A time in Africa

Erick and I were in the Peace Corps in Tanzania, East Africa from 1989 until 1991. We met there since we both worked with inland fisheries. He was stationed in the southern part of the country while I was in the central part up in the mountians.

I lived in a village named Kidete. I have a brick house with cement floors surrounded by mud houses with thatched roofs. The village was about 40 miles from the main road (the only paved road that ran down the center of the country at the time) and I had my trusty (albeit haunted) motorcycle to help me get around.

I was digging through old photo albums in search of some pictures from high school, and ended up flipping through my Peace Corps albums. All I can say - I was young, skinny, and my hair was that color naturally. Funny how things change!

Anyway, here are some pictures.

The view out of my back door:


I had this huge two-sided fireplace in the main room. I used to burn half a tree at one time, and it would stay burning for a week. It may have been Africa, but it was bloody freezing half the time. That's my cat, Kichaa with the fox ears:



This house and 'duka' (little store) was across the street from my house. I'm pretty sure it was deserted most of the time, and no one could tell me who had lived there:
This is Nema. She was the niece of my assistant. She hung out a lot and LOVED popcorn:

This was my outhouse. Nice, ain't it? Actually, half the village used it. Wondering what the eye is? Apparantly the PC volunteer before me had her dog poisoned (villagers didn't like dogs - they were afraid of them) and had witch doctor come and put some hexes on her house to ward off bad guys:

Couldn't find a picture of the front of the house, but this is the back side of my house:

Kichaa enjoyed the motorcycle almost as much as I did:

One day the kid from next door, Sofia, just fell asleep on my couch with the cat. I couldn't possibly finish the paperwork that was on the couch, so I'm pretty sure I took a nap, too:

This man was my best fish farmer, Matekeleza Chang'a. What a sweet, funny guy he was. He called me "Salah, oh Salah" 'cause he thought it was funny. I once took one of his little boys on a ride on my motorcycle and for the rest of the time I was there the kid would come right up to me and hold my hand when I came to visit:

At the one Christmas we were there, the whole group of PC volunteers (must have been 25 of us) met up at one of our houses and ate guacamole for a week. She had an avacado tree in her yard:

While we were slaving over hot guacamole, the boys were drumming and swinging. Erick is the cute young guy on the left. This was where we, well, started 'going out', as high school as it sounds now...

We were evacuated because of the first Gulf War and had one day to get rid of all of our stuff. So, I had a "come get anything you can carry home with you" sale. My assistant's sister (Nema's mom), his wife and my sweet little Gresse who liked me to read to her, came and went home with the couch cushions.

A group shot of my neighbors:

On a visit to Erick's house after Christmas, I met his favorite kid. I'm not sure who has the goofier grin!:

Looking at these pictures, we sure were young. All of the people I knew there struggled so hard for even the simplest pleasures. Although they had hard lives and dealt with hardships people in our country cannot even imagine, they were dedicated, grounded and friendly. I wish I had been a bit older, more ready for the experience, more ready to open myself to the change.

When I get wound up in all the silly things in my life, I try to remind myself about that little girl with the dirty dress and feet who felt safe enough with me to take a nap on my couch. I wonder how she is doing.