Lacey, why didn't you go to school today?

Wednesday 10/1/08

OCTOBER!

Sorry baba, I didn’t feel like hiking to campus today because I still can’t figure out what classes I need to take and quite honestly, I just don’t get the Africa school system yet. Sigh, maybe that’s not exactly what I said, but sure is what I wanted to say. That’s what baba asked me when he got home last night. I feel like I am five again and must go to school or I will get in trouble. Funny. Reminds me of good ole Vegas days! Yes Gary, okay Gary, anything you say Gary! Anyhow, hiked to campus this morning and I guess the next three days school is out-so much for trying to figure out classes today! Last night Debbie was saying, there might not be school tomorrow. My thought process, “there MIGHT not be school?! What!?! Might? Depending on the moon? This would never fly in America!”

PS…looks like I will be changing my plane ticket to nearly a month early! Yes, probably early Dec I will be home. So I guess I will be in school for 2 months? Now that’s funny because all I can think of is Ally and Brit have been in classes since August 25! HA HA HA

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Monday 9/29/08

“Head, nose, ear, eyes, teeth, eyebrow, tongue, hair, bandana, mouth, head, ear, tongue, eyelashes, cheek, forehead, chin, ear, hair, mouth, neck, earring, nose, one tooth, necklace, head, hair, teeth”

Amanda had the pleasure of seeing my level of patience for well over an hour while trying to teach Haiki a little bit of English. Thanks to my job back in the states I have learned to repeat myself repetitively without acknowledging the amount of time I am spending doing so, but Haiki was doing so well it was difficult to stop. I am trying to figure out how much she knows because otherwise, where does one start trying to teach?! She knows the alphabet, most of the colors, and how to count to 100. We worked on the head region today and she seems really determined, but it’s difficult because we really don’t have the time. I feel like I have to sneak time in when our parents aren’t here because otherwise she is suppose to be doing chores, etc. Anyhow, today when Amanda and I got back from our hike to campus from our failed attempt of registering for classes, Amanda told Haiki we were hungry. Haiki suggest chips (French fries) and a sausage (hot dog). Neither Amanda nor I are to keen on their hotdogs, especially for breakfast, so we told her chips would be just fine. She proceeded to offer us some eggs and again, we declined, but then I had small thought-nobody is home. So Amanda and I attempted to translate/draw a picture of a fried egg in hopes we could get her to make this instead, but to no avail, we were left stuck with a failed attempt. So I decided, I will cook the eggs and Haiki can make the chips. Atlas! Finally after two weeks of some sort of Spanish omelet yuckiness, we have an American egg! Amanda made toast with butter and we tossed our over easy eggs on top…it was heaven and Haiki was impressed. At least that’s what Amanda gathered after we explained the difference an omelet and a fried egg.

After reading Amanda’s blog and realizing how much I left out in my blog knowing she would write all the good details, I feel the need to add too one of her stories. Our first night in Arusha at the Florida Inn-I was literally in tears this night because of this incident. First off, Amanda really is a garbage disposal and as I have said, I am learning not to trust her taste buds as everything is tasty in her eyes. Nonetheless, I had only been in Africa a week at this point so I am still heavily relying on Amanda to guide me in the food area. She tells mama Kaaya what to order me and as she stated, Noel order her food. I asked Amanda, what did you order and she replies, “I don’t know, some sort of cow meat.” So we get our food and she starts eating. I ask her again, what are you eating and is it good? Her response, “It’s a little chewy, but you should try it. It’s some sort of cow meat.” I hesitate and refrain from trying it. This is when Noel chimes in and says, it’s not cow meat. It’s a chicken. Amanda looks at me and corrects herself. It’s chicken, not cow. I laugh and joke around saying, you don’t even know what you’re eating and she willingly admits she doesn’t, but continues to gnaw away at this chewy meat. Noel proceeds to try and describe what exactly this “firigisi” is while grabbing at his neck and saying chicken. At this point, I start laughing because I can’t help but to think of Amanda’s vegetarian lifestyle for the past four years or so while watching her eat this chewy meat while Noel points to his neck. You see, once I start laughing, I can’t stop. So I start suggesting body parts of a chicken to Noel wondering if any will click, but Amanda finally says under her breath to me, “I don’t think I even want to know.” So graciously try to gather my composure failing miserably and poor Noel doesn’t understand why I can’t stop laughing. Had Amanda not been a vegetarian I probably would have only laughed for a moment, but the thought just continued to run through my head and every time I looked at her play of chicken gizzard, I just started laughing all over again! She is definitely a trooper!

While on the topic of my laughing behaviors I am reminded of our first day on our Safari at our first camp sight. Ally(pronounced like all-ee) decides to show us around and bring us to the showers since we’re high class American’s and that’s just what we do…well, not so much Amanda, but I have a little OCD cleanliness issue. Nonetheless, Ally tugs on the shower door and it flings open. To all three of our surprise, there is a lovely naked lady taking a shower. Ally hesitates, looks again as if he wasn’t sure he really saw what the two of us were looking at and proceeds to shut the door. Poor ole virgin Lacey can’t stop laughing at the mere fact our guide just totally gave a peek show to the two of us and his only startled response, why didn’t she lock the door? Perhaps the door didn’t lock, that’s why! Too funny, but not sure how funny that would have been had it been me naked in that shower!

