Coming round the mountain

This country is ruled by corruption! If someone has not yet noticed he is either naive, blind or even both. Of course one notices how this topic influences every day life. Normally, I would definitely say that there is not a single positive aspect about corruption. Nevertheless, I was abled to make use of my observations during this week.

Mummy sent me a little christmas parcel filled with food. I told her before which treats I missed most and which could be of use to spice up the meals. Therefore, I went to the postoffice on Monday to check whether the parcel had already arrived. The lady behind the counter collect a huge box from one of the shelves and gave also one to Anna, whose mother had also sent a package. As we already wanted to grab our presents and bring it home, the lady behind the counter called us back. She told us that we first had to get a notice form signed in an office across the road. She did not explain the reason why. Slightly confused we made our way in the direction she pointed out. As we arrived we were led to an office on the first floor on which door a sign said “tax office“. Aha, now we knew how the wind blows. A man informed us that our parcels contained imported goods from oversea and therefore we had to pay tax. Puzzled about this we carefully asked about the amount he wanted us to pay. The official briskly hit some buttons on his calculator and declared 30$ for my parcel and for Anna´s about 15$. Virtually at once our jaws dropped open. That was pure madness! I was about to start ranting about the issue as Anna carefully twitched on my sleeve. She showed an unhappy face, blinked a few times and explained to the man with a voice sounding like she was near to tears that we were simply unable to pay that amount of money. I understood the hint and took the same line. I underlined that these were presents from our parents for christmas. Anna showed the man who was obviously nervous her purse which merely contained a few coins. This was all she could offer. Eventually, the man asked us what we were doing here in Tanzania. We told him about the Amani Centre, the work we were doing and as he thoughtfully nodded he picked up his stamp and crashed it down on our documents. He emphasized that he did an exception only because it was nearly christmas. We thanked the officer, changed our desperate expressions to relieved ones and rushed out of his office. As we emerged the building we broke into hysterical laughter. We did very well there! This country is ruled mainly by very strange regelations and laws but luckily there were enough possibilities to avoid them.

Back in the hotel I simply thought all my christmases came at once. I found there were christmas sweeties, cuppa soups, haribo and even instant cappuccino in my parcel. I, who regularly drinks a cup of tea or coffee, really miss the brownish magic potion. Although there are a lot of coffee plantations in Tanzania most of the coffee is being exported and therefore there are only few roasting facilities. The only coffee the people drink here is called “AfriCafe“ and is an awful tasting instant powder.

For the coming days Antonia had planned to come and visit us. I had promised her to climb up the Uluguru Mountains one more time and because she had only two more weeks in Tanzania it was about time for her to come. Of course we had a lot to tell each other once she was there. Everday happened different things, we had to exchange all our news and discuss everything in detail. Luckily we were blessed with perfect weather the day we went hiking. It was a bit cloudy so we did not have any troubled with the heat. In advance I swore not to go up the top of the mountain again but fortunately Antonia agreed to climb to the Morningside instead. The Morningside is a little cabin which was built by the Germans during colonial times. The route we took was similar to the one up the top. We passed all the waterfalls, to the house of our guide and had lunch there. From there on we stayed on that level but had to continue a while to the other side of the mountain. As we arrive at Morningside we were greeted by the guards who invited us for lunch. Together we had Ugali, a local mush made from cornmeal and water and a sauce. Also, a lady we met on our way had given us a jackfruit. The fruit is huge with a very hard and spiky shell. The pulp is of an orange colour, very sticky and it tastes a bit like chewing gum. Our guide easily balanced the huge fruit on his head all the way down the hill. After this exertion I felt better than after hiking up to the top. Of course it is very tiring to walk the extremely steep and narrow paths but still the tour to Morningside was more pleasant.

Antonia´s visit was limited to only to days. Because we would not see each other again before she would leave I had to say goodbye already. Hopefully we would meet again back in Germany!

