Moving out...Moving In....Delivery in Dodoma

On Saturday we moved into our three room apartment.  What a difference a day can make. The university did paint our concret floors, fixed our missing window pieces, and delivered our stove and fridge (more about that later).  After visiting other homes in the area, I can say our apartment looks about like all the rest who work for missions or volunteer.
Most places have unpainted concret floors, one kitchen sink, a shower same level as the floor with a large drain, (very European I think), borrowed and mixed matched furniture, hot water until 8:00 am off until 5:00pm (Dodoma is conserving electricity and water), facuets that look like outside ones for hot and cold, well worn wall paint including drips,  and a trash hole and fire pit out back of your home. But it is home and once we get it painted ....things should look up. I wanted to do a  Home and Garden TV make over but the supplies here are limited.  Very little good paint that actually covers the walls and  brushes fall apart as you use them. I have painted the cabinets white with much effort due to the poor paint and brushes.  It took four coats and still does not look like one full coat.  When I have gone shopping the home selections have been confusing and limited.  Often making a person shop several small businesses in the market area for supplies...only to give up from heat exhaustion.

Now for the delivery in Dodoma.  Our neighbor, David and I had gone to two stores in Dodoma that carry high end items like real stoves and fridges. The preferred cooking tool is a two burner cooker that can sit on a counter or floor or a charcoal stove, neither will have an oven. Finally we all arrived at a joint decision and the university sent a voucher .  On the day of our move no one seemed ready to honor our needed time table for delivery. When the items arrived by special Dodoma way they were the wrong stove and fridge!! So our former host and now neighbor went back and delivered some old fashion western industrial talk to the owner about making the customer happy and delivering on your promises.  Soon a man in a delivery cart ( a man  pulling the cart about 3/4 of mile from downtown) appeared and exchanged the stove and fridge for the right ones.  (Pictures are below!  Enjoy!) What an exhausting day for all...but now we are moved in and I am baking bread in my new oven!  My Grandmother Fagerstrom would be soooo... proud!!

           New Fridge and Stove

GOOD-BY WRONG ONES!!

The university still has not started but will slowly this week begin to assess students returning who failed a course or need to pay the rest of their tuition from last year and then take exams.  All in all it is still quiet out front.  Our place is right next to student housing.. about 800 of them when they come!! Right now we just have a couple of  African dogs (We nick-named "Mange" and "Flea"), a few university students, some faculty and two friendly gray lizards, "Fly Boy" and "Skeeter" (because they eat insects off our walls).  Soon another blog on transportation in  Dodoma.

Blessings, Charlotte and David

To Market..To Market..Rice and Stones!!

To Market ...To Market.. Rice and Stones...Grocery Stores!

Today's blog will concern itself with food!  Without a car... life here is rather dependent on who will take us to town and when.  Most days, because the university is not up and running the semester yet, we hitch a ride with our neighbor.  Riding into town is an adventure in itself but it really starts once we arrive near the vegetable and fruit markets.
 The establishments base themselves inside an open well used building ...which once inside might remind you of an Indiana Jones' movie.  It is dark in some sections with narrow passages,  flies trying to settle on food and people with bags of rice, potatoes , beans and peanuts everywhere.  Once your eyes have adjusted to the darkness you can see small boys running around begging to carry your shopping bags for just a few shillings. The vendors are  polite and friendly which surprised me due to all the confusion elsewhere.  You can find almost anything here except meat.  Evidently a few years ago a rather nasty sickness happened here due to the selling of butchered  meat without keeping it cold. This stopped the practice of offerring meat by its feet and hanging it upside down for flies to land on! I really haven't cooked on my own yet so I'm not very sure where I will buy non-frozen meats but I know you can here in Dodoma. For now I am perfectly happy to buy frozen (hopefully without flies attached).

                                                                                                                     Going to Outdoor Market

While in the market my nieghbor advised me to buy a rice basket.  This came as a complete surprise to me for I seldom clean my rice when I am home.  But for some strange reason there are small white stones in the rice sold in the market.  I know this for a fact because David and  I have chopped down on a spoonfull of rice only to hear a large crunch!  You take the unwashed rice and shake it  aound in the flat rice basket.  I am assuming the little stones fall out then through the bottom..but some hold on for dear life and make it into cooked rice!! Oh My!



