Karibu! Habari! Haribu???

One of the things that I love about Tanzania and Tanzanians is the long extended greetings that everyone gives to each other.  You ask about one's health, family, household... you name it.  It is really sweet and wonderful, and I really appreciate the care and joy that goes into each greeting.

I was anxious to figure this out upon arrival in Tanzania.  Although we had been proud owners of the Rosetta Stone Swahili for months... I sadly only could remember the word for "woman" in Swahili.  I also later figured out I was also pronouncing that wrong too.

I have been the jack of all trades master of none when it comes to languages.  I have halfway learned how to speak Mandarin and Spanish, and I am perhaps the only one in the world who has a tendency to get the two confused.   Now throw Swahili in the mix, and the language side of my brain is completely muddled.

However, one advantage that I do have with language is that I am not afraid to make a complete ass out of myself.  I have proven this numerous times before; one particularly memorable mix up was my ability to confuse the word for "sex" and "banana" in Mandarin.  I am still sheepish about saying either of them... because after so many mix-ups, I just have it permanently confused.

So, here I am in the market in Iringa, Tanzania.  Simple hellos should not be a problem, and I wanted so desperately to participate in the beautiful greetings.   In Swahili, "Karibu" means 'Welcome" and "Habari" is more or less "How are you?"  Both are easy enough.  Except I managed to mix both Karibu and Habari together to make "Haribu"... which essentially means-- destruction.  So for two weeks I went around telling everyone I was going to destroy them.  At least I did it with a big smile.

These are just a few that I promised to destroy...

Arriving in Iringa

"Iringa." Wikipedia. Web. 11 Sep 2010.  .

What will Iringa be like? We really had no idea. It is funny when you move to a place cold turkey. I had one picture on wikipedia, and a small blurb in the Lonely Planet which was my reference point for Iringa.  Luckily, Iringa turned out to be even BETTER than expected!

Beautiful flowering Jacaranda trees line the streets. There is a bustling food market in the center of town where women wearing colorful kangas sit atop mountains of vegetables.   The city is surrounded by beautiful hills and incredible rock formations.  It is home to extremely kind people.  And perhaps best of all, it is not super hot and humid.

Karibu Tanizania!

Upon arrival in Tanzania we were picked up by a very soft spoken, gentle man holding a sign with our names neatly printed in marker.   We were overjoyed to finally make it to Tanzania, but also excited that we weren't going to have to navigate Dar in the middle of the night with all of our luggage.  We had been waiting for this moment for a long time. 

Immediately after stepping out of the airport, we saw a large mob of people chasing a Land Rover down.  They eventually caught up with it as I wheeled my bag up to the car.   We asked our driver what was happening and he said in a very casual voice "He has stolen a car, maybe they will kill him."   Surely he must be making some kind of joke lost in translation right?

Turns out, thievery is not taken lightly in Tanzania.  I hope that is not the way that it ended in this story.  Fortunately, were were not around long enough to find out.

The helpful museum guide pointing out the murder of a thief in a mural at the Chief Mkwara museum

Capetown Photo Extravaganza!

Tempting Hammocks Swallow Tourists in the Transeki

We made a run for it. We broke out of the Garden Route and braved the long road to the wild coast of Africa. The east coast of Africa had a completely different feel. Although we were still on the beach (Micah and I hung close to the coast the entire time in S. Africa) we felt that the wild coast of S. Africa was just what we were looking for-- completely laid-back, incredibly friendly and exceptionally beautiful. We only planned to stay 2 days which stretched into 3...4...5 & finally six days.  We would have stayed even longer if we didn't have such a long trek back.  I think we both hit our hammock time quota for the year and enjoyed some great hikes with an exceptional guide.

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Optimistically Oprah

Although S. Africa is completely blessed with natural beauty, we still got the sense that there are a lot of challenges that lay ahead after apartheid. Much of my knowledge of S. Africa came form the book A Long Walk to Freedom which I embarrassingly called A Long Walk of Reading when I read it many years ago. With my very limited knowledge, I don't want to assume that I am a sage when it comes to the world of politics and social structure of S. Africa. Although it doesn't take a brilliant mind to recognize that S. Africa still has some formidable challenges in the way of equity. While traveling along the Garden Route I got the feeling that everything was not as the ideological S. African constitution lays out.

One night several beaches into our coastal tour, I got to have one of those snippets of conversation that makes the experience of traveling just that much richer. While sitting around a campfire, I got to talk to a man about his experience before apartheid ended. He talked about his experiences openly and freely, so after a glass of wine I decided to broach the subject on something that is near and dear to my heart.

Now that apartheid has ended, do all students have the opportunity to go to school together?

I know that even in the US after decades after the civil rights movement, we still face challenges with the resegregation of our schools long after Brown vs. The Board of Education. This issue is something that has had a deep impact on me for quite some time. I've worked with various organizations trying to gain a better grasp of the issue and possible solutions throughout my career.

I was extremely fortuitous when I interviewed for a school a little over six years ago and had the amazing opportunity to be a part of the founding faculty of an incredible school in Colorado that promised to buck this trend of resegregation. Previous to this job, my brief stint in teaching almost pushed me out of the profession. However, my experience at DSST changed my perception about what was possible in education, and quite honestly is why I am still in the profession today.

So what was the answer to my question asked around the campfire? Simply put, theoretically children could go to school together, but in reality putting black and white students in the same school, in his mind, only Oprah could accomplish such a feat.