Hi all! This will be a short post, hopefully more info and pictures later... This week was our fall break at school so I've been doing lots of traveling. Last weekend was Songeafest, an annual party thrown by volunteers near Songea town. Katie and I took a notoriously shitty but always interesting road west from Masasi through Tunduru and on to Songea. It was a two day bus ride with an overnight in Tunduru, and not at all fun, but now we can join the proud few PCVs who have made the trek. The first day was just your typical shitty bus ride on a shitty unpaved road, nothing we aren't used to. I guess we got a little too cocky though because the second day was by far the most uncomfortable ride I've been on in Tanzania thus far. The two bigger buses were already filled up so we ended up squished into the back row of a daladala, the normal Tanzanian transport that looks like a van but is stuffed with like 40 people. I've been on plenty of daladala rides before, but they normally last for less than 30 minutes to take you across a big town like Morogoro. This one lasted a torturous 7 hours, through a windy and hilly game reserve on the bumpiest dirt road I've ever been on. But we arrived safely and relatively on time, and were the first PCVs I've ever heard of whose bus(es) didn't break down for hours along the way so I'd say we were pretty lucky (a friend that took the road during this last rainy season spent a whopping 21 hours on the second half of the journey). And the party was fun, complete with a volunteer talent show, sports competitions, and a few dance parties. The next day I traveled with several other volunteers up north to Tukuyu, a town very close to Mbeya town. We stayed the night with a PCV living there and the next morning headed out to Matema Beach on Lake Nyasa (Lake Malawi). We spent a wonderful two days enjoying the gravel beach and freshwater lake, surrounded by a beautiful mountain view, and enjoyed our nights making beach bonfires. Yesterday we headed back up to Mbeya town (where I spent "shadow week" during training, if you remember), where I am now. Unfortunately I spent the night battling bouts of diarrhea (for only the second time since arriving in TZ but unfortunately once again during a vacation). I've spent the day inside near the toilet but have managed to get in a few good naps. I couldn't resist forcing down homemade banana bread and cinnamon rolls for brunch and am going to attempt going into town this evening for dinner, but more specifically to eat a famed creamy avocado burger which I had the pleasure tasting during shadow week and is easily the best burger I've eaten thus far in Tanzania. Tomorrow Katie and I will take an all day bus back to Dar (not doing the Tunduru path again), spend the night, and hop on another all day bus bright and early to head back down south. We'll stop in Ndanda for the evening for a little goodbye get-together for the Mtwara/Lindi education volunteers down here who will be COSing in the next month. Then finally back to my village on Sunday to prepare for teaching Monday!
As far as school is going, we've got just one week before our Form IVs take their big national exam so it will be a crazy next few weeks. The full week before I left for break, our Form IIs and IVs also took mock national exams so it feels like its been mostly testing and invigilating (proctoring) for me and the students, but things should settle down for about a month between Form IV exams and Form II exams in early November and I will hopefully be able to get some more teaching in. Despite writing all my midterms, my school ended up officially canceling midterms for Forms I and III last week because there were only two of us to invigilate all the exams which just wasn't possible. Although it will be nice not to have to grade lots of midterms when I go home, I'll probably spend the next week testing them during classtime because I'm a fun teacher like that. It feels like this term has flown by and will just continue to do so until we end in early December. And then, if you haven't heard the news, I'll be traveling home to Austin for the holidays - December 13 to January 4!!! Can't wait to see lots of wonderful family and friends!
Speaking of home, yesterday marked my one year anniversary leaving Austin (headed to Philadelphia for "staging") and Saturday will be one whole year in Tanzania. Can't believe it has gone by so fast, and I hope the next year is filled with as much fun, excitement, good friends, good travel, and of course satisfaction teaching my students!
