Nane Nane

Yesterday was Nane Nane (eight eight- as in the eighth day of the eighth month), the agricultural holiday in Tanzania. We went into town around 2:30 pm and headed to the fair grounds after a short stop at the local craft market.

The fairgrounds are HUGE, and admission was 1,000 Tanzanian shillings, which is equivalent to about $0.80 US. I am so glad we got to experience this because I feel like we really got a taste for an African fair. We went to the fairgrounds on Thursday this week mostly to just check it out- as the holiday runs for about a week and there were a lot less people there and we were able to talk to many organizations that had booths set up. We learned much about local cook stoves, cashew harvesting, the national parks, drip irrigation and some about the water supply in Arusha.

On Saturday, there were so many people there and it was super dusty from everyone walking around. It was much crazier than earlier in the week. There was a traffic jam about 1.5 miles away from the fair grounds so it took us awhile to get there- but totally worth it! We walked around and were attracted to a stage that had performers dancing and singing. Then they started to advertise condoms. Of course Patty, Bryna and I had no idea what was going on, it had to be translated by Damson. Apparently this kind of thing is common at fairs in Africa. It was pretty entertaining.

We left the fair grounds around 6 pm. We made our way to an expensive little coffee shop to get something to drink. After we had our lemon and mint juice (yummy) we witnessed thieves running down the road. People were shouting 'mwizi' (thief) and a huge crowd was chasing after these men. It was quite a sight, and there was more than one mwizi running down the road. Apparently Nane Nane is a huge time for thieves to make a killing. Don't worry- all of us are safe and still have all of our belongings.

The pictures in the previous post are:
One of the sand filters I have created in a water bottle to show the students how water can become cleaner just by filtering through the earth. I think it will be more entertaining to show this little experiment to the Biology teacher here at Peace House. He didn't believe me when I told him that water is naturally filtered by seeping through the many layers of the earth.

The other pictures are of some of the Form 1 girls here at the school. I was hanging out with them on Friday afternoon while we were watching the boys soccer team beat a team from the other side of town. They were pretty hilarious, and one of them loved touching my "soft" hair. I told them I need a hair cut, but they told me that I needed to grow it out longer to be beautiful. I think that most of them are still bitter about having to have short hair here, per school rules. One of my new friends also informed me that I had let the sun ruin my nose- apparently my freckles are noticeable.

Good news: Harry Potter 6 is coming to the Arusha cinema next week and everyone in our group is pshyced! We have been busy catching up on all the previous Harrry Potter movies from a ridiculous copy we bought on the street.

Only 2 weeks left in Tanzania!