Our supervisor came to visit us, check up on us, on my birthday. He visited our school campus and also the nearby TTC (Teacher's Training College) where Russ will begin work when the satellite Internet and 100 new Sun Systems computers are delivered in June! For lunch, we asked our mzee to cook chicken pilau, a spiced rice dish with some sort of meat. We thought chicken would be good. So after I taught I returned home, found that Russ and our supervisor were at the TTC, and was on my way out when our mzee pulled me to the store room and showed me a live chicken he bought "for a good price of 2,000/=" in the market. Russ and I thought he would just buy the already cut up chicken but nope, he bought a live one to slaughter for our guest. Anyway, our supervisor left and Russ said he received a text from a friend in town, so we went to town, but found the friend was still busy so we went home. When we turned the corner to get to our house I saw some of our friends and our furniture outside all decorated and with a two layer cake! For my 25th birthday Russ gave me a surprise birthday party! Russ gave them the key to our house and they took out our couch and table and chairs and put them outside. He hired someone to bake a cake and we served everyone beer and soda. It was a really nice time and people from town got to know teachers from the school and vice versa.
The teacher's college, down the road by about 10 minutes, had some "student teachers" come to our school for a few months to intern. They ended that internship a few weeks ago and we were invited for a little get-together for sodas in the library. Russ and I showed up at 2 pm, as that was the time we were told, but of course things didn't get under way until 3 pm or so. It was more than we expected as there were tables with table cloths, food (sambusas, chicken), and a program! Well Russ and I took some seats and just waited for things to start. There were about 8 "student teachers" who interned and each one wanted their picture with the wazungu. So one by one they sat between us and a camera snapped a picture. It felt quite strange to not really know who these people are yet just becuase we are white it's important to them to have their picture with us. Anyway, then we all introduced ourselves, although we all knew each other - we were all teachers at the same school. My Kiswahili teacher told the MC to have to say a few words so I stood up and said thanks to all the student-teachers. Throughout the whole celebration there was a boombox in the corner that they would turn the volume up and then down when someone spoke and then the volume would go up again. The whole party felt a little awkward.
We've had some things stolen from our yard such as potato plants. Apparently we used to have many, many potato plants but one day, when we were off riding our bikes, they were all stolen. Our mzee was really upset, even more so than us. Anyway, just yesterday I saw out of the corner of my eye in the morning a kid running away with one of our green pepper plants. Our mzee didn't like that either and said he would watch out. He takes very good care of us!
If Tanzanians saw how we Americans throw away our sweet potato, pumpkin, and other leaves they would flip. You should try the following leaves at home - they're great with onions, garlic, and tomatoes: sweet potato, pumpkin, ulezi, beans, and all types of lettuce and cabbage. I never thought leaves could taste so good. When we get back to the states we'll grow pumpkins just for the leaves!
Russ and I have found a cultural group in our town. We were told once that if you want African culture go to West Africa and if you want African scenery go to East Africa. But we've found culture in TZ! A group in town practices the local Gogo dancing every Friday and we've been twice to beat the drums and sing along in Kiswahili. We'll continue to go and I'm going to write down the words to the songs, which are usually about HIV/AIDS and malaria and prevention.
Russ had a close encounter on the road on our last bike ride. We were coming back from a trip to the villages, going down hill, around a corner, when a car appeared out of nowhere. He fell off his bike right in front of the car but the car saw him and stopped. Russ got a few minor scratches on his hands and leg but I'm so thankful he's fine.
Items we have dug up in our back yard: batteries, lots of shattered glass, a bicycle seat, mosquito netting, tons of bottle caps, a dried-hard-flat animal hide (we had fun burning that), plumbing pipes, plastic (bottles, bags), broken ceramic pieces, toothbrushes, empty tube of toothpaste, and a woman's shoe.
