densi ndovu

now in Kalifi, Kenya

2010-06-04T02:28:00.000-07:00

Hello all. Currently sat in a small estuary based town called kalifi, up the coast from Diani and reminding alot of people of Salcome. Just bought a Guardian weekly for an extortionate amount of money but highly enjoying reading about the world! Had a fantastic week, landed just right. Diani beach is beatiful and picturesque, but after that it becoms abit dull. Luckily we heard through the grapevine (local bar, whilst drining an INSANE mojito) about this charity even called Diani Rules. Wernt really sure what it was about so turned up to this big posh 4 star resort the next day to find out. asically, it was a sporting event and local companys like hotels and safaricom sponsored teams, These teams then payed games (with a difference) for days whilst drinking an awful lot of tusker (kenyan beer, and rarther good too)! We arrived late (of course) and plunged our selves into mid chaos trying to find a team to play on, as all the places were taken up. Me and Anna mcsweens jumped from team to team filling in spaces in the darts tournament before eventually being told by the organiser that he had made a new team for us. Thus came team TAFI, (local fish) which consisted of me, Clammy, Anna Mcsweens, Fenner, a German called Mangus (awesome at volleyball) and kenyan girl called neema (who turned out to be an international football player), a American girl called Jossie, (who was studying in Mombassa) and our team captian Doug, whod ust arrived from 6 months in Sudan doing conservation work. It was amazing to talk to people who had also been travelling across Africa becuase like me they couldnt quite comprehend the luxury theyd stumbled upon. With our teams we were given free tshirts (YES! MORE CLEAN CLOTHES!!!!!) and these beautiful green bands that ment we got free food. When it came to the first meal i think it would have been amazing to have filmed all the AVs reactions when they waled into that dining hall. so.much.food. GOOD FOOD, FREE FOOD AND DESSERT! SUCH GOOD DESSERT! Me, Dan and Marksy nearly cried when we saw it. Later when i was eating my passionfruit and pinapple strudel i got a call from my parents, checking to see if i was alright (day before was feeling very homesick). Just couldnt describe to them the utter joy of being given 4 star resort food for free, after months of rice and veg.
Team TAFI ruled, though we onlly came 2nd in our leauge. Spent three very happy days on the beach playing various differnt games, drinking and eating food. the most amazing thing was that we had no idea about it! Also met some other AVs! Very strange to see the AV bands on other people. tried to steal one of them, ive been feeling very naked since i lost mine body surfing.
Dan enterd a very expensive raffle and got the top prize. He is currently flying from monbassa to the massai mara basecamp, a 5 star eco lodge with Jack. He has two night full board completely free. Bloody bastard!
After the the excitement of Diani rules the beach lost a lot of intrest, we spent a day decided whether or not to go to Lamu, the most beautiful town in east africa. In the end it was ecided not beauce the road there was infamous for bandits. I am uite fond of my passsport and SD card and would like to hang on to them! Me, Kim and Anna hired bikes and went round the loacl villagfes. WE didnt realise how uch we missed rural africa and just hatting to people. Theres something so souless about beach resorts and the people in them who talk of 'locals' as bonafide rapists. (well, just the one woman i was talking to, but annoyed the living hell out of me).
next day went on a dhow trip to a national marine park to do some snorkeling. Really nice, saw a turltle! Then went to Wasini Island which base roack is coral with some amazing free standing coral gardens. Absolutely beautiful. Also had an epic 6 course lunch where fresh crab was on the menu! My parents will be plase to know i tried it, hammered the claw open and everything!
Next day went to a sacred forest for some basic tree hugging before moving onto Kalifi. A gorgeous town thats bright and colourful. Now im off to explore it more!
off to Nairobi in a day or so before safari in the massai mara. In 12 days im HOME! Stock up the fridge with plenty of phili please!
kwaheri kwa now!
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Well its raining on the kenyan coast...

2010-05-28T05:14:00.000-07:00

Hello all! So sory its ben a very long time since my last blog and once again i justspent the majority of my alloted (and VERY expensive) internet time checking facebook. Its a very dangerous thing... thus this may be abit rushed, once again. Actually, when is it not?

ANYHOO... teaching is now finished gone done and dusted. My last week at school was full, hectic, stressed and VERY emotional. We did little teaching and intead focused more on drawing exersies. Kisololi made folders which i then sorted all their artwork that theyve done over the past half term to give them on our last day. the swings went up!!! Very exciting, caused a bloody riot! Also, none of the kids, or adults have the faintest idea how to swing! It was very funny, Mr Mushi, one of the workshop teachers got on to try and propmtly fell off. Ive really never seen anything quite so hilarious. By the time it was my go i was in my element. I feel sorry for the poor child who tried to push me. nono. i can do this swing malaki by myself thankyouverymuch! so soon i was off up in the sky at the same time as trying not to let my skirt fly up and all teachers and kids 'awwed' with suitable amazment. I spent the afternoon of the next day teaching some standard 6's the technique, think they got it in the end!

The teachers held a party with was a very nice (if rarther akward) occasion, but of course in true african styl, with plentiful food and sodas! Mr mbowe made a really nice speach, me and rach sang (that was unexpected but in the end we did a rarther impromptu and nice version of joseph any dream will do...) and we were presented with Kitanga (african matierial) which is rarther nice,. Then the kids did some dancing and singing and it all got a bit to much for both of us,
HELL I MISS THOSE KIDS SO MUCH!

Tuewsdayafter we flew to nairobi, spent night there then onto Uganda. In Uganda did some bacis adreniline junkieing. White water rafting at the sourse of the nile. EPIC GRADE 5 RAPIDS, thrown and flipped out many a time. In one rapid we also got to try body boarding on the wave (a 12 ft on bdw) which i managed and was AWESOM! Best moment was on the third day going down the last rapid at Tundra, raft was smaller and thus more 'extreme'. nearly flipped and everyone, including the guide was thrown into the prapid, EXCEPT ME! VOICTORY! felt wicked.

right, well, now is the moment that i have been deliberatig oer for a while. As i told my parents i wouldnt do it then did. however it cannot go unmentioned becuase was so epic. Also, may i add rafting is SO much more dangerous,
so yeah, between 2nd and 3rd day went bungee jumping. HELL YEAH THAT WASFUN! standing at the top with m feet tied togehter i was fine, shufeled to the edge not so fine, looked down. deffo not fine but had to keep face becuase the instructor was rarther hot. then, just as i the thought, 'maybe my sanity has actualy cracked' drifted across my minds as i looked into the vast gap of nothingess below me. very far away was the the nile. then the hand on the shoulder the words THREE TWO ONE BUNGEE and sundenly that nothingness was filled by me and shrieks of surprise.
As i am so small i bounced alot, wich wasnt so fun, but the free fall, WOW THAT WAS FUN. deffo wasnt long enough though. the whole thing was over in 45 seconds, the headache that remaind from handing upsidedown being lowered into the raft remained for two hours. The beer lasted longer. I never finish beer. its gross.

Anyhoo, then we traveled up to a place called entebbe and staed the night in a zoo. great fun but becuase of my adreneline antics my back had siezed to such an extent that i couldnt move from the horizontal position of my bed. so missed out there really. Then a HORRIFIC 30 hour bus journey happend and we arrived back in kenya. Now on the pristine and blindingly white coast. However, although rainy season has finished in Tanzania and uganda, our taxi driver from the bis station happily informed us that here it was just starting. Its raining. again.
so, in three weeks im home and i daresay it will be sunny right to the moment i land, and which point the rain wil start.

hope all well
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summit, sunrise and saying goodbye!

