Pierogi's in TZ

March 30, 2011

I am back in the village and really refreshed and SUPER happy to be back after a long, but fun trip. I am kind of amazed at the amount of traveling I did and very proud that I was able to do it at times by myself. I took a bus from Iringa to Dodoma that went through the bush literally. I sat on the bus for 9 hours as we went up and down winding roads that were all dirt. I would say it would be the equivalent to riding through the mountains on the way to Steamboat but with only one lane on dirt with no guard rails. I have to say I did not feel like I was going to die once on that road which is more than I can say for most of the roads. I did realize though that if we would of crashed I am pretty sure I would either be dead or in critical condition because we would have just toppled off the mountain. But it was fun and the view was amazing.

I then spent the night in Dodoma by myself which was not too bad. They have 3G network there so I got to skype the family and caught up on everything. It was great. After that I went to Claire’s house and caught up with her and Yue. It turns out that Yue (PC education volunteer) is moving to Moshi which is in the north, so we are going to have a going away party for him on Saturday. It should be really fun although I am not looking forward to going back into town. I really need to go and I know it will be fun with everyone. I am just ready for some down time, especially too because I know that I am going to be gone for a while at home. Oh well.

So I returned and was pleasantly surprised that the termites had not eaten my door. I really thought I was going to come back to a house with no door. The termites here are killing me. I was also happy to see that my house was intact and no one had broken in. Lately is seems a lot of people have had break-ins. I can only assume this is also going to happen to me, but really hope it doesn’t. I think it helps that I lock every door that I can which comes to 4 and my neighbors Iive super close. But I have to say if they can make it all the way into my bedroom and out without anyone noticing, I would be very impressed and of course totally pissed off. But anyways the house was in order except for the amount of termites trying to take over, so I super cleaned the house and now it is beautiful. Then I went to see young Jessica and greet my neighbors. It was great. I really do love my village, even if at times I do not. They are just amazing, they remind me so much of everyone at the cottage. I also went to the open market today and bought some vegetables. I love the rainy season, cheap, amazing looking vegetables. So I made fried potatoes for dinner.

I also bought instant irish cream coffee when I was in Dar and a ceramic mug. I think my mornings are going to be transformed by this. I think the coffee tastes great although I am sure there are many who would beg to differ. I think I am going to attempt poptarts tomorrow. I am very excited. But not excited to do the massive amount of laundry that I have piling up.
And yes I just peed in my courtyard because a frog has taken over my bathroom. Why does it have to choose the bathroom. I also found a dead one when I was cleaning the bathroom.

March 31, 2011

I think God must be punishing me for something because in the last week I have got to care packages that contain peanut M & Ms and I walked through a whole aisle at the grocery store. Mind you I have not seen real candy in months. And now it all just keeps appearing. This is going to be a long Lent.

Also I forgot that when I was at Claire’s I walked into the kitchen to be greeted by a nice large rat that was running for cover. Needless to say, I freaked out and ran the other way on top of the furniture. This kept me awake all night. This also reminded me of the year of the rat circa 2007. Although Han ended up finding that one dead under the dryer. I feel this one might haunt me for a while as well. We shall see. Yue swears he saw it run out the hole in window. I am skeptical.

Today I spent the day doing laundry and cooking. I made poptarts that were amazing and a rice dish. I tried to use the corn that Jessica gave me. I boiled it for like 30 minutes, but it was still really hard. I wish they grew good corn here. It is horrible. Not something I will be missing from here. I also got a huge amount of corn from the village today that I get to mortar and pestle and then bring to the mill to get milled. This should be interesting. They would not let me say no to it.

And yet again the kids got me. Today they killed my sunflower plant that was in my courtyard. It was beautiful and growing all by itself. I am not sure how they manage to do all of this. But it is getting me one set closer to killing them. WHY do they have to kill everything I am growing between this and the playing with my water tank (I constantly tell them no and yell at them) I might go off the deep end. Today also made me realize that I need to shut my house door anytime that I lay down. I actually fell asleep today mid afternoon and was awakened by the mattress moving. It turns out that my dada’s son had walked in my house and was coming to greet me. He is 5 and usually walks in the house. This did not bother me as much as the fact that I did not notice until he was right in my face. I think I need to work on this.
Again I will say the ceramic mug has completely transformed my mornings. What Marge the fan did for Stephi, the cup is doing for me.

