blame my pitiful jogging performance on the altitude, I just hope I keep it up and improve. Anyway, I got back home just in time. I started cooking dinner and I heard the wind carrying me this sound which I realized the sound of the downpour on the aluminum roofs across the valley. About 10 minutes later it got to my house, and was quite impressive. Watching it come was gorgeous, as the sun was out too and the rain was very visible. I got a picture or two...
6.1.07
Today was another of those gorgeous mornings, and I was determined to take advantage of it (being Saturday). I did some household chores after getting up, packed my self a lunch (PB, honey, and banana sandwich. The honey I have is amazing.), and set out around 9:00. I've walked East for about 2.5 hours before, there's pretty steep mountains to the north, and the way south looks pretty boring (and roadless) for a while after the bus stop, so I decided to head West, trying to check out the path towards Lake Nyasa. I'd only been as far as Mlangali (about 45 minutes), so it was mostly new. It's very pretty, the rolling hills get bigger and bigger going towards the Livingstone Mountains, and the landscape is mostly cornfields or grass with frequent groves of eucalyptus and the occasional pine grove. It actually reminds me a whole lot of Northern California, though a little warmer in general.
I walked for almost 3 hours, and was about to turn around when I arrived at a village having some sort of celebration. I went up to check it out and was promptly invited to a seat with the village government, elders, and church officials (it was some sort of church-related event, I'm still not sure what exactly). Having a Mzungu (white person) at a celebration seems to add something, I suppose. Actually, they already had one Mzungu, Father Volker, who had driven in to preside and watch, and is planning on returning tomorrow to deliver a special mass for them.
There was lots of dancing, which I got some pictures of and later took part in, which everyone in the village LOVED. After I danced one song (not hard dances, step step step wait, step step step wait...) they gave me a drum and lots of smiles for that song, and then they gave me a flail/brush-like thing made maybe from the tail of some animal, which I waved around a lot but I'm still not sure waht I was supposed to do with it. Most of the music was either cassette tape (I think they were running a generator for the special occasion) or vocals with drums, but for a couple of the songs they brough out some of the most obnoxious instruments I've ever heard: bush kazoos. A couple of the women had short pieces of bamboo with a notch cut in the side and a piece of plastic rubber-banded on to one end which sounded just like a kazoo, and then some of the men had some small gourds with a notch in the neck that they blew through, the bottom half-chopped off to let the sound out, and the same pieces of plastic rubberbanded to the top, making bass kazoos. It was the first time I've heard kazoos in coordinated harmony, and was pretty cool, but it did sound like you would imagine a kazoo choir would sound like.
After the music and many long-winded speeches, there was a little feast in a community barn, and then luckily (because it was getting sort of close to dark) Father Volker gave me a ride home in his land rover. I got to learn a little more about him: he's a priest and Benedictine monk from Germany, and he's been here since the early 1970's. He said that Benedictine monks started Christianity in this valley about 70 years ago. He works with churches in 11 villages around Mlangali, as well as his big church in town. I know that he was instrumental in building my school in the late 1980's and in adding the A-Level buildings 2 years ago. He's also helping us build more classrooms now. I don't know quite how far-reaching his influence is. I've heard from a friend, Conor, who's site is about 25 km away (though a 2-2.5 hour bus ride... I haven't been there yet but I have pretty low expectations for the roads. That's an average speed of like 6 mph) that his mkuu (headmaster) got in a fight with some German Missionaries and chased them away. There are other German missionaries in the region, so I don't know if it's Fr Volker he's talking about. I'm looking forward to talking to Volker again, there's lots I want to know from him. When he started working here there was no AIDS epidemic, and though I haven't seen obvious evidence yet, it statistically must be pretty prevalent and I'm sure he has some experience.
Thursday, 11.1.07
I felt like a Peace Corps Volunteer Extraordinaire today. I organized a lab for my physics class, and after class about 6 students came to my office where a few of them played chess and the rest were looking at a couple world maps I had up (one was a great one National Geographic put out a few years ago of night satellite pictures, so you can see the lights of cities and fires and things) and talking about the world and asking questions about America and Tanzania and development. I think they may have been skipping another class to be there, but I won't worry about that just yet.
Also, I hung out it the staff room for a while and talked with a teacher who has been visiting his family for most of the time I've been here, and he seems pretty cool, I think I may get another good friend in him. I also got advice on the music stand I'm going to have made. I drew up some nice specs (taking Tools is coming in handy) and was going to go the the carpenter-fundi I've seen in town, but apparently there's a handy old mzee (old man) who lives near the school who will give me a good price.
I do have to say admit that my feeling of coolness came down a little with dinner. I steamed some pumpkin leaves and stalks with some onion and tomatoes--which has been on the menu for the last several nights running as I have a massive pumpkin vine--and instead of the rice supplement I've normally been accompanying it with, I decided to make some fried stuff. The onion rings turned out very well, the french fries were OK, I don't think I got the oil quite hot enough to really finish them well, and I also fried some cassava. I've tried several times to cook the cassava I was given, and I just can't do anything to it to make it taste good. Anyway, I ended up throwing out half of my dinner and eating a couple of bananas. The onion rings were great, but the grease on the french fries just started making me sick and I'm tired of the pumpkin greens. I think tomorrow I'll switch stuff up and do another little Italian food night.