2010-05-04T04:06:00.000-07:00

Well hello! Very scary to think i am now in the fifth month whilst I've been here, and now comming up to being here for 4 months (left at the end of january). Only one and a half weeks of teaching left and i feel its going to be very hard leaving. I realise that i havnt talked much about actually teaching in this blog. Mainly becuase it is such a part of my day to day life, well, its my job really. The things tht happen at th weekend all beome strange ad new and i forget that i prehaps havnt told you about Jemsi, my Kisololi LEGEND whos so clever and loves dancing, or Zawadi, not so hot in english but an immense artist, hoping to be a painter when hes older. And ZUlphur, who came to school without her headscarf on after Easter and i barely reconised her and Martha and her sulks whenever i take her maths book off her in a desperat attempt to make her work! I also have four boys in Nshara who ive ben teaching the alphabet to, and they have all improved so much! Exaudi can recognise most letters and write them now, and Ikram can read most basic swahili! Anoldi has even moved onto the english alphabet!
Anyhoo, back to the promised summit talk!

BARAFU 4600 M ASL
UHURU 5895 M ASL
MWENKA HUT 3000 M ASL
Woken (well, never reallygot to sleep) by screams comming from Rach and Kims tent, very girly like. Aparrently a gerbil had got into R's pack of mini eggs and rawled up K's arm. Serve them right for having mini eggs! Just after full moon so quite light, no need for head torgh. Issac brought us chai and biscoot in our tent and by 12 we were off! Spirits up, chatting and joking, but very soon i got VERY HOT. TO ALL THOSE WHO TOLD ME HOW COLD I WOULD HAVE BEEN, OH NO! i had to stop to take two fleeces off and ended up giving them to the guides beucase there was just no need for them, still very hot though! The walkto summit was 6 hours, strait up. If you look at a pictures of Kili in rainy season, lok at the peak, we stared below the snowline and just went strait up, over 1 K vertically, even entering into 'extreme alititude' (the same band as everest peak) It is one of the highest mountains you can climb without oxegen and y God does it feel it when you get there. On the second night we discoverd, running to the loo was just out of th question, and the air got thinner from there! It was amazing looking down upon the blanket of clouds below us, and seeing lightning storms from above. The hills rolled with thunder.
But later on i had no energy for this, the pain in my chest was unbearable. It was a challenge just to put the next foot down. One in front of the other, keeping my eyes on the person in front of me's gaiters. when we stopped for a break i would only just get my breath back, only to start again to find it gone. Four stiches at a time, felt as if my lungs were being compressed. This hell went on and on, Willieam seemed completely unaffected, as did our giude, who happily strolled past us with no bags a hoodie and no water! crazy people! By the time we got to 5000m out water started to freeze so very little to drink. I was away behind the others and kept blacking out, Issac took my bag off me, which some gremlin appeared to have put bricks in or something and was much better after that! Eventually we got to shira point, which was on the rim of the crater. 20-40 mins walk from there, not so upmountain! Now with my bag off and a nicer terrain my mind started going into giddiness! The people in front of me kept on looking behind, so i checked back to see what they were looking at. I was greeted by the strong morning sun, peeking its way through the clouds and slowly turning the snow golden. Turning back on the path the sign that announced Uhuru Peak came into veiw. This all became abit to much to handle at once! The feeling when i reached the sign, touched it and genrally realized what I'd done was something none of us have ever been able to explain. Literally on top of the world, so exhuasted and happy and just in such a bizzare and amazing place! Lots of photos then then long decsent down! You cant spend longer than 15 mins at the top really becuase of the alitutude, even our guides get headaches at the top. By the time we started walking back most of us had splitting headaches. You pass alot of others (for even in rainy season tis a popular thing) and many encouragements,s purring them on. I found myself saying 'your nearly there! its so amazing when you get there!' From someone else eye it might not have been, the only thing that differentiates Uhru from the rest of the moutain is a sign, but the knoledge of what that sign means! And yes, we were standing where the feet of Chris Moyles, Thingie Mcdoodle and Take that Man had stood before. Getton.
Walking down was long and hard, and painfull and just alot more pain! So steep and so slippery and then, with the sun properly up, in my MANY thermals SO DAMMED HOT! Summited at 6.20 AM and got back to base camp at 10.30. Greeted by the porters cheering and a nice cup of orange squash. Good nice sunny weather so a nice chill out, lunch and then at 1 o'clock we wer to walk down the mountain (for you cant staya t that alitutde for so long) to Mwenka hut, which was 3000m got into camp at around 4ish. Now, in the rain, damp and no sun. This was a bad bad time. All very tired, all very wet and the campsite had many rivers running through it! HOwever, slept VERY well!

LST DAY! MWENKA HUT 3000
MWENKA GATE (another height)
Nice simple day with 3 hours walk on a man made path all downhill back in the rainforest again. To tired to care really and we all pretty much legged it down. Almost like walking in the woods at home (the closet ive got to it here!) then we got to the gate at 1ish. WE HAD DONE IT! YIPPE!

And i will leave it there as once again, i have run out of time!
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Kili part 2!

2010-04-24T08:13:00.000-07:00

Ok, have 10 mins to write this so probably wont finish, this might turn into a three part saga.
DAY 4, BARANCO 3900 m asl to KARANGA 3930 m asl
First thing first, up baranco wall. literally a vertical wall. We asked our guide, is it flat. 'yes,' he answered, 'if you lie on your back and look up at it!' (Issac our guide, fricking ledge!) So much scrambling up rocks in the morning, good sun and my oh my did the lekki poles get in the way. Quickly seperated into our walking groups. I realised our groups was the slowest because of our frequent need to pee, or 'chimba la dawa' as Issac told us, because he kept getting embarassed at our frankness of, OI GUYS, I NEED A PISS, STOP YEAH?' fair shout really.We were all, but Willeam, on diamox, which helps altitude sickness. However the unfortunate side affects are near constant tingling (like pins and needles) in various partys of the body. Arms, fingers, toes etc, and even once my left bum cheeck, highly unpleasnt. Also it is a dialetic = akes you peee like a bitch! i swear to every 3 liters of water i drank i immediatly peed out 2.5. gr....

anyhoo, nice break at the top of the wall and a good photo op! then of course, the rain came. we were just walking up and down valleys, the last one being a sheer drop with many overflowing river which we had to jump, and mostly failed to do so. Then we had to climb up it again, URGH! We got to an overhand where we all shelterd from the rain and genrally congregated in a soggy miserable mass. Note to al those intreste in climbing mountains, NEVER hire equiptment, ESPECAILLY WATERPROOFS. They are NOT waterproof, and you will become wet, cold and chilled and there is nothing you can do about it! Victoria at this point was at her lowest and even threatend (in a jokey way) to throw the guide off the mountain if he lied about how far it was to camp (which he frequently did. my ass was that an hour!)
Got into camp, the happy tent (the communal tent where we had dinner and breakfast) was saturate, we were saturate, our tents were saturate as were our sleeping mats. Bad times, very mserable at this point. After about an hour or two the clouds settled (as in we were above them!) and old sun came out! we went for a breif and very enoyable acclimatisation walk beore just chilling enhoying the amazing veis and sunset over the clouds and on kili. Wonderful stuff!

DAY5 KARANGU 3930 m asl BARAFU (Base camp) 4600 m asl
Woke up to a wonderful sunrise (still above the clouds- we werent to drop below them now until desent) Had breakfast outside in veiw of all the outstanding beauty that was arround us. Best breakfast of my life! Far in the distance we could see moshi... we waved but couldnt see anyone waving back. A short walk to Baranko (about 3 hours) which was very pleasnt. As we walked we thought of the americans we passed the day before. They had decided to skip Karangu and go strait onto barafu. Therefore arriving at camp at 6ish. Then they were summiting that night (12 midnight) and wanted to come down in one day. We met them on Zanzibar and were amaed to find they actually did it, but at a massive cost. Every one of them was very sick and one even had a seizure (having never fitted in his life). Mountains and alitude are dangerous cookies and must be treated as such, bloomin fools. a descent of 5800 to 1000 in one day is far to much for one body to bear without serious side affects.

