Settling in

This was a big week for me. Wednesday I got the keys to my house. Thursday I got the keys to my car.
Exciting stuff! And just in time to settle in for Christmas. My shipment has arrived in Tanzania and is waiting for my diplomatic clearance papers from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Hopefully these come sooner than later. I can't wait to unpack all my things. Especially my kitchen things!

There's my driveway with my little RAV4. 

Stepping into the livingroom/dining room

 

Looking back at the entrance

 Into the kitchen

 Kitchen from the doorway in

 Hallway

 Guest bathroom

 Small guestroom

 Small guestroom from another vantage point

Storage/electrical panel/water heater room

 Bigger guestroom

 My bedroom

Closets in my bedroom

Ensuite bathroom

View of the double porch - the front door is beside the sofa outside

Jacuzzi/pool thingy in the front yard

Looking back at the house

There is a big backyard too - the perfect place for Peanut to run around. And there's a swing set in the backyard, so I might get some swings for it. That could be fun for the young and young at heart.

More pictures to follow when my things arrive and I start to unpack

This is pretty awesome. I'm browsing the classifieds for a car when I stumble over this jewel. I'm not sure which is better, the two daladala buses for sale, or the bulletproof car for hire.

Hopefully I find wheels soon!

The truth is, Ugandans want change - part ii

Tonight I had the pleasure of driving with Harriet, my first female taxi driver in Africa... or anywhere come to think of it.

Harriet shone with positive energy and told me she loves her job because she loves to travel. When she drives a taxi she gets to meet people with all kinds of different backgrounds - and that's the thing she really loves about travelling; it’s meeting people.

She asked me if there were potholes on the roads in Dar es Salaam. When I told her yes, she said, “it must be an East African syndrome.”

But unlike Francis and John who told me their worries, Harriet told me her hopes. Hopes that some days Uganda would realize its potential. Hopes that Uganda would follow in Rwanda’s footsteps and eliminate corruption. Hopes that the future for Uganda is bright, if the right steps are taken along the way.

“Some day we will be here and there will be no corruption. It will be history,” she said.

She told me it was like in South Africa when apartheid seemed an impossible obstacle.

“Then no-one believed that there could be a South Africa without apartheid, but now, it’s like history, a memory of the past.”

The truth is, Ugandans want change

“The truth is Ugandans want change,” said Francis, who drove me home from my meeting today. Francis is one of the two taxi drivers I’ve driving with during the last 24 hours. The election in Uganda is still two months away, but it’s a topic on everyone’s mind – or at least on Francis’ and John’s.

John, my taxi driver from Entebbe airport to my hotel, was eager to talk to me about the elections – both the upcoming election and what he called the rigged election in 2006. Knowing nothing about the political landscape or election history here, I listen as John vented his frustrations about the rigged results, the pointless presence of election observer mission if they can’t do anything other than write reports. I listen as he told me that western countries should do something, anything – even if it means withdrawing ALL aid from African countries whose leaders who fix elections misuse fund and disregard their people.

“The Nile starts here and runs all the way into Egypt. We have fertile land and a good climate, yet we are starving,” said John.

“Twenty-four years later and we still cannot feed ourselves – look at our roads – we need a government who will do something.

“It’s only when we have and election that things start to happen,” said Francis, adding that any progress end soon after the elections. They want us to think they are doing something for this country, to vote for them.”

Driving through the narrow, dilapidated roads, Francis had a point. Potholes sometimes took up entire lanes forcing us either on the red dirt shoulder with pedestrians on into oncoming traffic. The streets were often barely wide enough to accommodate the two lanes of traffic, especially when cares share the hilly and windy roads with swarms of motorcycles (a startling minority of use helmets – I didn’t see a single helmet on any motorcyclist today) and big trucks. The use of helmets is another failure of the government John tells me. When the police started stopping and ticketing the hundreds of thousands of motorcyclists around the city, they were apparently ordered by the president to leave the motorcyclists alone. With the shear numbers, they are a large potential demographic of voters.

“It’s a sign that something is rotten at the top and we want it to change.”
Francis and John both told me they are worried what could happen if Museveni doesn’t win (like last time, they say) but refuses to give up his power. They’re worried about the violence that might happen. They’re worried that they’re in for another stretch of the same thing. They’re worried that if they do vote, it won’t make a difference. And most of all, they’re worried what will happen if change doesn’t start to happen in Uganda.

