Jambo. first, i apologize if i repeat stories, i do not go back and read what i posted the time before. AND i want this to be as honest as i can be, if you havent noticed.... so forgive me if i offend or disgust. the title does say poop though....
we spent the past weekend on safari, hitting up lake manyara, the ngorongoro crater, and the sarangeti. unfortunately i took sick thursday night and had tummy troubs all night. I popped some immodium friday morning, praying i would be okay for the jeep ride, only to develop a fever in the car that wouldnt break with advil and tylenol combined. awesome. luckily my tummy troubs held off in the car and my fever broke for about an hour at the peak of our time in Manyara. To see the animals, even feeling like crap, was amazing. I took lots of pictures but i dont even think it does it justice. we saw baboons all over the road and climbing on cars, elephants, giraffe, lions - and cubs!- warthogs, tonnnns of zebra, impala, one rhino, hyena, wildabeast, and crazy birds. Think the lion king, we saw it. AND in the sarangeti we saw pride rock, which the lion king pride rock is based off of. so cool. we camped the first night outside of the park, where i felt like i was dying. I threw up in the middle of the night and made many a trip to the loo- was glad to see a western style toilet for that experience. the next night we camped in the middle of the sarangeti, with signs everywhere saying dont feed the animals that happen to come on to the site. so neat. the last night we camped on the edge of the ngorongoro crater, it was soooo dang cold but beautiful. you look down on a circle of grasslands that are in a ring of mountains. that night as we cuddled into our sleeping bags- i was wearing two skirts over my jeans, two tshirts, a long sleeve and a fleece, an airplane blanket and then my sleeping bag- the field next to our tents was fulllll of zebra. at least 50. saturday night our driver gave me some crazy tanzania medicine to take bc I still had the runs. Luckily, a brittish pharmacist had joined our safari, so i ran everything i took by him and he helped me manage my meds. Oh to see the places where I had to go poop- if you can even call it poop. many times it was just between two rocks. haha. what an experience. I began to feel better sunday night and actually got to enjoy the good food. over all, it was a freaking amazing experience to see the animals and just the environment. it really felt and still feels surreal when i look at my pictures. wow, i am blessed to have that opportunity!
We arrived back home Monday evening, and it was nice to be home- and warm- again. sadly, i got sick again Monday night... allllllll night. tuesday morning i took my cipro, hoping to finally kill whatever was causing it. I stayed home from the orphanage yesterday and just slept. I felt better, i think cipro is a wonder drug! we found out last night that the boy who got sick with the same thing i had was in hospital last night- bacterial infection. i suppose my body fought it off better, he was throwing up more than i was and his fever didn't break for two days. he is doing well now i think. I am feeling better now, still not 100%. but I am getting there. soon.
Now for the more interesting news. I am officially teaching only now. I will visit the orphanage a few times, for an hour here or there, but I am done there. Yesterday while i was home sick, an immigration officer came to the orphanage. because i wasnt there, i am still a little unclear as to what happened, but apparently they wanted us to show them our passports and since we didnt have them we were suppose to bring them back this morning. apparently they were checking that we had volunteer visas, which we didnt. after forever of heated voices, titus, our volunteer organization director, came to meet us and told us he had talked to the officers and worked out a deal to keep us from being fined 400 and had bribed them into giving us the new visas for $50 instead of $120. the girls were pissed and yelled at Titus about how we shouldnt have to pay. the whole thing was just bad. I had to keep telling them to stop interrupting him because he couldnt even tell us the soultion because they kept asking questions and just saying they wouldnt pay. it was incredibly frustrating. It worked out that we were to meet him today to get our new visas for $50.
one of the girls refused to work within Titus's bribe and wanted to do it herself and contact the embassy. Emma told me that all things in tanzania are bribes and you just go with the corruption. i was set to just pay the 50 and get the visa i need. instead, when we met titus, he told us to leave it for a few days and see what happens. as soon as we had settled that, two other girls working directly through the orphanage came out of the immigration offices with the new visas. because they went, we knew thy would be looking for the 3 americans that they had written down to come through. lindsay and i decided to opt out of the orphanage and teach, meaning we wont need another visa- yet atleast. Stacey and sharon gave titus their passports to get the new visa so they can stay at the orphanage, they dont want to teach. The orphanage has been targeted because they have volunteers directly through the place as well as through organizations. as well, the nannys told the officers we were there before we could tell them we are just passing through between safaris. in the future all should be well. although i was kinda looking forward to having to get another visa- and another stamp! haha. oh my passport, i adore it.
So things are good, kinda up in the air again, but good. I talked to anne briefly last week and she said i sounded kinda bummed. honestly, it was a big adjustement when i got here and i didnt expect it. I am still getting used to being around fairly negative volunteers. Often i want to just scream 'you are in Fing africa....' when the toilets arent good or there is only bread of breakfast, or we have to get another visa. i am really working on staying positive and trying to ignore all the negative comments, but its getting annoying. I am hoping to go see emma in a few weeks- alone, if i can swing a tactful way of saying i want to go alone- for some space and time to be with someone who loves tanzania and will not have negative things to say about not having toilet paper in the bathroom all the time and getting annoyed to have to ask for it when it runs out.
I am truly excited about teaching, the babys are adorable but holding babys all day could get old in two months. plus being with children i can interact with more, will be much more enjoyable. plus, i am thinking it will pump up my swahili. i have been kinda stagnant in my learning for a while. so that will be good.
there are minimal plans for zanzibar in two weeks, but i am not hopeful that they will come through. i have told the girls that i refuse to go if it is half ass planned and planned stressfully a few days before we go. so we shall see. there is still time. I will go alone if need be, there are plenty of travelers there.
all in all, i love it. im happy, and getting healthy.
xoxo
No comments:
Post a Comment