Despite the fears of many family and friends, I made it home in one piece without any scars from large animal bites, any strange diseases, or extraordinary mental conditions. After traveling on 4 airplanes, taxis, subways, buses, and cars and spending several days re-entering American culture in New York City (where I visited one of my roommates who is living there for the summer), I am back in Minnesota enjoying warm lakes, bicycle rides, sweet corn, and sunshine with my family and friends. Everything that seems so familiar really has changed in the last 6 months- people have graduated, married, had children, gotten new jobs, or grown 3 inches taller; buildings have been erected, trees have been cut down, roads have been repaved and most of the flowers have already blossomed and died until next year. Neighbors have moved and new neighbors have come and all the birds are getting ready to migrate again. I never assumed that all things would stay the same while I traveled around the world for half of a year, but it is really interesting to return home to discover what actually changes in a period of 6 months to surprise you in a place that is mostly familiar.
I want to say thank you to all of you who have so faithfully read this blog. I hope that it was at times entertaining, at others educational, and that it was never frightening to those who wanted me to return home safely. I feel so lucky to have been able to see such a different part of the world and be welcomed by so many people into cultures that were very different from my own- and I hope that sharing these stories simultaneously satisfied and stimulated all of your wanderlust. I tried to share the best, most ridiculous, most humorous, most tragic, most overwhelming feelings that I had on this trip with you all on the blog, but I have many, many more that I would love to share with anyone who would like to hear more about this trip. On AUGUST 2 from about 6 until whenever I am planning on making a slide show of my favorite pictures and telling stories. Feel free to come join my family and friends to celebrate my brother’s graduation and my return (and birthday on the 3rd!) for a little potluck. Just send me an email anna.santo@oberlin.edu, give my house a call 651-714-8384, or put a comment here and I can send you directions.
For those of you who are in Minnesota this summer, I would absolutely love to see you and catch up on your lives. I will be here until late August, though during the week I will be living and working at a biological research station in Central Minnesota (near Bethel, MN). I plan to be in the twin cities on the weekends and would love to get together.
If this is your first time visiting this site, welcome and I hope you enjoy reading about my adventures. And if this is your last time visiting the site, thanks again and I cannot wait to start a new blog with new adventures!
Last, but definitely not least, I must publicly proclaim my most sincere gratitude towards all of the staff and students of SIT Study Abroad, the Wildlife Conservation Society, all of the wonderful people I met in Zanzibar, Tanzania, Malawi and Kenya, and to my best and at times only companion in East Africa, Mr. Christopher Rice. This experience was unbelievable and would not have been the same without you.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Monday, July 14, 2008
On the road again...
Walking down the streets of Zanzibar again is so amazing. Most of our interactions with people go like this:
1. Make eye contact- we recognize a person.
2. Smile, give them the typical greetings.
3. They recognize us, their eyes get really wide.
4. They start shouting words of welcome and greetings into our faces at incredibly high volumes.
I’m actually really surprised at how many people recognize us. I know we were here for a long time, but we can hardly go anywhere without someone squaling with joy at the sight of us. It is overwhelmingly welcoming.
Our trip to Kenya was incredible. The drive there took two days, after the bus stopped an hour preemptively in a different city than was the original destination. It was about 13 hours in a bus the first day and about 5 or 6 hours the next day. Nairobi is absolutely crazy--- it didn’t feel dangerous at all like the news makes it sound. People were reall friendly and left us alone more than any other place that we have been. Since the violence there calmed down about 6 months ago, it has been peaceful. I definitely had the wrong impression of the city when we arrived. The largest slum in Africa is just outside of the city, so I thought that there would be a lot of poverty and we would want to be really careful about walking around downtown, but it wasn’t like that at all. Some of the neighborhoods have a really Western feel and we did things like go to the mall to eat greasy pizza, perused the largest supermarket I have ever seen, and we even went to our first polo match with about 200 British people in one of the suburban areas (what a ridiculous, ridiculous sport).
After spending a day in Nairobi, we left to go on a 3-day safari in Masai Mara, the park that is the Kenyan side of the Serengeti plains. It was really amazing. We shared a safari VAN with a young French guy and a Japanese guy (who said, “oooooh greeeeaaat!” whenever we saw wildlife). Our driver was a maniac- cruising the Serengeti plains after ostriches and lions and cheetahs. It was really fun- and fun to meet all the other people (they were all really young) who had made it out to the bush for budget safaris.
