Road trip to Iringa

Iringa is 300 miles inland, connected to Dar es Salaam by a long stretch of tarmac road called the Tanzanian-Zambian Highway, or the TanZam Highway for short. It stretches from Dar, through Iringa, then on to Zambia via Mbeya.



Iringa is one of a handful of towns along the highway that is Zambia's only overland connection to the coast. And when I say highway, I mean a narrow road with one lane going each way. This is The Route to get people and import goods from the coast to Zambia, and every place in between. So semi-trucks, giant buses, gasoline tankers, and trucks crammed with tomatoes, potatoes, onions, or cattle rattle along this road, competing with private cars, local mini-buses, military convoys, and the ubiquitous NGO-owned, donor-funded Toyota Landcruiser SUVs going 80 miles per hour.

No one wants to drive this road after dark--there are no street lights at all, and the road sometimes curves through mountain passes with steep drop offs, and other times directly through villages with everything from bicycles to goats to three-year-olds crossing the street at any time. Buses are determined to get their passengers to their far-flung destinations in one day, too, so they drive insanely fast, rumbling over villages' speed bumps and potholes as if they were nothing. The semi-trucks have their deadlines to get their goods to Zambia, but this often takes several days, and truck stop restaurants and cheap guesthouses dot the highway. The remains of trucks and buses that have rolled off the road in deadly accidents also dot the highway.

Speed limits are enforced in only two ways: speed bumps (called speed humps here, lol) and police stops. The police don't have cars to catch speeders, no. Police just get dropped off at random places on the highway, and they flag you down as you drive by. Even if you aren't speeding or passing illegally (absolutely everyone passes illegally, on blind curves and narrow bridges, up hills in mountains; they just try not to do it if they can see a police stop in the distance), the police almost always find an excuse to ask for a "fine." Either you were one kilometer over the limit, or one of your many registration/insurance/fire safety inspection/who-knows-what stickers are out of date, or you don't have the proper stamp on your registration. One policeman even claimed that we needed to paint our address on the body of the vehicle (it wasn't even our car).

The police, you see, are bored, or hungry, or greedy for a, ahem, "fine." We've found that speaking in very rapid English--it doesn't matter about what--does the trick to get us a clean pass. Once, Justin went off about Juma's school in Baltimore and what subjects he learns there. What matters is that the cop sees how many other cars are driving by without being stopped, and realizes he's wasting his time on the fast-talking mzungu, and waves you along. As one of our expat friends explained, they'll never ask for a "fine" in English, they don't really know how, so if you reveal your Swahili abilities, they've got you.

Last summer, we decided being stopped by the cops is inevitable. But on this most recent trip down to Iringa, we weren't stopped even one time. We felt very proud of this accomplishment, though I think it had everything to do with the fact that we were driving a rental car, with the company's well-known logo on the driver's side door, and nothing to do with us.

Before, we were renting a car from some friends, a monster of a car we had a love-hate relationship with. We called it The Green Machine; the owners called it the Avocadomobile.




We spent more money on repairs for it than we did in rent, and we got three flat tires within the first week. Once, we got two flat tires at the same time, high in the mountain pass where the road was the narrowest, the drop offs the steepest, and there was no cell phone reception. Thankfully, we had two spares. Another time, it broke down completely on the side of the road in town and Justin and Juma had to wait for two hours for help. That car scared me so much I never once drove it, all last summer. Justin, awesome husband that he is, did all the driving. As much as that car helped us build character, well, we're happy to be driving a more reliable car now. And, yes, I do drive this one, though re-learning how to drive a manual, and on the left side of the road no less, scared me. (And every time I drive it, it scares Justin.)

Despite all that crap, the drive through Tanzania is actually quite scenic. We pass through rolling hills with banana, coconut, and mango trees; a national park where you can see giraffes, elephants, baboons, zebras, and water buffalo while driving by; a huge forest of baobab trees; tiny villages; plantations of sisal; and beautiful mountains that remind me of Utah. There's one place about half-way through that serves Swiss food, oddly enough, and right next door is a snake park with pythons, cobras, vipers, and green mambas in cages. And as we get closer to Iringa, the air gets noticeably cooler, the road climbing up into the Southern Highlands, Tanzania's coldest regions, and our home.

the journey to Tanzania

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.

safari

Here is a little taste of the safari we went on last weekend to Ruaha National Park. If you want to see more, I put 87 of the 400 pictures on facebook.