Uganda ranks 143 on the most recent human development index, according to 2010 estimates. Uganda’s GDP ranks around 100th in the world according to the World Bank but is also ranked by the World Bank has having the 12th fasted real GDP growth rate in the world and the third fastest on the African continent, after Ethiopia and the Republic of Congo. The per capita GDP is USD 1,200 annually or just over USD 3.30 a day.

Beach resort monkeys

Had a great excursion out of Dar yesterday to a little place called Kasa Beach Hideaway, where there's a great beach that's not overly visited.

It's around 48 km outside of Dar and we drove through some beautiful country side and 4 small villages on the dirt road before getting there. All villages have unmarked speed bumps, which can be an unpleasant surprise, even if you're only going 40 km/h.

Spent the afternoon alternating between wave diving and vegging on the beach with a yummy picnic (guacamole and crackers and a great big salad. oh and a bag of salt and vinegar chips and some basset's all sorts).

When we went back to the car, I discovered the beach monkeys. The tree I'd parked under for shade was crawling with cute little monkeys. I looked at them, they looked at me, and the guard looked at me like I was silly. Wish I'd brought my camera, you'll have to make due with phone photos.

Ethiopia friends and bongo beats

Tonight I danced along side a tall, lean Maasi woman with strings of beads hanging from various holes in her ears while the sunset behind us over the Indian Ocean.

A local dance and drum troupe was performing in the square and I had great friends from Ethiopia visiting with their children so after playing on the playground, we decided to go dancing.

It's amazing how differently we are raised to move our bodies. The Tanzanian dancers shook it like no-body's business. It make all the kids shake it too. And then the dancers would break from their moves and grab someone sitting and watching. Crazy man dancer in clothes which I can only describe as looking like dreads grabbed and pulled me to the middle. My approach, monkey see, monkey do (me being the monkey) and gave my best shot at mimicking him moves.

Later, while they were singing, I got grabbed and pulled up again. This time along with a Maasi woman, whose dancing is completely different. Maasi are jumpers. So I jumped too.

And then I danced my way out of there and on to dinner.

Saturday afternoon

This afternoon I headed to the beach with a friend, Isabel, and one of her friends, Ollie. It was his last day in Tanzania. He's studying medicine in the UK and was doing some sort of visit to hospitals here. He spent two months in the country helping in local hospitals.

We hopped in a bajaj to the Kigamboni ferry, where we walked aboard for a two minute trip across the habour. On the other side we jumped in another bajaj and headed out to Kipapao Beach resort to lay on the beach and bathe in the Indian Ocean.
The weather was gorgeous, not too hot but a little windy. The water was amazing! We chilled for a couple hours before heading back home, substituting the second bajaj on the other side (in uptown Dar) with a taxi home.

After a bite to eat and some time with the peritos, we headed to the Irish bar for a drink... my first social outing in Dar so far. We kept it low key and headed home after a few hours.

Earlier today I went to look at a house which I was rather fond of. It's huge (lots of room for guests) but has great character and really great outdoor space. It's a little above my budget, but I asked my agent to see how much she could get the rent down to. Tried to emphasize that I'll be there for the next three years (stable tenant) and work with a big organization so I'm a good kind of tenant to have. My agent took me there because she said he might be willing to negotiate price. I'm hoping it works out! Let's see.

Tomorrow I'm off to Kampala for work. Stupidly enough, I left my itinary at the office and I'm not actually sure what time I'm supposed to be at the airport tomorrow. I'm going to enjoy sleeping in tomorrow and lounging on the balcony in the morning before heading off.

Coincidentally, I'll be at the same hotel as the colleague whose house I'm sitting. I should be back in Dar on Wednesday evening.

Kipapao Beach

Loved the little statues of an elephant and giraffe standing on the beach.

Random beach-patrolling Maasii and Isabel's feet.

Fishing boats tying in the for the evening on the Kigamboni side of town.

Sun going down over uptown Dar es Salaam

Starting week two

It’s the beginning of week two. It feels like we only just got here yesterday, but already the routines are starting to fall into place. No progress on the house hunting yet. Read, I haven’t even started yet. Somehow this house-sitting deal has made me more relaxed about the housing situation but maybe too relaxed.

On our late afternoon walk today I saw I great looking property with a for rent sign outside and plan to walk by there tomorrow morning to note the phone number. I seriously need to get started!