The highlights of the trip to Kenya for me, though, were our trips to the elephant orphanage and giraffe sanctuary just outside of Nairobi. At the elephant orphanage, there were at least a dozen very young, very uncoordinated orphan elephants rolling around playing that you could watch and touch, and two rhinos hanging out that you could touch. Warthogs just wandered around everywhere and young schoolchildren came to see the animals. It was really cool. And on our walk out the founder of the orphanage picked us up and gave us a ride.
The elephant orphanage was cool, but the giraffe sanctuary was a transformational moment for me. I finally discovered my favorite animal. Giraffes. I think it might have to do with the fact that my long neck and legs make me feel a deep connection with them, but I definitely think that giraffes are the coolest animal I have ever seen. At the sanctuary, they gave you food pellets of grass and you could feed the giraffes. Their long, slimy, spotted, gray tongues would smother your face if you held the food in your mouth, and they would just eat right from your hands or wherever. So cool.
The trip back was terrifying. I have traveled the same route on another occasion- and on that occasion it took us 10 hours to go from Dar to Arusha, and it takes about 5 hours to go from Arusha to Nairobi. So when they told us it was only 12 hours on the bus from Nairobi to Dar VIA Arusha, I was skeptical and thought that that was just their way of trying to sell us tickets. Wow, was I wrong. After sitting on the bus, listening to Tracy Chapman’s song “Revolution” as the bus left at 6 in the morning, we arrived in Dar Es Salaam 12 hours later. The driver was a complete maniac. He had anywhere from 0-1 hands on the streering wheel at any time, and the other hand was gesticulating wildly to his frien in the front seat. Rather than waiting in line at the weigh stations, he would zoom past the line, throw the bus in reverse and reverse backwards to the front of the line. If traffic stopped, he would get out of the bus to give the other drivers a piece of his mind. I covered my face for at least the last 2 hours of the drive, when we were averaging at least 130 km/h and never hesitated to pass cars despite oncoming traffic. When the driver left about half the bus along the Tanzania-Kenya border, he slammed the bus into reverse and at full speed, backwards, we recrossed the border to retrieve the passengers. The choices of entertainment were interesting as well- at 6 in the morning, we were listening to the all 80s all-the-time station, by the afternoon we watched two movies called Sweet Love I and Sweet Love II. And at the scariest part of the trip, when the driver really went crazy, we watched one of the most violent movies I have ever seen called “Blood Diamond”, about the diamond trade in Sierra Leone (Good movie, bad time for it). We made it safely to Dar Es Salaam, though, and the next morning took the ferry to Zanzibar and feel like we’re back at home again.
Chris leaves tomorrow and I leave 3 days later. I can’t believe we’re almost on our way home! I can’t wait to see you all.
1. Make eye contact- we recognize a person.
2. Smile, give them the typical greetings.
3. They recognize us, their eyes get really wide.
4. They start shouting words of welcome and greetings into our faces at incredibly high volumes.
I’m actually really surprised at how many people recognize us. I know we were here for a long time, but we can hardly go anywhere without someone squaling with joy at the sight of us. It is overwhelmingly welcoming.
Our trip to Kenya was incredible. The drive there took two days, after the bus stopped an hour preemptively in a different city than was the original destination. It was about 13 hours in a bus the first day and about 5 or 6 hours the next day. Nairobi is absolutely crazy--- it didn’t feel dangerous at all like the news makes it sound. People were reall friendly and left us alone more than any other place that we have been. Since the violence there calmed down about 6 months ago, it has been peaceful. I definitely had the wrong impression of the city when we arrived. The largest slum in Africa is just outside of the city, so I thought that there would be a lot of poverty and we would want to be really careful about walking around downtown, but it wasn’t like that at all. Some of the neighborhoods have a really Western feel and we did things like go to the mall to eat greasy pizza, perused the largest supermarket I have ever seen, and we even went to our first polo match with about 200 British people in one of the suburban areas (what a ridiculous, ridiculous sport).
