Expecting something longer...

[Email - To: All]

...but thank God it's not.

The Internet crashed in Mafinga just as I sent the email last time, so imagine my pleasant surprise that it did reach everyone back home. Go on, imagine it. You'll like it, I promise.

While I'm on the subject of Mafinga, I didn't get much of a chance to talk about it last time, as it was only the first time I got a proper look at it. To be perfectly honest, though, there's not much to be said about it, save for four points of interest - two of which I've already written about (the bus station and the internet - incidently, please scrub all positive sentiments about this from the previous email and replace it with a string of six expletives of your own choosing).

Anyway, the first of the other two is where we had lunch - ZigZag. Not that interesting, in fact, but they are producers of the finest chips mayai known to Man (I had two). They are also run by our Bwana Shamba's (Agricultural officer) brother, I believe, and bizarrely, were showing the 1998 World Cup Final in full on some obscure TV sports channel.

The other ineteresting thing is that our table afforded an excellent view of the Mafinga Hilton across the road. Yes, that's right, the Mafinga Hilton. I do feel, however, that if Paris, New York and London have let their standards sink to similar depths then this famous brand name could be in for some rocky times ahead.

I won't bore you with details of this morning's bus ride into Iringa. Let's just say it was akin to Blackpool. On one of the wooden rollercoasters.

Anyway, now that I don't have to type that all out again, I have a bit more time for the events of the last couple of weeks. For starters, the lads in Ihalimba have proved to be all mouth and no trousers/trainers, through the singular failure of each and every one of them to live up to their interest in going out running at half six in the morning. (That's not to say I have.)

We also had lots of them interested in joining the CAG (Community Action Group), but our day-long seminar last Saturday (starting 9am) was somewhat of a flop when two women turned up at 10.30, realised they were the first and went away again, saying they'd be back in a bit. In total attendance was 10 women (higher than expected), and one man (significantly lower than expected). We eventually started at 11, and then lunch took two hours because Ihalimba's only Mgahawa (sort of cafe/restaurant/butcher thing) is the most disorganised this side of Jupiter, and quite possibly broke the world record for "Slowest chipsi mayai (chip omelette) Ever".

Apart from this workshop, though, our work has been pretty uneventful. Due to our Mwenyekiti's (Village chairman) sudden attack of chronic disorganisation, seminar's are being cancelled left right and centre through no one knowing they'd been organised. I keep saying we need to be more proactive in promoting these things (I can't believe I just used the word "proactive" - I didn't even spell it right, I'm sure there's supposed to be a hyphen), but Vende is Mr Unplanned, and won't prepare for anything unless it's just about to start. I think he thinks I'm his PA.

Had fun in the classroom yesterday, though. As part of our non-formal education techniques, we congratulate correct answers (or every few correct answers) with something called "pasha". The basic one is like applause, only more interesting, and now we just make new ones up willy-nilly. I introduced them to the Monty Python pasha yesterday - we say, "And there was much rejoicing," and then they wave they arms in the air and say, "Yay." I know they haven't got a clue what it's significance is, but they enjoy it all the same, and I certainly get a kick out of it.

We're supposed to be doing a teacher's workshop at some point, promoting all this NFE stuff (as well as suggesting alternatives to corporal punishment), but it seems to have been largely taken on board already - one of yesterday's lessons was really difficult because there was some very loud clapping sounds coming from the next classroom. We've definitely got a better relationship with the teachers than most of the other placements.

I've managed to find a way off road around the village, now, too. It was a bit depressing just running up and down the main road saying "Kamwene" to someone every hundred yards, so I've been experimenting with different paths. Most of them just lead to someone's shamba and then just stop, so I wasn't getting very far until I went over the Ruaha river (longest river in Tanzania, and boundary of the village). The moment I got off road then, I made it over a hill and found myself in...


















...YORKSHIRE!!

Or, at least, it looked like it. Grassy hill with badly eroded footpaths running over them. Last Sunday morning I went for a long run. I got up early, boiled some water for my bottle, and then made some rice pudding out of Saturday night's leftovers. I packed a pair of trousers, a jumper and my waterproof so I could run for as long as I wanted to and then walk around for a bit before coming back.

I ran out of the door, and after about a hundred yards, was passing a man who was walking to Mafinga (for the uninitiated, this is an insane thing to do and he was quite clearly unhinged, says he who goes on long runs for no reason). He started jogging alongside me, and I soon learnt his name was Ali. He had come from Vikula (the next village after Ihalimba) and it was something to do with work. He also mentioned Mbeya (very long way away), and how he goes there too. He mentioned Mbeya, Mafinga and Vikula a few more times, then kept on saying something was kubwa (big) and making "kubwa" gestures with his arms. I took this to mean that he worked over a very large area. I told him who I was in the best Swahili I could muster (considering I'm not exactly fluent and I was already feeling a little out of breath), and then just after the Ruaha bridge we parted company.