Got to camp about 12ish in time for cooked lunch (Woopee!) sun was shining and a clear veiw of mwenka. Now we just chilled and aclimatised, rested for summit night. a big BIG night. The camp was beautiful and set on an overhangthough there were and awful lot of gerbil type creatures. Willem woke up in the tent with one on his chest, which we were all alterd to by some very feminine shrieks! Dinner was a good affair but most of us had lost our appetites becuase of the alititude. Sleep early and awake at 11.30 for chai and bisquooit (PM that is) to set off up the big ol' hill at 12. NO SLEEP WAS ACHIEVED IN THIS TIME. THIS DID NOT HELP MATTERS.

however, i am once again out of time, so the horrendous experience that was summit night will have to wait for another day!

love you all, and must admit im feeling most fondly for my duvet right now!
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urm...

2010-04-17T05:05:00.000-07:00

OK, so i know i promised to finish off my kili blog now, but i may have left my diary in Anna mcsweens bag, who lives in arusha, and so i cant quite rember the final details, so im afraid that will have to wait for next week (i know you all so entralled... :S ). HOwever, LOTS has happend since kili so i may as well get on and write about that!

Firstly, let me talk abut Zanzibar, getting there was fun...not. Night after kili we stayed in a hotel (which had a tv !!!!! showing A KNIGHTS TALE!!!! soooo happy). Then a 10 hour bus journey to dar, without an ipod, or knitting and i cant read on transport, so i was dying with boredom really. Then arrived in dar al la dump. Stayed in the YMCA (WOO!) which was ok, had dinner in holiday inn which was SO POSH. Air conditioned, SHINY CUTLERY, like, crazy time, loads of tvs so clean and white, so posh and expensive. twas very odd. So dinner set us back quite alot, but was only the start. Zanzibar was SO EXPENSIVE. the next day ferry to Zanz (as clammy very gap yah tradge style calls it) then when we arrive (a wet two hour journey) i got embarasingly excited to see a port. It seems so long that i was at fowey. I found myself immediately countin how many tankers there were (7 by the way) and if there were any tugs around. Thats right Brigham family, TUGS. I am turning into my father. good times. Incidently, there was one green tug and two pilot cutters.
Anyway, got there, asserted that we were residents therefore did not need to faff with immigration (So cool! I love being a resident, everythings so much cheaper!) and got a taxi to the north of the Island, Kendwa, where all the AVs who hadnt climbed kili had been staying whilst they did their PADI course. Kendwa was beautiful. Cocktails immidieatly became my thing of the week (spent alot on them...) My current favourite is screaming orgasm a la Zanzibar which is kaluhah, bailieys and amarula mixed with milk srtained with ice. hmmm..... Found a good shisha bar to, and so most of the day was spent in the sea, WHICH BY THE WAY WAS 29 DEGREES CELCIUS, OMG! SO NICE! sunbathing in the shade, in the sea again, watching the INCREDIBLE sunset, mostly from the sea. In the evenings we happily spent our time having nice fresh fish, good food, chilling out by/in the sea or at beach partys getting very drunk. A very bad time (awesom party but felt terrible in the morning) at annas birthday where i somehow ended under a rugby scrum and two full sized tanzanians fell on my head. wow. Never knowmn so much pain as when i woke up the next morning, konyagi hangover X 10. Bad times.

Anyhoo, apart from the fact that it was very pleasent and filled with the usual AV dramas (which would be pointless to relate here as to an outsider its probably quite dull) Zanzibar passed in that heavenly way. Went to stone town for two days, was great fun just getting lost in the streets, casually shopping, asking the prices of things then laughing in shopkeepers faces when they told us. Becuase its such a touristy area its all mzungu prices to the exteme. We were having none of this nonsense! One guy tried to sell me earings for 20,000 when you can get them for maximum of 2000 in Arusha. foolish boy. Foridani gardens in the evening was great fun. It is an outdoor food market and you can absolutely stuff yourself for under 10,000. A massive rarity on Zanzibar! however, most of us got african tummy, just in time for the ferry and bus journey. Whoopee! Immodium agogo. (very sorry if that was too much information for those of a delicate disposition. African tummy is a standard part of life here, and as such is talk about poo. To the extent that both Ngateau and Machame house have a poo chart, listing such qualities as flushability, smell, rating out of ten, type and group reveiw. If you are ever caught having a poo in machame you have to make an entry listed as a party pooper. Living in small houses with unflushing toilets does this to you).

We also went on a spice tour which was fascinating. Basically were taken out to a farm in the middle of Zanz-darling and shown loads of spices and how they look when their growning and how to cook them. Things like jasmine flower, pepper, cinnamon (wow, fresh cinnamon smells amazing) coca, henna, this flower that has a dye like lipstick and many other things! Got some fresh cocnuts down from a tree and drunk them (yum!) before going to eat an amazing lunch with all the spices in it. Never been so full!

So anyhoo, im back at school now, only got 4 weeks left! Its painting agogo land! We are given a certain amount of money from AV to give to the school in some form of donation. i.e, desks, books, painting etc. So after visiting Lambo we decided a set of swings would be really nice. I LOVE swings and the reactions ive had from the kids they are insane with the idea! So we proposed our idea to Mr Mbowe (Nshara head) on wednesday and he got us to talk to Mr Mushi, who is the head of the training workshop that is a part of the school that trains people who cant afford the seconday school fees to do things such as metal and woodwork. He loved the idea and proposed we should go to the church where there is a set of swings to get meaurments. So off we trotted. Then he said, yup, all good, lkets go into moshi tomurrow and get matireals. So i told the guys at Machame as they were keen to get a set to and they decided to jump on our bandwagon. The next day (thursday) we went to moshi and got all the stuff and by friday they were starting! The matierials used up all our donation money ($200) so now i feel over organized by doing it all but so good! Its really good that we have to workshop on the school site becuase it gives them both training and application. I hope all future AVs use it! Also, its so efficient, i have never in all my time in AFrica seen something happen that quickly!

so anyhoo, now spending a pleasnt day in Moshi. Its very strange as this is the first weekend since ive been here that the Arusha crew and Moshi crew havnt met up. Missing everyone there quite alot especially because i spent a solid two weeks with half of them. Climbing a mountain really brings people together! When we got home to lambo we found it very/ far too quiet.

So this is where i leave you, i fear i have babbled alot! HOpe your all well. You shall be happy to know that as its now rainy season (Long rains). It rains everyday and in the evenings i have to put on a jumper. not cool. Also, the mud (matope) is INSANELY STICKY. var annoying as its all mud tracks where we live, my feet will not be clean for a long time...

love you all!
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MOUTAIN KILIMANJARO! l

2010-04-12T07:30:00.000-07:00

Right, i believe I have been very neglecting of the blog of recent but that is with two vbery good reasons. Number one, i was up a big fuck off (large) mountain no where near any civilisation and number two when i got off that mountain i went strait to (via a very long uncomfy journey) a very nice but expensive beach., where the internet was extausionate and slow. (mind you, its slow everywhere...grrr.....).

so, lets start with kili. yes i climbed it, it was fucking (very) hard, by far and away the hardest thing i have ever done in my life ever, arnt i great. lalala.

We took the 7 day machame route, one of the longest so we could acclimatise properly therefore have the greatest success of summiting. I believe the celebrities took the mwangu route (otherwise known as the coca cola route) over 9 days (extende4d due to Fern's alititude sickness)
SO, DAY ONE, MACHAME GATE TO MACHAME HUT.
After poaying the park fees ($700 worth, eeek!) and genrally faffing with the organisation of porters we started off up the big hill-not very pole pole. Here i interject to say that pole pole is swahili for slow, and its the token saying of any porter, guide or climber attempting the mountain. All in great spirits, the terrain was rainforest and quite humid. Nice man made path an very easy walking, all up hill, but we got used to it after 2 days! Nice scenery but unchanging, a little annoying as you never knew where you were as you couldnt see anything except for trees. Drizzle started at about 12, continued of and offish into rain untill about 6ish. Discoverd thast my waterproof didnt work at about 23.30 ish. good times. A quick hint for anyone going to climb or walk anyhwere like this, never hire rainjackets. big error. HUGE.
stopped at a damp place for lunch, at what point im feeling distinctly queesy and discover i cannot eat anything really. lunch was a packed sort of hamburger thingie, which was unappetising anyway. After lunch i seriously lagged behind due to feeling absolutely horrible. All i could here was Phil Gibson's prep talk for switzerland going round my heafd about how many calories you needed to take in when doing something like this, all the time that i had hardly half of that amount in me. Really hard afternoon as then, due to miserableness, wetness and genrally being miles from anywhere started feeling horrendouly homesick. especially for my aga.
After what seemed an age we got into camp where we had cups of chai (tanzanian tea) and popcorn. Though i was barely halfway though when i had to run to the long drop and CHUNDERD EVERYWHERE! (this saying derives from a youtube video called gap yah, the amzingly middle class gap yah tradition that only two of the group had seen, but applied so well it soon became a fixation with kili. TAKE THAT NATURE!)

