Intensive Cleaning and Conversation! (Sat 7/11)

I got to sleep in today! I woke up at around 8:45am, but heard Joseph and someone else outside my room a little beforehand. Before I could think, Joseph called me to get my clothes ready for washing! Today is cleaning day after all! I gathered up all my clothes, my soap, and brought out the first batch (shirts and pants). When I left my room, Skuma was in the main room on the couch making music with his music program! I said good morning before going out to the front of the house to wash my clothes.

Joseph and a couple of buckets and a basin in front of me greeted me. I thought I knew how to wash my clothes, but here at Joseph’s house, we wash clothes a little differently! Instead of using a bucket full of water and scrubbing, Joseph gave me a basin full of water and full detergent powder to wash my clothes. He told me to deliberately start with the whites and scrub thoroughly with my soap bar for all of my pieces of clothing. I could tell that the detergent helped clean the clothes better, but I think it’s a little unnecessary (I’m not the biggest fan of the scent of my clothes having a strong chemical scent to them). Regardless, I’m very thankful for the water and detergent being prepared for me!

Joseph washed with me and I really enjoyed it (Paul never washed with me). During our scrubbing, Joseph asked me a ton of questions about America which were fun to answer (I asked the same questions back to him if applicable). The main focus of our conversation was about the many amenities of America like AC, grocery stores, and washing machines. I’d explain something to Joseph and he’d usually be surprised by my answer or want to learn more. To summarize, we have it easy! We also dove into the realm of politics. This surprised me as in America it always feels taboo to talk to anyone about politics, but it was a really great conversation. I learned more about Tanzania and how Joseph likes the president that’s currently in power. Presidents here run for five years at a time and can run for a max of two terms. Another interesting fact is that all of the government buildings are in Zanzibar which is a semi-autonomous region that’s technically a part of Tanzania, but also wants its independence. Therefore, to keep Zanzibar connected to Tanzania, Tanzania puts the government buildings there to show Zanzibar it’s important to Tanzania. I don’t know much about the history of Tanzania, but I know Eli has told me it’s very fascinating. The concept of same-sex marriage also came up. Joseph was quite astonished to hear that it’s legal and I had to assure him that we’re all about freedom in America! To also shift it into a religious point-of-view for Joseph to understand, I told him that Jesus tells us to love our neighbors so we should too!

With my first batch of clothes done, I went inside and got my second batch (underwear and socks) and washed those too! Due to all of the dust when we play volleyball, my white socks are a nice brown and are very satisfying to clean. After scrubbing all of the clothes the first time with soap, we did a series of rinses that I thought were overkill. I think one good rinse of water is good, but with the detergent I think we have to do more. We rinse and wring the clothes 3 times before we hang them up.

Andrew came by and I learned that he’s been our neighbor the entire time! Just like everyone in the village, he was doing lots of cleaning. Skuma came out several times to ask Joseph music questions and I sort of understood what they were talking about (stuff about chords). It’s a little different than how I learned, but the conversations further reinforced how music is truly a universal language. Instead of giving notes a letter name, they sing it! I’m impressed as my ear and my singing aren’t good enough to distinguish notes!

Towards the end of my cleaning, Miraclin came over as she was finished with her laundry and wanted to see what we were up to. To her dismay, all Joseph and Skuma talked about was her not having a boyfriend. It’s common for women here to get married at 20 so not even having a boyfriend at 21 was bewildering to Skuma and Joseph. Since Miraclin is going off to the UK to get her master’s and is pursuing the advancement of her professional career, she simply doesn’t want a boyfriend right now! I could tell Miraclin wanted to shift the conversation, but they continued to be uncomfortably interrogative. I might be wrong here, but it seems very much so that the value of a woman is what she can do for a man. Therefore by not having a boyfriend, it unfortunately gives less value to Miraclin. Of course, as people here become more educated, this sentiment is decreasing, but it’s still extremely prevalent. To prove this point, whenever Joseph talks about wives, it’s all about what they do for him, not what he does for them. An interesting thing is that even though Joseph is Roman Catholic and therefore religiously would practice monogamy, he’s a part of the Skuma tribe which allows polygamy. I’m not sure which trumps the other, but Joseph wants to have five wives and seems adamant to getting them! I’ll never bash another culture, but polygamy seems like such a wrong and objectifying thing to women.

