The dilemma at the house isn’t so much the lack of power, it’s the lack of power for extended periods of time. (see previous post for background info) 12 hours without power a day are manageable, problems arise when the power is out for longer than 12 or so hours. Last night it was 24 hours, which started to be a problem.
Why you ask? One main reason: water. Water gets into our house by pump. There are two water tanks on the top of the house that store water. As you may have guessed by now, the pumps need electricity. When the electricity is out it’s still possible to take a shower, but water pressure is based purely on gravity. So even though my hair is 12 inches shorter than the last time anyone saw me, it still took forever to get the shampoo out of my hair. (Think trickles of water coming out of the showerhead.) So am I really complaining about a little water pressure?
No, the real problem is what happens when the tanks no longer have water in them. (Obviously, they’re empty.) And with no electricity to refill the tanks, the bad water pressure seems pretty appealing. They think (key here is that no one really knows) that the tanks would normally last about two days, but we have twice the amount of people that normally stay in the house right now. So that means one day or so of water.
Enter the little generator that couldn’t. (I probably shouldn’t be making fun of it since we need it again tonight.) So last night there was a rather hysterical scene involving two generators, 4 guys, me (holding the flashlight), a cut-up water bottle (make-shift funnel), a few liters of petrol, and lots of electrical cords. The big generator didn’t work, so after a significant amount of spilled petrol, we tried the little generator. After lots of horrible noises, a few things flying out of it (I’m referring to bugs) and some great-smelling smoke, it turned on.
What does our little generator sound or look like? Take apart your lawnmower. That’s exactly what it is as far as I can tell. There just aren’t wheels or sharp blades. It sounds exactly like a lawnmower too- ridiculously loud and noisy.
So for too brief a time we had partial electricity in the house- fans only. And we supposedly filled the water tanks up, at least partially. Then the little generator that could became the little generator that couldn’t. (And no, it was not as simple as us running out of petrol.)
So the question is... what happens when I leave the office in a few minutes and head home. Will the bureaucrat in the office have ordered our transformer part in time for it to have arrived and been installed by today? I’m thinking… doubtful.
And more importantly, since we all took ‘showers’ this morning and the tank was only partially filled… well, add that idea to the no fans, and I’m sure we’re all going to smell great at work tomorrow.
25 January 2007
the transformer that couldn’t take it
As I may have mentioned previously, power is a bit of an issue here in Dar. Power for Tanzania is hydroelectric power- it comes from the dams that are upcountry. So when the dams are low (which they currently are) power can be a bit questionable. In the past two or so weeks we’ve had a couple of power outages, but nothing that lasted more than a few hours. So I other words, lately the power situation has been pretty great. When the power’s only out for a few hours, the fridge is okay and it’s just a minor annoyance for everything else.
So Tuesday night the power went out in our area, Upanga. And when it came back on, it decided to make sure that everyone knew it was back on, so it surged back on with a little too much power. And in its excitement, it blew the transformer for our half of the block and the block behind us. (Though we didn’t find this out until last night.) So at about 1-2 am Tuesday night (Weds morning) the power went out. Really out.
I, and everyone else in the house, slept beautifully from that point on with no fans. It’s really amazing how much a little thing like a fan can make or break the heat for you. But being tough, we all dealt with it for the rest of the night, took showers in the morning and headed to work.
After spending the day at the office with wonderful fans, we all returned home. It was a pretty funny picture, all of us upstairs sitting in the dark talking about what we were going to do for dinner and how long we thought the electricity would be off. Flashlights and candles are always an option, but just after dusk the mosquitoes are deadly, so sitting in the dark is a much better option. Then we found out from one of the guards that it was the transformer that blew. That was a happy moment.
Now, just having power off because the country doesn’t have enough electricity is one thing, but having something that needs to be fixed is a completely different timeframe for getting power again. Our problem requires a bureaucrat (who has power at his house) to send someone out to the problem to figure out what’s wrong with it (which apparently happened yesterday), to have that person have the right tools/part to fix the problem (which clearly didn’t happen yesterday), to then- and here’s the fun part- to then order the part or get the part from a supply office, to have that part/tool sent to the person who’s going to do the fixing, and to then have the person come out again and actually fix the problem. In other words, you don’t exactly measure ‘fixing time’ here in minutes.
