The Long Road Home (16 Feb 2008 at 2 pm)

Our journey to home base begins. We have an old-school van that is prepped for tours. The windows open all the way and it appears that there is a removable roof. Richard sits on the right side and we drive on the left. We exit the aiport which requires having a guard open the gate. We didn't have any problem coming into the airport, but apparently the exiting is the problem!

Home base is a 45 minute drive from the airport. The road leaving the airport is long, narrow and bumpy as most Afrian roads are. It's paved though and there are cyclists and people walking all over the place. Most people are carrying big loads, of what I'm not sure. We come to our first intersection -- to the left is Arusha and to the right, our home, Moshi. Off we go. I notice a couple of things first. There are lots of livestock, cows, donkeys, and chickens. The cows are extremely thin and everything eats right off the road where the only green grass is. The cars speeding past do not deter them. It looks very dry and brownish green. There's lots of dirt and only patches of green grass which is probably why the cows are so thin. It reminds me a lot of my drives through the Navajo reservation actually. Things seem old and make-shift. There are the occasional mud houses and lots of houses that have been started and not completed (or were at one point completed but then abandoned). There were really dark rain clouds off in the distance where Mt. Kilimanjaro is.

The weather was warm still, but the wind blowing through the car was nice. After several kilometers of semi-desolation, we make it to the marketplace. It was bustling with activity since it was a Saturday. Locals were everywhere and the shops looked interesting and fun. The road, still extremely narrow, seemed a bit more treacherous as we zoomed through the marketplace, narrowly missing pedestrians and dangerously passing slow vehicles in the left lane. Apparently, this driving is the norm. We were in good hands so I was never scared at any point, but it was quite exciting. We never got much past 40 km/hour, so we weren't going that fast!

After the marketplace, we went through what is more the town that we will be frequenting. I'm not sure if it was actually Moshi but it's fairly close to where we live. There's a Mr. Price store which is apparently the main store for getting anything beyond food (think 7-11 meets CVS).
Finally, we turn into our drive. It is dirt with massive potholes. This is the norm for roads in Moshi. We didn't have a long drive down it (literally a couple 100 feet), and we turn into our home base. We are in Rau Village and I assume that's the town that we go to when people talk about heading in to town...When I got here, I realized I forgot a comb, so I'm unbrushed right now and probably somewhat frightful! The other volunteers shuddered a bit when I mentioned that I didn't have a comb...sounds like I"m going to have a tough time finding one. Better learn the Swahili word for comb!!

By the way, I learned quite a bit of Swahili on the plane (comb wasn't one of them, but...) and I'm not half bad!!

(Written 17 February 2008 at 8:45 am)