Would also like to add, Amanda can be a clever little smartass. For those of you who don’t know what happened to my feet this summer, let me make a quick recap. Isaac (a little boy I work with) just learned how to ride his bike thanks to his father. Now this is a huge deal for me because for years he has been riding a bike, but ever so slowly and for him to actually be able to ride a bike with no training wheels was sheer amazement for me. So I decide I want to take Isaac around the block real quick because I am so ecstatic. I figured I don’t need my shoes as it’s not sunny out and just days prior I got a tattoo that was still healing on the top of my left foot. So the intelligent individual that I am decides to go barefoot. After feeling my feet tingle for quite some time and continuing on thinking it’s just glass already embedded into my feet I discover when I return to his house that I had in fact burned the bottom of my feet. They turned into beautiful blisters which were lots of fun to play with and then into minor craters which still exist as I type this. Anyhow, my feet were still peeling the first week I arrived and so I had to explain to Amanda what I did to cause such a mess. She laughs and I think nothing more of…that is, until our second to last day on our safari! I notice my left arm is burning from the sun and I say to Amanda, “I can tell my arm is burning because every time I put it back in the edge of the sun, it tingles.” She replied something along the lines of ‘ah did you learn a lesson about tingling?’ I can’t remember her exact words, but she is lucky we have only known each other for two weeks. It was clever, funny, spontaneous, and took me a minute to register exactly what she was saying, but I could have totally fed her to the male lion!

So Sunday night Amanda and I decide we are going to go check out the movie theatre in the shopping mall near our house. It’s a short little 15 or 20 minute walk if you take the short cut through some trees or much longer if you take the main roads. We have been advised to avoid short cuts in the dark and for good reason. So it’s about 6:45 pm and the Amanda asks me, do you want to take the daladala? I hesitate a little while looking out the window and figure it might be light enough to still walk. So Amanda ponders for a moment and decides to remind of the two girls on campus who were held up with a machete her first week in Africa. After being reminded of this event I began to think, maybe we should skip the movies?! Eh, we can just take the daladala. We get to the movies and purchaseour tickets (you actually have to pick your seats when purchasing tickets!), get us a coke and some tasty popcorn. It was really super, but the movie Debbie told us was playing at 7:30 was in fact not even playing at all. So Amanda and I look at the list of 5 movies we can choose from and decide on Forgetting Sarah Marshal. I am horrible with movies and it’s not until we sit down in the theatre with our assigned seat that I realize I have already seen this movie with Lora at the drive inn’s! It was great sadness, but I played on my phone for a bit and even dozed off for a few naps in the AC! Yes, there was AC! Anyhow, we leave the theatre and I take most of my cash and tuck it in my shirt, leaving just enough for a daladala or to make it appear I wasn’t hiding anything if we were held hostage with a machete! Being the two white blondes we are, the moment we step out of the mini mall we are attacked by cab drivers. Amanda declines their services and we continue to walk. We realize its past 9 p.m. and the daladala’s stop running after 9. So we decide to just walk home entirely. I send a quick text stating, “if you don’t hear from me in 45 min, freak!” Sigh, it gives me some comfort. So as were walking I proceed to tell Amanda, hey, maybe they won’t notice we’re white since it is pitch black out and she replies, “Have you seen my legs? I am afraid we’re glowing.” Ugh, it was a good thought. We hesitate a bit when we approach the short cut. Should we run for it or take the long way. It’s probably a difference of at least 20 minutes, but we look to sketchy so we decide to take the long way. There were a few spots with light, but most of the way was pitch black. Amanda managed to take a fall in a decent size hole. She totally busted and scratched up her leg a tad bit. It made me feel better given the fact that I nearly wiped out in the middle of campus earlier that day. I miraculously caught myself after drenching my computer bag and spraying the muck all over Amanda too. After Amanda wiped out in the dark, she stated “we are the two most graceful walkers.” Sigh, brought back high school memories and the many falls running up the stairs, but so true. Anyhow, we make it to our street and we’re almost home safe when I spot a dog. It walks towards us very slightly as we pass by and proceeds to cross into the street. As I start to slightly freak out saying to Amanda, “it’s following us!” the dog thankfully stops. Deep breath…we make it home…and what does baba say, “How did you get home?” We tell a small lie about how we tried to get a cab (we didn’t try at all) but rather ended up walking the long way. He continues to ask, “I sent you a text Amanda. Did you get it?” No, no we didn’t. So she reads the text and it says something along the lines of, I advise you to take a cab Amanda, there are fierce dogs outside. Amanda and I look at each other, ‘seriously?’ Well, we did encounter ONE dog and I guess that’s more than a group of kids with a machete holding us hostage.


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Tuesday 9/30/08

Well, Amanda hiked to campus today while I stayed home like a bum. It’s more fun trying to teach Haika English and honestly I have been extremely tired lately. First week and a half I could hardly sleep. Stayed up all night listening to Amanda sleep talk which is very entertaining, but the past three nights I have fallen asleep first, woke up last, and wanted a nap! Whoa, totally normal if I was in America, but haven’t been this tired since I have been here. Perhaps I am just settling in. Who knows? Anyhow, thanks Dawn for the email back with the classes. I will hike to campus tomorrow morning and try to figure some things out with classes. Totally confused, but I guess this is Africa!