English speaking grocery owners are few and far between here in the city.  There is a new store outside of town on the way back to Dar es Salaam that is small but operates like a small supermarket.  It has prices on the items, stocked on well lighted shelves, and they even give you a itemized recipe at the end!! Most of the stores just add up the items without telling you what they cost and show you the total on paper or on a calculator.  Yes, no prices on your cans, cartons, eggs, drink cases, boxes of cereal (not much variety either in the types of items you can buy.)                                                                                                                                                           .
There has also been somewhat of a shortage here in  milk and soft drinks in all our stores for the past week or so.  We don't know why...you just can't buy those items anywhere in town. David is going bonkers for diet drinks!! I can survive on tea or coffee but I must admit I am beginning to want milk for cereal and creamer.

Food here in general is good. Our host has a  housekeeper who cooks, well the same meal everyday and it is healthy but meat free.(rice, tomatoes, onions, beans, potatoes, cucumbers  green beans). Sometimes we go to Rose's Cafe,  an Indian resturant down town near Two Sisters' Grocery Store. She has excellent food and very cheap prices.  Rose serves the best tea and milk drink along with chicken or beef curry dishes.  Yes curry... but it is not spicey like in Boulder, Colorado..very good and fills you up.  After a rather exciting round of shopping in Dodoma, Rose's Cafe seems a little like being home (but first I close my eyes and tap my feet twice).

Stay tuned for more adventures here at the end of the highway in the middle of Tanzania....

Blessings to you all..............Charlotte and David

PS: Can't really show the Market because some people do not want their picture taken.  I will try to sneak one in from the street!

THE MANY CHALLENGES OF DODOMA

(Mama Ruth and Grace in a dress from Colorado)

I can't believe another week has gone by since we arrived.  So much has happened to us and St. John's University has not even started back up yet!!  There are so many topics I could write about that I have decided to share only one or two for each new blog I write.  That way I can upload pictures and you can see the joys and frustrations of living in Dodoma.
The first topic I would like to share is about the missionaries here and volunteers like ourselves.  There is only a small community of internationals here, mostly from Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom and few of us from the United States and Canada.  We mostly bump into one another as we move about downtown shopping at all the English friendly stores or markets.  Everyone here is connected somehow to a church organization, health agency, soil or water project, educational institution, book and Bible distributors, or like us here on our own.  Here in Dodoma there are about 100 of us out of about 300,000 population.  We sort of stand out, especially when walking.  Tanzania appears to use a lot of outside assistance to help with humanitarian projects. David and I have met a number of people who are from the UK, Australia or New Zealand.  In fact I am beginning to think in an accent!! OOPS!

                                                                                                                   Church of England in Dodoma

Another group of people who live and work here are the ones whose ancestors came from India.  They appear to run the smaller grocery stores and some of the resturants.  They speak several languages including  English. As of yet no motels, just a couple of hotels are operated by people orginally from India.

Market owners are locals along with the day laborers.  We see road work (Shoveling gravel, etc.) often done by African women.
(Woman do a lot of the work here!)
We will need to employ a housekeeper three days a week.  They are usually women or men who live near the college and will clean, wash by hand (no washing machines or dryers here) and iron, cook lunch, burn your trash, ( no pick up in Tanzania) and water what brave little plants you have growning! I draw the line at burning my own trash you see.  By the way if we had to do that in America I can tell you that it will really change the way you see yourself shopping.  Last week David bought 5 cans of coke and I asked our host  where to put the empty cans.  He said they will go out in a hole in the backyard for things you don't burn. I turned to David and said, "Sorry, only bottles for you from now on..I can't have a dump and a fire pit in my backyard!" So it's back to the 1950's with glass bottles and cases of drinks.
Sunday morning downtown Dodoma!

The last item is our University population.  The faculty here are all educated (MA, or few with PhDs like David) and come from various African countries, Tanzania as well as the usual western nations.  The staff of administrators are all from Africa and many from Tanzania.  Some have been educated out of the country even as far away as the US or UK.  That is a blessing for our students.  It provides a wonderful role model.  More coming about the food, the clothing, the roads, the weather and yes our mission!
             R TO L David,  teachers from St. John's and  CAMS on a Sunday for coffee and biscuts.