And one last thing. My garden is starting to actually look like a garden, it only took 3 months, but it looks healthy. Although nothing I am really interested to much in eating out of it. It does look good. I am going to have lots of sunflowers, corn, and sorghum. Guess I
will make some oil and flower and eat like the villagers.

April 1, 2011

Yup, it is April Fool’s Day. And of course I had no idea. I was gullible twice within the time span of 10 minutes. When you have no idea, why would you suspect people. I am going to plead that I am just that nice and think everyone is always telling the truth. Which I actually do think most of the time because at least to me it seems like a lot of work to lie to people. Telling the truth is just so much easier.

I know I keep talking about my chicken group. But they are just so wonderful. I finally finished the grant and am turning it in tomorrow. This only took me about 1 month to finally do. Hopefully it is good because I really want to give the women chickens. I am very proud of them at the moment. This project seems to be the only one that is actually getting anywhere at the moment.

So I was running through the middle of town today when some of the children greeted me. I went to look at them and tripped to my death. I do not think I am cut out for running in Africa. I tripped on a rock that might have been sticking out a few millimeters. I have some serious running problems. If I do not really hurt myself by the end of 2 years it is going to be a miracle. I think the children were in shock, I just laughed and got up and continued running.

I still love the late afternoon/night here the best. It is so peaceful and the weather is cool. I feel like I get a lot accomplished and really enjoy myself. It is funny because at times I am really sad that I am going to be going home and gone for a bit and then at other times I cannot wait to get out of here. I do think going home is going to be good though if not just for the fact that I get to see everyone. But also because I think I can take a closer look at what I am doing here and reevaluate what I still want to do and what I still want to get out of the culture and the village. We shall see how well this works. I honestly see tears in my future, mostly just because I am going to hate to leave everyone again. But it will be fine as it always is.

I made the best thing today. Flat bread with garlic paste (thanks Blair), cucumbers, tomatoes, and lawry salt. It was amazing. I am really hoping to attempt cinnamon rolls sometime soon. I just need to find some eggs. Another good reason to have a chicken project hopefully this means more eggs in the village which means I can actually make more things. Although this could back fire because of all the food I will then make and eat.
Another thought. I am not sure if you have seen Tanzanian shillings before but they look like monopoly money. If this was not bad enough they reprinted this year and they now look even more like it. This makes it really hard to remember that this is real money. I just spend it like it is nothing. At the moment I would not be winning the game.

April 4, 2011

I have returned again from town. I walked in Saturday morning. It only took me about 1 ½ hours. I was really impressed with myself, especially because I thought it was going to take like 2-3 hours. It was a nice walk and I got to talk to a lot of people on my way in. One embarrassing thing though is that I got passed twice by a guy carrying sugar cane. To put this in perspective this is a guy that it pushing a bike that has sugar cane equivalent to the size of 2 by 4’s down the road. And he was able to pass me not once but twice. How, how is this possible. It was great though because when I got into town I ate breakfast with everyone at my favorite chappati place. Then we did a bunch of errands before meeting a group of people at one of the restaurants for some pork and fries. It was really good. Then everyone came back to Claire’s and we had cake for Yue’s going away and another friends birthday. It was an interesting array of people with a mix of personalities and nationalities. But it was really fun and we had a dance party which was great. I forgot how much I miss music in general.
Then Yesterday me and Claire just chilled and did nothing. It was great. I attempted to make foccia bread but it was a disasters. But of course we still ate it and watched the movie forgetting Sarah Marshall. A really good lazy Sunday.

Today I cleaned my house and made ciabbati bread. It turned out awesome, so I made brushetta it was great. I got some balsamic vinegar from Claire so it is adding more flavor to my food. Very exciting. I also went with Bebe and Jesca to get water. We walked into the mountains and into a gully where Bebe dug a hole and we waited for the water to fill up so that we could fetch it. Again very thankful to have a water tank and that I was born in a country with running water. This water was not appetizing but really there is no other choice for water. Although I still am not sure why the water pipes are not running more frequently since it is the rainy season. I think they need to clean out the system which I and the old man that oversees it have both told the government about. Hopefully they fix this soon otherwise we are going to have even more water issue’s than normal.

April 5, 2011

Today I was awakened by Paputo greeting me. It was 8 am and I was still not out of bed. I do not know what it is, but I have been sleeping a lot lately and am always still really tired. Not sure what this is all about, but Jesca was amazed that I was still sleeping. It was a good sleep to. Maybe I just exchanged having a hard time sleeping in general for always wanting to sleep. Oh well. I guess I will just drink a lot of coffee in my awesome mug.
Today I went to the secondary school to talk more to the headmaster. He was busy so I was talking to a teacher and I asked him what he thought I could help him with. These are his answers in order.