Anyway, this whole week has been extremely busy. I've been trying to get some stuff done around the house (laundry, some more 'moving in') and I've been preparing about 1 hours worth of new physics material everyday (on fluid mechanics, which I've never studied--it's pretty cool), as well as trying to sort out what math homework problems to give, and trying to get some work together for my kids to do next week while I go to Iringa for AIDS training. And I was sick a bit in the beginning of the week, marking the fourth time I've had giardia in the past 20 days, though on the plus side I seem to be developing an immunity to it. Which is actually very nice, because it's really unpleasant. I have no idea how I managed to get giardia 4 times. The only two possibilities I can think of are that the drugs they had me take didn't really kill it off the first three time, or that somehow my drinking water got contaminated, so this time I re-sterilized my drinking water buckets and started reboiling and filter water.
Friday 12.1.2007
Today was a holiday, Zanzibar Revolution Day. Luckily, one of the other teachers mentioned it to me yesterday, so I slept in a little and didn't show up in the classroom at 730 expecting to teach. Instead, I did some cleaning in the morning and then climbed a nice little mountain by my house that I've been wanting to climb because there's a cell phone tower at the top which is what keeps me in contact with other volunteers and the little bits of contact with America I get. It's also a big mountain to the Southwest, so I was hoping I could maybe see Lake Nyasa from the top, but all I could see was the bigger mountains in between me and the lake.
Tomorrow, bright and early, I'm heading in to town to start making my way to the AIDS training I have for a week. To summarize life now, things are busy, which is nice for the most part, but two years still sounds like a much longer time than it did before. However, it's hard to believe that I've been at site for almost one-and-a-half months, making me 1/16 done.
Saturday, 20.1.2007
I've just completed my PEPFAR (President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) training seminar. It took place in Iringa, which is, I think, my favorite Tanzanian city so far. It's up on top of a hill, very pretty, not too hot, not too big, but big enough to have a nice market and some very nice shops (very safi dukas as we PCVs semi-correctly call them) and some really cool things going on.
For example, we were lucky enough to meet a guy named Bill Lloyd (I'll post a link to his website when I get it) and his son, both from DC, who were in town for a couple weeks delivering 70 computers to schools in the area. He's started an NGO (Non-Governmental Organization) in his free time where he accepts donations of computers from a lot of sources, fixes them up, and gives them to churches, schools, and community centers in America, and now also in Tanzania (this is his second computer-bringing trip to Tanzania). He also is hosting a Tanzanian student in his house and takes him to the community college where he teaches IT stuff. We were thrilled to meet him, especially since he was so happy to identify people in country here who can help him find good homes for these computers. He was very happy to give me a good MS Office tutorial and some ethernet cables so, if I get a router, I could set up a nice little LAN.
Now, I think this entry may have gone on long enough. The week has been really motivating, now I'll have to see how well my time can be managed as I try to start a Health Club and start organizing computer activities in addition to all the teaching. Step 1: get a housegirl to cook and do laundry!
until next time,
Gregor
Monday, January 01, 2007
New Year is Here!
So, on Wednesday I start teaching full time, it's the official re-opening of Form V. The first topic I'm gonna do in Physics, I think, is fluid dynamics, which sounds really cool--I've been reading a lot about it because I've never learned it before... Though I might start with some review of circular and harmonic motion, make sure the kids remember.
So, I should be teaching my butt off for about two weeks, when I have to interrupt to go to a PEPFAR (President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) training, which will be nice to see people but a shame to have to take a week off teaching. After that again I'll be teaching like mad until mid-March, when I think the A-Level kids have a month-long vacation. Then, I don't know what I'll do as most of my friends are O-Level teachers who will be in the middle of the school year. It may involve a lot of bicycling.
I'm getting settled in pretty well at my site. I've begun working my garden, a little bit, which is being a nice food source of spinach-like greens and pumpkin leaves, as well as basil, parsley, and rosemary. I'm still under some pretty heavy mood swings, but sooner or later they'll subside. I hope. I think starting to teach lots will actually be about the best thing for me, being very busy means no time to be lonely.
I've been doing all my cooking so far, but a goal for this week is to find a nice mama who can cook lunches for me, because I just won't have the time to do that. I may even have her do a couple dinners a week--we'll see. That and my laundry. I have to say, doing laundry and dishes by hand in buckets is one of my least favorite chores ever.
So, that's how things are looking now, I thank you all for all the support you've been sending, it helps a lot.
-Gregor
So, I should be teaching my butt off for about two weeks, when I have to interrupt to go to a PEPFAR (President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) training, which will be nice to see people but a shame to have to take a week off teaching. After that again I'll be teaching like mad until mid-March, when I think the A-Level kids have a month-long vacation. Then, I don't know what I'll do as most of my friends are O-Level teachers who will be in the middle of the school year. It may involve a lot of bicycling.
I'm getting settled in pretty well at my site. I've begun working my garden, a little bit, which is being a nice food source of spinach-like greens and pumpkin leaves, as well as basil, parsley, and rosemary. I'm still under some pretty heavy mood swings, but sooner or later they'll subside. I hope. I think starting to teach lots will actually be about the best thing for me, being very busy means no time to be lonely.
I've been doing all my cooking so far, but a goal for this week is to find a nice mama who can cook lunches for me, because I just won't have the time to do that. I may even have her do a couple dinners a week--we'll see. That and my laundry. I have to say, doing laundry and dishes by hand in buckets is one of my least favorite chores ever.
So, that's how things are looking now, I thank you all for all the support you've been sending, it helps a lot.
-Gregor
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