Sunday, December 1, 2013

A few snapshots from the highlight reel...

Everyday Dar

The view of city center with the Indian Ocean in the background (and the coming-soon-Bus Rapid Transit system in the foreground - progressive planning comes to Dar es Salaam!)

The view from the office


Foleni - traffic...10,000x less frustrating from 5 stories above it


A rainy day commute


Mattresses on the move - I swear there's a driver under there somewhere..

When daladala buses aren't enough...

The starting point for my new train commute!


Commuters awaiting their train


The office end of the train commute


Sunset for company on my walk home from the station


Recycling :)


PRE-Thanksgiving Christmas decorations. Can't escape it even halfway across the world!

The Homefront


Rainwater harvesting from our rooftops!
Backyard duck raising to supplement our chicken operation. The irony considering the vegetarianism is not lost on me!

See above :) Though kudos to Juliette, Balozi and Zuhura  for their entrepreneuring - they sold these chickens supermarket-style for a total of $30...more than enough to feed the household for a week!
    
From the travels..

Tanzania-Zambia railway station - last Tanzanian stop before the border. 
Mbeya town! 
Mombasa homestay family reunion, seven years later!
Nawal at 18...yet another reminder of how time flies 

On the work front

GIS day pics with some of the InfoBridge crew
My new office digs!

Orientation to my January volunteering gig with Center for Community Initiatives - an education in affordable housing, slum dweller rights, sustainable building, and economic empowerment all in one go 

CCI's Chamazi slum dweller tenant resettlement/homeownership initative

Friday, November 8, 2013

Back from hibernation


Wow. It's been an exciting and inspirational enough couple weeks to kick even this lazy, haphazard blogger out of hibernation. I don't even know where to start! If I picked up where I left off, I'd have two whole months to catch up on!

It's amazing how time moves here. The pace of life is akin to a New Yorker's vacation mode - divided by 10. Yet somehow the days fly by anyway. Until this week, my life here didn't exist in front of my computer like it does at home, which made it easy to put off blog updates until "tomorrow". My days were full of random adventures, curious encounters, and unexpected lessons on everything under the sun. Officially, I job hunted. But in my spare time, I organic farmed, dabbled in chicken and duck raising, bused to the border of Zambia, got myself to advanced proficiency in Swahili, and took daladalas to and from every corner of Dar es Salaam. I blinked and two months had gone.

The official task - the job hunt - is better now that there is some light at the end of the tunnel. Job hunts are full of anxiety and impatience regardless of where you are. The fact that my job hunt is underway in a place where haraka haraka haina baraka ("haste has no blessings") is the unofficial national slogan only added to my anxiety. 95% of emails go unresponded to. Organizations that promise meetings, express interest, and sometimes even follow up once or twice sometimes turn out to be doing so just because it appears to be the polite thing to do, despite the fact that they never actually had any interest in hiring you. Contacts with whom you've had a great start sometimes fall off the map for a month or two before resurfacing. But sometimes…a company you contacted on a whim despite the fact that their mission is really only on the fringe of your career aspirations calls you in for a meeting, leaves your jaw on the ground with the number of perfectly-fit-for-you projects they have in mind, and tells you that they have a computer, mapping software and a desk that will be waiting for you when you get to work tomorrow at 8am. And sometimes…in that very same week, you finally get a call from an urban housing and slum upgrading organization that you have been after for going on three years now, to tell you that they have been designing a project specifically for you to take on…and that project happens to be about all of the issues that you are most interested in working on over the long term - decent and affordable housing for the urban poor, upgrading of informal settlements, sustainable building, and permaculture. And sometimes…the scheduling even aligns so perfectly that you will still get to visit home for Christmas :)

So while the hunt for a decently-paid job continues, I have two great organizations I'll be spending my weekdays with while I grow my network, all the while adding experience that is exactly the kind I was looking for when I made the call to move halfway across the world. Cheers to the universe working things out in funny and unexpected ways…looking forward to keeping you all updated on the projects I've got in store!

Sunday, September 1, 2013

First contributions to Perspectives project are in!

A sincere thank you to Justine Brunnett and Allison Punch for their insightful contributions to the Perspectives project I'm slowly working to grow - check them out here: http://uhurunausafiri.blogspot.com/p/a-collection-of.html!

Kenyan wanderings

Crazy how time flies. I'd studied abroad on the Kenyan coast for a semester in 2006 but aside from a quick trip in 2008 hadn't been back to visit again until this past week. It was so fun to spend time catching up with my old home stay families; it was also a useful reminder of just how much time had passed since the last time - the kids who were itty bitties when I was there are now grown, and the once-were-teenagers now have children of their own. All in all, I don't think I could've had a better time thanks in large part to the hospitality and kindness of my Mombasa and Lamu families as well as the easy goingness, adaptability and adventuresome spirit of my travel pal Allison who I'd studied Swahili with in Arusha.

