An Abnormally Chaotic But Weirdly Representative 48 Hours

I realized recently that my blog posts have become very abstract, full of moments I’ve appreciated and ideas I’ve come to realize, but I have been missing out on the actual day-to-day details of what my life looks like right now. As the great Annie Dillard writes in her great book of essays Teaching A Stone To Talk, “my memories… had altered, the way memories do, like particolored pebbles rolled back and forth over a grating, so that after a time those hard bright ones, the ones you thought you would never lose, have vanished, passed through the grating, and only a few big, unexpected ones remain, no longer unnoticed but now selected out for some meaning, large and unknown.” I have been consumed by this idea with equal parts fear and excitement– fear that I’ll forget the things that feel so meaningful now, and excitement to see what remains– because so many of my memories here seem so all-consuming, and like they will never fade. Regardless, I know they will, in the same way that my most poignant memories from Chile are not at all what I might have expected them to be. 

In many ways, that is what this blog is all about, striking a balance between the things I must write about because they are so large and bright, and trying too to write about the things I fear I’d otherwise forget. 

So, a hectic 48 hours. It really started the night before the 48 hours began, on a Friday night in Arusha, staying in a house with a big living room and loud speakers, in which the eight of us danced and laughed and drank terrible cocktails, myself abstaining because, as I said to dear Olivia earlier in the night, “I feel like I really burned the candle at both ends this week, and it’s showing.” We called it a night early, forgoing an adventure to our favorite club in Arusha because of our 8am sharp call-time at the office, itself a surefire untruth. I fell asleep around midnight, tuckered out from the week of kulabata (direct translation “to eat duck”, meaning “something you do to have fun”. One of my favorite Swahili phrases, no doubt). 

At 6:55 I woke up from a dead sleep, sure I had something to do. I did, sort of, which was to call my dear aunt Katie, but I had the day wrong. Regardless, she was around, so I made a cup of coffee and sat on the back porch as she made dinner, catching up on our very-different-looking lives and feeling like I could have been back in Providence, our cross-country distance feeling no different than our cross-continents-and-ocean distance during the course of the call. Of course, halfway through our chat we got news that we didn’t need to be at the office until 8:30. Classic Tanzanian Flexible Time. 

We trudged in as a group a bit later, walking into a series of one-on-one meetings about our Independent Study Project proposals, i.e. lots of waiting around and a five-minute conversation each with our head teacher. I wandered the Saturday market next door, searching for last-minute gifts for family and a particular lavender oil Txuxa had bought which I find divine. I bought some almost-bagels and listened to a live local band. I wrote a blog post in the office; I read my book. Two hours and a bit later, I walked in for my meeting, a brief affair in which I was told my paper needed to be clarified. I walked out and bolted back to the house, wanting lunch and to lie down. 

Back at the house, I made breakfast sandwiches for myself and the boys, listening to Jenner Fox and thinking of Chile, using up the rest of our bacon before the group’s mass exodus early the following morning. I lay down for a bit, packed a little, and prepared myself for our afternoon activity, a return to our homestay families. 

I forgot how good it feels to return. As someone who lives for anticipation and excitement, I think it may be the case that a return home is the only thing that feels better than the anticipation, the feeling of sinking into your own bed and smelling the familiar scents of garlic and dogs. Going back to homestay wasn’t quite as euphoric, but it felt good, better than I expected to be driving the familiar route back and seeing village characters we’d come to know and love. 

On the way, discussing our plans for the evening and projected departure times from the village, Ryan had the bright idea that, rather than catch an early night of sleep for the 13+ hour bus journey the next morning, we say screw it and stay up all night, with the compelling argument that the next day would be shot anyways, and that time would certainly pass faster if we were bone tired. With a pointed look from Olivia, remembering my comment the night before, I embodied the essence of “hamna shida” and one of my favorite phrases in moments like these: “I’ll sleep when I’m dead”, or in this case, “I’ll sleep tomorrow on the horrible bus ride”. 