After spending a day in Nairobi, we left to go on a 3-day safari in Masai Mara, the park that is the Kenyan side of the Serengeti plains. It was really amazing. We shared a safari VAN with a young French guy and a Japanese guy (who said, “oooooh greeeeaaat!” whenever we saw wildlife). Our driver was a maniac- cruising the Serengeti plains after ostriches and lions and cheetahs. It was really fun- and fun to meet all the other people (they were all really young) who had made it out to the bush for budget safaris.
The highlights of the trip to Kenya for me, though, were our trips to the elephant orphanage and giraffe sanctuary just outside of Nairobi. At the elephant orphanage, there were at least a dozen very young, very uncoordinated orphan elephants rolling around playing that you could watch and touch, and two rhinos hanging out that you could touch. Warthogs just wandered around everywhere and young schoolchildren came to see the animals. It was really cool. And on our walk out the founder of the orphanage picked us up and gave us a ride.
The elephant orphanage was cool, but the giraffe sanctuary was a transformational moment for me. I finally discovered my favorite animal. Giraffes. I think it might have to do with the fact that my long neck and legs make me feel a deep connection with them, but I definitely think that giraffes are the coolest animal I have ever seen. At the sanctuary, they gave you food pellets of grass and you could feed the giraffes. Their long, slimy, spotted, gray tongues would smother your face if you held the food in your mouth, and they would just eat right from your hands or wherever. So cool.
The trip back was terrifying. I have traveled the same route on another occasion- and on that occasion it took us 10 hours to go from Dar to Arusha, and it takes about 5 hours to go from Arusha to Nairobi. So when they told us it was only 12 hours on the bus from Nairobi to Dar VIA Arusha, I was skeptical and thought that that was just their way of trying to sell us tickets. Wow, was I wrong. After sitting on the bus, listening to Tracy Chapman’s song “Revolution” as the bus left at 6 in the morning, we arrived in Dar Es Salaam 12 hours later. The driver was a complete maniac. He had anywhere from 0-1 hands on the streering wheel at any time, and the other hand was gesticulating wildly to his frien in the front seat. Rather than waiting in line at the weigh stations, he would zoom past the line, throw the bus in reverse and reverse backwards to the front of the line. If traffic stopped, he would get out of the bus to give the other drivers a piece of his mind. I covered my face for at least the last 2 hours of the drive, when we were averaging at least 130 km/h and never hesitated to pass cars despite oncoming traffic. When the driver left about half the bus along the Tanzania-Kenya border, he slammed the bus into reverse and at full speed, backwards, we recrossed the border to retrieve the passengers. The choices of entertainment were interesting as well- at 6 in the morning, we were listening to the all 80s all-the-time station, by the afternoon we watched two movies called Sweet Love I and Sweet Love II. And at the scariest part of the trip, when the driver really went crazy, we watched one of the most violent movies I have ever seen called “Blood Diamond”, about the diamond trade in Sierra Leone (Good movie, bad time for it). We made it safely to Dar Es Salaam, though, and the next morning took the ferry to Zanzibar and feel like we’re back at home again.
Chris leaves tomorrow and I leave 3 days later. I can’t believe we’re almost on our way home! I can’t wait to see you all.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Kenya!
After quite the journey we made it to Kenya AND to the Serengeti plains where we saw, among other things, a Cheetah eating a gazelle and a black rhino (this morning). I don't have time to write now, I just wanted to let everyone know that all is well. No need to send any more worried emails, though I kind of enjoy knowing that people notice if I'm MIA. :)
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
What do you mean they released the prisoners??