This elephant really was that close. This is not using the zoom.



This lion wasn't really that close. I was using the zoom.

it's official: we're moving to Tanzania!

Justin and I will both be working on a HIV prevention project through the university. He'll be full-time, I'll be part-time while I finish my PhD. The project is slated to last 4 years, though it will likely go longer.

It's very exciting for both of us, though not so much for Juma. He's very sad to leave his great friends and wonderful school, naturally. But we have found a great English-speaking international school for him, which I am sure is filled with wonderful friends for him.

We will be in Iringa, which is the same city we lived in last summer. We'll be in the very same house, in fact, and have the same address:

PO Box 1441
Iringa, Tanzania

So we are packing up the house, and will spend about 10 days in Utah for the holidays before we go. 2012 in Tanzania!

whoa, it's been a busy month

The blog doesn't say so, but it was a busy August. We still haven't gotten permission from the government and university to do the research that we were supposed to do this summer, but we had lots of other tasks, like visiting organizations and government officials, and furnishing the project house. Here are some events and pictures from August:

Three times we drove (Justin drove, we were passengers) south to visit other towns in the region for work. Njombe is a large town, far enough away that we had to stay overnight. Once, we broke up the trip and stayed on a farm in between Iringa and Njombe.

Lucky us, the staff made a mistake and upgraded us to a luxury cabin.



We took the day off and hiked around the farm, stopping to see their crops, cattle, and lakes.




On one of the trips to Njombe, we stayed with some new-found Danish friends, on their farm. They had tons of fowl, goats, sheep, and cows




as well as a bunch of pigs. These little piglets were just 4 days old.




Njombe has a club that was once the British colonial club, complete with a library of old books and a snooker table. It's a bit like pool, but the table is huge.



Part of our work-related travels were documented in a Tanzanian newspaper!






Back at home, we put our fireplace to use. Yes, it is cold enough in Iringa to have fires!




Juma roasted hot dogs over the fire, and invented a new dish: chocolate hot dogs. He claims it was good. Later, Justin has a metal worker make a grill for the fire, so we can cook lots of yummy stuff.




Since we moved into an unfurnished house, Justin has been having a carpenter build us furniture (Iringa region produces timber). Here's a view of the empty dining room



and now with our 8-chair table.



We also bought some tables that are serving as work desks for now in our once-empty living room. (We still don't have couches or anything.)






We also had beds made, then fancy mosquito nets.




Right now, we are in Zanzibar for the end of our trip. We got to see the new baby boy of our friends we met last year. Meet Nuh (Arabic version of Noah).

address

We have a PO Box in Iringa now!

Beckham
PO Box 1441
Iringa, Tanzania

We also have a six-bedroom house (hint, hint...come visit).





and a temporary car until we can get something with a little less...character.

monkeys and bullfrogs and butterflies, oh my!

Iringa-Dar-Zanzibar

We finished up our short trip to Iringa, and took the looong car ride back to Dar es Salaam. We heard from various people that the car ride between Dar and Iringa is anywhere from 5 to 8 hours. It took us 10, door-to-door. Part of that was because we went into Morogoro town, partway between the two cities, to eat at a certain Indian restaurant that was recommended by someone on another project team. The food was fabulous, but they apparently had to prepare everything from scratch after we ordered it (actually, this is the norm for mid-priced restaurants in Tanzania; we should have known), so we were there for a while. The distance is about 500 kilometers, so we could make the trip in 5 hours...if there were absolutely no other cars or slow-moving transport trucks on the road, no construction, no pot-holed sections, no rain, and no stops. Which will never happen. Next time we go, which will be as soon as next week, we’ll call ahead to the Indian place to give our order, so it’ll be piping hot and ready when we reach the town.

Everyone kept telling how cold it is in Iringa, and giving their sympathies for having to endure such cold. To them, the heat of Dar is the default, the normal, so Iringa is not only cold, but too cold. But to me, the cool of Iringa is awesome, and Dar is far too hot and sweaty. The weather was downright pleasant in Iringa, and uncomfortable in Dar, even in the cool season that we’re in now.

