29.07.2011 Emmy’s Last Day and Our Leave for Uganda.
Today was Emmy’s last day at placement. She leaves tomorrow to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro and then she’ll be going on a week long safari. I miss you already Emmy!! Instead of having class today, we had a party for Em. I brought bubbles, which the kids went crazy for. We didn’t let them blow them, because they would have killed each other fighting over them. They really enjoyed jumping up and trying to pop them. Em also brought them peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, which was a vast improvement over porridge. Instead of eating them as a sandwich, they took the two pieces of bread apart and licked the jelly and peanut butter off, and then ate the plain bread. It was a mess!
I had to say goodbye to Em early because I left for Uganda today at 1430. Emilie, Kaylee, and I all packed a book bag worth of clothes. Kaylee even found a store that sold American candy like Reese’s and Twix. She spent 33,000tsh on candy for herself! The bus ticket cost 60,000tsh, so I couldn’t believe she spent so much on candy! I spent 500tsh on a package of hard biscuits. Not as satisfying on the palate, but does the job well.
The bus was running on African time, and didn’t arrive until about 1600. That’s okay though, because Kelvin met us there to keep me company. There was a restaurant right by the station, so we enjoyed a couple Kilimanjaro beers. An older man who was retired from the tourism business joined us, and started talking to me about the Changing Sands of Ngorogoro. He was quite a rambler, so I’m not sure if I ever got the point of what he was trying to tell me, but it was fun talking to him. These sands, he said, create very large, wall-like mounds, and then change to flat lands in a matter of hours. It is due to the wind. The Masai discovered this many years ago, and told the Tanzanian government, who didn’t believe them. They sent people to see for themselves, and discovered it was true. They have been researching and studying it since then. Kelvin showed me pictures of him at the Changing Sands when he went there for a class in university. I’d like to go for myself because it’s only in Ngorogoro, which isn’t far form here. He said he would take me one weekend.
When the bus finally arrived, we quickly went to the bathroom (from my experience with the bus ride from Dar, you use the bathroom when there’s a toilet, even if you don’t have to go) and then piled on. The seats were surprisingly comfortable, and the backs leaned back. We reached the border of Kenya within three hours. There was a nice, older man there who helped us quickly fill out the necessary papers. By quickly, I meant we were there for 45 minutes waiting for our visas. Everyone else on the bus was from somewhere in East Africa, and got through within minutes. Although we are residents of Tanzania, we are still citizens of America (or Canada in Emilie’s case), and so our paper work and the entire process of getting a transit visa was more complicated. We also had to pay 20USD. The visa was finally completed, and so we passed the border to find a bathroom. We paid 200tsh to use a hole in the ground with makeshift walls for privacy, and then got back on the bus. Next stop would be Nairobi, about five hours away. Attempting to sleep was on my agenda.
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