At one point while staying in Iringa, Chris and I came to the realization that we didn’t really have any friends. We definitely didn’t really see this as a problem, or even a negative thing, because we thoroughly enjoy each other’s company and we spent four months on Zanzibar unable to escape acquaintances. Over the past several days, however, we have realized that we do know quite a lot of people here in Iringa, and that perhaps we know too many people. It has really been kind of a snowball effect of beginning to know too many people throughout East Africa, starting with too many people in Stone Town, then too many in Zanzibar, then the whole archipelago, then along the coast, all the way to Arusha (near the Kenya border), Iringa, and now even when we travelled to Malawi we inevitably ran into people that we knew. When we are walking down the street, people frequently stop us, ask us if we remember them (95% of the time we don’t), and then quiz us on where we first met them. Chris especially is very unique looking—a black, dreadlocked, but still clearly westerner rather than rastafarian, man. Just two days ago, someone recognized Chris from our stay on Pemba Island about 3 months ago and approached us- he remembered his name, where they met, etc.... Chris had absolutely no memory of ever meeting him. As we were sitting in a bar in Malawi, a group of 3 British people walked in that had been sitting next to us in a restaurant across the street from our office in Iringa ealier that week. Our safari driver from our trip to Saadani National Park in March recognized us on the bus from Dar Es Salaam to Iringa (at least an 8 hour journey and 2 months later).... and as we crossed on foot into Malawi we were greeted, by name, by several men who claimed to be our friends. I get mysterious phone calls and text messages all the time, usually with odd requests such as dating proposals or asking for money, but I have no idea who sent them or how they got my number. It’s true that in a culture that you’re not used to people kind of look the same—people tell me all the time that I look like every other white woman—but I never expected to have absolutely no memory of meeting people who clearly cherished our 5 minute conversation enough to remember it 4 or even 5 months later. Crazy.
Today as we were walking down the street we were recognized by someone I did remember. “Midget” (nickname), a young British girl who helped us close down the Wildlife Conservation Society campsite about 2 weeks ago screamed “Mr. JIGGY!!!!!!” (a nickname that she gave to Chris) from a passing land rover. When we caught up with the car, she told us (among many other things) that some of the friends that we had made a few weeks earlier were robbed in their home. Apparently a crew of men, armed with AK-47s and pistols, came to their house, held their security guards and entire family at gunpoint while they stole all their money, computers and phones. Luckily no one was seriously injured. The father of the household was off on a backpacking trip with our other two housemates (they run a campsite and do trips like that- he’s basically a guide), so these guys who apparently knew the family came and stole all of their valuables. Unbelievable.....
While this was shocking to us, it came in a serious of really scary news stories. A couple nights ago, Chris and I decided to accompany a German girl that Chris met to a birthday party. When we told them we were going to walk home, a bunch of people at the party started freaking out and telling us that we couldn’t leave. Our house was very close (definitely less than ¼ mile), it wasn’t particularly late, and Iringa is usually very safe, so you can imagine how surprised we were by this seemingly irrational reaction of paranoia. That’s when they told us that “they” had “recently released the prisoners”. This statement confused us, mostly because there seemed to be no way a bunch prisoners would just be “released” without any sort of reason. So we started asking questions... What do you mean they released the prisoners? Why did they release the prisoners? Where did they release the prisoners? How many prisoners did they reslease? Logistical questions, like true Americans... As it turns out, the prison just decided that they didn’t want to have so many prisoners, so they decided to release a bunch. ???? There have been several rapes and murders since their decision, and now this robbery.... This place is absolutely ridiculous sometimes. Needless to say, we are being extra careful when going out, now that we know of the dangers of the released prisoners and the large guns that some of them have come to possess.
Other than the news of the released prisoners, the birthday party that we attended was really fun, though not at all what we expected. We left our house, hearing very loud music in the distance. I made a joke about how that was probably the birthday party, but we laughed it off. As we got closer and closer to the party, though, the music got louder and louder. It wasn’t until we were in the driveway that we realized that this bumpin’ dance party was, in fact, the birthday party where we had been told there “wasn’t much going on”. We sat around a bonfire, listened to very hilarious choices of mostly American music, and finally made a lot of young friends in Iringa! As the party was coming to a close before everyone migrated to the nearby disco, someone made a request that we stand in a circle, hold hands, and give speeches. The circle started off with a short rendition of “Oh, Happy Day”, and quickly progressed to speeches about how this party had reminded people of being boyscouts out in the mountains of the Kilimanjaro area, and how people were finishing college and would miss this place so much. As much as the circle and the circumstance made me laugh, it was actually really sweet. I was very impressed that Chris held it together, as I would have expected him to burst into fits of laughter at how awkward we felt.