DAY TWO MACHAME HUT 3000 ASL
SHIRA HUT 3800 ASL
woke up nice and early, a good rest and felt better. Everyo9ne is very impressed by the quality ofg the food. our chef was called issac (though for the first 4 days i thought his name was George). For breakfast was an intresting porridge, which is good with loads of sugar, bread and powderd eggs _ weiners. Had some porridge then trumped off. Today we got above the rainforest, the trees reduced in number and sizeand steadily growing a ridiculous amounts of lichen. They looked like wisend old orks (urm, maybe not orks but the trek was very heavily lord of the rings oreintates thanks to Dans new found geeky side.)
Lunch today consited of many differnt stops, of which we all looked at each other hopefully and pout down our bags to get out our lunch before being told that we had to keep walking. In the end we lunched at camp (short day walking, 3-4 hours). Campt was b\muvh better than machame hut with the most stunning veiws, which got better and better as we got to the higher camps. In the afternoon we had an alimatisation walk, when the rain stopped, that was really more of a stroll over to shira platue that looked almost exactly like dartmoor. fantastic! Clammy and me found it hilarious that we'd got halfway up a mountain to go letterboxing. No one else found it funny, as they dont know what letterboxing was. silly northen fools!
Nice sit down hole toilet that was vaugly new, though var nippy noodles at night!

DAY THREE SHIRA HUT 3900 ASL
BARACO 3900 ASL via LAVA TOWER 4600 ASL

Day three experienced good and bad times. Willien (pronounced Villem, tis Dutch) made the mistake of walking backwards, tripped and almost fell off the mountain. not cool. This was the closetst we actually got to really playing the invented game of 'lkets throw Kim off the mountain'. the terrain was dartmoor esq fadinbg into boulder-y martian. Thisd day it rained. and rained and rained (probably no more than it did on other days but today it got to us more). We had lunch on lava tower (var high, var exposed) which was miserable. Dan at this point had given up with his hired waterproof and was just wearing a red t shirt. I felt awful for him, in the end our guide lent him one of his coats! i kept at mine, didnt work bu it was an extra layer. Lots of mice at lava tower, visibility rubbish as we were in the clouds. the real low was when we his in the long drop to escape the wind, Me, Kim and Alice all huddled in this ammonia infused hell hut, whilst both me and kim put on an extra thermal. urgh. on the way down we passed through anamazing valley which inspired Dan and Marxy to re inacct lord of the rings, becasue apparently it looked just like it. Also at this point we had all settled into seperate walking groups according to our speeds, therefore lord of the rings names where given thus;
The Long Legged Crew (stupidly fast people)
Williem - Aragorn
Marxy - Legolas
Dan - Gandalf (you can tell who chose the names here cant you)
Anna Mcsweens - Treebeard

The Country Ramblers
Clammy - Gimili
Victoria - Samwise
Rach - Arwen
Alice - Aeowen

The Pole Pole crew
Kim - Frodo
Celia - Pippin
Jess - Merry (/ork/balrog)
and me? yes well... i got prehaps the best choice, espcially compared weith my partner Rach, I got Gollum.

Fantastic, thanks guys.

Apparentlky when i climb down rocks i look like him, that compared with the colour of my hired coat. Bastards.

HOWEVER for now that is where i leave it as i have gone over time and have no wish to spend more money on the internet than i have to. Im in Dar es Salam at the moment, on the way back from Zanzibar, everything is very expensive compared to Moshi so im affraid youll have to wait until next weekend to hear the next installment!

love you all!
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the term 'bugger off i dont wanbt to go on your safari' strongly applies here.

2010-03-25T06:30:00.001-07:00

HELLO ALL! Mambo, Qwasa-kia/ma/be (new chagga word of the day) etc. Hope you are all well. First to say, thankyou for all my letters and parcels! got them today (with the exception of the kili package, grr....) and was very welcome. I was also alerted, by most of my family that my pa is reading this blog out to Gran each week and should therefore tone down some of the lanuage that may not be so tickity boo. Therfore what i propose is that after each, maybe violent exclamation, i shall follow it up with a safer alternative in brackets, for you to censor at your wish. :)

well, an awful lot has happened since i last wrote! The weekend was amaing. It was Jacks birthday so all of us trundled up to machame to re-visit the waterfalls on satureday for a birthday picnic. Amazing dayl. On arrival we dumped all our stuff and went climbing over the massive boulders, downstream. Magical veiws of the valley streched out before us, before popping back up to the waterfall at lunch. after a wet picnic (i was sat by the river which kept splashing me,how dare it) of plain pasta, chopped carrots and peppers dipped in peanut butter, avocado and tomatoe followed by biscuits and frechly ground coffee we set off again! This time up the waterfall, and as the way so so trechrous no cameras this time. Every boulder we climbed (and as they were as smooth as glass, carved by the ever thundering water i frequently slipped back onto Dan and needed a leg up) lead to a new paradise! We ewventually reached this amazing lagoon, with a waterfall pattering hard in the corner, really deep apart from one slippery rock in the middle, that, with the current was very fun to try and balance on. It was softly lit by the afternoon sun and had large lillies reaching down into the side. As we sat by the rocks we could even see a family of monkeys playing! Truly amazing day. The downside is that on the way up i got into a fight with a tree and sadly lost, resulting in a lovely strached all down my back (owee). we decided we had found Tanzanias equivilent of thailands the beach" (that really shit (ahem... rubbish) film with leo D.C in). The fact that we had no cameras made it even more specail i think. On the way down we got to the waterfall we could jump off. I umm and urred about jumping last time... and now i was at the top it looked A LONG way down! (bowut the same as the middle one at golddiggings). BUt after seeing rach and anna go down, i just couldnt not... SO I DID! so unlike me. Hit the water very hard, and i think that is what did my back in (on alot of neurophen atm) but was so fun! eee!!!!

Monday after a fun art club (drawing leaves this week, focusing o the tendrils) me and rach went to Doris and Catherin's house. They are young teachers at the school. Twas very nice to sit and chat on comfy sofas, listening to some TRUE CLASSICS. Nsync, westlife, abba and boyzone all made an appearance. nice to watch TV as well! cant wait to have them over to our house!

Tuesday was very exciting becuase MAMA LYENETTE (our rep) came to see us! Ckeck all was well with our schools, which it was then we got out of our second lessons to go and visit the victorias in lambo (travelling in a very posh 4x4). after that back to the house for tea and flapjack and genral chatting about it. We suggested haviing two AVs in each school next year, becuase we have found it so hard juggling our time with staffrooms. Wer missed chai however, and my stomach was not happy with this (chai is tanzanian tea, very sweet and served at break. The wonderful mandazi lady comes and has wonderful half akes, a mix between cake, bread and doughnut, which i have two of every break. WONDERFULL STUFF! at the weekends i pine for my chai!)

Wednesday saw no lessons in Kisololi and a midterm test in Nshara. I was intresting keeping the class silent for 2 hours (AHH!) but the results were ok. One STAR got 93% and our lowest was 93%, and seeing as im pretty sure she has severe learning disabililies its not to bad!