We’re in a little bit of a waiting game on the project with some bureaucracy, so we decided to come to Zanzibar, our second home. It’s lovely to be back. We’ve already run across some people we know and visited a couple of our old haunts. We had a couple of meetings with people in the US today, so we conducted them via Skype from a rooftop restaurant while a great view of Stone Town and a lovely breeze, and then while having gelato at our favorite little Italian place just off the beach. Justin commented that it’s too bad we have to do work while we’re in Zanzibar; I said, “Yeah, but we’d be working anyway; might as well do it from Zanzibar!”

One our second day here in Zanzibar, we went to our oldest friend, Juma's, house. His wife gave birth to their first child in February. We'd been waiting almost 5 months to meet her. Since our Juma is named after big Juma, they named little Sarah after me!

meet Sarah Juma Hussein

Juma jumping (Iringa, Tanzania)

karibu Iringa!

We are in Iringa town today, having made the long 8-hour drive down from Dar es Salaam, where we have been so far. We, along with two of our American colleagues, rented a car (rental cars come with drivers here) to come. We wanted to see Iringa for the first time--Justin and I had only stopped for 20 minutes at a truck stop outside of town once in 1999--and meet some of the officials we’d be working with. .

Iringa town is on a large hill in a region of low mountains (for someone who grew up in the Rockies, they are low; for Africa, they are certainly mountains). The site was originally chosen by the German colonists because it was on a high hill, both for defense and to stay away from mosquitoes. Everyone here claims there are no mosquitoes, and the hotel didn’t even originally provide a mosquito net for Juma, but when they say “there are no mosquitoes,” they mean “there are fewer mosquitoes here than elsewhere.” Which is still too many for us. We’ve done malaria three times in our family, and we’re not eager to do it again.

Anyway, the town is hilly, and has a nice view of surrounding valleys and mountains. It’s the cool season, and that actually means cool, not like in Zanzibar, where cool means it gets down to 75 at night. Here at night, it gets down to the 50s, which is cool enough to want a blanket, and a jacket in the evenings and mornings. I’ve had long-sleeves on all day, even outside, and while inside with no fan, and I haven’t sweated a bit! It’s astounding. The plants and trees are cooler-weather ones; they even grow peaches and pears in this region, and there is a noticeable lack of coconut palms.

The drive down here was long, but pleasant enough. Had the single-lane highway not been so full of slow-moving trucks the driver had to strategically pass up, we would have arrived a lot earlier. The road takes us right through Mikumi national park, and we spotted lots of animals standing very close to the road: several elephants, including a baby; zebras, giraffes, gazelles, baboons, and a monkey. I snapped a picture of the elephants with my phone, but without a zoom. Our coworkers got better pictures, I’ll try to get one from them. The road also takes us through all different topographies, from the coastal lowlands to the baobab tree forests, to sisal plantations, to areas with bright red dirt, to onion farms, to the mountains of the Rift Valley.

Here's the obligatory picture in front of a baobab tree. Their fruits are going into a yummy candy.

different

I can’t even remember what we did Friday and Saturday. I’m pretty sure there was another long meeting in a conference room, and some lazing around the hotel while trying to ignore the loud sounds of construction from the building sites on two sides of the hotel. Also some eating out at fancy restaurants (fancy for us in Tanzania, but pretty normal as far as our American choices would go) with our colleagues.

Again, the key theme on this trip is difference. The busy city, the interactions with more Americans and highly-educated Tanzanians in offices than regular Tanzanians in the neighborhoods, the rides in hired cars, the quality of accommodations.

In previous trips, especially before Juma was born but also after, we looked for the cheapest possible hotels. Not even hotels, but hostels and guesthouses. We paid 10 dollars a night, tops, per person, often as little as 2 or 3 dollars. They were generally just in the hustle and bustle of the city, and could be close to loud traffic. One was right above a city bus stop, with honking and yelling going all hours of the day and night. Those kinds of places have horribly uncomfortable, lumpy, thin mattresses, questionable sheets, dirty mosquito nets with holes in them, and shared bathrooms. Which could be quite scary at times, and usually had mosquito screens on the windows, but they were inevitably full of holes and being bitten in unreachable places on my back while showering was a given. There would be no question about not using the tap water to brush your teeth, because one look at that sink and faucet screamed, “Stay away!”