During the conversations, I learned that Skuma’s name is Mboje and will finally be able to reference him correctly in my blogs! When I finally finished rinsing my clothes, Joseph and I went to Andrew’s clotheslines. Ours was too tiny and full of bed sheets! I finally got to use clothes pins for the first time and began hanging up all of my clothes. Joseph instructed me to make sure that all of my clothes were inside out to protect them from sun damage! With all of the wind and sunlight this clothesline had, I’m excited to see how fast my clothes dry!

With our clothes cleaned, it was time to move to the inside and clean there! I swept my room before mopping it (we used the water from our laundry for the mop water). To wring out the mop, you use your hands which feels gross but is the only way. When I finished my room, Joseph swept while I mopped the rest of the house. All in all it didn’t take that long and was quite satisfying! Leonard came over when we were finished and sat with Miraclin and I on the couches in the front room. There was a radio I messed with and got to work! There were only three channels: two music and a news channel. We listened to the Swahili music and talked with each other. Leonard goes to the same church as Miraclin and I and invited us to be a part of the choir and dance. We don’t know the songs, but I’m sure we’ll try our best! At this point it was 11:15am and time to go to tea!

Joseph and I needed to go pick up Eli so we walked to his house to find that cleaning had been successful for both Jordan and him. Eli cleaned his shoes which is something that I should’ve done (I also realized I forgot to wash my towel, goals for next Saturday)! Eli and I went to Roza’s house and had some amazing sweet potatoes and tea full of sugar; a very filling meal. Afterwards, Eli left to help Rozadia with some maize while I spoke with Miraclin about the dynamics between a man and woman here in Tanzania. It seemed like a relevant topic from conversations we were having earlier at my house. It was hard to talk due to a speaker that was blaring behind me, but there was no way to turn it down and we didn’t want to turn it off (reminded me of Paul’s house). We talked about how in a more developed country, only having the women do the domestic things is stupid. Arguably the work of man gets easier as a country develops (think office job vs. hunter) and women also enter the workforce. It’s not fair for the woman to work AND do everything around the house while the man sits around and expects to be taken care of. However, that’s how it happens here and unfortunately might persist for a long time. At least how Joseph puts it, it seems dishonorable for a man to take care of the house when it should be seen as a privilege (the man and woman should take care of each other). I assume that as education becomes more prevalent, this sentiment will change. The whole dynamic between man and woman here is simply very different from America and it's hard to understand. I’m not here to change anything and must simply live with it!

We eventually got sick of talking over the music so we went outside to find Roza and a bunch of other women shucking corn. They were all talking, some getting their hair braided, some sifting through the corn, and it all seemed like such a great community. We didn’t know where Eli went and he happened to be outside as well! Little Alvin was running around and we played with him for a bit by throwing him around and what not. He’s a feisty little kid and is just like the crazy chipmunk! The day was passing us by and I wanted to go to the office to work on videos and upload my blog. I went back to my house with Eli and had the posse of three kids following us the entire time. As I grabbed my stuff, Eli held the door shut as the kids banged on it and tried to get in. When I was ready to go, we opened the door and scared them all! The kids were being very violent and pretended to shoot us with imaginary guns. On the way to the office, a mom yelled at all of the kids to leave us alone and they listened immediately!

At the office I got connected to the WiFi when Jonathan and Miraclin showed up. Us four had a great conversation about village school stuff, village to city transition for people here, and Jonathan’s own transition from Tanzania to the US! Eventually Jonathan needed to get back to work so we all split up. Eli went back to his house to hang out with his host, I sat outside for a little longer, and Miraclin went to her room to work.

Even though being outside was lovely, I figured I should record videos for once! I told myself I’d record them on the weekend, and here I am in a quiet office with no one around! It took a while to set up my phone, but after some creativity I got it to work. I wanted a straight down view of my hands to talk about the components of Kolibri. The only way that I could get this angle was to use a cardboard box and lodge my phone into it. A good quarter of the screen is the box itself, but it worked well enough for what I wanted. I figured that my videos are only a foundation and that eventually the education department should make their own! With the first part of my recording finished, I went on my computer to start recording videos on how to set up a router. Before I could get much progress, Miraclin came into the room to tell me it was time to eat!

We went to Roza’s house at around 3:15pm and ate rice and beans for lunch! It was delicious and honestly a combo that is hard to beat. We all talked for a bit until heading back to the office around 4:00pm to finish the rest of my router videos. When I came back, Andrew was in the office as well fixing a Chromebook. He was playing some music, but not loud enough to ruin the quality of the recording. There was some extra time so I made some videos on how to work the projector as well! In my mind if there’s something unfamiliar, a video is needed!