1. water (not like I am not trying, they already have a water tank and a pipe in front of their school, really not sure what else I can do for them here short of building a lake)
2. Electricity (did not even know what to say, I am not God thus why he thinks I can do this who knows)
3. Lab (which is actually what I am working on, but they have no science teachers to at the moment not going very well obviously)

I then went this afternoon to Jesca’s and mortar and pesteled the shit out of 5 kilos of corn that is going to be milled tomorrow by my bebe who is carrying it into town. (probably should be doing this because I am younger but she will not let me). So I know you were wondering the how corn goes from cob to flour in Tanzania. Here is the great, long process. First you plant the corn and wait till it grows, then you pick the corn and separate it from the husk and let it dry in the sun. After that you mortar and pestle the shit out of it to get rid of the shell then you wash it and finally take it to the mill. Now add in usually you have to walk about 1-2 hours to both the shamba and the mill and this turns into a long, long process. Again machines are amazing.

Me and my neighbor tried the fuel efficient stove that I made. Still not sure my thoughts on it yet. A lot of smoke was being created, but Talita said that it was from the wood, I am skeptical about the whole thing but she says the more it gets used the better and easier it will be. I hope so because if this is the case this will greatly improve the lives of people (women) in the village because they will not have to spend so much time cutting firewood. I hope this works but it looks like it is going to need to be made differently.

April 6, 2011

I woke up somewhat early this morning and made drop biscuits. So I had biscuits and coffee for breakfast. I thought this was the making of a great day. This was not the case. I got a huge stomach ache from the biscuits and have been sick the rest of the day. The smell and thought of both food and oil makes me queasy. I really hope this passes soon.

But I went on with my day and talked to the Bwana Shamba (Mr. Farm) about chicken vaccinations. I then did a ton of laundry and I still have a ton more to go. Since it is the end of the rainy season and I have a full tank of water I am trying to wash anything and everything that could possibly need to get washed before I head home. Speaking of water, there is still hardly any water in the village. Not good luckily it is pouring at the moment so people will be able to fill their buckets.

Other than that not too much happened today. I have been thinking a lot about home and getting really excited to come home. Me, Claire, and Randi have been talking about it, and came to the conclusion that I am coming home to see everyone and eat lots of good food. We decided food was a huge plus in coming home because although we can make things here, it is a lot harder and a lot of work and honestly it doesn’t taste the same. I think tomorrow depending on what the day is like I might attempt pierogi’s, not sure if I am in the mood to try them yet or not. But the day is getting closer.

April 7, 2011

Leona would be proud today. I made pierogi’s from scratch of course. I made a potato, onion, cheese filling and then I boiled and fried them in onions and butter. They were really good although they would have been great with some bacon, sour cream, and horseradish. But you cannot have everything. I think I will have to make them again. I think next on my list in potato pancakes. The problem here is eggs. Supposedly there is a huge amount in one of the subvillages but at the moment walking that far just seems like a lot of work. But let’s see how desperate and bored I actually get.

Which leads me to this morning. I got up rather early for me and went to wash my face to discover that my face wash was missing. Not wanting to jump to conclusions, I checked and rechecked the house. But of course it was not there, the children had swiped it. I left it out, but I have been leaving it next to my water tank for weeks now. I was so mad about it I went back to bed. It just makes me so angry, especially because this just puts further evidence into me having to keep my courtyard door closed at all times which I do not like. I wish I just knew who it was, instead of having to condemn all the children. It sucks to because it was Clean and Clear face wash which makes my face feel really clean and obviously is hard to get here. I guess I am lucky that I am coming home, if at the very least to stock up on things that I want.

Last week it was a rock that came out of nowhere, this week it was the mud. I was walking at night (bad idea, even with a light, really, really, dark out here) and slipped in the mud. Luckily there was a tree to grab hold of, but let’s just say I was not clean anymore.
Have continued to run although, I think I might actually be getting slower if that is possible. Really need to start kicking it into gear. I do not want to be last, and I have to beat Han so I really need to start running. (stephi possibly, but I do not see this one happening) Although if Emily runs the that is the number one goal, I just need to come in before her, if only by a second.