So Tuesday night the power went out in our area, Upanga. And when it came back on, it decided to make sure that everyone knew it was back on, so it surged back on with a little too much power. And in its excitement, it blew the transformer for our half of the block and the block behind us. (Though we didn’t find this out until last night.) So at about 1-2 am Tuesday night (Weds morning) the power went out. Really out.
I, and everyone else in the house, slept beautifully from that point on with no fans. It’s really amazing how much a little thing like a fan can make or break the heat for you. But being tough, we all dealt with it for the rest of the night, took showers in the morning and headed to work.
After spending the day at the office with wonderful fans, we all returned home. It was a pretty funny picture, all of us upstairs sitting in the dark talking about what we were going to do for dinner and how long we thought the electricity would be off. Flashlights and candles are always an option, but just after dusk the mosquitoes are deadly, so sitting in the dark is a much better option. Then we found out from one of the guards that it was the transformer that blew. That was a happy moment.
Now, just having power off because the country doesn’t have enough electricity is one thing, but having something that needs to be fixed is a completely different timeframe for getting power again. Our problem requires a bureaucrat (who has power at his house) to send someone out to the problem to figure out what’s wrong with it (which apparently happened yesterday), to have that person have the right tools/part to fix the problem (which clearly didn’t happen yesterday), to then- and here’s the fun part- to then order the part or get the part from a supply office, to have that part/tool sent to the person who’s going to do the fixing, and to then have the person come out again and actually fix the problem. In other words, you don’t exactly measure ‘fixing time’ here in minutes.
23 January 2007
green leafy stuff
Normally expats here go out for lunch to one of the hotels or restaurants that cater to expats. Lunch usually runs $3-$10, depending on where you go. The fare is traditional European/American variety: sandwiches, salads, Italian, pizza, Indian, etc. (Alas, no Mexican!!!) So at about 12:30/1 there’s an exodus of cars from offices as all the expats leave to go to the same places. There’s even lunch-time traffic.
I decided to be brave today and eat lunch with our Tanzanian staff. It was a great idea in theory, but in reality I ended up eating the same food as them at my desk since I have a ton of work to do. We decided last night that our study starts recruiting women in less than two weeks so suddenly all the things on my ‘to do’ list actually have to be finished. (Preferably by yesterday.) Hence the eating lunch at my desk.
Lunch was a huge pile of rice, three pieces of meat, a small pile of green leafy stuff and a small pile of beans, all covered in a red meatish-tasting sauce. There was also an option for upagi, which is a cornmeal paste, basically a polenta. Those are the staple foods here: rice, upagi, beans and green leafy stuff. Tanzanians also eat tropical fruits. There are banana trees everywhere and since pineapples and mangos are in season now they really taste wonderful. Meat is too expensive for a normal Tanzanian to eat, but our staff are employed and better off than most.
The best part about it is that the food is brought to the house. A woman cooks it in the morning at her house, puts it in tubs that look like big paint cans, and then brings it to the office. (I’m sure the tubs are completely sanitary.) I have to say that was one of the best lunches I’ve had since I was here. I even ate the green stuff it was so good.
And the cost? 55 cents.
I decided to be brave today and eat lunch with our Tanzanian staff. It was a great idea in theory, but in reality I ended up eating the same food as them at my desk since I have a ton of work to do. We decided last night that our study starts recruiting women in less than two weeks so suddenly all the things on my ‘to do’ list actually have to be finished. (Preferably by yesterday.) Hence the eating lunch at my desk.
Lunch was a huge pile of rice, three pieces of meat, a small pile of green leafy stuff and a small pile of beans, all covered in a red meatish-tasting sauce. There was also an option for upagi, which is a cornmeal paste, basically a polenta. Those are the staple foods here: rice, upagi, beans and green leafy stuff. Tanzanians also eat tropical fruits. There are banana trees everywhere and since pineapples and mangos are in season now they really taste wonderful. Meat is too expensive for a normal Tanzanian to eat, but our staff are employed and better off than most.