He seemed a very nice guy, despite the fact I only understood about 15% of what he said, and so I asked to take his photo. Yes, I had my camera with me too - the views are spectacular. So I took his picture, and then he took my picture, and then he asked about an address. I'm not sure whether it was his address or my address, but he obviously wanted a copy of the photo. Unfortunately I had no pen or paper with me, but I did have the ingenious idea of writing in in the dirt on the ground, and then taking a photo of it. However, like all ingenious ideas, this came three hours later.

Having made our rather disappointing goodbyes, I headed off to the right, up the banks of the river and over the hills. I was thrilled to discover that it not only looked like Yorkshire - the weather was too! Mist and rain and wind. Marvellous, and ideal photography conditions, too. It was very enjoyable, but I quickly discovered that the path network was not as extensive as I had previously imagined.

I also found that you do, on occasion, pass someone's house when outside the village, and people are always sitting just outside their house. Part of the reason for going on this little adventure was to escape and not have to greet people all the time, but I soon found that this was, in its way, much worse. Whenever I came across anyone, I didn't just have to greet them.

The first stage was them keeping their distance or, in the case of small children, running scared or bursting into tears. In the second stage, an angry-sounding voice from an indiscernable source would start shouting. Angrily. The third stage, after I had initially attempted to ignore the voice, would involve me running over to explain that I was just out running. Quickly, it would dawn on me that I was outside the village, and therefore needed to explain first who I was, as they didn't even know that. This would quickly allay their fears that I might be a thief or someone from the government spying on their farming practices, and their manner would soften accordingly. Then came the tricky part... (I'll translated into English for simplicity's sake)

"Where have you come from?"
"Ihalimba."
"Where are you going?"
"I'm running over there (pointing vaguely towards the next hill), and I will return to Ihalimba."
"But you're going the wrong way for Ihalimba. It's over there. (pointing back the way I'd just come)"
"Yes. I'm running over there. And I will return to Ihalimba."
"Oh. What are you doing?"
"I'm running."
"Where are you going?"
"Over there."
"Why?"
"I'm running." (you see now how limiting foreign languages can be)
"What are you doing?"

and so on and so forth ad nauseum. Until, finally, it will dawn on them that I was doing exercise. It has occurred to me to tell him/her this several times already, but whenever I pronounce the Swahili, "mazuezi," no one ever understands it.

As you might imagine, this kind of ruins my rhythm a bit, so I gave up after about an hour, found somewhere secluded to sit, down by the river, and got my clothes and my breakfast out of my bag. I felt wholly cheated on pulling out my tub of rice pudding. I had tried to keep it upright anyway, but I knew the words "Airtight Container" on the bottom of some crappy wannabe-Tupperware market stall tub were too good to be true. I should have bought the other one - the one with "Rice-Pudding-tight Container" on the bottom of it. Oh well, not too much mess. Worse was to come from my food (no, not that).

Rice pudding went in, sense of direction went out. Not as bad as it might have seemed, but still not the pleasant stress free walk in the country that I was planning for the rest of the morning. There were plenty of landmarks (like, the river, the big granite rocks on the edge of the hills, etc, etc), so I wasn't completely lost. So, I followed the river, on a roughly trodden path through a meadow, and then over a stream, and through another meadow. (This, of course, coming after the panicked half hour spent wandering back and forth across the same meadow trying to find the path I had originally come on.)

Eventually, I reached some rocks on the edge of a hill, and knew I didn't recognise them, but the next set might be the ones I knew. Luckily, they were, and I was able to walk straight through a field to go and sit for a while on my favourite rock, overlooking the valley. This of course, would not have been possible in England, but here you can freely frollick in the wilds without having to worry about stinging nettles and brambles. All they have here are those namby-pamby snakes and spiders.

Talking of spiders, there was a huge one on the tree I was sitting next to on the rock. I felt guilty for not having brought out curds and whey as well as rice pudding, and I'm not sure what a toffet it, but I don't
think it's made of granite. How disappointing.

See a few big spiders recently, apart from the little friendly ones that live in our house. The shower area was filled with a web a couple of weeks ago that I had to destroy before washing. The spider itself was huge. So I burnt its web with a candle at arms length. Then, when the spider lay on the floor, I poured some of my water over it to drown it a bit. At this point, it was still alive, albeit struggling, so I went and got my umbrella to stab it. It seemed to do the trick.

Also seen our rat. Shortly afterwards I saw our dead rat (hurrah!). We put a trap down a while ago in the food store, but it didn't catch anything (to be fair, it's the only place I've never seen the rat, or evidence of the rat). Then on Thursday I saw it running up the wall in the living room, and into the wall, so we moved the trap to the route it seems to take. Just as we were about to go to be, we heard a snap, crunch, and some scuffling, so we went to investigate. It didn't take too long to die, but while it was suffering I almost felt sorry for it. Almost. That'll teach the little blighter to shit in our water and piss in our bedroom. Hopefully I will catch the whiff of urine slightly less often when going through my stuff.

Well, that's nearly two hours' worth of email, so I'll stop there. Off out tonight for Min's b'day (actually on Monday), and then I should be back to placement tomorrow morning, but I have a habit of spending longer than I intended in places, so you never know.

Phil :)