2 weeks in Nyangao

2 weeks at nyangao and the joy of Shikamoo

Wow, that has gone quickly!  I’m settling in now.. to be honest it was a culture shock at first.  The village is small, with just the hospital, a church a small market and a mosque – so not much to do in the evenings unless I want to become religious!  I am the only mzungu in the village so it seems everyone knows my name and everything I do… “Ahh, Mr James, I saw you in the market yesterday”, “Mr Jamesi, habari za tembea?”  (how was your walk?) …but that does make me something of a local celebrity, and everyone will say hello. 

The language barrier has been a bit of a problem. I speak very very basic Kiswahili and only Some people here speak basic broken English, so I am having to learn quickly!  I’ve already improved in the short time I’ve been here, and  I am meeting with a teacher from the local primary school to arrange lessons.

Having said that, everyone has been very friendly, welcoming and accommodating.  Tanzanians are generally friendly people, as demonstrated by their greetings.  Greetings are an important part of Tanzanian culture, when greeting an elder one must use “Shikamoo” to which the elder will reply “Marahaba”… then there are various levels of formality from “Hujambo” (formal)  to “mambo”- slang <what’s up/any issues?>  to which can be replied “poa” – <cool>.  Once you have said hello as above, then you MUST ask “habari” which means what is the news/how is……  ?.... and not just one “habari”.. oh no. that would be rude…. You should ask habari za asabuhi (news of the morning), habari za familia (news of the family), habari za mama (news of your mother), habari za kazi (news of work), habari za kaka (news of your brother) habari za kuku (news of your chickens), habari za weekend (news of the weekend)

So greetings take a while.. and it is quite rude to skip them and get straight down to business, even at the market or in a shop when all you want is two onions!  What is quite nice is being “Shikamoo’d”.. makes you feel respected.  And I’m actually starting to get offended if kids don’t shikamoo me !

The staff in the laboratory are very friendly, and are used to having volunteers so are very welcoming.  They are grateful that I have come to Tanzania and we all hope we will learn a lot from each other.  They are all helping me with my Kiswahili, and I am helping them with their English.  (For those geeky enough to want to know about the lab, I’ll post some pics and stats soon!).  It is nice living 2 minutes walk from work, although as I entered the hospital gates on Wednesday last week there was a cobra lying in the grass.  I only avoided it as the security guard was telling people to!.. I’m just not used to looking out for lethal animals on my way to work!

A not-so-lethal gecko on my lounge wall !

Arriving at Nyangao

Well It’s been a couple of weeks since I last updated the blog……Where to begin?  Maybe at the beginning?

So I arrive at Mtwara airport after a short 1 hour flight from Dar es Salaam, and what a spectacular flight with views of the Tanzanian coastline, the Indian ocean and Mafia Island.  Remember when Hurn airport was just a shed in a field with a bit of tarmac.. well that’s Mtwara airport. After being ushered off the plane and into “terminal one” (there is only one!) , a couple of blokes unloaded the luggage from the plane onto a glorified wheelbarrow and pushed it into the building, and unloaded the bags onto a table in the room where myself and the other  passengers where waiting.  Then everyone went home – only one flight a day it seems!  

Thankfully I was met at the airport by the Hospital driver – a chap named Eric.  That’s all I got from him as I can’t speak Swahili and he can’t speak English!  Instead of going straight to the hospital we went to the MSD (medical stores department) in Mtwara apparently to pick up some items for the hospital.  So we waited, and waited and waited.  I tried to find out what was going on in my (very) basic Swahili, and think I got told that we were waiting.  By this time I gathered that we were waiting, so waited some more.  After waiting for two hours, we waited some more.  Then a truck came and unloaded some boxes.. that was exciting, and after that we waited….I think we waited for a bit more, and finally after 3 hours of waiting we apparently got what we came for – 2 small boxes of something!  So off we went!  (I’ve since learnt that pone of my jobs will be going to MSD to pick up supplies for the lab.. note to self: take a book)

The drive from Mtwara to Nyangao takes around 2 ½ hours  on the only tarmac road in the region!  The road passes through plantations of coconut, mango, rice, banana and tomatoes and oranges, and  cuts through many small villages consisting of a few mud huts, some street vendors selling tomatoes and oranges.   I was admiring the sun setting over the hills in the distance as we drove through another village when we suddenly turned off the tarmac onto a dirt track for a few hundred metres and passed a sign saying NYANGAO HOSPITAL.   I had arrived!   When VSO said I was in a rural location, they were not bloody joking

In at the deep end

After arriving at my new house and meeting my housemate – Evelyn – a VSO volunteer from Kenya who has been at Nyangao for about 6 months we went to the bar in the village (the only bar).. when I say Bar, what I mean is a shack with some patio tables and chairs and a roof made from coconut palm fronds – but it does sell beer (and is called Old Trafford)!- to meet Ronnie – the hospital administrator, from Uganda, and a previous VSO volunteer.   A quick cola and a chipsi-mayai later* I was in bed spending my first night in my new house and ready to start work the next day.

