Today I did some laundry, which was kind of painful because I have cuts on my knuckles and fingers, and swept out my house. My phone ended up falling in a bucket of water, but I grabbed it quickly and took the battery out. It’s fine now, but I do need to start being more careful around water. Phones, water, and I have a history together. (Smith College Noteables/Haverford Humtones can vouch.)
More excitingly, some students finally removed the unused bunk bed hanging out in my kitchen, so I finally have the whole room to set-up! They narrowly missed snagging all my clothes down from my clothes line when they were taking the bed sections out of my house, but fortunately everything stayed hanging.
At around 11:00 I went to find Anjelina, a mama who has taken me under her wing here. She is really good friends with my mkuu and now considers me ‘one of her children’. She’s a very sweet woman and very energetic. I found out today that she is a widow, and the mother of two (formerly three) children. She’s invited me to come to her church multiple times, so I will probably go sing there when I’m in my village on Sundays. I plan to usually go to Lushoto on weekends, but I’m sure I will be here on some weekends, especially during the rainy season.
Before going to the fundi, I explained what I wanted to do with each of the fabrics I brought with me. I had two khangas (one is black and yellow and was given to me by my host family in Morogoro, the other is a Peace Corps khanga they gave us), in addition to the fabric I bought to make curtains. I ended up deciding to use one bunch of fabric for the curtains and the other to make a skirt and blouse ensemble. We went and I was measured. Once again they were impressed/surprised by the size of my hips. I’m not sure why they can’t tell just from looking at me, but it seems Africans never think that a white girl will have such big hips.
We stayed at the fundi for a while, and I watched her cut the khangas in half and stich-up the sides so they don’t fray. Anjelina made me put one of the black and yellow khangas on and then took me around the village while the fundi finished making my curtains. For some reason everyone tells me I look really good whenever I am wearing a khanga. It's a phenomenon I haven't quite figured out yet, but I assume it's because I look more "Tanzanian" with cloth wrapped around my bottom-half. Regardless, today I got numerous compliments while wearing my khanga. People were very excited that the black in the khanga matched my black shirt, which obviously wasn't on purpose, but I just said "asante sana" over and over again. (Asante sana means "thank you very much" in KiSwahili.)
After visiting couple houses, we went to the clinic. Anjelina has a bad headache and a backache. They gave her three packs of malaria meds without asking many questions or doing any tests (any illness here is considered malaria), and then we went to Serafina’s house to get lunch. I made Eva, the toddler who cries whenever she sees me, cry extra hard today. Apparently my glasses were scary looking.
I was pretty hungry by the time lunch was ready, and I felt kind of bad because I knew that I had been expected to eat back here at my mkuu’s house, but it seemed to be fine when I got back here. The mboga was particularly good at Serafina's house, and I wasn’t forced to have seconds, so it was a very enjoyable lunch. Anyway, I spent about 4 hours in town, so at least I’m getting out and about! I will probably go to the village center again tomorrow as well, but I hope to spend the afternoon cooking for myself rather than hanging out in other peoples' houses. The fund told me that the outfit I’m having made should be ready by tomorrow. As they all said, “It will be ready if God wishes.”
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