This weekend completely felt like vacation. It seems surreal that I’ll be working in this environment and when you can chill in a hammock and drink chilled white wine with a view of the ocean, reality seems so far away. Peanut and I put a good 13 km behind us on Saturday and has a great walk on Sunday plus a play date with Shaki and Rocca, resident puppies at the house we’ll sitting on from Thursday.

But it’s not all a dream. Sunday also brought a reality-check—a reminder that despite the kilometres of white sand beaches, this isn’t a resort town and mzungus (foreigners) are the favourite target of beach gangs.

Driving to work last week, I was amazed that the beautiful beaches all seemed deserted. But then on a Tuesday morning, what else would you expect. On our Saturday morning walk we briefly walked on Coco Beach, which at 10:30 in already sweltering heat was also empty, except for a few small vendors. We only walked about 200m on the beach before returning on to the road. And after Sunday, I’m glad we didn’t walk further.

After arriving at the beach house, Carlos and I decided to take the peritos (he’s Columbian, so the puppies are addressed in Spanish mostly when he’s around) for a short walk on the beach outside their house. Carlos had been working on a little beach clean-up project with his guards and was digging in the sand when I arrived, so we threw our flip-flops but he kept his hoe/pick with him as a walking stick. It was low tide and there was lots of room so I let Peanut off leash. She was thrilled to be running free, tearing up and down the beach and sniffing out crab burrows. Further down the beach from us where three other older mzungus out for a Sunday stroll. Carlos and I walked about 300 m before stopping to sit beside a beached dug-out canoe. There were some children just on the other side, so I leashed Peanut and we sat and talked. I had my bag with my camera and Peanut’s long leash and treats with me.

Just after we sat down a kind of sketchy looking local came up to us. I whispered to Carlos that this is when Peanut was trained to bark on command. The guy sized us up and Carlos did the same, telling him to keep his distance because Peanut’s name was Killer. The small peritos were running around in front of her, so Peanut was a little jealous and vocalizing with howls.

A few minutes later a group of guys walked passed us, exchanging words with the guy who was stilling hanging around us. They walked past without giving us much attention. Sketchy guy made some off hand remark about the beach mafia, which we just attributed to trying to translate Killer to Kiswahili. Then we heard screams.

Both Carlos and I jumped up and hurried around the corner we had been sitting at. The three other tourists were being circled by the group of guys and herded toward the water. In a split second reaction we both start yelling and Carlos takes off running towards them, two month old puppy in one arm, and the raised garden tool in the other. Peanut starts barking like mad and the guard who had stayed by their gate started blowing his panic whistle. The group of guys quickly dispersed, two of them fleeing further toward the water with Carlos in hot pursuit, tool raised, screaming, “I am going to kill you!”

Peanut and I walk over to the three tourists and I yell to the guard to press the panic button and call the security company. While I talk to the three tourists, Carlos, who dropped Rocca off with me, and two guards (one from the neighbouring house and one who guards a telecom tower on the other side of the house) take off running down the beach to try cut off the guys from coming back into land before the security company arrived.

One of the ladies tells me she didn’t know what to do so she just started screaming. One of the guys had pulled a machete on them. They weren’t walking with bags or money on them just some small jewellery. Sometimes, I learned, it can be more dangerous to have nothing on you at all if your mugged, the muggers being angry that they aren’t gaining anything are more likely to hurt you than if you have something to give them.

“I thought this sort of thing only happened in South Africa,” the woman says through a thick Afrikaans accent. “We’ve been here for three weeks and nothing like this has happened, and today is our last day.”

Eventually Carlos and the guards came back to the house with the back up from the security company. They hadn’t managed to catch the guys (I’m afraid to think what could have happened if they had) but called the police to file a report. By this time the tourists were gone even though I had told them we were calling the police.

We stayed off the beach for the rest of the day, the episode providing us with a sobering reality check. Even as the tide came in later in the day and the water was almost all the way up to the gate, shrinking the beach to just a meter or two, and some local kids were bathing outside, we decided that the beach was off limits for the rest of the day.

Now I understand how the beautiful white sand beaches along the Msaki Peninsula are deserted despite home to most of the ex-pats in Dar es Salaam. I also understand why people pay the exorbitant membership fee at the Dar es Salaam Yacht Club so they can go to a “safe” beach. Before I didn’t understand what they meant by “safe” or why you’d pay hundreds of thousands of shillings to use a beach.

There is a lot more to write about. Look forward to the tale of Peanut and Miriam joining the Hash House Harriers Dar es Salaam Chapters Monday evening. And on Sunday I’m off to Kampala for fours days, so I’m sure there’ll be an update or two from that adventure.

