water/electricity

If I remember correctly - it was quite a while ago - one of the first debates between Peace Corps Volunteers when we got to Tanzania was on running water vs. electricity: Which would you rather live without?

The first few weeks, there actually seemed to be some discussion around this point. At the time, I had both electricity and semi-running water from an outside tap source, so I didn't have much to input. Then something happened to the pipe, a clog or a leak or i dont know what, and for a period of 2 or so days there was no water. My mind was changed.

Fast forward a year. Ask almost ANY of this same bunch of volunteers now, and I'm willing to bet 95% will answer, without a moment of hesitation, that they would rather have running water than electricity.

Well, looks like our decision, having running water or electricity, has been made for us - THANKS A FREAKIN BUNCH, mother nature.

Tanzania depends on hydro-electric power generators for at least a significant portion of the daily electrical output (not sure what percentage, but it's high). Tanzania is also, at pretty much a nation-wide level, experiencing a severe drought this year - the expected rainy season from December to January basically DID NOT OCCUR in numerous parts of the country.

The effects of this, then, are two fold. As they say in Kiswahili maji ni shida sana, 'water is a big problem.' It is dirty, it is expensive, and it is hard to get. I have heard scattered reports of cholera outbreaks increasing in frequency and scale. FUN!

**Food for though: Prior to coming to Tanzania, the most I ever worried about cholera was when guiding myself and my family/friends through the interior of the country on the Oregon Trail, trying not to capsize our wagon, while shooting as many 200 kilo bison as I could (yes, I know, not very wise given that I was fully aware of their once near-extinction numbers).**

So water is a problem. Of course, this problem also then extends to food, since there are basically no irrigation systems in the country and farmers rely heavily on rains for maize, rice, and other crop harvests. Here nearby Lake Victoria, a few farmers are having a field day planting and harvesting bountiful crops - in places where the lake has receded so much that large new areas of farmland have become available. Again in Kiswahili, tutakuwa na njaa mwaka huu, 'we will be hungry this year.'

But getting back to the topic of the water/electricity debate, since water is a problem that means - BING! - so is electricity. And as of last week, they have officially begun a nation-wide rationing of electricity. In Misungwi, we did not have power from Wednesday through Saturday, though I hear that once the rationing system is well settled our area will be cut off on Thursday and Saturday, from 5am until 11pm. Mwanza town is on a different schedule, which will probably be coordinated beautifully to coincide with the days I'm most frequently in town being the days without power.

So it's a pain, but what can I do. Quite a few volunteers live without electricity ALL the time, the problem is that I've gotten used to it, to my appliances, to putting off my work until 9 or 10 pm, and so when the power's cut it is just a huge pain in the neck. I don't even have a kerosene lantern, I just use candles.

[to give you an impression how bored I was the other night, I found a shutter-delay feature on my new camera that allowed me to take a picture of the candle, move the camera around really fast, and have the image come out looking like the flame formed a loop or a line in the air. this kept me occupied, quite intently, for a good hour and a half. At least the power wasn't cut out for the finale of the African Cup soccer tournament, in which all my neighbors were sorely disappointed that Egypt beat the Ivory Coast - there is definitely a 'sub-saharan' vs. 'northern' african rivalry here, or as most of my neighbors put it, 'black africans vs. arabs.' Ah, gotta love the political-correctness]

So anyways, thats the situation here, and it also explains why I still haven't gotten around to posting pictures - had no interent access, the office has been closed, and since my fan isn't working i've been generally too lazy to do much of anything that involves leaving my house after 10am or before 5pm. But I keep talkin about em, so as soon as they are available I will be posting (starting with the cat/lizard, followed by my boredom-induced candle experiment, and then some shots of my house).

One last thing speaking of pictures - it's weird having my picture taken with friends/neighbors/other people here. I guess I've never explicitly stated this, but I might as well now - you see, everyone around me is African. They are black. This is not a sensitive term here - Tanzanians will say, when trying to describe to me someone I'm not sure I know, 'that really really black one' or 'the white one' [meaning not as black as others]. But yeah, everyone here is black, with the exception of me and a few albinos whom I rarely see because they live in a nearby village, and I assume keep indoors for protection most of the time.

Now, I know that I'm white, and I know that everyone else is black, but to be honest this is not something that I notice on a day-to-day basis. And I also feel very proud to say that there are at least a few people here, perhaps many, who no longer notice or particularly pay attention to my whiteness. But then I'll have my picture taken with a group of students, or the neighbor kids, and I can't help saying to myself 'damn, I am really really freakin white.'

Though to be honest, my whiteness is not so much today. I''ve got a nice coat of dirt that gives me some color. I haven't bathed yet today [my guard used up the water, yaargh], nor did I bathe yesterday [not a fan of cold baths, too lazy to heat up my water on a charcoal stove]. Ahh, the joys of a water shortage/electricity rationing.