Mombasa

Mombasa is a Swahili port town on Indian Ocean with a cool old town dating back to its start as a Swahili trading settlement in I would guess the 1600s (which I of course failed to take pictures of) and a modern city that is still growing today. It's a hotspot for Kenyan tourists from the interior of the country so there are plenty of silly touristy things to do. Like visiting crocodile parks and cycling trails :)

A visit to Mamba Village Crocodile Farm in Mombasa with Allison and homestay cousin Nura
This part was fine. The part where they put another smaller one on my head? A lot less so...
Crocs sunbathing as they await their evening feeding
The evening feeding dangling pieces of goat (I think?) from a hook 15 ft above the croc pool. Yikes.
The beginnings of our 10km bicycle adventure at another park outside of Mombasa with homestay brother Mohammed (now a regular American after a year of study abroad in Pennsylvania and cousins Nura, Asya and Mohammed Ali (who goes by the nickname Cassius Clay - amazing)


Lamu

Lamu is hands down one of the most unique places I've ever visited. It's an island and traditional settlement which has been continuously inhabited for the past 700 years (source: UNESCO) - it's roads were built well before the arrival of anything automated like a car or motorcycle (urban planner paradise..) so they're really narrow...pretty much just wide enough for a donkey carrying a load of sand or coconuts or whatever on either side to pass by. Tourism is the bread and butter of the local economy (though dhow building and fishing help) but tourists mostly stick to the nice beaches in Shela on th eother side of the island and Lamu's waterfront where most of the interesting commerce happens. It's a place full of secrets with big Swahili homes hiding behind giant carved wood doors and conservative dress with many women keeping everything but their eyes covered with the help of baibui, hijaab and ninja (not making fun..this is legitimately the word people use for the face covering which I think is a relatively new addition that came along with the spread of a more conservative Islam). Allison and I were lucky to stay with Nasra and her family (another old home stay) where we get a better taste of Lamu life than we would in a hotel. We woke up every morning to the smell of coconut bread that Nasra's mom bakes to sell every day, spent a lot of time catching up with every one, and worked hard to convince Nasra's one and a half year old that we actually weren't as terrifying as our pale skin and foreign hair made us seem (unsuccessful - maybe next trip). Lamu hasn't changed too too much from the last time, though is getting ready to transform with the new port that is expected within the next several years.

Lamu skyline :)

Getting lost in the maze of Lamu
Traffic jam..


Grinding rice for the morning's batch of bread
Playing the part of tourists with Nasra and fam at Ras Kitau in Lamu
Evidence of how time flies - Nasra's muchkins Abdul (3 going on 23) and Shumi (1 and a half)

Mama Nasra
Home made baby hammock that Shumi climbs into for her afternoon nap

Abdul on his way back from Mosque with the big boys

Silver smithing! My pockets are a whole lot lighter three pairs of earrings later...



 

Further evidence of time flying - Babu (top left and bottom second from left) now playing the part of uncle to Abdul 7 years later!!

My lovely travel companion Allison a couple days after her 21st bday and I sunset cruising with Nasra's brother and friends

Nasra and I (and photographer Allison!) strolling Lamu's waterfront


Sunday, August 18, 2013

Home again in Tabata Segerea

With my Swahili language intensive wrapped up, I'm settling in to Kaduma's home in Tabata Segerea, Dar es Salaam to kick off my job hunt (not before having a little...okay, lot of...fun and hitting the road one more time). Most of this week was spent reconnecting with old friends and contacts and having a general blast with Kaduma's family. Have I mentioned I love this place? There was plenty of cooking, a good amount of farming and even a couple good adventures with some of her extended family...highlights to follow :) Tomorrow morning, I'm off to Mombasa for a few days, then to Lamu, then back to Mombasa then to Dar. Then to the job hunt..


This day ranked among my favorites this far - Zuhura, Grace Juliette and I hiked to the Dar es Salaam airport so Julie and Grace could check out planes take off and land for the first time. I don't think there are words to explain just how excited Juliette was, but suffice it to say it was well worth the walk! 

More adventures - this one was a trip to City Center with Juliette and Grace - here is Juliette checking out peacocks in the botanical gardens in Dar es Salaam

Full bloom

And the girls at the Indian Ocean on the same trip. We were genuine tourists that day :)

In other miscellany: someone's to go bag for dinner that evening!

Soon to be completed homeowner Luna checking on progress at his new digs!!

Front porch (most important room of the house) under construction!

See you laters and thank you's with the Arusha fam

Surprise Going Away Party

With cake, poems and all!

Mama, Katrina and I with our oldest and youngest brothers Abisai and Alexi

The almost whole famdamn :) (minus Sunday who's the photographer)

The team

Da Boys

Goodbye poems for the Ndosi extensions :)


The guys checking out a volcanic crater lake

And for a little touch of miscellany: fire ants!!! the bain of Arusha's existence