Eva, Lukas, and Minna sitting down to lunch on the first floor balcony Sunday afternoon. That giant glass of white wine is mine.

Until next time, stay safe and don’t underestimate the deterrence factor an excited Dire Dawa Street Terrier (or Shepard… who knows exactly her lineage) can have on the beach mafia or any other bad guys out there.

Dusk over Msasani Penninsula

Here's the photo I look last night while eating dinner at The Waterfront Restaurant in the SlipWay plaza/concourse.

The Preface

I’ve decided that these first posts are what you would call the preface of this blog – an introduction for both you and me to my new life.

As an introduction to this life, I caught a dala dala (spelling?) home from the office today with a colleague, Isabel. Dala dala are the city busses here. Although full and with standing room only when we got on, it was surprisingly comfortable and not smelly or cramped. Isabel and I jumped into a purple mini-bus about a block down from the office. Helpfully the dala dala’s are colour-coded and have their destination painted on the front of them. We managed to get caught in a traffic jam and the pleasure of the bus ride was a little longer than usually, but eventually we arrived at the junction by the international school where we jumped off. From there it’s about a 10 minute walk back to my apartment, but we (Isabel and a friend/neighbour of hers, whose name I think is Joe, and I ) jumped in a bajaj, stopping at my “home” first and then continuing to their street.

We made plans to meet up later for a drink on the pier and watch the sun go down. After dropping my things at home, I ran to the supermarket in the Slipway plaza and bought a bag of dog food (51,000 TZS!), a cutting board and some dish soap. Maybe it will be cheaper to make my own food here after all! A 7kg bag of Pedigree for 33 USD is a little steep. Then again a half-kilo of ground beef here is pretty pricey too. Add to that the cost of rice and veggies, and I’m not sure which will add to be more. I’m so not a numbers person so a cost-breakdown of the two options isn’t exactly in my cards. Plus, I’m not sure how long the dry food will last. *edit* Although I must admit that when I convert it to USD, it actually isn't as scary as it sounds when you pay over 51,000 of anything for dog food. *edit*

When I returned from my (stressful) walk with Peanut (she had a melt down or two where she just snapped and started attacking the leash and then growling at me), Joe and Isabel were waiting for me at the gate and we walked down to the pier for a drink. It’s great to meet some people and drink a glass of wine in the company of others, even if it’s only a Monday night.

After a day at the office, I’m trying to digest the contents of my first day and first meetings. On the agenda for this week are technical briefings with all of the staff on the project so I can better understand what we’re doing with this project. I’ve already got a list of tasks to throw myself over. I definitely won’t be bored at work for the next long while.

I’ve agreed to meet Isabel on the corner by the international school at 7 am tomorrow. We’re planning to get to work early so we can beat the traffic in the morning, and leave earlier so we can beat the traffic in the afternoon too. I’m off to bed now so I can catch my 8 hours of sleep and still have time to take Peanut for a good walk (hopefully more successfully) in the morning before heading to the dala dala corner.

Second Landing

It’s 8:30 on Sunday night. Peanut and I have been in Dar es Salaam for six hours now. I’ve just finished unpacking my suitcase arranging the few things I brought with me. I’m renting a two-bedroom apartment at a hotel on the beach. I’d just organized my clothes into the wardrobe in the one bedroom, when I discovered the other bedroom was bigger, with more furniture and a better closet. Although the air-con in the “master” bedroom is older and perhaps less efficient, the room is better organized, so I moved all my things over.

After arriving and throwing everything into the apartment, I screwed Peanut’s tie-out stake into the ground on a little patch of grass and set her kennel up beside it. Although I’m fairly certain she’s had enough of her kennel after the flight from Addis Ababa to Dar es Salaam, I figure she has to learn to love it again. Especially since we’ll be moving at least once more before we’re “settled”.

The airports in both cities hit my wallet hard. In Addis, Ethiopian Airlines charged 189 USD for Peanut as excess baggage, despite that I’d already booked cargo space for her, which was only supposed to cost 62 USD. Apparently someone had dollar signs in their eyes and changed their mind. That was the first unexpected blow. The second came when we landed in Dar es Salaam and went through customs where they insisted on charging duty on her and asked me her value. Of course she’s priceless, but I said, she’s a street dog, she’s lucky to still be alive, really she’s not worth anything. The stern customs clerk didn’t seem to find my argument amusing and charged me 100 USD plus a 25 percent VAT, totally to 71,200 TZS (Tanzanian Shillings). Of course they couldn’t take Visa so I had to leave Peanut and my bags behind, exit the luggage claim area, find a bank machine outside and then explain the whole thing to the security guard to get back in. The cab back to the hotel-apartment cost 40,000 TZS, mostly I think because he was uncomfortable with dogs. Surprisingly, Peanut behaved like an angel in the car ride (when not in her kennel, she usually opts to communicate her discontent with a combination of yawn-groaning and arm-biting).