My favorite moments at the party, however, were interacting with individuals. Other than the girl who had invited us (Sophia- from Germany who is volunteering for a year at an orphanage here), the first person that we met at the party’s name was Miriam, a self-proclaimed Shakira look-alike. Now, I am not an expert on celebrity impersonators, but I am a Shakira fan, and while this woman (who was a black Nigerian woman) did look vaguely hispanic, she looked absolutely nothing like Shakira. We agreed to friend her on facebook, and were told that she would be the one with the Shakira picture instead of her face. We later met a middle-aged Swedish man, who seemed just a bit too old for the whole scene, and wouldn’t stop making suggestive comments directed at every woman. He introduced himself by staring me down, accusing me of stealing his Konyagi (the cheapest liquor in Tanzania that you purchase in packets for like 50 cents), and then saying, “Hi, I don’t think we’ve met, my name is Marcus....” There was a drunken brawl going on outside the entire time we were there, with fists flying and people stumbling through the bonfire. And there was a mute man attempting to communicate his anger at the fact that he had drunkenly misplaced his shoes.
I’m not sure why there has been such a culmination of mute men entering our lives here lately, but it has definitely been a recent trend. It completely freaks Chris out, which makes the whole interaction seem just hilariously unfortunate to me.... The man at the birthday party was around our age, unable to communicate with words, but was able to understand us and communicate with other sounds. He would let out very aggressive bellowing sounds, while at the same time thrusting his upper body in your direction. My chosen form of communication with him was the thumbs up, for which we definitely had a mutual understanding. At one point, the man approached me, let out a howl-like sound and pointed at his bare feet. The shoes that he had just been wearing seemed to have vanished in the brawl he had been a part of. I looked at him, gave him the thumbs down, and he returned a thumbs down, and belted out a sound. The foot-pointing and bellowing continued on and off for at least the next half an hour, but I expect he eventually just got on with the evening. This event was preceded by an encounter with a mute man on the Malawi-Tanzania border who made loud, violent, heaving sounds as a way to encourage us to hire him as the driver of a bicycle taxi. We were already surrounded by at least 10 men trying to get us to hire their bicycle taxis or change currency, and then this man approached and started bellowing at us and making angry faces and sounds.... I have never seen Chris so eager to escape a situation. And on my walk to work I met another man who couldn’t really speak. I just had no idea that so many encounters could be possible in the time span of one week...
Well, I am shocked that it is July, that I am coming home in about 2-3 weeks, and that our time here is over in 2 days!!! (We are leaving on Friday for Kenya) It’s strange because I’m so excited to come home and see everyone, eat summer sweet corn, swim in the lake, see the fall colors, go back to OBERLIN!, and to hear all about how everyone has spent the last 6 months, but I am also so sad to have only two more days here... And the trips to Kenya, Zanzibar, and New York City in between those two things are just entirely overwhelming to me. Well, it feels like time is speeding up, so I guess I’ll just wait and see what happens. Maybe it will make the 4 plane rides seem faster, too. I love and miss you all. See you SO soon.
Today as we were walking down the street we were recognized by someone I did remember. “Midget” (nickname), a young British girl who helped us close down the Wildlife Conservation Society campsite about 2 weeks ago screamed “Mr. JIGGY!!!!!!” (a nickname that she gave to Chris) from a passing land rover. When we caught up with the car, she told us (among many other things) that some of the friends that we had made a few weeks earlier were robbed in their home. Apparently a crew of men, armed with AK-47s and pistols, came to their house, held their security guards and entire family at gunpoint while they stole all their money, computers and phones. Luckily no one was seriously injured. The father of the household was off on a backpacking trip with our other two housemates (they run a campsite and do trips like that- he’s basically a guide), so these guys who apparently knew the family came and stole all of their valuables. Unbelievable.....
While this was shocking to us, it came in a serious of really scary news stories. A couple nights ago, Chris and I decided to accompany a German girl that Chris met to a birthday party. When we told them we were going to walk home, a bunch of people at the party started freaking out and telling us that we couldn’t leave. Our house was very close (definitely less than ¼ mile), it wasn’t particularly late, and Iringa is usually very safe, so you can imagine how surprised we were by this seemingly irrational reaction of paranoia. That’s when they told us that “they” had “recently released the prisoners”. This statement confused us, mostly because there seemed to be no way a bunch prisoners would just be “released” without any sort of reason. So we started asking questions... What do you mean they released the prisoners? Why did they release the prisoners? Where did they release the prisoners? How many prisoners did they reslease? Logistical questions, like true Americans... As it turns out, the prison just decided that they didn’t want to have so many prisoners, so they decided to release a bunch. ???? There have been several rapes and murders since their decision, and now this robbery.... This place is absolutely ridiculous sometimes. Needless to say, we are being extra careful when going out, now that we know of the dangers of the released prisoners and the large guns that some of them have come to possess.