Antonia´s stay was the quiet before the storm. On friday Jan, Elisabeth and two of their friends wanted to come and on Saturday Elena and Leonie. Together with the people from Dar es Salaam we wanted to enjoy some cold drinks after work on Friday and planned to go to a bar nearby. Elisabeth and the other two friends did not feel well and stayed in the hotel. Anyway, a co-worker from the Amani Centre, Thomas and a few of his fellow students joined our group. Morogoro is very different to Dar es Salaam considering the possibilities to go out in the evening. We went to a local and quite overcrowded bar, had a couple of beer and talked. Next to me sat one of Thomas´ colleagues who got on my nerves after a while. He kept telling me he wanted to marry me. In Afrika this is not extraordinary as even strangers yell similar things to you on the streets. Time flew and just after midnight it was time for us to go back home. Then there was a great shock. I grabbed my waist bag as I always did automatically to check on my belongings as I discovered it to be extremely flat. Nervously, I fumbled for the zip but the compartment for my mobile phone was empty... I ran back to the taxi to check on whether I dropped the phone there but found nothing. Anna who played it cool dialed my number on her phone. Nothing, the mailbox answered straight away. Great, that meant that somebody had stolen my phone and had already taken out the SIM-card. Desperetaly I tried to figure out how that could have happened as we only sat together with our group. Discreetly, I asked Thomas whether it was possible that the guy sitting next to me could do such things. After short consideration he nodded. He believed him to do anything and promised to deal with him first thing next morning. This was the last thing I could do with now. Not because the phone was of any great value but because there were a lot of photos and other media on there. Although I had always felt relatively safe up to that point I became extremely aware on the possibility that somebody was able to invade my privacy at any time and rob my mobile phone for example without me noticing. To cut a long story short, the phone was of course never to be seen again. Fortunately, I still had an emergency phone but still all my photos were gone.

The next morning I went to the police to report the burglary. I tried to explain what I wanted to tell them using wild gesticulations until they handed some papers over to me which listed all the important details. After I got a new SIM-card for free at the shops we continued to the pool. For now all I needed was peace and quiet. Although there was a wedding going on because of the weekend I still enjoyed myself reading a good book while sipping an ice cold coke and letting the sun warm my skin. During the afternoon I got a message from Elena and Leo telling me they arrived in Morogoro.

We returned to the lodge to welcome the two girls. Because the guys from Dar es Salaam went hiking for the day we drove to Rock Gardens with the girls. Rock Gardens is a bar at the foot of the Uluguru Mountains which offered different kinds of drinks with benches amid the rocks and bushes of the wood. It did not take long for us to get hungry and foraging for food we went to the neighbouring restaurant.

The next day we wanted to go to church. Actually we hoped to visit one of the services including gospel singing but eventually it was more or less a typical catholic mass. Anyway, we had fun listening to the Swahili talk and I also thought that the songs sounded way more cheerful compared to the sounds of the organ played in Germany. Next to me sat a woman who kindly explained what the talk was about.

We left the church completely proselytised and believing and decided that it was time to go shopping! The local Sabasaba-market offers everything one needs: pots and pans, shoes, ornaments, plastic containers and of course fabrics. We went in single file from one booth that sold Kanga to the next one. After we had a good look at every single stand and everyone had bought at least one Kanga or Kitenge we spent the rest of the day in the lodge eating fruits and playing funny card games.

The days flew past extremely fast and so it was already time to say goodbye on Tuesday. The girls had to return to Tanga to work the next day and could not stay any longer. Even Anya left Morogoro today because she wanted to meet a friend in Dar es Salaam to go to Zanzibar with. Anna and I stayed behind on our own and spent our free-time at the pool. Anna´s time in Morogoro would also come to an end soon. In the past few weeks we did handicraft work in the Amani Centre while listening to christmas carols. We cut out elephants, glued photographs of the children on them and gave each kid one elephant. The children were delighted about their christmas present. We had even planned a little party for them with African music, food, sweeties and games. Events like that a very rare so the kids were jumping and running around, hunting balloons and dancing in a mad frenzy.

Even when the temperatures were constantly marking way over 30°C there was a hint of a Christmassy atmosphere :p