When we arrived in Ngaramtoni, we headed straight to Griffin’s house, my second family while I lived in the village, and resumed familiar positions around the dining room table, eating delicious food Mama Flora heaped onto our plates. We later moved outside, drinking beer and listening to music drifting in from the nearby student housing, staring up at the now-familiar but never-dull view of red-gray Mt. Meru in the distance. After a few hours, local friends drifting in and out of the yard, I decided to go find my own homestay mama at her hair salon in the market down the hill from our houses. With Txuxa by my side, we climbed on a pikipiki (motorcycle), something that felt extremely dangerous and not-allowed when we stayed in Ngaramtoni, but which has become part of nearly every day since. Down the dusty hill we went, arriving around sunset in the market area, no clue where my mama’s salon was, realizing that the two beers might have instilled in me more courage than I actually felt to find her. Thankfully, the second we stepped off our bike I found her, tapping her on her shoulder and instantly being wrapped up in a huge, delighted, surprised hug. Off we went around the corner to her little salon, where Txuxa and I sat on the couch and practiced our rusty Swa-English to chat about the month since we’d seen her. It was so wonderful to see her again, this person who had cooked me such delicious food and been so patient and kind to me for three weeks. It felt like no time had passed at all as we sat reminiscing about Zanzibar, Serengeti, Mazumbai, our studies and adventures and bus trips around the country. 

Then a client came, and Txuxa and I sank into the background, sharing a quiet moment in this clean and well-lighted space. “I missed the peacefulness of homestay”, Txuxa noted, “the lack of expectations and ability to do nothing in a quiet space”. I realized I couldn’t agree more, sinking into the comfortable couch, thinking about how fun and exciting and fast-paced the month before had felt, and how I hadn’t felt really settled since sitting at that kitchen table after school, doing homework. Returning to what you know feels good, a comfortable couch and the watchful eye of an adult who cares about you. I smiled and closed my eyes for a minute as my mama gently washed a well-behaved baby’s hair.

Too soon, Txuxa and I headed back up the hill, my mama haggling for pikipikis for us in the twilight. Another huge hug and sad goodbye. We met up with the boys and their families in the local bar, listening to instrumental versions of the Swahili songs we know well now. It was a sweet, quiet moment, all of us making up some strange, unexpected family and returning to a moment we all loved and missed. It was hard to leave these people we probably won’t ever see again, to leave a peaceful scene reminiscent of what was, I realize now in hindsight, a very special period of time.

We headed back to the house, tired and dusty from those familiar, rock-filled tracks, stopping to pick up Indian food on the way home. I was feeling burnt-out from the week, stomach nauseous, eyelids fighting to stay open. I flopped onto my shared bed and called Tiger, feeling confident I wouldn’t make it through the long night ahead without falling asleep. Eventually, one-by-one, Neil and Ryan stopped by, Neil to deliver some encouragement and Tums, Ryan to jump up and down shouting “sleep when we’re dead! Sleep when we’re dead!”. Feeling encouraged and invigorated, I joined the festivities downstairs, where two friends from a different accommodation had come by to play games before heading out. 

Eventually we headed out, packing two motorcycles with the six of us for the quick ride across the city. It’s hard not to feel like you’ll never sleep again in these moments, anticipating the thumping beat of a sweaty dance hall, wind whipping through your hair, shoved between two dear friends, speeding down familiar roads.

The club was a hoot, as it usually is. It often reminds me more of an indoor-outdoor bar with too-loud music and only a small square for dancing, which we usually monopolize throughout the course of a night. We danced our hearts out, taking in the various characters and scenes, and I felt very much like a college student. Later, it poured, a rarity in Arusha, the meat station at the club (GOD I’ll miss this place) moving under an awning, where we huddled and ate delicious choma when we needed a break from dancing. Strong petition to bring back this tradition to the States. We ran around like we always do, spending the night bouncing between busy rooms and the bathroom, always looking for someone or on some small mission, my favorite way to spend a night out. 

Around three, the latest we’d ever made it during a visit to The Hub, with us the only mzungus left on the dance floor, we headed out on our too-fast rides on rain-slick ground, through the cooled-off, breath-exhaled middle-of-the-night city, Ryan and I individually in our earbud-siloed worlds, dancing our fingers in the breeze on the way back to the quiet house. I’ve learned this semester, moreso than at any other time in my life, that music in earbuds can put you into you own little world, your own peace in the chaos, or just amplify a moment, whether it be a safari, a late-night pikipiki ride, or the end of a long night lying in bed. I have particularly come to love when those moments are shared in parallel, each of us in our own little words of our own little making. 

When we returned, we went directly into silent-feast making, snacking on leftover pasta, warming up garlic bread, cheffing up quesadillas. Ryan decided to make fries as the beginnings of a sunrise turned the black air outside the window gray, both of us engaged in our silent disco of munching and cleaning and dancing around the kitchen. Around 4:00, mid-fry making, Ryan went to lie down on the couch and promptly fell asleep. After a half-hearted attempt to wake him up, I finished making the fries and undertook the task of cleaning the entire kitchen, which was in a frat-like state of disarray. More music in earbuds, feeling like the only person in the world while hand-washing many wine glasses full of liquid of dubious origins. 