School is now finished for the term and we are preparing for our kili climb. We start out on saturday, doing a seven day machame route. I now think i have enough clothing, to list, when i summit (which i wiull hoping i will not sucumb to AMS) i shall be wearing;
Underwear,
Two thermal tops,
Two t-shirts,
i micro feelce,
1 wool jumper,
one sheep looking fleece,
massively thick coat,
waterproof,
two thermal trousers,
shorts,
two paris of fleece trakkies,
ski trousers,
waterproofs'
balaclava,
wooly hat,
two pairs of socks,
two pairs of gloves,

and i very much except i will still be freezing! (it being minus fuck (big) knows what)

love you all, hope the wall of corn is going good. cant wait to get back. After finishing tropple ive been treating myself to some stella hard reading, animal ark, dolphin in the deep, hell yeah (after re-reading some narnia) and now REALLY miss my cats! three months to go, thats not long... :S

love to all!
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just a quikie....

2010-03-19T08:47:00.000-07:00

I only have five minutes left so im afriad ill have to make this one a quick one. This week has gone very fast. We started on rarther a down note as one of our number, Lizzie, went home. she has been with us two months and we all felt she had got all she had out of it all she could. She was very homesick and missed her ma (who from my memory from the airport was very bubbly) and so unfortuanely left us. I am glad she left on such a good note. She was in our jeep in the Ngorogoro so got to see all the big five and ended on a massive high. We had a farewell dinner at the coffee shop on tuesday evening with just the moshi crew. Very funny, the4 evening was spletterd with Dan and Jacks impressions of theire teachers whenever they try to leave the school, *croaky voice, head tilt* "WHERE TO?" HILARIOUS.
Unfortunately that night the victorias both got food poisoning, so were off for the next two days of school. Not pleasent!
However on the upside my first letter arrived on tuesday from my Gran! Very short, at only one side of A5 but nonetheless very welcome! I read it out to everyone at the coffee shop and we all a greed it was a ture homely gran letter. The first line she talked about her pasty pie. How much more torture can one girl take?! Barnecutts will not know whatr hits is when i get back!
I also got to start the rainbow on the mural on monday. This invovled taking all the standard 7's out and getting them to handprint the wall. 7's are red, 6 are orange 5 are yellow,etc so all the raindbow will be constructed of their hanprints! So exciting to see the school gradually becoming a tad less like a jail./ (though still a long way off, and i dont know how much differnce i can make, it will take several years of AV's)
Anyhoo, thats it for now!
Hope your all well!
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NGOROGORO CRATER!!!!!!

2010-03-13T23:55:00.000-08:00

OK, WELL, HAD A GOOD TIME YESTERDAY!!! It really feels like it was a dream, looking through all my pictures this morning i was just in awe of it all! Friday we were picked up from shoprite after a yummy lunch to be taken to the campsite juist outside of the crater. About a 2-3 hour car journey in a big jeep. We all found this slightly wierd, becuase now we were proper mzungus. For the past 2 months we've all been living in africa, desperately not being mzungus, not being tourists and trying to show people this. We walk like everyone else and feel so far away from the white people whizzing around in their jeeps on safari. Now we were one of them! odd times. Anyway, got tyo the campsite with no voice whatsoever, compeltely gone, could only croak. So after a nap and a bowl of soup, strait to bed for me! It was really nice to camp though, and use my sleeping bag (though it was bloomin hot). Then a nice early start of 5:30, to eat at 6 and be off at 6:30. At we started driving the sun had just =came up, beautiful and cool and lightly orange! Started the day with a chorus of 'circle of life' (me croaking along). took about 45 mins to reach the crater, (the day before we went over the rift valley, b.e.a.utiful) and as we came to the rim, well... absolutely stunning. I cant upload my photos now, becuase there so big, so youll have to wait till i get home, but i just stood there drinking it in. It was amazing. Just so amazing. As we continued driving about n6 baboons passed our jeeps path, so camreas out! they peeted away and put the camrea back again, just as our guide slows down, points and says 'look, leopard'. there was a leopard, by the side of the road. Smaller than i imagined, wiith a long tail and beautiful markings. Unfortunately i didnt have enough time to get my carea before it slinked away. Our guide was ecstatic. Leopards are very solitary and very shy creatures, it was the first time he'd ever seen one in the crater! A GOOD START TO THE MORNING! One of the big five (Leopard, Lion, Elephant, Buffalo, Rhino) crossed off our list.

Went down polepole into the crater drinking the veiw. Saw my first Zebra (and certainly not my last) along with a family of PUMBA's! (warthog).
Talking about it really dosnt do it justice, becuase you just need to go there or see the photos (sorry to be such a cop out) It was just so nice to have the lid of the jeep up and just be zooming around the feresh african air and seeing all these animals in their natural habitat. As we were leaving (we had not seen all the big five at this point) our guide steve said, 'so now we see big five!?", que us looking abit perplexed, 'nono, we have yet to see Rhinos' he points to our left and over in the distance sit two black rhinos. Absolutly amazing to look at. We stayed for a while and whilst i was looking through Rach's binoculars i saw two more blots coming towards us. Two more rhinos running! Black rhinos, 4 IN ONE DAY! another first for our guides! they ran across the other jeeps path, it turns out it was a mating ritual. Kim got quite angry about this, an we all started cheering for the lady rhino as she ran away! 'dont give up! Rights for female rhinos... :S

so, the list of the day included;
Leopard,
Cheetah,
Hyena (eating a baby wilderbeast, who was still alive),
Wilderbeast,
Zebra,
Pumba,
Lion,
Mzungus (the lesser spotted Canadian, longer legged and red tinted),
Rhino,
Elephant,
Ostrich,
antelope,
Vulture,
Corobuster
and other things!

All i can say is the if you ever go to Tanzania, or Africa infact, Make a beeline for this place. It not just the anamals, just the location and sheer beauty of it all!

Left at 2, got back in Arusha at ^ feeling very rough due to severe cold/no voice/ epically sore throat. But i am one happy mzungu.

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19 NOW!

2010-03-12T01:23:00.000-08:00

AS I WRITE I AM FEELING ROUGH! however, it is all self inflicted... partially. I seem to have inherited Rach's rarther flemmy cough, have COMPLETELY lost my voice and have a wicked hangover. Because we are going on safari today (Ngorogor EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE) we had to take friday off school, so we thought we may as well go the whole hog and get to Arusha for Thursday night to go to Via Via. Via Via describes itself as a cultural bar, and thursday nights are in essentials the same as barley nights, EXCEPT 10 TIMES BETTER! (well, i dont want to slag off my beloved barley so i may just say differnt, but they have a live band)
Its all outside, big garden, chinease lanterns, epic stage so chilled out, millions of mzungus and NO CREEPY LOCALS WHO PUT THERE HANDS UP YOUR SKIRTs (not in my pool).

By the way, i would just like to add at this point that 5 seconds ago i got my last unconditional i was waiting for from Edinburgh, casually declined it and accepted UCL. hell yeah baby.

So yes, a very good night, celebrating my now 19ness!
Right, backtracking the week quickly i must describe my birthday abit more becuase it was just SO FUN!
I was rarther rudely awoken by Victoria M and Rach bouncing me awake (not happy about this). But soon trotted off toschool for our first lesson (at 8:00). BOth classes had fun singing me happy birthday at the top of their lungs then we did no work for the lessons. Mainly did a wordswearched (heavily based around me and birthday themse) which i hilariously inputted words like poo, bum, nude etc... they didnt find them, it was just very funny. Kisololi spent the rest of the lesson drawing (most made me cards!) and we taught Nshara a new song. To the tune of 'give me oil in my lamp', which slightly atlered the words to 'give me water in my tap, keep it running....' and sentiment we feel very strongly out here!