On this trip, though, we’ve had rather nice accommodations, will comfortable beds, nice mosquito nets, and pleasant gardens surrounding the hotel within a gated compound. The room we are in now is super spacious, with a separate nook as a dressing room, a desk in one corner, and a sectioned-off area that serves as both sitting room and Juma’s room. The staff are (overly?) attentive and nice, and there is even a trampoline on the grounds (the owners have small children). We have accidentally used the tap water on our toothbrushes, tricked into a false sense of security by its shiny cleanliness (Juma reports he has not--phew). We are quite pleased with it, and it’s someplace to be comfortable in, and not just put up with. My only complaint is that the supposed free wireless has been spotty or completely inaccessible. I’m writing these blog posts offline, to upload later...

Dear Jet lag,

I am jet lag.

Jet lag I am.

Do you like awake-at-1-am?


Jet lag I am, oh, jet lag I am,

I do not like that jet lag I am.


Would you like some in your bed?

Or would you like the couch instead?


No, I would not like it in my bed.

We do not have a couch instead.

I do not like you, jet lag I am.

I do not like awake-at-1-am.


Would you, could you, with a barking dog?

(Who wants to be sleeping like a log?)


No, I would not, could not with a barking doggy,

His bark is making me quite groggy,

I do not like you, jet lag I am.

I do not like awake-at-1-am.



Would you like to hear a goat,

A hellish bleating from its throat?

Try it, try it, and you may!

Try it, and you may, I say!




I do not like the bleating goat,

And that, jet lag, is my last vote!

I do not like you, jet lag I am!

I do not like awake-at-1-am!

day 2. is it only day 2?

After a fairly good night's sleep our first night here, we got up bright and early for an 8:30 meeting. We don't have child care arrangements for Juma yet, so we had to bring him along to two meetings yesterday and one today. At the first meeting yesterday, we had to be on the guest list and go through crazy security. Juma wasn't on the guest list, so that caused a hullabaloo, but we eventually got in. We hooked up Juma with a book to read, and he sat in the corner while we did our thing.

This trip it totally different from any of our previous trips. Not only are we on the mainland instead of the islands, but we are working top-down with lots of organizations and government officials instead of at the grassroots, talking to villagers and hanging out at local shops. We're going from hotel to taxi to air-conditioned conference room to taxi to another air-conditioned conference room. We ate at restaurants that cost just as much as they do in the US. We have an actual budget with real money. We have incomes and job titles, and I handed out more business cards in the past two days than I ever have in total.

It's like we're grownups or something.

As we waited for a taxi today after a meeting, Juma put on an impromptu concert for our colleagues (from my department at school).

something familiar

We are in Tanzania once again. We arrived late last night after two long-haul flights, unaware until we arrived that a volcanic eruption in Eritrea or Ethiopia added a detour and an extra hour to the second flight. The transit isn’t so bad now that we’ve got the travel routine down. What to pack and what to buy here, the best positions to attempt to sleep in while on the plane (best combined with an over-the-counter sleeping pill), the best airport for layovers (Amsterdam), how to stretch Juma across our laps so he can sleep, which airplane food to avoid.

It’s nice to land in a familiar airport, know how to talk to the passport control guy, how to walk confidently through customs so they don’t flag us down for inspection, how to pick a taxi driver out of all the many vying for our attention, how to negotiate the price down from his initial bid.

It is so completely different from our first time here. I was reminded of our first time to Tanzania while still on the place. We sat behind three young women, around 20 years old, who were obviously traveling to Africa for their first time and were obviously American (they were so loud!). They cheered when they took off, giggling with delight, “We’re on our way! Say goodbye to civilization for the next three weeks!” As we landed in Kilimanjaro airport (just a layover for us), the girls were too excited to sit still, and leaned over each other to see out of the window, sharing ecstatic “We’re here!”s and giving each other tips on how to wear their money belts. I turned to Justin and asked, “Were we like this our first trip?” “No,” he answered. “Well, probably, yeah.” We had left the US wondering what we were getting into, brought camping gear thinking we’d be really roughing it, eagerly watching out the window as Nairobi came into view, keeping our money belts on our waists the entire flight. Or I should say, the entire sting of flights. There were 5, since we took the cheapest route possible, stopping on the east cost, Europe, two places in the Middle East, before finally landing in Nairobi, Kenya.

