One month ago today we arrived in Tanzania, exhausted and disheveled after 36 hours of travel. Although we have endured that trip many times--Justin has made the round-trip 10 times, I have 8 times, and Juma 6--this trip was different. First of all, Justin and I had spent the night and day before the departure sick as dogs. We had caught a ferocious stomach bug during the holiday festivities, and did nothing but lie in our hotel bed in Springville, Utah, wishing it would end and texting everyone I could think of to please come pick up Juma and feed him. Thankfully, it was only a 24 hour bug, and by the morning we were well enough to finish packing our 12 bags and drive the hour to the airport.
Which brings me to the second reason this trip was different--we were moving to Tanzania. Not just staying for 3 months or even 8 months like previous trips. That's why we had the 12 bags, 6 checked and 6 carry-on, the airline's limit for international flights. After all, we need a lot of stuff: sun block, mosquito repellant, tampons, decent socks, Legos, all our electronics--cameras, digital recorders, laptops, hard drives, a scanner--the kind of stuff we cannot get in-country.
The flights and layovers themselves were uneventful, as they almost always are. The most memorable thing about all the flights was the fact that there were no individual TV screens on the flight from Portland, Oregon to Amsterdam. What kind of airline doesn't provide individual screens an a 9-hour flight?!? Nevertheless, we survived Salt Lake City to Portland to Amsterdam to Kilimanjaro to Dar es Salaam.
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania's biggest city and commercial capital is hot, noisy, dirty, and cram-packed with cars. I never knew the Swahili word for traffic until we spent time in Dar last year. Fuleni. We're talking it takes 2 hours to get 2 miles sometimes. The city has 4 million people and there is not a single freeway. Cars are constantly competing with buses, pedestrians, bicycles, bajaj, donkey carts, you name it. Tourists have one reason to come to Dar: to get somewhere else--Zanzibar, safari, Mt. Kilimanjaro. While Dar has its advantages--good hotels, supermarkets with imported goods, a movie theater, a variety of restaurants, even a mall--the fuleni is impossible. I don't comprehend how people live there. Lucky for us, Dar is not where we need to be based for our projects; we only have to pass through from time to time. I don't even have any pictures from any of our trips in Dar; I haven't bothered to take pictures of anything there.
So within 2 days of arrival, just long enough for us to buy some rabies vaccines and get a rental car, we made the 300 mile overland journey to our new home: Iringa.
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