A nice break where the teachers gave me two chapaties, on top of my cup of chai and half cakes (hmmm.......) and after a while we tottled back home. Got to the house nice and early so settled down with V.M's ipod to finish watching pride and prejudice, and then shrek 2 whilst everyone else did stuff! Massive lunch of pancakes, followed by cake! I must now describe how amazing the idea of cake is becuase we have no oven, just a keroseen stove (posher tranger essentially!) so they made an oven with pans and coins, and it took 3 hours! it was amazing though, and i was completely oblivious to it! After this we trudged up to the pool (bout 4 by this time) where i received a very nice phonecall from Anna, which was epic as i aint spoken to her in like two months (wierd.com). Managed to blag the use of one of the $154 rooms to have a HOT POWER SHOWER (first in a month) and sit on the SPRUNG MATRESSES WITH PILLOWS, FEATHER PILLOWS AND A TV!!!! Quite amazing.. Later we were joined by two of the young teachers from school, Doris and Catherin, Who stayed for a really nice drink then had a WEPIC meal of beef stroganoff!

Also on tuesday i got my first parcel from home, including some trousers, thermals AND MALTEASERS. ohh, a good birthday treat!

Right, i am running out of time, but i shall write on sunday to fill you in about SAFARI IN NGOROGORO CRATER!!! eeeeEEEEEE!!!!!

hope englands thawing out.
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p.s, thankyou everyone for the birthday love, 53 notification, felt well popular.

week what now?

2010-03-07T00:32:00.000-08:00

Hello All! I was planning a really good in depth blog this week but i am absolutly shatterd so the likilihood is that the spelling will be even worse than par and will be rarther half asrsed. Also quite hungover. TISALGOOD!

This week has been rarther good. It appears in Nshara school we have a change of head. Both me and Rach are FINE with this as mr Shiyo is a four letter word begining with T. Enough said. The new one speaks WONDERFUL english, knows all about AVs and what we do, what where there for and is genrally rarther nice. Unlike mr S he does not expect every letter we write home to be asking our parents to send out packets of dollars, embarassing us every break by buying our mandazis and genrally being rude and inapropriate! So thats all good. Weve finished the undercoat of the murla, now just waiting for COLOUR! Art club is immensly enjoyable and we;ve started the months new topic which is comparison. On friday we just made them race each other round the classroom then compraed who was faster than who, they went slightly crazy!

Friday night we (me, Rach, Kim and Lizzie) went to stay at Iklidinga house (now nicknamed Alkydinga) in Arusha. It was absolutely loverly. I am very jelous of their set up! I came to Africa fully prepared to be living in a small house, no running water or electricity (admitedly, they are not at all garranteed in lambo) and to have the luxruies lambo house offers is amazing, but it is SO BEAUTIFUL THERE! The back of the house overlooks a gorgeous valley where the sun sets red every night, the community of teachers is really nice and theyve decorated its all very green and fresh. Although there is no electricity the parrafin lamps (though very hot) add alot of atmosphere. Becuase lambo is so well protected we have a concrete wall for a veiw and as we live in a banana plantation ive never really seen the sunset! However, Ikiy does come with its downfalls. Becuase their rooms are on the school grounds the children are allways around and their is little privacy. going through their rubbish is standard. They told me one day they returned home, with the standard hangover to be greeted by a group of children with tampon applicators on their fingers. As they dont have such contraptions out here they obviously did not no the true horror of what they had on their hands. Never the less, they did not stop to educate them, they ran away for their lives!

Booked kili last weekend, so attempting that bugger three weeks yesterday, Not gunna lie, quite scared! But hey, twill be fun hopefully. Quick run down of next week, Monday normal day (though no market), Tuesday teaching in the morning orphanage in the afternoon, Wednesday (my birthday!) Pancakes for lunch, swimming in the afternoon followed by dinner at the hotel, thursday teaching in the morning, afternoon go to arusha. Via Via in the evening, hangover friday morning followed by leaving for the ngorogoro crater. Sleep outside the crater in tents friday night and safari saturday!!!!!!!! Back in arusha in the evening, back home on sunday. VERY EXCITED ABOUT ALL THIS!

Hope Englands warmed up. Tanzanias cooled down slightly, need to get some wellies for the rains though.

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p.s. hahaha, my spellings appaling. im so sorry you had to go through that.

STOP THE DALLADALLA!

2010-02-27T22:45:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone, quite an uneventful type of week this week, but highly pleasant. An amazing art club session on monday, we introduced the idea of wax crayons and ink, which the class abosolutely loved. Rach has been sent a pack of 280 colour pencils so we often introduce them into lessons and get them to draw and stuff, they love it so much, and its so nice to see theyre books becomming colourful! Caroline did a really nice picture of me and rachel as well (im not going to lie, she is one of my favourites!) Tuesday we started painting a wall for a mural, which is easier said than done becuase of the immense roughness of the surface, after that we popped up to the orphange as we do on tuesday afternoons. Wednesday saw the start of kili trainging in the local pool, everyone who will attempt the summit had to do at least 40 lengths, whilst those heading to zanzibar lounged around laughing! All in all a very pleasnt week, so as not much of note happend i shall write about something very differnt, African Transport.
Public transport is very good here, and also very cheap. This is mainly becuase of the small amount of cars and poor qualitly of the roads (though the tarmacd ones arnt toooo bad). To get to Moshi costs 700 tsh (35p) which is a 30-40 minite journey and a bus to Arusha will put you back 2000tsh (1 pound) which is a 2-3 hour journey. Of course, this does come at a cost and with any budget travel (as all those will know who have traveled with easyjet, ryan air will know) that cost is comfort. A small bus, or 'dalladalla' as they are called is smaller than an adverade people carrier, but higher. It will very often not move away untill it is completely full so you have know choice but to get on, wiating for the next not-o-full one is not an option! I would say the adverade dalladalla can fit 3 people in the front seat then a further 24 seated at the back, 7 people standing and a further 3 hanging out the side. If your really keen maybe 2-3 haning off the back as well. With this mammouth load its not surprising that the tyres are as bold as brass, stalling and breaking down is very common and woe betide you should you put your feet on the floor behind the driver. Underneath that floor is the engine, and it boils. fruit has been cooked on that surface before! thank God for sturdy reefs. Of course - as with all vehicles they speed down the road at a rate of fuck knows, most of their speedos are either broken, or just not their. The Country is apparently left hand driving, however about 30 pof the time they will drive on the other side, often with oncomming trafic, whilst overtaking other vehicles, or sometimes just for the hell of it!

limited time now so ill have to finish this desciption another time, in the meantime i hope england is fairing well, and ess freezing than it was whewn i last heard!
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more amazing things!

2010-02-21T02:38:00.000-08:00

Such an amazing week this week i missed out the two most exciting things from that blog. Number one is that i got an unconditional from UCL, which i am SOOOO HAPPY ABOUT! QAnd the second was a phonecall i got, just after we were asked to dinner by the Americans, from my oldest sister I. Shes 3 months pregnant and the due date is in Augst, a month after i get back!!!! Such exsciting and unexpected news, Eeven though we had no food or water, this kept me in the happiest little bubble all week, which no amount of mud or lack of rain could burst!!!!! To celebrate i had a creme caramel in the protea when we went swimming. It was amazing. OBriony, A girl from Arusha, also has a sister the same age who is 3 months pregnant too, we are both soo excited, (but abit bummer that we miss the whole pregnancy :( ) BUT HEY! YAAAAAAYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Phew, long times since I've been on here!

2010-02-21T01:34:00.000-08:00

Its been an epicly crazy few weeks over here. I'm sorry for not writing ablog last week. As some may know i had some pretty epic food poisoning on Thursday and was not feeling great (in fact, plain miserable) all weekend. Woo! That makes a change! (NOT). So monday after starting this months topic (yes slightly late i know) of apostrophes me and rach ventured up to machame hospital to gte me checked out in the afternoon. This was a very exciting adventure. Not only do dalla dallas appear not to go all the way to the hospital, but they dont seem to comprehend the idea that a mzungu would want to do anything that high up the mountain except see monkeys.

