Today we moved in with our host families. My family lives in a village outside of the banking town of Morogoro. There are four other
volunteers in this village, and all the rest are spread out in groups of five
around the area. We will spend some of our time doing trainings in our village
with the other four people in our group, and spend the rest of our time
training as a big group in Morogoro.
There is apparently a wide range of host families. Some have
rats and roaches, while others have hot showers and marble floors. My family
has a large cement house with cement floors and a metal roof. I have my own
bedroom and a queen-sized bed with a mosquito net hanging over it. They use a
pit latrine (squat toilet) and use water to flush things down into the hole.
There’s no toilet paper, but there’s liquid soap right next to it in order to
clean your hands. I brought some TP with me from the city, so I’m already
prepared. They also have TV and
electricity, which I was very pleasantly surprised about. There’s no kitchen,
so they do all their cooking outside on a small fire. Today my host mother cut
herself while prepping everything. There was a ton of blood that went on the
ground, so they used ashes and dirt to cover things up. I haven’t really seen many
mosquitos around, but there were an amazing amount of flies outside when dinner
was being prepared.
I’m still not completely sure who everyone is in relation to
my host family. I have two or three host sisters, one named Jackie like my mom
(they thought that was hysterical), but there are also older girls who were
sewing here, in addition to some other children who came in and out of the
house. Our neighbor came by with her baby (probably about 1 year old) who was
amazingly cute. We have a water well right outside so people seem to come a lot
to fill up containers. One little girl who was probably about 8 years old came
multiple times using her bike. She wasn’t really strong enough to lift the
water or push the bike, but she managed to do it with a little bit of help.
The family is very nice. They are soft-spoken but very kind
and hospitable. My youngest host sister Priska helped me go over all the
Swahili phrases in the phrase book given to me by the Peace Corps, and in
return I attempted to tutor her and another girl named Gloria in English. They were learning how to tell time in English
and say things in the past tense. It was pretty difficult to explain things
without a dictionary or any real language skills. I have been doing fairly well
at understanding the gist of things, however, and I hope to pick things up
quickly since no one in my family speaks English. I am confused about some
things that were said, but hopefully in time those will become more obvious to
me.
Coming here has made everything feel much more real. The
drive from Dar was a very interesting event. People banged on the windows of our
bus when were slowed in traffic to try to sell corn, cashews, trinkets
etc. Black exhaust is emitted from most
every vehicle and people ride and drive pretty recklessly. The landscape is
absolutely beautiful out here. The mountain, Uluguru, is spectacular. But there
is also quite a bit of visible poverty and a very different way of living.
The food is very fattening (coconuts, avocados, fruit juice,
cashews, peanuts, rice, potatoes etc.), but also quite yummy. There are certain foods I haven’t enjoyed,
such as the ultra-chewy beef that can sometimes seem impossible to swallow. My
favorite thing tonight was a vegetable sauce made with coconut milk. It was
extremely tasty when poured over the white rice and potatoes that were also
prepared.
Meeting back up with everyone tomorrow in Morogoro. I can
hear soccer playing on the TV, but it’s already 11:00 so it’s bedtime for me!
Tuttaonana kesho! (See you tomorrow!)
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