Day 19

Unfortunately I have not had time to update my blog this week (the Arusha National Park picture notwithstanding), so I'll try to recount the week:

This was the last full week we spent with our host family. After class on Monday, we went to a great nyama choma (barbeque) place near our house. Unfortunately it took quite some time to order our food, so we returned to the house fairly late in the evening. I needed to get a little bit of studying done since that day we also learned that we had a midterm on Thursday (yesterday).

On Tuesday, our host dad took Hugh, myself and my two host brothers to Arusha National Park. It is actually very close to Arusha and TCDC but loses some name recognition with Ngorongoro, Oldupai and the Serengeti also close. I actually enjoyed the park quite a bit - perhaps not as much as Ngorongoro, but it was still great to visit. He picked us up right after lunch (we were allowed to leave early from TCDC) and we traveled about 20 minutes to the park. Luckily there weren't that many people visiting. We managed to see a LOT of giraffes (probably 8-10), including several that were extremely close to our car. We drove for a while, saw some more zebras, wildebeest, etc. and then parked next to a small lake to have lunch. We sat there for quite some time, which was very enjoyable. Mt. Kilimanjaro suddenly appeared in the distance above the lake (see the picture), which was an incredible sight! Of course the pictures don't do it justice. When we left the lake we saw a hippo get out of the water, which was a great sight since we didn't have a good hippo sighting while in Ngorongoro. We returned around dusk.

Wednesday's class sessions were interesting (as they always are). During the afternoon session - which is about 2 hours long - our instructors informed us we were going to have a 1-on-1 conversation with a TCDC employee about the conservation policies in Tanzanian. It was extremely daunting, especially since we weren't given any guiding questions and we were entirely alone with native speakers, but I actually managed to fill the 2 hours with fairly substantive conversation. Wednesday night was spent studying for another (ridiculously impossible) test.

Thursday was a little rough, as it was test day. Naturally everyone left the test feeling dejected. I went straight into Arusha with Hugh after lunch and spent a lot of time trying to exchange my travellers cheques. I managed to exchange my money and we returned for our last evening (at least for a while) with our host family.

I went into Arusha again today. It's nice being able to know my way (more or less) around the city now. A small group of us had to run some errands before leaving tomorrow morning for Dar es Salaam and Zanzibar. I am very excited about the trip. We will be gone for one week, spending about 3 days in Dar es Salaam and 3 days in Zanzibar. One day will be spent in Bagamoyo, which is north of Dar, but is rich in history. It's most widely known for its importance as a slave trading port (Arabian slave trade, not American) and also where the first European settlers in the region became established. We're visiting several museums in Dar (population 2.5 million) and touring the island of Zanzibar (Stone Town and other regions). I'm unsure of how much computer access I will have during the trip. Our hotel in Dar is extremely nice so hopefully I can find something.

If not, until next week!