The best part about it is that the food is brought to the house. A woman cooks it in the morning at her house, puts it in tubs that look like big paint cans, and then brings it to the office. (I’m sure the tubs are completely sanitary.) I have to say that was one of the best lunches I’ve had since I was here. I even ate the green stuff it was so good.
And the cost? 55 cents.
22 January 2007
Kipapeo
This gorgeous picture is of the beach were I spent Saturday. How can a day spent on a warm beach having someone bring you drinks and food not be an amazing day?
Dar is a large port- one of the two main ports for East Africa. (The other being Mombasa in Kenya.) At the mouth of the port/river/inlet is the ferry to the south of the city. As far as I can tell, the north and west of the city are much more developed than the south, but I could be completely wrong on that.
I could bore you with details of the ferry ride, but I won’t. Suffice it to say that it was the shortest boat ride I’ve ever been on and a bridge would be so much more logical. Though it was much better for my slowly darkening skin to stand in the sun. I love mid-day sun. It’s not hot at all.
Once we got off the ferry is when the fun started- we took a dala-dala down the road. (They’re the buses here.) To talk about dala dalas would take an entry in itself, and since I don’t have a picture of one, I’ll leave you with this imagine. Their footprint is about as big as a Suburban, but they look more like mini buses. And they have 4 1/2 rows of seats in them (3 1/2 facing forward, 1 backwards), plus the front seats. And they sit 4 across. So a good mental image to have right now is trying to fit 20 people in a suburban. Now add about 6 or 8 more, just for fun. And did I mention no air-conditioning?
So the beach... the beach was beautiful. It was a typical Dar day- hot, humid and lots of sun, so the beach was the perfect place to be. There are little ‘cabanas’ that are basically thatched A-frames open at the bottom that you get for the day. Right after you sit down a waiter comes and gets your drink order and makes sure that you always have cool drinks. And when you get hungry, he brings you a menu and then food appears. Granted, the quality of the food may not be 5-star since my chicken was essentially raw. Though a few beers helped kill whatever I ate, and the second version of chicken was more than cooked. But since you don’t go to the beach for the food, enough about that…
The water was warm and clear. So warm and so wonderful. It’s real ocean as it should be- no initial chill to the water when you climb in, so you can spend an eternity in the water. And real sand, not pebbles and not cold. Hot sand that you can barely walk on. In other words, a great beach.
There was also a camel for camel rides. I’m not quite sure about the significance of that- I think it was a tourist gimmick. But it was pretty cool. And since this is Africa, and there are always surprises, there were even cows being herded down the beach in the late afternoon.
So in the end, it was one of those days that just feels perfect.
And on a side note, Water was already named Gary by one of my roommates. And since he’s lived in the house longer and named Gary first, his name sticks. (We would hate to confuse Gary with two names.) So Gary’s still alive and well. And I’ve named the spider around my desk- who has an uncanny resemblance to Gary- Water Jr. or WJ for short.
18 January 2007
Kitchen, Water and Porch
Those are the names of my three new pets- I’ve named them after the rooms in which I usually find them. The first two are geckos. Water is the spider that lives on the water cooler. There aren’t enough names in the world to name the ants and mosquitoes in the house, though since I kill those as fast as I can, I don’t think that I should waste time naming them. I’m undecided on naming the cockroaches- the main hindrance is that I can’t really tell them apart, hence they have no names.
So yes, I’m guessing that you get the picture that I live with a lot of bugs. A LOT of bugs.
When I’ve talked about bugs in emails and chats, I love the fact that people have asked me why I don’t just close the windows or door. Thank you everyone for thinking I’m really that stupid. I’m not. (I swear I’m not.)
There are two things to consider when talking about my many-legged roommates.
1- Homes here aren’t sealed in the same way that American homes are. For example, our front door- which is a screen door- doesn’t actually touch the floor- it’s about an inch form the tile. So closing the door wouldn’t really help. Which of course begs the point of why don’t I just install a strip of rubber so that there is a seal. (See, I’m not an idiot.) That brings up the issue of windows and more importantly, the roof. Trust me when I say that I can guarantee the roof isn’t perfectly sealed. (One important note is that our house is nice, but it’s not a luxury, luxury house. So there are houses here that I imagine are sealed completely, but I seriously doubt those are bug free. Why you ask?)