Other than the news of the released prisoners, the birthday party that we attended was really fun, though not at all what we expected. We left our house, hearing very loud music in the distance. I made a joke about how that was probably the birthday party, but we laughed it off. As we got closer and closer to the party, though, the music got louder and louder. It wasn’t until we were in the driveway that we realized that this bumpin’ dance party was, in fact, the birthday party where we had been told there “wasn’t much going on”. We sat around a bonfire, listened to very hilarious choices of mostly American music, and finally made a lot of young friends in Iringa! As the party was coming to a close before everyone migrated to the nearby disco, someone made a request that we stand in a circle, hold hands, and give speeches. The circle started off with a short rendition of “Oh, Happy Day”, and quickly progressed to speeches about how this party had reminded people of being boyscouts out in the mountains of the Kilimanjaro area, and how people were finishing college and would miss this place so much. As much as the circle and the circumstance made me laugh, it was actually really sweet. I was very impressed that Chris held it together, as I would have expected him to burst into fits of laughter at how awkward we felt.
My favorite moments at the party, however, were interacting with individuals. Other than the girl who had invited us (Sophia- from Germany who is volunteering for a year at an orphanage here), the first person that we met at the party’s name was Miriam, a self-proclaimed Shakira look-alike. Now, I am not an expert on celebrity impersonators, but I am a Shakira fan, and while this woman (who was a black Nigerian woman) did look vaguely hispanic, she looked absolutely nothing like Shakira. We agreed to friend her on facebook, and were told that she would be the one with the Shakira picture instead of her face. We later met a middle-aged Swedish man, who seemed just a bit too old for the whole scene, and wouldn’t stop making suggestive comments directed at every woman. He introduced himself by staring me down, accusing me of stealing his Konyagi (the cheapest liquor in Tanzania that you purchase in packets for like 50 cents), and then saying, “Hi, I don’t think we’ve met, my name is Marcus....” There was a drunken brawl going on outside the entire time we were there, with fists flying and people stumbling through the bonfire. And there was a mute man attempting to communicate his anger at the fact that he had drunkenly misplaced his shoes.
I’m not sure why there has been such a culmination of mute men entering our lives here lately, but it has definitely been a recent trend. It completely freaks Chris out, which makes the whole interaction seem just hilariously unfortunate to me.... The man at the birthday party was around our age, unable to communicate with words, but was able to understand us and communicate with other sounds. He would let out very aggressive bellowing sounds, while at the same time thrusting his upper body in your direction. My chosen form of communication with him was the thumbs up, for which we definitely had a mutual understanding. At one point, the man approached me, let out a howl-like sound and pointed at his bare feet. The shoes that he had just been wearing seemed to have vanished in the brawl he had been a part of. I looked at him, gave him the thumbs down, and he returned a thumbs down, and belted out a sound. The foot-pointing and bellowing continued on and off for at least the next half an hour, but I expect he eventually just got on with the evening. This event was preceded by an encounter with a mute man on the Malawi-Tanzania border who made loud, violent, heaving sounds as a way to encourage us to hire him as the driver of a bicycle taxi. We were already surrounded by at least 10 men trying to get us to hire their bicycle taxis or change currency, and then this man approached and started bellowing at us and making angry faces and sounds.... I have never seen Chris so eager to escape a situation. And on my walk to work I met another man who couldn’t really speak. I just had no idea that so many encounters could be possible in the time span of one week...
Well, I am shocked that it is July, that I am coming home in about 2-3 weeks, and that our time here is over in 2 days!!! (We are leaving on Friday for Kenya) It’s strange because I’m so excited to come home and see everyone, eat summer sweet corn, swim in the lake, see the fall colors, go back to OBERLIN!, and to hear all about how everyone has spent the last 6 months, but I am also so sad to have only two more days here... And the trips to Kenya, Zanzibar, and New York City in between those two things are just entirely overwhelming to me. Well, it feels like time is speeding up, so I guess I’ll just wait and see what happens. Maybe it will make the 4 plane rides seem faster, too. I love and miss you all. See you SO soon.
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