Half an hour before our departure time I shook Ryan awake, feeling like a little sister, and headed upstairs to wash my hair, determined not to sit down for fear of falling asleep. At 5:15, packed and ready to go, I finally sat, realizing instantly that I was useless to the group until I could catch some shut eye. After a small snafu with the car driving us to the bus station, we headed out, me instantly falling asleep in the car as the sun rose in earnest. I woke up confused and groggy as hell at the bus station, no idea where I was, what time it was, or why it was light out. Ryan arbitrarily picked a rafiki from one of the many men shouting bus options at us the second we stepped out of the car, and we were shown onto the nicest bus in the lot, a very very happy coincidence. The bus was empty except for the two of us, and after paying and being told the bus wouldn’t leave for half an hour, we both promptly fell asleep, and didn’t speak a word for the next five and a half hours. It makes me chuckle to no end to picture the rest of the bus passengers boarding and seeing the two passed-out mzungus in the middle of the bus, and I cannot begin to imagine what they thought had happened to us. Maybe it was close to the truth.

At 11:30 we nearly simultaneously stretched and nodded at each other, and began a normal bus ride, happy with our decision-making, which was never that horrible and resulted in a clean house, a fun night, and a half-as-long amount of conscious time on the bus.

A note on the bus. Transportation in this country varies significantly, from the top end of the spectrum (hired private cars, fun motorcyle rides across Arusha, tuktuks, the silly, three-minute ferry we take to get to Ushongo) to downright horrible (inter-city busses, crammed mini busses called daladalas, the random mid-sized buses we sometimes get shunted to mid-way through the journey from Arusha to Pangani). The inter-city busses are certainly at the high end of the worst of it, but they still tend to be hot, incredibly slow, and often uncomfortable. Luckily, we’ve always gotten seats on the busses, which is not true of everyone, but they are still no fun, and a surefire way to waste a day of your life being too hot, dusty, cramped, and generally unhappy. I have spent five days of my life this way so far in this country, with two more to come, and I will be very happy to leave them behind. However, they have been an indelible part of my experience, and there have been moments seared into my brain forever looking out of those dust-streaked windows at dozens of men trying to sell me cheap sunglasses, small bags of peanuts. The proudest I ever am of my resilience in this country is in these moments, too, which would simply never happen or be considered acceptable in the States. The bus journeys are almost type two fun, certainly unpleasant while they’re happening but excellent stories, and they make me feel like I’m a real person in this country, not just a hand-held student being taken on safari.

This trip was one of the lucky ones– we got to Muheza, the change-over point for a new bus to Pangani, before 4pm, meaning we didn’t miss the last bus out. Ryan almost got left at Mombo, the only stop along the way where people can stop for lunch and a pee break, which did cause me a small moment of panic, but was fine in the end. In Muheza we were shown to a bus pretty quickly, the jankiest bus I’ve seen so far, big but tilted at an angle, looking like it was on blocks or in the middle of being repaired. We boarded and waited for about an hour as the bus filled with women carrying huge sacks of potatoes and tin-smelling pots, mamas with babies slung over their shoulders, all of us communally sweating and filling the space with the distinct smell of too-hot humans. 

The journey from Muheza to Pangani is no more than twenty miles, but usually takes two-and-a-half to three hours on a bumpy backroad (sensing a theme?). I read my book and dozed, reminding myself all the while that I’d be returning to Ushongo, a place of great peace, a comfortable bed, and most importantly the salty sea. Anticipating that sense of return, the deep exhaled breath of home-away-from-home. 

We made it back around 8, a record time for the journey all the way from Arusha, and immediately headed to our classic dinner spot for beans and chapati. It felt like a homecoming, lots of “karibu”s shouted as we walked down “Main Street”, feeling confident in our patterns and excited to return to them. We shoveled down food, the true weight of my exhaustion settling in like a warm blanket, but I still found it in me to plunge into the dark ocean before crawling into bed. 

They were a couple of days full of excitement, exhaustion, adventure, dust, sweat, friends, dancing, good food, long bus rides, fulfilling naps, great music, leaving and returning, sea salt, wild decisions. A couple of days that filled me with gratitude for this place, for the people I am surrounded by, the things I will and won’t miss, and how comfortable I’ve become with all of it. A therapist once told me that I have a distinct willingness to exist in discomfort, and never has that been tested more than in this country. But all of it, the highs and the lows, I wouldn’t trade for anything– except maybe a bagel.