The hospital was quite big, bigger than liskeard definately and very airy and coool, and vaugely clean (by African standards). On arrival we trotted to the reception, looked considerable lost, as everything and everyone around us was speaking either kiswahili or chagga (the local dialect). Eventually a rarther more clued in nurse noticed the very lost looking mzungus and asked us what we wanted, after reading out the name of the doctor recommended by the machame hoursehold (the one who sorted Jacks dyssentry, ew) she said 'yes yes. follow now'. Which we so did, for about half an hour all round up, down, inside out of this hospital before she realized that i was actually wanting to see the doctor for medical reasons, not donation reasons. After that message was well and truly drilled into her head we eventually found a room with a promising looking doctor in. Very nice and excellent english, after telling him my symptoms he immediately asked Rach how long we've been here, to which she replied 'oh, 4 weeks. 'AH! You must have malaria!' he says. fantastic! OF course, i highly doubted i did becuase any ailment you ever get in east africa it is immediately malaria! So i was quickly bustled back to reception to open a file (to which i had to give my adress, realised i didnt actually know it.....) before bustling back to the ofice, and finally the lab to do some 'tests'. oh jolly! The lab room was great, a desk where the technician sat doing all the tests to her unfortunate victims, and behind a bench for all those waiting to watch with greta trepidation as she stabbs the unfortunates arms to take a blood sample. Never having had a blood test before i was absolutely caccing myself. Luckily however, a malaria test only requred a drop of blood from my finger, acheived by stabbing it with an impressively big (but sterile thank god) razor. (still bloody hurt though) And after that a stool test for any other tropical diseases i may have picked up along the way, WOO!

Anyway, after finding a toilet (french squat of course) and making rach garud the door and beggin for toilet paper we eventually made it back to the lab where we were instructed to 'SIT!' which we did. for a long time, watching the line of unfortunates be stabbed by crazy technician lady. Eventually however we were led back to a w=office/ward and were joined by the doctor african time later. He had no idea why i was ill, i probably had something nasty, but its unsure what, so he gave me a load of antibiotics, rehydration sachets and paracetamol just to be on the safe side. Getting the drugs and paying was another african waiting time fandango, but the whole experience only cost me tsh 8400, the equivilent of 4 pounds.20.

So after this we toddled quite happily down the road to machame market to pick up our veg for the week. It was a first for visitng the market and it was amazing! Fruit and veg ewverywhere, spiced laid out, sacks of maize, piles of salted fish that made my mouth water (although they looked hanging) wonderful matireial (at least half the price it is in Arusha) and any other odds and ends you may need for an african life. Of course we, being very white, did not go unoticed, the air was rent with cries of 'MZUNGU', 'rafiki',' karibu!' etc, which was nice, but choosing which stand to actually buy the veg from was hard! Overall we got 4 massive aubergines, 8 potatoes, 6 passionfruits, a big bunch of bananas, 2 avocadoes, 4 or eight tomatoes, loads of garlic and ginger and probably some more stuff for well under tsh 5000, equivilent of 2.50.

The next day was also intresting. Tuesday is our day of many lessons in the moring (4 followed y sport) but as bad luck would have it afircan time and african timetabling ment that other teachers decided it was their turn to teach, leaving us rarther pointless. So we went home very early when i spotted a glimps of white through the banana trees, MZUNGUS, 3 OF THEM (and not that albino either, who just confuses me, but REAL mzungus, in kisololi!) So we hurried after them and skuled around behind them, being abit unsure what to say now. luckily they were very outgoingm Ameircans from new york. They seemed very impressed by our being teachers and offered for us to come along to see some waterfalls with them, as they were just going. Obviously, as our lessons had been cancelled we agreed instantly, and had a very pleasent time talking about why we were there, why they were there (climb kili and missonary work in Rwanda) and things i say and did when i went to new york at new years. Luckily i had my journal on me, which had all my notes about new york, and one of the guys (phil) had trained in musical theater and knew half the cast of phantom of the opera, which i saw on broadway in january. Very odd! The waterfall was loely, very relaxing and peacefull. They were also very impressed with out knowlede of kiswahili (you have to be good at greeting to survive the walk to school) and so invited us to dinner, TO WHICH THEY SAID THEY WOULD PAY. i would like to now mention that they were staying at the immensly (for our standards) expensive protea hotel where we swim every Wednesday. So we were very hapy aboout this! After saying goodbye we popped up to the orphanage in machame (where we go to help out every tueday as we have the afternoon off). Whilst we were there about 10 other volunteers from a seperate organizeation came, which was very nice as obviously its good to meet other mzungus and talk about the western world, but they took all the good babies! I was left with crazy baby, who though is very fun, does not like to be cuddled, hes all about bashing the walls and flinging himself to the floor (v. funny though).

On arrival back at Lambo house we recieved a call from a rarther paniced and pissed off victoria, we had no water! fan-tast-tic. So, as instructed by our diligent landlord we called Mr meena to report this problem, to which he instantly replied he come, we get ready the buckets and we leave. Great! Next came the most mammouth panicked clean up session, trying to make the house less like a bombsite and more like the house he left to us, with no water at our disposal and worrying about making dinner. Mr Meena promptly arrived in his van and ushered victoria mc and rach off, to a river. Here they collected a good amount of muddy water to deposit in our emergency tamk. after about an hour of frantic water carrying, in which everyone got very wet, muddy and was very luaghed at by our neighbours, we had enough water in the tank to satisfy for now. It was very brown. apparently ok to be drunk once boiled! however, time was getting short now as we had to meet the amreicans for dinner, so me and rach ran off to the hotel (not a mean feat, as it is up a hill and 30 mins walk away) to be there nice and early, followed by the victorias who were given a lift by Mr meena. uckily, we all made it, in time, dry and clean with nice clothes and makeup on (crazy times). We settled down for a very relaxing evening. The amercans were named James, a pastor, Kelly and Ryan, a mac computer wiz (who trained in musical theater, has sung in all the big churched in the world and performed for the queen twice). It was AMAZING. This was the first time in a month where we had had a proper, civilized meal with grown ups, with big people conversation. Also, NO COOKING AND NO WASHING UP! They were so generous as well, they took great pity in our water situation and gewnrally seemed very impressed by the lifestyle we are living out here (in which case id love to see there reaction if they ever saw the AArusha houses). they bought us water to keep us going through the night and paid for all our meals. which were al least 10,000 tsh each! We also met their guides who gave some great tips for Kili, which they would start in the morning.

Lessons are going well, we've introduced coloured pencils on fridays to do drawing with apostrophes and other english related topics, which they absolutley love. I lvoe how colourful their books are getting now!
Yestdrday was a epic day. All 18 of us went to machame to vist the waterfalls. Long hike in the morning (which was very welcome), In the rainforest of Kili. after that we ground, roasted and dran coffe before a long hike up a SPECTACULAR valley to a bigger waterfall where we could swin, and jump off. I did no jump off becuase i did not trust the current one bit, however some other did and thourghly enjoyed it. it rained most of the day as well, which made it very fun becuase we were all damp and cold. A FIRST! Also, it ment that hopefully our water tank will fill up so we'll have running water again soon! yay! no more river water!

