more spelling trouble...

Yesterday I went to speak with the PLWHA group, and to visit the home of one group member. The meeting was moderately successful, we discussed ways to improve nutrition, to ensure that group members recieve all services, testing, and medicine free at their nearby health center (a right that is supposed to be guaranteed at all government health centers, but one occasionally exploited by health workers looking for a little supplemental income), and to discuss ideas for income generating activities (currently focusing on selling local handicrafts manufactured and marketed by group members at tourist shops in Mwanza, possibly setting up communications and markets back in the States, work in progres....)

The town where this group is based is called Ukiriguru, or Ukiliguru, or Ukirigulu, or Ukiligulu. I see the first and second most often, the third and fourth rarely. The local tribe, the Sukuma, do not use both the letter L and R in their language, but to be honest, I can't remember which one they do use and which one they don't. Which pretty clearly illustrates why it's impossible to get a confirmed spelling for Ukiriguru, since no matter how you spell it, it'll be pronounced the same. I get the impression the L/R distinction is not very clear for most tribes of Tanzanian, but that the Sukuma are especially bad at mixing up the two. Which suits me fine, whenever I get asked to teach English and I don't feel like it, I just tell them that I speak American English, then tell them how I pronounce the words 'water' and 'rural', and they stop asking right quick.

Ukiriguru/Ukiliguru is beautiful though, and made me hesitant to return to my house in Misungwi/Missungwi. It is heavily forested there, while in Misungwi I usually rely on artificially provided shade. It's also a bit smaller and secluded there, a bit more of a village feel, and a whole lot quieter. And it dawns on me, as I write that last sentence, that it is a fantastic place to VISIT but maybe not to LIVE. Misungwi is boring enough at times, Ukiriguru would probably drive me crazy.

I plan on returning next week to visit, not work-related, a group member who is becoming a good friend. He's about my age, 25, and is very passionate about a ton of different things, as I am. He has a tree nursery business, but also studied car mechanics and would like to be a driver (as well as get a degree - I wish I had kept that first college brochure I ever recieved, for what was it, the Southern School of Auto Mechanics in Kentucky someplace....) He also, I learned yesterday, has a kid. It seems recently that all my friends here in Tanzania have already had children. Which is fine. Well, sometimes it's not fine because the mothers gave birth when they were way too young and many of the fathers have neither the income nor the sense of responsibility sufficient for the task of raising these brats. But even when it is fine, it makes it awfully hard for me to have friends. I mean, I am still friends with this guy, and a girl at the market, and a teacher at a nearby primary school. But our lives are pretty freaking different, and I wish I could just have some good friends here who have finished school and started work and DON'T want to start a family at the moment thank you very much. Horrifying to think that people here my age are having kids. I sure as hell don't want any for at least another 5 years, at least. Even more horrifying, I recently realized, is that it could very well be the case even when I return to the states!!!

Life, when not terror-inducing, is sameoldsameold. But with a twist of crazy, out-of-place excitement. This week is the last before the national elections here in Tanzania, an event that about 10% of the population of my town looks foward to with excitement and hope, and the other 90% look at as a meaningless exercise in choosing people who don't care about them except during the month before elections when they distribute free tshirts. So anyways, yesterday one of the no-chance-in-hell-of-winning candidates visited. Tanzania is a multi-party democracy, at least has been I think since the 80s when opposition parties were legalized, but much of the political system here is still dominated by the revolutionary party that has held the office of the president since independence, and is expected to win again next week. But that didn't mean this visit of one of the 'other guys' wasn't exciting. It was! He came by HELICOPTER!!! Now, a helicopter is enough to get ME excited, and it was about 100 times more fun seeing the faces of people (big and small) who had never seen one before yesterday.

The other bit of excitement, which should give you all in 'uzunguni', or 'westerner-land', an idea how little excitement there actually is here: today I carved a pumpkin and baked a pumpkin pie. The pie was hard - I have no oven so I have to make do with a charcoal stove [I get the charcoal going, then nest a small pie-pot inside a larger pot using rocks to prevent burning, then put it on the stove and put some charcoal on top to try for evenness]. Still haven't tasted it, it's cooling at home, but without whipped cream my heart isn't in it too much. Will probably just give it to the neighbors, who will either really like it or will force themselves to eat it to respect me and then throw it out later. The carving, though, I have to say, is a masterpiece.