Our wall fell over...

Shinyanga was hit by a huge storm on Saturday night, thunder and lightning like nothing we'd ever experienced, although we've since been told that it wasn't anything special and that there's a lot worse to come!

Woke up on Sunday morning to a unexpected sight from our kitchen window - the house next door. Turns out the particularly loud thunder we heard at one point was the wall between us and our neighbours being blown over. Thankfully no one was hurt but it did hit the wall of the other house and cause some damage. See before and after photos below.

The owner of the house has been great and there's now a construction team working on the re-build. Apparently they couldn't get hold of any pre-made breeze blocks so are making hundreds by hand, one at a time. We also have no water at the moment so they have to walk and get water to mix the concrete. Really is a slow and painful process in some serious heat. Think a lack of foundations may have contributed to the original collapse so will be interesting to see if that's rectified this time.

It did give us a good opportunity to meet our neighbours who are very friendly and may even supply us with a few eggs, every Tanzanian cloud...

Tanzanian Premier League

Saturday, 4pm (advertised at 2pm but 2 hours isn’t even close to being ‘late’), optimistic crowds and the unmistakable howl of vuvuzelas can only mean one thing – it’s Tanzania Vodacom Premier League time. Young Africans from Dar, one of the best teams in the country, were in town to play local team Stand United. 

Stand United really are one of the success stories of modern football. Delightfully named after the bus stands where the idea for forming a team was originally hatched, the team is comprised of local talent who have never forgotten their roots. Loyal to their club, playing with pride in their shirts and with an annual budget comparable to the cost of one of Wayne Rooney’s hair plugs, they really are the local boys done good, now plying their trade in the upper echelons of Tanzanian football.

Unfortunately the fairytale was not destined to continue on Saturday as Stand United were outplayed by a superior Young Africans team featuring not one but two star/aging Brazilians. The near capacity crowd of 10,000 (unofficial estimates nearer 20,000) at Kambarage Stadium in Shinyanga was rocked by an early Yanga goal from which Stand never really recovered. The young, skilful Stand-onians had no reply to a team consisting of six members of the national team and as tired legs and minds kicked in, the visitors helped themselves to two late goals to finish with an emphatic victory.

Football clichés aside, it was a remarkable experience and a great match to watch. We had ‘VIP’ tickets which granted us permission to drive into the stadium and park along the sidelines. Unfortunately we were too late to take in a car but we were able to stand beside the subs bench for the first half, felt more like a member of the team’s back-room staff than a casual observer! 

Tanzanians really are passionate about their football so the atmosphere was incredible – no idea how people dance, sing and blow vuvuzelas for 90 minutes at temperatures well over 30 degrees.  However, passions spilled over into some bad tempered bottle throwing at half time so we had to make a quick escape from where the players had gathered until police intervention had calmed things down.

During the second half, Young Africans decided to abandon their designated subs bench so, not having a seat ourselves, we were invited to take advantage and enjoyed the best view in the house (click here for photos). We were very aware of how conspicuous we were, the only white people in the stadium sitting on the players’ seats, but all part of our ‘Mzungu’ experience.

Stand United til I die...not sure if season tickets exist though, or a fantasy league...

Swahilli word of the day: Ligi kuu Bara

means National Premier League - Google it for further news, views and updates

Mr. and Mrs. Paul

Our current routine consists of Monday to Wednesday in school and Thursday / Friday spent initially observing community based projects with the aim of becoming more involved in those as the months progress – we have a lot to learn and get used to before we get really stuck in! The school is a good place to get used to how things work, meet local people and help us feel like we’re instantly involved.

As we are now called in school, Mrs. Paul is teaching English and Mr. Paul has got roped into helping with a few Physics classes so our evenings are spent refreshing distant Junior Cert Physics knowledge and trying to work out what using the present continuous tense to convey repetitive irritation means (answers on a postcard to Mr. and Mrs. Paul, Shinyanga please). Thankfully, secondary school education In Tanzania is all done through English so our lack of Swahili does have some uses. It seems to be going well so far, we think...

Alice is having a lot of fun with the standard English comprehension texts in her class which have included gems such as “The woman’s husband has died. When is the funeral?”, “Why was he buried that day?” and question and answer sessions with responses like “I like to pray, I do not like to death”. Needless to say, Alice is going to try and inject some less morbid themes into her classes. 

Water and electricity supply are interrupted relatively often here (as we type this we’re in the middle of a power cut) but you adjust to that pretty quickly, cooking meals and charging phones when you have it and reading by torch light when you don’t. We are also very fortunate that the house has a water storage tank so we always have a steady supply.

However, the school is badly affected by water outages, particularly as they need quite a bit to feed and wash 200 boarding students. Last week, the school’s supply was stopped because a heavy truck drove over a mains pipe – an avoidable error in its own right. Within a short space of time, their storage tanks were drained so the students had to take it in turns to walk with buckets to a pump half a mile away which majorly disrupts classes. Although, as with most things that pose a problem here, the collection of water was done with a cheerful attitude that sees such adversity as a challenging part of life to be overcome, not wallowed in.

The lack of water is also a major issue in terms of hygiene and health and is something that the school is looking to rectify. During a meeting we were told that now there’s a Water Engineer here, we won’t have any more problems so looks like Paul will be involved in that – no pressure!  We are beginning to adjust to the pace and approach to life here but as we do we increasingly realise that it will take time to overcome our limitations.