Once secured, I left Peanut to chill alone and walked down to the hotel complex to explore. The Tanzanian sure have understood the tourism concept, especially compared to Ethiopia. Granted, white sand beaches are definitely more attractive than red dessert, but there’s a whole different level of services (and customer service) here. At least so far.
I quickly figured out how to buy wireless access and sat at the Classico Caffè (yes, that’s how they spell it) with an iced frappaccino and some net access. The café is in the middle of a plaza of small souvenir shops, interior decorating stores, a well-stocked grocery store (where I later bought a few essentials, like tea, ground beef, and hangers), an icecream shop, and a number of restaurants, among other things. I took a quick walk around and decided that it’d be a perfect place to explore on Peanut’s evening walk.

We walked around the pier, if we can call it that and then headed down the road the hotel is located on, toward a residential area. Earlier, I had seen two women jogging down the dirt street. While we walked, we met a handful of other runners, a masaii, and at least a dozen SUVs driven by expats. It’s a posh neighbourhood with big garden, bigger houses and through the compound walls, I spotted swimming pools a number of places.

After dropping Peanut off at “home” again, I headed back to the café for dinner- fish and chips (or butter and lemon grilled red snapper, fries and some super yummy courgette and carrots) and a glass of white wine. The plaza was humming with activity. The playground which had been only been occupied by a handful of children earlier was teaming with them. The ice-cream parlour had a steady stream of customers and the restaurants were all full. Sitting on the other side of a little terrace, was the Italian couple who I’d sat beside on the airplane. I watched the sunset over the activity with palm trees and the Indian Ocean in the background before heading home again.

The entire afternoon I’d been cursing my camera. It had gotten switched on in my carry on, and I didn’t notice until I got to Addis, without my charger. There the outlets use the clunky British three-pronged plugs and my charger is North American and the only adapter I have is the mainland Europe model. Tomorrow at lunch I have a mission.

It’s 9:00 now, and I’m going to feed Peanut, then walk her over to reception to find out how much time I should budget to make it through the morning traffic tomorrow. First day of work, here I come!

oops!

I wrote a long blog post last night. Of course I managed to forget my flash drive so I can't post it now. Look forward to updates soon!

First landing

I could feel the wet air sticking to my skin as soon as I stepped out of the 777-800. I arrived at about 25 minutes past ten in the evening. The flight tracking system had shown 22°C when we landed. The moisture made it feel hotter. It’s definitely a different kind of hot here than in Dire Dawa, which I’ve started describing as a dust bowl, compared to this.

At close to eleven, the trip through the city to the hotel was a breeze with empty roads; the trip hardly took 15 minutes. When I planned to come to the airport again today, I was warned to budget at least an hour to get to the airport. The traffic here really is horrible, a colleague told me as we were crossing the street to get me another set of (unflattering) passport photos. This is the fourth time this year. These ones will be used for my work id, my residence permit, and my driver’s license among other things and were taken against blue background which made my purple shirt and reddish hair look more garish than a white background might have.

I managed to drop by the office for a few hours this morning—conveniently right next door to the hotel I stayed at last night. I’m now equipped with a desk where I unloaded the stack of papers I acquired during my briefing in Geneva earlier this week. We managed to get the computer up and running with a username and email address for me. I met a few of the colleagues I’ll be working with here and had lunch at the canteen in our building before rushing back to the hotel to catch a taxi to the airport again.

I’m off to pick up Peanut who has been staying in Addis Ababa with friends since I left Ethiopia almost two weeks ago now. I’m anxious to see her again, hope she’s behaved herself and with any luck, matured a little in the last two weeks.

Sunday we turn around and fly back to Dar es Salaam and Monday is my first real day at the office. I’m looking forward to a weekend in familiar surroundings, and hope the wine, cheese and deli meats I picked up in Amsterdam can even start to repay Rafa and Lisa for dog-sitting last week. I also hope the wine makes it there without exploding in my checked baggage.