Finished the day with a trip to la liga, and made it back at 4 in the morning., A good night by most!
hope englands well
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Habari Asubuii

2010-02-05T06:35:00.000-08:00

Ello England. 'Ows tings? Awesom week thuis far. Last weekend, after all the other AVs came over on Friday night for Victorias birthday (awesom night) we went to stay in moshi for the weekend. Had my first proper shower since leaving the UK. IT.WAS.AMAZING. Sampled the one club tanzania has to offer us, twas an exprience! Found Dan (our token American) slam drunk in a cupboard, doing a very good inpersonation of a corpse. We reckoned later he had tryied to narnia his way back to the US.
teaching this week has been great. We've been studying nouns and I'm fairly sure they get it (at least kisololi do) Its amazing the difference between the two schools. as teachers i guess your not ment to have favourites. Rach and me do! Kisololi is so much better behaved, more polite, more honest and get on with their work without any trouble! Nshara are so rowdy and the beright ones spend most of their time finishing off the maths work for their previous lessons. THIS IS SO FRUSTRATING,. becuase theyre doing maths, they dont understand whats going on, then thats our brightest student down. I got so angry with them today i slammed my hand down on the desk untill i saw every single maths book in bags. I am definately the bad guy out of me and Rach, shes so nice its ridculous! Sport is going really well, Kisololi are so great and pick things up really quickly, we're starting rounders with them on monday (Argh cant wait). Less said about Nshara the better. They kick alot.
Also started a singing club on thursday which was really good, started any dream will do which is sounding good. Though no one really understand the idea of 'after school', when the bell went they all just left! Me and rach were left in the classroom like, urm......
Spent alot of my donation money already on paint, cannot wait to get started. working on the prep drawing for the mural and im going to start painting standard 1 classroon on monday. Mr shinno (finally found out his name!) asked me to write out the alphabet for him, which i will do, along with a big picture of bambi! (which i found in the house)
right, got to go.

Next time i promis i wont blab so much and will talk of other things that need mentioning, these be; African time, Mr Meena and transport!!

HOpe your all well, Miss you all!
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Habari Sana

2010-01-30T08:35:00.000-08:00

Habari san! (I hope you are well)
I am very well after a very eventfull week. after all that stress i didnt get to teach on tuesday becuase i started the morning with some intresting projectile vomiting. it was just too early for bran flakes. Ive now found to marmite, and im sticking to it religiously! After a good rest on tuesday i was back up to full health and raring to go on wednesday. Arrived in good time and sat with much anticipation in the class room eager to being standard 5 in kisololi. The first lesson we did introductions, my name is, i an from, i have so many sisters etc. It is truly amazing, their syllabus seems very advanced (this month we have to teach them possesive 's') and yet they trurly understand diddly squit. We are all just exasperated with what the teachers have been doing in the past few years (apparently dictation, nothing but).

It was a good lesson, in both schools becuase we got the measure of understanding and talent. it is VERY varied. There are at least two in each class that were going to have to teach to read and write, then there are others who really do understand and have amazing handwriting, AND SPELLING! We have tried to make lessons as interactive as possible, using group and matchin sentances excercises, which they absolutly love. The hard part is that its very difficult to explain to them what we want to do (but they do love our bizzare demonstrations!) but most of all, they write EVERYTHING down on the board in their books. This is very good of them, but when the starter involves matching pictures and words, and only three of them out of 30 have pencils, and they MUST use pencils to draw, and it takes each child about 20 mins to write it out, it does eat lesson time!

We've also been enjoying (? rach has) teaching 'sport'. Of course, we were expected to bring buckets of footballs asports equipment and the first lesson we were completely hounded by horrible snidy standar 6 and secondary school children demanding footballs. we will leave it along time before we introduce anythin like that me thinks. However, though it took them a while to understandf the concept of relays, they seem to really enjoy it. Duck Duck Goose goes down a treat (played it for 20 minuits!!)
very importatn to drink during these lessons, bith me and rach very almost fainted, expecsally when dealing with 150 kids!
right, times up
Talk to you soon!

Lala Salama!

2010-01-25T07:09:00.000-08:00

Well hello everyone! I cannot believe only a week has passed, its been unbelieveably busy.
I met the other volunteers at the airport, before the rarther nasty task of saying goodbyue to my parents. Everyone is lovley, (sickeningly so, i just dont see how everyone can look so lovely in this heat!). The plane was horrile, i was sat between to complete strangers, couldnt sleep etc. Landed at nairobi and found our connection to Kilimanjiro international, intrieging airport i must say, but luckily no cockroaches unlike sri lanka.
After Landing we went to LL'oasis lodge outside Arusha. Very pleasent stay whilst we had our 3 day orientation course. This was scary. Everything appears to be dangerous, cause massive illness or even death. Many horror stories where passed our way to shock us into behaving sensibly, many of them based around Uganda. It seems a horrible place from the amount of AV accidents (though of course it isnt). We joked that in our free travling, we would go in, go water rafting THEN OUT! before any malaria/corc/snake/rapist/mugger/bo monster/lochness monster ate us alive.
We learned some basic kiswahili, which i promtply forgot. useful ones a shillin ugani (how many shillings?) asanti sana (thankyou very much) jambo, mambo, mombo poiur, shikano which are all greeting of various types. i was very excited to find out asati sana ment something becuase its what rafiki(meaning friend) sings in The lion King 'ASANTI SANA SQUASHED BANA' which me and rach have been singing all week.

We moved to our house on saturday, its very big (in comparison to others) and nice and cool. The toilet is a french camping site job, which dont flush, shower dosnt work and the cooking is intrieging. we seem to be constantly boiling water becuase we drink it so fast (much cheeper to boil than to buy)
We were greeted by the heads of Lambo (where victoria and victoria are teaching) and Kisololi and Nshara(where me and Rach are) to eat a awful stew of goat that gave us all nightmares. (still, better than thr tripe in the c\staffroom today that i declined to eat) then went for a tour around the schools. Lambo seems to have done comparitvely well for itself, Somerfeild prep (the one that goes into eton) sponosr some of their water tanks and things, and previous AVs have been very generous. I think they expect alot from the Victorias! kisololi and Nshara on the other hand has never had any AVs and i feel were definetly starting from stratch! (but more on that at a later date)

Today was our first day at school, Leaving proptly at 7.25 to get there at 7.45 (school starts at 8). We met both headmasters and sorted out our timetables, me and rach shall be teaching english to standard 5 in Kiololi, then in the next period in Nshara. and in the afternoons, sprot, to what we fear will be the both school, god knows what standards! After alot of lesson planning we went home at 3, to venture out to the town of moshi (where i sit writing this) which is about 30-40 mins away in a crazy taxi.
Nice amount of shopping done, got some good bits and peices (shampoo)

The worst thing to happen so far is that i reacted against my malarial pill (at least thats what i hope has happend!). Which means i havent been able to eat, been very nauseous, drained and had an very painful burning in my stomach. It has made everythibng alot tougher and ive been inexplicably homesick. Sunday i was just a complete emotional wreck, after throwing up the day before, and a week of no food i could hadly move from my bed, and couldnt even thingk of england without crying. However, im using rach's malarone for now, hoping that the synmptoms will stop (today i have felt better, less nasueous).

Im very sorry about all the mistakes, i have alimited time on here and not enough to go checking it! Teaching startes proper job tomrurrow, (very nervous).

My love goes to all of you, I hope it isnt to cold in england, your welcome to some of this heat!!!!

Love you all, miss you all(even romaticised the chavs the other night)
Roo

p.s, lala Salama means sleep well (lala meaning sleep, my favourite word so far!)

Welcome!

2010-01-12T14:45:00.000-08:00

Well, this is my first post (clearly). Now I'm quite new to this thing so please forgive me if it dosnt work or other problems that may arise. I also feel that i should, on the outset explain that good spelling and grammar have never been high up on my list of achievments. Please ignore the undotted i's and left over 't's, i assure you, years of unforfilled targets on school reports has annoyed me more than 'whent' can annoy you!

Moving on! I created this blog so my friends, family, sponsors and genrally anyone else whos intrested can keep up with my progress in Tanzania, to which I leave for on mondayat 19.00 from Heathrow. We (me and the rest of the group with AV) will be traveling to Kenya airport, beofre catching a transfere to Mt. Kilimanjiro in Tanzania. We will then have a 2 day orientation course/ acclimatisation days before continuing to our schools.

May I first begin by (and I know I'm repeating myself) saying a enormous thankyou for all who played, watched and sponsored the concert in Decemer. It was an amazing success, words cannot describe how exhilirating it was to see so many people in the church, and the players give so much. I therefore dedicate this blog to you good people!

many thanks, and I'll keep you posted!
Roo
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