Days turning into a week! September 18th through the 24th

Moses, Charlotte, Grace, Ruth, David at Msalato Theological Seminary

Excuse the melting of days together into one entry but the last seven days have gone by quickly.  We arrived at St. John's only to find our small apartment not ready.  A gracious host has been allowing us to stay in his home. We are comfortable but very anxious to move into our apartment.  A little bit about the campus.  It has campus housing for students, a main area with administration, store, church, library, and three or four classroom buildings.  Campus housing for faculty ( people from western countries and people from Tanzania and Africa)) is provided within the campus.  There is a security gate but little fencing around the campus so every large home has a very high fence and a locked gate.  There are three main roads which are dirt and at the moment very dusty. The majority of staff are not here because the university will not start until the 19th of October. This is actually good for us because we have much to purchase for the apartment and repair before we can move in.
This past Monday we went to visit Moses and Ruth at Msalato Seminary and see their new baby.  The baby clothes I brought were a good fit for Grace their little girl.  It was really great to see them again.  They are two gracious and loving people.  Afterwards we walked around their seminary and met up with our neighbor from St. John's who had taken us with her while she saw a good friend who also worked at the seminary.  It was a wonderful visit.  Later in the week on  Thursday we visited the seminary to observe their English classes.   We had lunch with Sandy Mccann in her home and she drove us back to Dodoma on her way to a meeting in town.
For most of this past week though our soon to be neighbor, an Australian in the Geology Department, who is living next to our apartment,  has been wonderful.  She has taken me shopping, explained the prices and best buys and shuttled me across town and back.  The streets here are small, filled with dirt and sand, hot and crowded with all sorts of unexpected items.  It can be quite a challange to navigate them but she does it with ease and a good horn.
The shopping here can also be difficult.  Nothing is under one roof or even a roof.  Most of the little stores are really just make shift sheds with a door and tin roof.  Nothing is lined up neatly or with any reason.  Streets or stores are always in repair with dirt, bricks or hand carts in the way of your car .  In some of the shops there is not room inside so one must stand outside and ask for items to be passed to you.  Once in a blue moon we will find a shop with air conditioning or fans.  That is a blessing indeed!! In all my years of shopping this is the only place I have been that I do not like the experience. Immediately once home I wash my feet, hands and face to cool off and take the dirt and sand off.  Coming to Dodoma has proved to be a hard move but one I know God has prepared us for and he will guide us through to the end.

Faculty housing at St. John's University

On the Road to Dodoma

September 17th

Finally we were traveling on the road toward Dodoma.  Once heading west out of Dar es Salaam there were fewer cars but still the same crazy drivers. We had the unusual competion for the road by  bicycles, people walking with large bundles on their heads, childrens in uniforms walking home from school, buses and trucks.
Once past Morogoro the traffic became less and the landscape changed from wet to very dry.  The mountains we had seen became small hills and sand replaced the dirt, plants and palms. Now just a brief word about the road to Dodoma.  The roads in Tanzania tend to be a bit unkept making speed driving very difficult. You can be going very well and suddenly a small village appears ahead which means a large speed bump straight ahead.  Now I don't mean the usual US or western bumps these are HUGE.  Which translates to your car slowing down to a total of 0 to 1 mile per hour.  Then near the village outskirts there is another bump equally as HUGE.  Needless to say all this speeding up and slowing down creates more time in your car...but thanks to our trusty driver we arrived safely late in the afternoon.

September 16th, 2009...More of Dar es Salaam

                          

Day two in Dar es Salaam was another day of in the car and out.

Yesse, our wonderful guide and driver for that day from St. John's

took us to several strip malls and downtown to see the city.

The area had palm trees, round abouts, some trees and plenty of people and traffic. Buildings in this city look to be in constant need of paint or repair.


The streets here are narrow with small shops and hand carts.
Traffic speed and safety is very bad with near misses with bikes, people or cars.

This day Yesse took us to a resturant at the ocean called Coco Beach. It was very rustic complete with broken cinderblocks laying around out front to plastic chairs and tables.
The food was fine but very expensive for the three of us. Later we returned to our hotel and rested up for the next day's trip to Dodoma.

Hello from Dodoma

                                                                                             

Finally we have temporary internet service and are beginning to adjust to our new lives here in Dodoma, Tanzania.  The weather is hot but dry.  The streets of Dodoma are crowded with people, bikes, carts,

some cars, small van buses, motorbikes and did I mention people?  The past six days have gone by fast meeting faculty, neighbors and fellow Christians, getting to know the city, and just adjusting to a new way of life. I have decided to condense our activities from September 14th to just a few impressions and post  pictures that hopefully will tell the story.                                                   

                                                                                                                      .

September 14 and 15th  We arrived in Dar es Salaam late around 10:00 pm.  The airport was not crowded but was hot.  Customs was not a problem and we met our driver who took us to our accomodations about 10 to 13  miles away.  This drive was my first impression of night life in Africa.  Crowds of people

walking around, fires burning off the road filling the air with smoke, music blarring into our car windows (no air conditioning) and crazy drivers to our left and right of the road.
Once at our hotel tiredness took over and we fell asleep until about 3:00am when a very noisy rooster woke us up.  Once  back asleep we awoke to the praise of Allah for prayers around 5:30 am.

No rest for the traveler that day!!

Yesse ( Human Resources Director for St. John's University)
and I at the hotel.