Swahili Birthday

I'm in my room on the campus of MS-TCDC (Training Center for Development Cooperation), where I'm studying Swahili. I’m enrolled in a two-week intensive course. The center’s campus is really beautiful. There are all sorts of tropical flowers, grey monkeys running across the iron rooftops of the classrooms, and gigantic cranes with a wingspan of maybe 5 feet!

The classes have been going really well. I've been reading and writing Swahili for nearly 7 hours a day for 9 days now. That adds up to equal all the previous time I spent studying Swahili… almost. I've noticed a big improvement in my Swahili. I feel much less worried about trying to communicate. I've spoke with some Tanzanians in the school's dance and drum troupe for about an hour and a half last week. They didn't know any English and I was able to hold a conversation (albeit a shallow one).

Libby took the bus up from Moshi on my birthday. She met me here and then we took a taxi into Arusha. We saw a Japanese sushi bar the last time we went to Arusha and were both skeptical and intrigued by the idea of sushi in Africa. It looked very out of place in the neighborhood of the normal city shops and bustle of people, but inside we felt immediately at home.

They had tuna (maguro) on the menu, but the waitress (Tanzanian) said they didn't have any. Instead she recommended that we have our California roles with marlin. When it arrived it looked very recognizably as the inside-out rolls were used to. It was delicious! After that we just started ordering everything we recognized off the small menu: okonomiaki, misu soup, pickles, more ngiri rolls. We left feeling the pleasurable levity of a post-J-meal in our bellies. The pleasure of the meal was intensified by many months of rice, beans, lentils, bananas, goat and chicken.

The owner came in while we were eating and I said "Konichiwa!" to him. He rolled his eyes and snickered. At the end of the meal he came back over and I said "Thank you very much for your hospitality" - the only real stock phrase I've retained, because the only interaction I get with the language are in restaurants. He kind of looked up and smiled, but didn't say anything.

Afterwards, we tried to walk over to this place called the Greek Club, a hang-out for tourists and other wazungus ("white people"). But, the guards at the gate smiled and said tonight they were closed by making his forearms into a big X. We started to walk back down the street and saw a really fancy looking hotel with a bar in it, so we dipped in.

Arusha has a huge wealth gap, with a huge population living in shanty communities next to elegant hotels and restaurants where the better off play. Hundreds of nongovernmental organizations are based here, including the United Nations. There have been many international lawyers here since the beginning of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, where leaders of the perpetrators of the genocide during the 1990’s are being tried. All of this money means there are some pretty swanky places scattered throughout Arusha.

Inside the East African Hotel it looked like it had just opened. The big leather chairs didn't even have creases on their seats. The flat-screen televisions were crystal clean and the grandfather clock ticked in time as the air-conditioning began to blow. We ordered off the cocktail menu (one Sidecar and one Pina Colada) and then helped the bartender make the drinks. I spoke a little Swahili to this guy, but I could tell he wanted to speak in English to us.

Later, the barman helped us get a taxi, which had a special price for the tourists who didn’t realize they were right around the block from their destination. We went to Via Via and had drinks and listened to a live band. There are lots of young, white tourists and then younger Rastas from Arusha. We ended up hanging out with a couple of the Rastas for a while and we spoke with them in Swahili. After a few drinks I was feeling very confident about my language ability.

It was a really great birthday. Libby gave me a couple of new (second-hand) jeans, a shirt, a backpack, and a knob-kerrie, a wooden weapon used by the Zulu tribe. I’ve been asking for one for a while. My biggest gift was waiting for me in Moshi though. She said she had gotten something unusual. When she brought it out of the storeroom at the bar, I was shocked – a mounted Impala’s skull and horns. It’s twisted black horns are totally rad! Apparently the gift also includes the papers to get the thing back into the States with us next year.

Valentine’s Day at the bar was busy. James and I bartended for about 70 people and Libby, Heaven and Muro made dinner for 36 of them. We were exhausted at the end of the night.

Comments

[Libby]

The highlight for me was getting into a conversation about knitting with the rastas! He was telling us how he made his sweater and sells hats and things and Joe mentioned that I was making socks. He asked how many needles I use and was interested to hear that I'm using 5. He just uses one, with a hook (crochet). Should I start a Rastafarian Knitting Circle??