With the work day finished at 5:00pm, I played on my computer for a bit before heading back home to change into my volleyball clothes for volleyball. I walked by my clothes to find that they were all completely dry! INSANE! In Madisi it took four days for my laundry to dry because I kept it all in my room (there wasn’t a clothesline until the last week I was there). Back at the house, I dropped off all my stuff, went and picked up my first load, dropped it off at the house, got my second load, and then changed into my volleyball clothes. Between loads I noticed a massive dead bee stuck in a spider web! There aren’t a ton of insects here so it’s cool to see a new one!

Completely changed, I walked to the volleyball field, said hi to Peter on the way, and joined Eli and the really good player’s team (for now I’m going to call him Doctor as he works at a nearby medical center). Not many people showed up today so it was 3 on 3 until Peter came late into the evening making it 3 on 4. My team was quite dominant and we ended up winning 10 out of 13 sets (we only played to 10, not 11 which is odd to me)! I had sort of a slow start on my end, but really picked up my playing as the games progressed. If I could get a good set to the Doctor (happens around 50% of the time), he’s able to send a missile straight to the other side that’s impossible to receive! All in all it was tons of fun, and with only three people, I was touching the ball so much my blister cracked open! I really enjoyed finally being on a team with Eli and not pinned against him. For some reason everyone finds it entertaining when we play against each other!

As the night began to creep in, it became too hard to see and it was time to end our fun. After our quick end game debrief, I went back to my house, washed my filthy hands, and folded my laundry. I say fold but if my mother saw how I was putting away my collared shirts, she would be very disappointed! When I was finished I went to Roza’s house to pick up some hot water for a bucket bath. Grabbing my bucket of hot water and bringing it inside to add cold water in, I had to test the temperature first (one time in Madisi I forgot and had a cold shower). It’s impossible to know how hot the water is by the amount of steam coming off of it as even lukewarm water produces it here. I stuck my whole hand into the scalding water and shrieked! At least the wound on my thumb is clean! I learned a lesson and made my own warm water. Before I took my bucket bath, I noticed a foul smell coming from my room. It was coming from my slides which have started to rot. The strap part that holds my foot into place has a cloth cushion underneath it which holds water and never dries… I can’t even begin to explain the smell that’s emanating from them. I’ll be putting them outside and washing them before determining if they’re a lost cause or not! In the meantime, I’m using Joseph’s slides.

After the bucket bath, I get dressed, and since Joseph is at church, we don’t have to rush over to Eli’s house after I finish getting ready. I sat down and got caught up on my blog! Since I’m not usually home at this time, I got to listen to all of the noises that happen around the house: Andrew’s pigs, barking dogs, beeping horns, and talking children. By the time I get home every night, all of these sounds have stopped and all you’re left with is the sound of the wind blowing through the trees (very calming).

Eli eventually came to pick me up to eat dinner around 9:00pm! I wasn’t expecting Eli to come get me so it was a surprise to hear him yell “oddee” and me to yell “karibu”. I packed away my laptop for blogging, and we went over to Roza’s house for dinner. We ate rice, beans, and avocados for dinner. The rice and beans were filling as always and I was excited for the avocados as they are usually one of my favorite parts of any meal. To my utter dismay, they were extremely unripe and tasted like rotten fish. I’m not sure if it was the type of avocado or if it was simply the fact it hadn’t sat out long enough, but I didn’t even know avocados could taste like that! We all didn’t enjoy the avocado and learned the importance of patience.

With the meal concluded, we asked questions about church tomorrow and learned that Eli is going to a Lutheran church that happens to be the church that is the farthest away! Roza made sure to add that Eli will also be at church until 1:00pm so he should be in for a treat. For Miraclin and I, the Roman Catholic church starts at 8:00am and ends a little after 10:00am. I’m sad I won’t be at church all day with Moses, but I’m excited for this opportunity to experience a new church and meet new people!

Dorris came home at 10:00pm as always and all of the students walking by outside from the school exclaimed in Swahili, “I didn’t get to see the white people dancing tonight!”. Roza heard this and translated for us and we all laughed. We enjoyed each other’s company for a little longer, but were all so tired and ready to get to bed. I think we all are so much more tired here than Madisi because we’re actually getting work done!

I walked back home and found that there was no Joseph! I made sure to not lock the door from the inside! When I got to my room, I was still a little hungry and ate a package of glucose crackers and blogged. While blogging Joseph did finally come home, but said nothing to me (completely fine). It’s like we’re roommates now and simply coexist together in the same house. Blogging gets me sleepy and I fall asleep right as I put away my laptop. What a great cleaning day!