To see some pictures of our school, click here

Our New House

After a welcome week in a hotel which allowed us to adjust to our new surroundings slowly, we moved into our house on Wednesday. It's not far from the centre of Shinyanga and is close to AICT's office as well as on the road to the school so it's an ideal location for us. It's also quite big and in an ‘upmarket' part of town - certainly at the upper end of the housing spectrum. 

While a very safe place and community, it's normal to have decent security which in our case consists of a perimeter wall with razor wire, locked gates, barred windows and a guard who sits at our front door from 7pm to 7am every night. Does feel a bit overkill (although we could have done with all that in Belfast) but as ‘Mzungu’s we do attract added attention so better safe than sorry.

Houses here don’t generally come furnished so we were very fortunate and thankful that the owner left us a bed, fridge, kettle and cooking hob – all things we would have had to buy if they hadn’t been here. Appliances cost the same or more than in Ireland and can be hard to get so having a fridge in this climate is a real bonus. The house also has air conditioning in the bedroom and living room so we really are living in luxury!

Everything else we needed we had to go and buy so in the absence of IKEA, we visited the gloriously named establishments ‘Amazing Grace’ homewares, ‘The Japanese Corner Shop’ (not a piece of sushi or even a Japanese person in the vicinity), and the ‘Half London Gift Shop’ where we bought and will continue to buy our eggs. Unfortunately, Amazing Grace only had one knife available during our visit so having cleaned them out, we will continue to share until a further shipment arrives!

Thankfully, we had help during our shopping spree, otherwise it would have been near impossible. We start Swahili lessons on Monday and they really can’t come soon enough.
  
The house is fantastic and we’re very glad to have moved in and are well on the way to making it feel like home. We’re always delighted to have visitors so feel free to call in anytime...

Swahilli word of the day: Mzungu - literally means someone who wanders without purpose but came to be applied to all white people in East Africa and heard regularly when you’re the tallest, whitest person in a town

7am....

....is the time that church starts...and was still going when we left at 12:30!

Not that we're complaining, it was an amazing experience, just something new to get used to over the next year! 

We went to AICT's main church in Shinyanga which has over 1000 people attending Sunday services. In true African style, there was plenty of singing and dancing as well as smiles and laughter. We were introduced at both morning services, hence the extended stay. One service usually lasts for about 3 hours and we'll probably be attenders of the 7am - it can get very hot by 12. We were brought to the front and gave a brief introduction of who we are and our plans for the year which was warmly received, followed by a large number of hugs and handshakes! 

There was a very welcome break for a typical Tanzanian breakfast of tea and chapatis between the services - much needed energy for a second round of song and dance in Swahili! Church here is a truly social affair with stories, greetings and choreographed dances helping the time fly. The people are very friendly and the church will be a very enjoyable community to be part of.

We were told later that day that 'Sunday is for Church' and can last varying amounts of time. A church that runs until 4pm was recommended but we may need to build ourselves up slowly for that marathon!

School Graduation

This week’s big event was the final year graduation ceremony at Bishop Nkola secondary school – the school set up and run by AICT in Shinyanga. The school was established in 2009 with one student and has grown to over 200 this year. In line with AICT’s development philosophies, the school focuses particularly on educating girls from poorer backgrounds who are often more likely to miss out on education. 

 

There are 8 classrooms, each with a blackboard and desks but no windows. The school plans on increasing numbers over the next few years and is currently involved in building further dorms and a kitchen.

Graduation was a 5 hour affair with plenty of speeches, lots of singing and dancing and even some comedy. It turned out that it was also being used to welcome us so from our esteemed seats at the ‘top table’ we had to chip in with a couple of off-the-cuff speeches but no dancing, thankfully!

First Days

They say the first blog post is the hardest.....

Greetings to the thousands of people who will inevitably flock to read our musings from Tanzania. We arrived safely and spent Tuesday night in Dar es Salaam before flying to Mwanza yesterday. From there, it was a 2 and a half hour drive to Shinyanga where we’ll be based for the year.

Following a number of arguments with the volumetric capacity of our suitcases, we landed in Dar wearing far more clothes than is advisable at over 30 degrees. Coupled with navigating a hectic airport, long visa application process and carrying over 60kg of luggage, it made for a very sweaty afternoon! We had been told that “boys wear shorts” which turns out to be completely true, so no matter how hot it gets we’ll be covered to our ankles.

Initial observations include a surprising amount of Chelsea shirts (lots of Drogba fans, not Adam Nditi related apparently), radio dominated by Pitbull and Katy Perry (really makes you feel at home) and bicycles laden down with loads that a truck would be proud of. It has also been impossible not to have already been struck by the friendliness of the people we’ve met so far.

Shinyanga is a town of 100,000 which is far smaller than Dar’s 5-6 million so feels a lot less full and busy. Bicycles dominate the roads with cyclists needing to keep a keen eye open for goats and cows feeding at the roadside. So far, we have visited AICT’s regional office and met the staff we’ll be working alongside – really great people who are very focused on the issues in the communities they work in. 

Today was spent at the AICT run secondary school in Shinyanga who were having their graduation ceremony for final year students. It turned out to also be a welcome ceremony for us which was great. This is the school that Alice will be involved in and we will work out how that looks over the next few weeks. Facilities are very basic but the students are enthusiastic and eager to learn and staff work well with what they have.

Swahilli word of the day: Pole, Pole (polay polay) – slowly, slowly

said to us in an airport queue but could also be used to describe the Tanzanian approach to life; patient and calm with an emphasis on slowing down and enjoying life