The next morning at 7.30 I was thrust into the daily clinical meeting with all of the doctors at the hospital, met the chief doctor and chief surgeon then was shown around the hospital meeting every single one of the 300ish staff…  I’m now called Mr Jamesi – and everyone knows my name even if I have no idea about theirs! 

                                      (Photo taken from Google Images)

* chipsi-mayai  (chips and eggs) is probably Tanzania's second national dish (after ugali).. and is basically a Chip Omlette !  Cooked in a pan over a charcol burner and sold on every street corner and every tiny village it is greasy, tasty and generally cheap and contains none of your 5 a day! It is usually eaten using a cocktail stick -  Good nosh - try it! 

chipsi mayai ..   just needs lashings of chili sauce

Nyumbani (My house)

My front door!

Coconut trees

Tortoise not included

Resident Chickens

Basic kitchen... but enough to cook rice and tomatoes!

Morogoro

 Morogoro

Just finished a week of swahili language training in the beautiful surroundings of Morogoro.  We stayed in a convent that is also run as a guest house.. the nuns were ace! - drinking beer on Friday afternoon and cracking open the red wine on Saturday lunchtime!!   The course was intense, it used to be 3 weeks but has been squeezed down to 8 days.  I could do with 8 more weeks- although I now know the basics - greetings, haggling at the market, asking directions and past, present and future tenses of verbs!   Swahili is actually a difficult language to master (it has 13 different noun classes!)!   We did get one day off with the choice of a safari or a hike up the mountain.. I chose the hike, and was pleased I did.. 3 of our group and a guide walked up through little villages on the mountainside, past crops of mangoes, bananas, guava, rice, strawberries and beans.  The children in the villages all ran out to greet us with cries of "Muzungu Muzungu" - literal translation is "white person"!   Most of the children of primary school age can speak some basic English, so we were greeted by many "how are you?" and "what is your name"... it put my Swahili to shame!!!.   Again I was amazed by the resourcefulness and resilience of the locals.. as we struggled up the pretty steep hill in full hiking boots, rucksacks, enough water and food for a week long expedition and sweating buckets we were overtaken by a woman with a full basket on her head, carrying a child in a sling on her back and wearing FLIP FLOPS!

The hike took us up to a lovely waterfall about half way up the mountain (1500m).. which was far too cold to have a swim in!!! 

I'm now back in Dar for a night, and am flying down to my placement in Mtwara tomorrow to start working finally!!!

Hope you like the pictures!

Scary bus ride to Morogoro.. Tanzanians are mental drivers!

The VSO volunteers and Swahili teachers

A small section of the market.. it sold everything you could imagine

yep.. chickens on a motorbike!

Hike up the mountain

I FOUND ONE!!!!   hlafway up a mountain in Tanzania!! (actually I've seen 3 so far in Tz!)... I will find a nice one and ship it back to England!

View of Morogoro from the mountain

"Muzungu Muzungu"

The school on the mountain.

A few picutres from Dar es Salaam

Dar Es Salaam airport

Dar skyline from the ferry

The Kigamboni ferry to the south peninsula beaches

The beach!!!  it was lovely.. and the sea was as warm as a bath!

Mambo!

Mambo!  Habari gani?
Hello!  Well, I've had a week in Dar es Salaam and am enjoying myself so far!   I've been looked after well by VSO and had a week of fairly hardcore training etc so have not had much chance to get on the net until now. I have today off, so am off to the beach later for some R&R.  Dar is a crazy city, so much going on but the people are friendly and helpful even if I can't understand what they say!  It is SO different to anywhere else I've been - amazing how people make do with what they have.  The street outside out hotel seems to be the local mechanics, with people changing engines with their bare hands right next to a BBQ chicken stall.  It's hot... It was 28C when I arrived, and has stayed hot all week... and this is winter!  It did rain today as I was walking around the city.. really rained... but only for 2 minutes... and I dried off quick in the heat. 
Other things I have noticed:   
Beer is cheap (2000shilings = less than 1pound).  
Some things are stupidly expensive (a rubbishy towel= 30 000 shillings = 12 pounds)
Satellite dishes point straight up
The call to prayer from the mosque is both loud and early

I'm going to Morogoro tomorrow for one week for some kiswahili training and then I'm going down to my placement near Mtwara.  It sounds like my placement location is very rural so will be a massive change from my week here in Dar, nonetheless I'm looking forward to starting work.

Hope everyone is doing well back home
Kwa Heri