So I'll update to tell how the election was for us over here in Tanzania. I know a lot of folks who read this don't agree with me, but I am a firm Obama supporter. I won't go into my reasons for all of that but it's relevent to the story so here goes...

All of the americans at Amani are Obama supporters and we were very excited to see what would happen with the elections on Tuesday night/Wed morning our time. We decided to get a hotel room (split between 5 of us was pretty cheap) which had cable so we got CNN, BBC and Al Jazerah, all of which were covering the election results as they came in. They started to actually come in at about 2am our time. Some of us got sleep, I maybe got an hour of dozing but would wake up every time they gave this sound to let us know they had a new projection coming in. Finally at 6 am they declared Obama the winner, and then we got to see his speech a little after 8 am. After which I went to Amani until lunch, then went home to sleep because I literally couldn't keep my eyes open even while doing active work.

It was a pretty crazy and fun ride! Obama mentioned something about "people huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of the world" and our director, who had stopped by on the way to work to watch the speech with us, cheered even though it didn't quite apply to us. Close enough. Of course everyone here is really excited - Kenya actually had a national holiday on Thursday because Obama's father is Luo (their second largest tribe). They are also putting in electricity, a tarmac road, and running water into his grandmother's village, I suppose in anticipation of a presidential visit. I think it's a bit much (since Obama met his father all of one time) but I'm sure the villagers are happy to have it ;).

Anyhow, maybe I'm being overly optimistic but I am hoping that this change might make me proud to tell people what my nationality is again!

Update from Moshi

It is very hot here.  Also very dusty much of the time.  Oh well, I guess that's what I should expect from living near the equator.  My work at Amani continues to go well and the kids are showing a lot of progress with their reading and math skills.  I do have a few who have started to test me a bit to see how much I will let them get away with, which as they find out is not very much ;).  But overall they are working very hard.

This weekend we held a mexican night at our house in Karanga, which was a vast success.  It was really good to eat mexican food after 3 months without it and one of the other workers at Amani made some delicious salsa.

I'm definitely beginning to miss people in the US a lot.  I think spending a solid 9 day cruise with my family gave me a good dose of family time right before I left, but it is beginning to wear off as I realize it will be 9 months before I see anyone from NC.  So to deal with this issue I have decided to go on a big safari over Christmas and New Years.  I was looking at the itinerary today and found out I will be spending Christmas in Etosha Game Reserve in Namibia and New Years in Chobe Game Reserve in Botswana.  Now that I have blown any sympathy anyone ever had for me about spending the holidays away from home...Anyhow, I am really excited to get to see some different parts of Africa, especially Namibia which is supposed to be just spectacular.

So that's pretty much it from Moshi for now.  Hopefully the short rainy season will start pretty soon.

Hi all, just a quick update - it is getting much hotter and much dustier in Moshi, but we did get some rain this week.  The rain is good for cooling things off but makes the clay soil very slippery so it definitely makes walking around an adventure.

I am continuing to work mainly in small groups with kids on reading basic Swahili and doing basic math.  I enjoy it and the kids are eager learners who (mostly) are making good progress.  Thank God that Swahili is a phonetically regular language - each letter only makes one sound so it's very easy to teach even though I am still learning the basics myself.  

I continue to enjoy living in Moshi, especially since the Americans who work here at Amani have taken to getting together occasionally and cooking "wazungu food" such as macaroni and cheese or pizza.  That makes life a little more like home.  

Wow! I can't believe it's been almost a month since I posted. I guess I have been busier than I thought. I have some pretty fab pictures to put up soon but unfortunately internet at Amani has been down for the past week or so. When it gets back up I will post them. It's been very pretty around here lately - clearer so that often we can see Kilimanjaro and also the Usambara mountains to the south and even Mount Meru to the west.

I continue to love it here in Tanzania although Taco Bell cravings are definitely on the increase. I just remind myself that when I return next year I am coming through Detroit and they have a Taco Hell right in their international terminal. It is going to get hit hard ;). I have been eating very healthy here and walking everywhere so I am now at the lowest weight I have been at for at least the past few years, which is exciting! I actually had to buy a belt since none of my pants fit anymore.

At Amani I continue to work with kids on reading. The other special ed teacher left last Wednesday (sad!) We assessed all the newer kids in reading and math so I have now started a schedule working with groups of kids who need the most help with reading and math. My swahili is improving slowly but since Swahili is a phonetically regular language (all letters and blends always make the same sound) I can teach basic Swahili without a problem. I have mastered all the math vocab so am working with kids on that as well. It's exciting to be able to do this work because it's definitely needed here!!

I will post again once I am able to put the pictures up.

