Our daladala heads north out of town on the Nairobi-Moshi road, so-named
because it is the only road leading to Nairobi to the north and Moshi to the
east. The driver slows down only for the
few well-placed, speed bumps, which are the only things preventing daily mass
bloodshed on the roads. Depending upon the number of stops, which are unlimited
and unpredictable if there's a willing customer with 100 shillings (13 cents),
we reach Sakina in about fifteen minutes. There is the landmark pointed out by
Nancy on our first day in Arusha: a large Coca-Cola billboard sign with
"Sakina” in black bold letters on the bottom. I don’t know what “Sakina”
means, I only know that this is our stop.
Sakina, my neighborhood, is behind
the Azimio compound where men working for the army and their families live for
free. There is no driving inside the Azimio compound but then there are no
roads or car owners either. The compound is walled-off and the gate is locked
at 10 p.m. every night. The quickest route to our house is to go through the
center of Azimio.
Teresa and I walk up a rocky,
uneven dirt path and within moments we hear a childish chorus of "Mzungu" or "Good morning
teacher" that doesn’t stop. As we walk, I can’t help but notice that the
lower third of my body is coated in dust—a silky sand-colored grime the
consistency of sifted flour.
“Mzungu, Mzungu, Mzungu…” The
chanting is incessant. Technically, it means “European person” in Swahili,
nothing derogatory or racist, but it bothers me.
Theresa seems to be oblivious to it. She
smiles, her brown eyes warm and friendly and says a hearty “Jambo” (hello) to
everyone we meet. Theresa is the kind of person I’ve always wanted to be—calm,
thoughtful, and patient. She is solid goodness---no hidden agendas, no
skeletons in the closet, and completely non-judgmental. Pretty much the
opposite of me.
I’d met Theresa at O’Hare airport
just before we caught our first flight to London and then to Dar es Salaam.
Somehow, Theresa recognized me from the blurred black and white photos of the
thirteen Tanzania 1999 Visions in Action Volunteers sent to us a few weeks ago.
As we sat in the departure lounge, just minutes away from boarding, the
realization that I was about to set off on a yearlong adventure caused me to
regress. For I moment, I was back in grade school. I had a sudden childish
impulse to ask her "Do you want to be my friend?"
The lack of indoor plumbing brings
life in Tanzania to the great outdoors. Mothers are doubled over bathing their
children in plastic washtubs; naked toddlers squat into metal pots that double
as chamber pots; grown men brush their teeth spitting the chalky froth onto the
dirt pathway just in front of us; others stroll to the public bathhouse in
broad daylight, clad only in a towel. Women must bath in the dead of night
since I never caught sight of them near the bathhouse.
A child happily splashing in
the water freezes at the sight of us. Imagine a stone-age tribe from Papua New
Guinea, dressed in loin clothes, carrying spears and covered in war paint
bursting into your living room one evening and you get the idea. The mother
points to us and says "Mzungu"
as we pass.
Homes
appear haphazardly at odd angles, like a giant Monopoly board that has been
bumped. But we are a very long way from Park Place and Boardwalk. Most are nothing more than one or two room concrete-blocked
sheds or a shack consisting of rotting boards held together with rusty nails
and dried mud, roofed with a flat sheet of corrugated tin. Like flags, curtains flutter in each doorway,
providing a thin veneer of privacy, only a stone's throw from the neighbor's
curtained door waving back across the path.
Mother hens with their chicks in tow, like a toy train run back and
forth, are late for mysterious barnyard appointments. Bicyclists ringing their
bells whip by and red-cloaked Maasai herding goats or cows and using their
spears as walking sticks have the right of way. The only thing to do is to step
off the path, hopefully in time, and wait until they pass.
The
path opens up into small plots of maize and beans tended by women and teenaged girls.
The women brought the water from the stream some distance away in jerry cans
weighing twenty kilos, balanced perfectly on their heads, without spilling a
drop.
Little
dukas selling everything from eggs to
kerosene to beer are everywhere. Old men sit on benches outside these dukas leaning on their canes. I will see
them in the mornings when I leave for work and they will still be there in the
afternoons when I return. And there
are young men with them, also sitting, doing nothing. Women’s lib hasn’t quite
caught up with the economic realities of the developing world. Women are
responsible not just for housework, raising the children and cooking the meals,
but also fetching the water and firewood for cooking, cultivating the crops and
selling vegetables to earn a few extra shillings.
We’ve
been walking along the dirt path now for ten minutes when we come to the
cassava lady who is always just outside the gate leading out of Azimio and into
our neighborhood of Sakina. A wizened woman shriveled inside her bright yellow
and pink print dress with a green scarf covering her head, sits on a tiny bench.
In front of her is a pot that looks like a wok, sizzling with deep-frying
cassava, cut into pieces the size of large carrots. We’re feeling adventurous
so we each buy a piece. The woman gives us a huge, nearly toothless smile. Neighborhood
men and boys gather round and stare. One of the men says something to the
cassava woman and they laugh. Arusha is a tourist town because it’s the jumping-off
point for safaris to the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater, but tourists don’t go
to Azimio or Sakina. We are probably the first foreigners who have purchased
cassava from her.
“This
tastes like a French fry,” says Theresa after it has cooled enough to take a
bite.
I
agree but thinking of French fries makes me homesick.
We
pass through a gate the size of a door onto the crest of a small hill. To the southwest,
far beyond the outskirts of Arusha, are bell-shaped bluish hills rolling away
into the African plains. I like to imagine I'm looking right into the heart of
the Serengeti and somewhere out there is a lion on the hunt or a hyena tending
her cubs.
