November 8

Last week two other Peace Corps Volunteers, Matt and Jerusha, came to Ndanda to some of their kids swim lessons. Somehow new experiences like swimming and what not are tied up into HIV/AIDS education, but to me the links are pretty tenuous; anyway few of the children had been submerged in water before. I had told Matt to make them put their faces in buckets before they came, hoping to weed some of the less serious ones out, but they all easily passed that test.
Matt and Jerusha are both a bit older than me. Matt lives about 24 km away from Ndanda and is certainly the volunteer who I see the most often; the weekend before swimming lessons I visited him in his village, and returned home on his bicycle while giving his Tanzanian friend a lifti. There is no electricity in his village, but he bought a solar panel in Dar es Salaam and now has enough to power an ipod speaker and to give a small bit of light at night. He also charges his student’s cell phones and puts the proceeds into this health club.
The trip to Jerusha’s house involves a three-hour bus ride followed by another hour over paved roads; I haven’t seen her since my first week in the South. She had taken a different bus to Matt’s village, then the two of them led their nine children down the plateau to Ndanda; I met them at the swimming pool at about ten o’clock.
I run up to this pool almost every day. The monks dug it out to provide hydroelectric power for the Abbey and now guard it incessantly, keeping it clean and bilharzias-free. Google Ndanda Abbey, Tanzania and you can see a picture of it during the rainy season, when it is muddy and disgusting; I’ll also post some more pictures soon. It’s about 70m long and 25m wide, and people can stand only at the very edges; it is a lifeguard’s nightmare because of the deep bottom, steep edges and cloudy water. When I arrived a German friend, Adrian, had arrived along with a Tanzanian named Seafood (no joke) who he had met in Mtwara. Seafood had apparently met Jerusha at some bar there as well.
Swim lessons went like all swim lessons do, except I had to try to explain everything in Kiswahili. Matt and Jerusha did what I told them to. Seafood interrupted if my Kiswahili was breaking down, or if he thought he knew better than me. Adrian took pictures. Afterwards everyone walked back to my house, and we crashed while the kids wandered around Ndanda. The three “adults” spent about three hours cooking chili and rice while their students cleaned themselves.
Many of them had never used a real bathroom before, so I can’t be too angry; nevertheless, when they were finished washing, dirt covered the bathroom and the toilet was broken. Someone had opened up my contact case and dumped the contents on the floor. Worst of all they had used all of my shampoo and most of my deodorant. Everyone else was watching a movie, and I came out of the bathroom and threw the shampoo bottle against the wall, “Noone can use the bathroom! If you have to help yourself, go outside! Noone can use the bathroom!” Matt suggested smelling the kids to see who used up the shampoo, but then we realized they were all guilty; each child smelled like shampoo and fear. Jerusha told them they wouldn’t be welcome anywhere else if they acted this way. Matt turned off the movie – the power was off anyway – and everyone went to sleep.
The next day everyone left early. Matt remained and offered me some of his shampoo, but then remembered that the kids who stayed at his house smelled really nice too. Neither of us had ever been on the other side of that sort of situation before.
Seafood, no child, took all of Adrian’s shampoo also.