Update from Moshi

I started real work this week after a two week orientation. First order of business has been to place three special needs students in a public school, I am helping (very little, mostly just observing so I can monitor it later) the special ed teacher who is here now and leaving in September. We found a great classroom at a school 10 minutes walk from Amani! This was so wonderful because the other two places we had seen were very depressing and clearly the kids were not being challenged at all there. This one near Amani is perfect because the kids can walk to school with other children from Amani who attend there. They attend from 8-12 Monday - Thursday which is also good because I can continue to program the other teacher has started here with them in the afternoons and also on Friday, and have plenty of opportunity to go to their school to see what they are doing there and how I can support that. Above all it is FREE, they just want TSh 1500 per month for tea and porridge (that's less than $1.50). Overall an answer to prayer!!

We have had nicer weather for the past few days. There have been several days in a row where we can see Kilimanjaro quite clearly, at least the top of it. My good friend Lorrie is coming to Arusha on Sunday and I will bring her to Moshi for one night before she goes on to Zanzibar. Then she will be back in Moshi for several days and hanging out with me at Amani. So hopefully she will actually be able to see the nice scenerywhile she is here!

Here are some pictures of my new abode in Tanzania.  They aren't that great but I can't get too far from the house and still see it because of the walls around it.  The first picture is of the house from the front, it's hard to see but the gatekeeper keeps a beautiful garden out front.  There are banana trees in the back, one of which has a large clump of bananas that I need to figure out when to have the gatekeeper chop down.  The second is of the "theft deterrent system" which consists of a lot of broken glass on top of the wall.  The third shows my neighborhood, and that there are lots of corn fields around :).

I had a good first week of orientation last week and am continuing this week.  Tomorrow I am going to Arusha (about an hour away) and will go around with the street educator there visiting street kids.  That should be very interesting to see but challenging to take in because the conditions for those kids are really bad.

I had a successful weekend, especially on Saturday when I managed to go to the market and get all the things on my list without being charged the mzungu (white person) price for any of them.  I am loving the fresh fruit here - mangoes, oranges, and papayas are all good and very cheap.  I also saw pineapples at the market but did not get one, I might this week.  On my way home I was able to see the peak of Kilimanjaro for the first time - they are having an unusually rainy period here and it has been covered by clouds.  I'm enjoying the cool weather while it lasts though because soon it will be very hot and dusty. 

A short update from Moshi.  I am starting a two week orientation with Amani, which has so far been quite the adventure.  I am supposed to work in every department, which will give me a good idea of how it runs.  Yesterday I was cooking and today I went out with a group to check on some of the kids who had been reunited with their families or were attending primary/secondary school sponsored by Amani.  We went out into the countryside and onto this huge coffee plantation.  It was very muddy.  Next time I go with these guys on a visit I will know to wear boots ;).

So far I am enjoying things here, although it is a much slower pace of life than what I have been used to.  Many of the other workers at Amani live very close to me (one next door) so that is good since I will be living by myself until the end of August and the surly guard is, well, surly.  One teacher here who is also a special ed teacher from Boston has really bonded with me.  She took it upon herself to show me around town and how to use the dalla dalla (local minibuses which are a hair-raising form of transport).  She also took me to market where we got all kinds of fresh fruit and veg for about 1/5 of what it would cost at home.  

Speaking of which, I seem to be through no effort  of my own on the Africa weight loss plan (thank God not the amoebic dysentery weight loss plan, or the tape worm weight loss plan).  It's much easier to go buy fresh food at the market and cook for myself than to go into town and buy expensive junk food.  As far as I can tell I have lost all the weight that I put on during the Alaska cruise, and I have only been here a week.  So that is pretty exciting :).

The staff and kids at Amani are great like I knew they would be and I have started Swahili lessons, so hopefully my communication will get better.  I was able to carry a conversation for 3 turns rather than 1 today, so that is a start :).

Here are a couple of pics from Alaska! I will put the rest on shutterfly as soon as I can (which may not be very soon since the internet connection is slow, slow, slow. Anyhow, I am now in Tanzania which is a very different climate :). Watching the glacier calve was awesome, and we also saw many many humpbacks although I didn't get a picture of any of them.

update!!

Long overdue fundraising update - I have received $4100 in donations from friends and family - I really can't find a way to express my gratitude for all this support, I am truly overwhelmed!  This means I already have enough funds to go, stay the year, and hopefully leave a sizable donation with Amani when I leave.

I am starting with Rosetta Stone to try to learn Swahili - no luck with the teach yourself book, since I seem to still have no language learning ability whatsoever.

I'm also working on purchasing a plane ticket to Kilimanjaro, hopefully within the next few days.  I will be leaving on July 14th.