Hi loyal blog readers. This is Anna's dad. She's having trouble posting to the blog from her new spot in beautiful downtown nowhere, so she emailed the following to me to post on her behalf. Enjoy.
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Okey dokey, here goes....
I'm not sure if it's intended to be a fashion statement, or if it is to keep warm, or purely to ensure safety in the event of a horrible crash, but for some unknown reason, people living in Iringa, Tanzania wear dental vests when riding motorbikes. The first sighting we had this morning, I was convinced it was a bullet-proof vest, which made me a little nervous, but upon closer inspection and confirmation from a weathered Tanzania resident, it was clear that those thick, gray, outfits were, in fact, the dental vests that you wear when getting an x ray or just plaque scraped off of your teeth.
Chris and I made it to our final destination in the middle of nowhere african wild bush after 3 ridiculous days of rest and relaxation in Kendwa, Zanzibar (aka vacation paradise), the waviest ferry ride that I can imagine, a night in a hostel in Dar es Salaam, and an 8 hour bus ride across the african plains and into the mountains. When we got on the bus it was about 90 degrees and we were right along the coast, and when we got off it couldn't have been much more than 70 and we were surrounded by people wearing large, puffy down jackets. We climbed about 3000 feet in elevation and were looking at mountains in every direction.
This place is unbelievable. Yesterday night we spent at the Wildlife Conservation Society's house in Iringa (which is a pretty big city). Tonight we are staying at the bush camp, about 130 km outside of the city, which is unbelievably posh, as ironic as it might seem. For example, while we are technically off the power grid, there is a solar-powered satellite TV and (obviously) internet where I can type on my blog... We ate delicious Mexican food for dinner, and were only interrupted 2 times. First, when two elephants came splashing through the river whose banks we were sitting next to and second, when a lion roared off in the distance. There is one family who lives here all the time- and their two kids are awesome. They gave us a tour around the camp, introduced us to their pet falcon who they are nursing back to health after being hit by a car, took us to see the monitor lizard and the hippo tracks, and showe d us their trampoline (?). To get here we had to drive into the Great Rift Valley, the place where humans evolved!!!!! This trip just gets crazier and crazier.
I can't wait to get started on some sort of research project. There is a lot going on here- I wish that I could summarize it all for you, but I think that will have to happen another day.... because we are about to have a lot of days with very little communication with the outside world. I can't wait. :) More later.
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