October 14th ....msasani... night out with cousins and my old job

Crashed my second Tanzanian wedding on Sunday, apparently I had met the groom but I have apparently met hundreds of people in this town. I was dragged along by Abdul, Keyfa's charming cousin at 9pm when I was about ready for bed and had to beg for time to change my clothes. I always have an interesting time out with the cousins. There is a generation within my adopted family that almost meets my qualifications for a peer group except that they are all a bit younger than me and therefore have much more stamina when we go out together. (Unfortunately they are also usually my ride home.) Dada Asia, who is at least ten years my senior, also came and was my waiting partner when we had had enough of drinking and dancing and watching married couples quarrel.

At about twelve oclock Asia came over to sit with me. Half and hour later I noticed that all of the cousins were sitting around us. Nobody - except two young teenage girls who rarely get the occasion to go "disco dancing" and were dressed to the nines - was dancing, drinking or even talking much. It was as if we were waiting for something, but I couldn't figure out what. I know better than to ask, so, assuming Asia wanted to wait for them to leave because she didnt want to pay for a taxi, I offered to pay(we were the only two going in our direction anyway). She agreed, asked if I was in a hurry to go and when I told her I didnt mind waiting a little she was happy.

At one thirty we were in the exact situation when the band played their last song and bade us farewell. Abdul asked Asia and I, the matriarchs of the group if we were ready to go and we jumped at the ready. We got to the family vehicle which is kind of a more efficient version of a family van, with the middle seats ripped out you can fit a lot more people. As soon as we all arrived at the vehicle Abdul disappeared back to the bar as he didn't have his keys. When he returned about ten minutes later, all of the men disappeared to help with what turned out to be a truck stuck in the ditch across the street. There were about 40 other people "helping" as well. Half an hour later, truck still in ditch, the men returned and Abdul disappeared again to find his phone. The van finally slowly crept out of the parking lot, picking up more family members, friends and neighbours on the way. Also balloons. As more people filed in the air filled with the noises of popping balloons and voices calling out names like attendance at school as there was at this point no way to know who was inside and who may have been left behind. The van stopped twice on the way for people to reshuffle, once Abdul was stuck on the outside, holding the sliding door as close to closed as it would go. We ended up getting dropped at a gas station at about 2:30 where we continued home in a cab. Abdul and his friend tried their best to convince Asia and I to escort them to Moshi's hot new club but we were both over done. A long end to what could have been a lovely evening.

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Two nights ago a good friend of mine, Otto, stopped by my place. He had heard I was in town and surprised me with a visit. Even more sup rising was the woman - his girlfriend - he brought with him. One of the only Canadians that I got along with when I was working on the medical caravan on Kili last year. Another surprise was when she invited me to join the caravan now in progress. Guess I did a better job than I thought. So yesterday I put in a full day at triage in the village of Kirua, about 2000m up Kili and had a fantastic time. I triaged about 150 patients and got some great Swahili practise in. I was amazed at how great I felt last night and this morning, after putting in a day's work. The whole "life has a purpose" feeling is pretty cool. Even though I don't put in a lot of value in the type of help that is being distributed through these caravans (the expenditure to return ratio is pretty weak) it sure beats hanging around the bar all day, waiting for the heat of the day to die down so I can go into town and get like one thing done.

So I think tomorrow I'll go again. Why notty notty? It would be nice to have an answer to question "what are you doing here in Tanzania?". I would like to spend less time at home anyway as I've been quarrelling with Babu Rasta who, after I refused to lend him a new laptop to watch a movie last night (he doesn't even know how to turn one on) told everyone at the bar that I was from Babylon which is fairly high up on the Tanzanian insult scale.

Today I woke up at 6 hoping to find a way up the mountain to join the caravan but noone had gone to fetch the water, my cell phone charger has disappeared, and I didnt have a contact number for the caravan crew - all together compiling into enough of an excuse to go back to bed. I was pretty proud of myself, though when I went through the long process of getting ahold of them and actually calling them to say I wouldn't be showing up. A great leap forward in my being brave enough to let someone down and own up to it. Its not like they were counting on me to come, I had just told them that I would let them know if I was coming but the point is that I actually did let them know and thats huge for me.

Highlights of the day included

*Sitting out in the dusty street this morning studying my correspondence course and loosing myself in a textbook, (Really? Ya!)

*Taking Karim to the pharmacy and paying a ridiculous amount of money for a ridiculous amount of drugs (two types of antibiotics and two tubes of antifungal cream) to fix the long term rash on his head. It was cool because Asia, Karim's mother, who cooks for me everyday, cleans my room when I go out of town and takes care of me in general asked me if I knew what medicine she should use to help him and I got to feel like I was paying her back in a small way.

*Sitting in my room eating chipsi mayai with Kefa, answering his adolescent questions about what dreams are and if they come true.

Looking back it has been an awesome day. Except of course for the constant diarrhea.