How the bustle, heat, noises, and smells overwhelmed me when we arrived! There was the confusion of where to go to show our visas, where to get our bags, worrying that they all arrived, looking at the Swahili/English signs. I had taken a whole year of Swahili before I came, but didn’t comprehend any of the conversations I was hearing. I was tired, and feeling dirty, and completely lost. I remember the tremendous relief I felt at seeing our professor, Gary, a head-and-a-half taller than the rest of the airport crowd, waiting just outside the airport. Something familiar! The next 4-plus months on that trip held very little that was familiar to me.

boy, have I been busy

Well, I have been super busy. I was taking 5 classes and TAing another. I helped my mom and siblings plan a surprise birthday party for my dad's 60th birthday, and I flew out to Utah to surprise him in early October. Then my first term of classes ended with a bang of finals the next week; I spent an entire weekend on campus studying. The minute I finished my last final I started writing a grant proposal, which I worked on feverishly for five days (including an entire Saturday on campus) until I turned it in about 30 minutes ago. Second term started the day after first term ended, but won't hit hard until next week when I have three assignments due Monday and Tuesday, and another grant proposal due Wednesday.

So now I have time to blog a bit while my professor lectures to a class I'm a teaching assistant for.

In Utah, I got to see my parents, almost all my siblings and nieces and nephews--on both sides of the family, since all of Justin's siblings now live there.

I got Liam to like me



by letting him play with the camera on my iPhone. He was very proud of his choo choo train shoes.



Mariah liked to pose for him.




At the birthday party, the kids had a great time playing on the stage and running around the gym and out into the hallways making their parents wonder where on earth they had gone and what they were up to. If they are anything like I was when I was a kid in a church on a non-Sunday (and I'm pretty sure they are), they were getting drinks from the drinking fountain, running in the halls when no adults were watching, and looking for unlocked rooms only to be disappointed when all they found was folding chairs.



While I traveled, Justin and Juma entertained themselves by going to museums and eating Ben & Jerry's ice cream



and going rock climbing. Juma loves climbing. Juma's the one in the green shirt and orange harness.

home!

in Baltimore. New address and eventually new phone numbers. Stay tuned.

next leg of the journey home

We are in the Dar es Salaam airport, killing time before our delayed flight, surfing the net to use up our modem credits, and spending our last Tanzanian shillings on candy. Fun stuff.

on our way home!

Can you believe it? The eight months are over!

We took a boat from Unguja to Dar es Salaam yesterday.

Here's Juma saying, "Goodbye Zanzibar, Hello Dar es Salaam!" Juma was pretty excited because he's never actually been in Dar anywhere other than the airport.



Our next leg of the journey takes us to London on Sunday. We'll spend the night at a friend's house, then our final flight on Monday brings us to Washington, DC.

Once we get to our car and storage unit in Baltimore, I think our first priority will be to find our air mattresses and some linens so we can just sleep, sleep, sleep in our temporary apartment. Then we have one day to unpack before I have to go to school!

Juma is 8 years old!

Juma turned eight! It was the last day of school, too; what better birthday present is that? Well, even better than that is that Justin came down from Pemba, suffering two awful ferry rides on a choppy sea, just to be here for two nights to celebrate with us.

On the first night, Juma's actual birthday, we ate out at an Italian restaurant (pizza! gnocchi! three types of bread!) then had a birthday cake (unfrosted, at Juma's request).





The next day we took a boat ride with some of our friends out to Changuu Island, about 30 minutes away, for a relaxing picnic and swim at a little beach.

Abdul, who lives downstairs, and Najesh, who lives across the street, came along. Juma's known these kids since we lived in this same house in 2004, when they were all just toddlers. They had a blast playing in the ocean and then in the sand.






And of course Juma's namesake Juma came along, and helped him stay warm in the wind after his swim.



Our newest friend, Chase, also came, for her very first trip to one of the outlying islands in the archipelago. (That's me, Sarah, in the picture, by the way, the one with the shaved head and sunglasses.)

friends weekend

Two of my classmates who are working in Dar es Salaam came out to Zanzibar for the weekend, and we had some fun showing them around town and going to a northern beach.

This thing-a-ma-job Juma is holding is to help you take bucket-showers, but Juma used it on the beach.




These pictures are in Forodhani, a area right on the seashore that was fixed up last year to look nice like this. It's very popular with both tourists and Zanzibaris in the evenings.





These are from around Stone Town.







These are the crazy, scary steps up to our apartment.




And these are from Nungwi, a village on the northern tip of the island.