Monday, October 13, 2008

Tanzania


Dave got home this morning. He was tired but had so much to tell me. Communicating with him while he was in Tanzania was nearly impossible so we really hadn't talked at all while he was there.

Dave in Tanzania Fun Facts
1. The first night he was there the other archivists took him to the most expensive restaurant in Arusha. He spent $16.
2. People drive on the left side of the road.
3. Theft is a pretty big problem in Arusha. There was an armed guard at the ATM.
4. Tanzania is so close to the equator that each day was exactly 12 hours of daylight.
5. Arusha, the city he was in, is at such high altitude that the temperature was about the same as New York (60's and 70's).
6. Arusha is at the base of Mount Kilimanjaro.
7. The customs people asked him to pay $100 for his visa into the country. But once Dave explained that he was working to archive the Rwanda Tribunals they did not charge him.
8. He did not go on a safari! He could have seen elephants and lions and whatnot and decided to check out the surrounding towns instead. What's with that?
9. He called me last night on an airplane phone while he was flying over the Sudan. It was like a conversation you have IMing with two stands of dialog because of the delay. I would say "so you get in at 10 tomorrow?" and then I would hear "so how is Andrew?" and I would say, "He's been okay." and then I would hear, "Yeah, 10:30."
10. He came back very, very dusty. When he showered it smelled really strongly of dust. But, he's clean now!




This is a market where he bought me very cool fabrics and some pottery and pieces of carved wood.


Apparently you buy the fabric and then bring it to these women that set up right at the market to make your clothes for you.



This is another market.


So, so beautiful. There seems to be a lot more sky in Tanzania.

5 comments:

Kirsten said...

Welcome back everyone! Love the pictures of Tanzania.

Marti said...

So, so excited to see these pictures Dave took. Any stories about the tribunals?

Anne said...

I love the smell of dust.

And I agree about the big sky. What happened to ours?

Mama V said...

Welcome home, Dave! Looking forward to hearing more stories sometime...

Melissa Belmonte said...

I know exactly what you are talking about with the delayed phone conversations...reminds me of when Chris was in Israel. But, the sad thing is, when I read that, I thought, "Oh yea- that's what's our conversations are like, too!", not realizing at first that you were talking about a phone conversation. Our dinner conversations are so scattered with everything going on and w/ us being so tired, that we have so many lingering and interrupted topics!

Welcome back, Dave.