If you have not noticed already, I am really bi polar when it comes to everything here. And to keep in them with this, today I had almost every emotion possible. It is weird I go back and forth so much about wanting to stay in my village versus finding ways to escape it. It is a weird thing. At the moment content with village life but this morning I would have done anything to get out of here. Weird how that works.
Also had watermelon for dinner, it was wonderful.

April 8, 2011

Finished the watermelon in under a day. I was a little ashamed of this but then I talked to Randi and she said she did the same thing yesterday. It is just so good and of course you do not want it to go to waste. I might try to cook watermelon jam, I am not sure if it sounds that appetizing but I have the time so I figure why not try it. So tonight for dinner I had bruschetta again and then I had bread with peanut butter, honey, and bananas with coffee. It was really good. This got me to thinking about cooking and how in the US I would never cook this much for myself. I do love to cook for people, but hate cooking for myself. I am starting to enjoy cooking for myself although I would obviously prefer company. But I think this experience might help me to have better nutritional skills when it comes to cooking for myself. I actually think I eat more of a variety here (at least at the moment). If I was cooking for myself I would more than likely be having minute rice with a frozen vegetable. Not that exciting.

Today I went and greeted old Jessica because it has been way to long and of course on the way I got a that a million times. Where have you been, it has been so long, which really I cannot get mad about because I would ask the same question but I still hate answering it and having to greet everyone and their grandma along the way. It is just a lot of people and although I am a people person there is such thing as to many people. But I went and greeted her and everyone else. We then went and saw 2 people that were sick. The first was a little boy that was almost all better which was good because he looked terrible last time I saw him. But now he is back to normal. We then went to her neighbor and talked to her. I am not sure how to put this but it was horrible. They say they do not know what is wrong with her, she is about my age and has one kid. I was not prepared for what I saw, although Jessica did tell me she was really sick and that she really wanted to die. I still did not understand fully. I also thought that I have seen a lot of sick people but this was way more than expected. She couldn’t move at all by herself and was skin and bones. Her mom moved her around like a doll she couldn’t even keep her head up. She also could not talk, it was more like a deep cough if anything. It scared the shit out of me, I did not know what to do. A million things were going through my mind including OMG what is she dies right now, it was that bad. I went back into the other room because I really thought that I was going to faint in there. Not a good thing to do. It was kind of a wakeup call.

I also had a chicken meeting today and of course it went wonderful. I am in love with my chicken group they are just amazing. Everything is going so well, I could not be more proud. Although today Jessica was late to teach and they wanted me to start. This also scared the shit out of me, I am not sure what it is but when I have to talk in front of people I literally become stupid. I cannot even say one word. Not a good characteristic to have in a volunteer. Guess I am not destined to be a teacher. Next week we are vaccinating chickens. IT should be really interesting.

I am thinking about doing an HIV/AIDS testing day. Although I am not sure at the moment how that would work or how I would get people to come and actually get tested. I talked to both Jessica’s about this and they thought it was a good idea. Although old Jessica said that people are really scared of HIV/AIDS and do not want to know which is true. Even I am scared of it. But I am hoping I can figure away to get people to come because although it is a scary virus, it is better to know if you have it I think. I think you can live a better, fuller life. But I totally understand why people are scared, it is a scary disease. I might try some type of bribe such as if you get tested you will get a plate of food or maybe a magazine. Petty maybe, but better than nothing.

April 9, 2011

*****STO LAT AL AND STEPHI!!!! I hope you have a wonderful birthday.*****
So the women that I went and saw yesterday that scared the shit out of me died today. It is really sad, but I think it is all for the best. She is with God now. Although I was thinking about this and it is a little scary because that could of happened while I was there. I am just not that used to death and dying, the only people that have died were Grandpa Witte and Sister Terence. I have been very lucky.

I feel like I got a lot accomplished today, I put my thoughts in order which was good because tomorrow me and Randi are going to have a meeting to talk about our projects and see if there is anywhere we can collaborate. I am really excited about this because I think it will help give me some feedback and more direction.

I just finished a book of short stories. I am not sure yet if I like this idea or not. Some of them were really good, but then others almost killed me getting through them. I think I am more of a one story per book kind of gal.

I am getting super excited to come home as usual. I cannot wait to see the cottage, all the pictures look awesome.

I went running today and it is crazy how your mind wanders while you run. I also noticed today how beautiful the scenery was. I wish I could capture how gorgeous it looks. It is breath taking. I am going to try and take some pictures we will see if they turn out. But the view is so good, I almost don’t want to stop running, especially when the sun it going down. Although Sunsets are always amazing.