2- These are tropical bugs. These aren’t your wimpy little American variety. They have a tenacity and stubbornness (not to mention intellect) that would make Shrub envious. I think that they’re smarter than half the population of the US- and more ingenious and devious. If they want to get into a room, they will, regardless of what the human inside the room does. It fascinates us how long it takes them to find food. One of my roommates pointed out that you can leave food out in the US and it takes at least an hour for the ants to find it- sometimes overnight. You drop or spill anything here and by the time you get back with a sponge it’s already covered with bugs and it’s already half-gone.
Which brings me back to Kitchen, Porch and Water, my new friends. (All of whom happen to eat the annoying bugs.) Porch is still a little scared of me and runs away when I get close to him. Water is a cheeky little boy and loves to crawl up my arm every time I get water.
So no one fear, I’m making friends.
So yes, I’m guessing that you get the picture that I live with a lot of bugs. A LOT of bugs.
When I’ve talked about bugs in emails and chats, I love the fact that people have asked me why I don’t just close the windows or door. Thank you everyone for thinking I’m really that stupid. I’m not. (I swear I’m not.)
There are two things to consider when talking about my many-legged roommates.
1- Homes here aren’t sealed in the same way that American homes are. For example, our front door- which is a screen door- doesn’t actually touch the floor- it’s about an inch form the tile. So closing the door wouldn’t really help. Which of course begs the point of why don’t I just install a strip of rubber so that there is a seal. (See, I’m not an idiot.) That brings up the issue of windows and more importantly, the roof. Trust me when I say that I can guarantee the roof isn’t perfectly sealed. (One important note is that our house is nice, but it’s not a luxury, luxury house. So there are houses here that I imagine are sealed completely, but I seriously doubt those are bug free. Why you ask?)
2- These are tropical bugs. These aren’t your wimpy little American variety. They have a tenacity and stubbornness (not to mention intellect) that would make Shrub envious. I think that they’re smarter than half the population of the US- and more ingenious and devious. If they want to get into a room, they will, regardless of what the human inside the room does. It fascinates us how long it takes them to find food. One of my roommates pointed out that you can leave food out in the US and it takes at least an hour for the ants to find it- sometimes overnight. You drop or spill anything here and by the time you get back with a sponge it’s already covered with bugs and it’s already half-gone.
Which brings me back to Kitchen, Porch and Water, my new friends. (All of whom happen to eat the annoying bugs.) Porch is still a little scared of me and runs away when I get close to him. Water is a cheeky little boy and loves to crawl up my arm every time I get water.
So no one fear, I’m making friends.
14 January 2007
TV at Longido
So the street that I live on is called Longido Street, hence the house is referred to as Longido House or just Longido. I was playing around with the TV yesterday and exploring the channel lineup. I have to say, it’s pretty funny.
BBC News & Sky News (both British)
ESPN (European edition, so lots of soccer)
Discovery Channel (Euro edition as well)
MTV- I’m not sure if it’s the Euro or Asia version
SABC (South African station, comparable programming to NBC or CBS)
8 Indian stations (7 of which are in Hindi, and I’m guessing the 8th is a Tamil station. I have to say that the Hindi soap opera I saw yesterday was even more fun to watch than Mexican ones- more slapping, more supernatural events, more explosions- they’re great. And did you know that there’s a ‘Big Brother’ for India? And a ‘Who wants to be a Millionaire’ too?)
A Pakistani channel
3 Arabic channels (one being Al-Jazeera at least part of the time)
An Egyptian channel
A Kenyan channel
A Turkish channel
A religious channel where people call in and have their problems solved by God. (Though I’m not sure which God is solving the problems.)
and I think the last channel is a Tanzanian station
So as you can see, there’s both nothing and tons to watch. I’m sure the TV would become much more interesting if I learned Hindi, but at the moment I’m having enough trouble with KiSwahili.
BBC News & Sky News (both British)
ESPN (European edition, so lots of soccer)
Discovery Channel (Euro edition as well)
MTV- I’m not sure if it’s the Euro or Asia version
SABC (South African station, comparable programming to NBC or CBS)
8 Indian stations (7 of which are in Hindi, and I’m guessing the 8th is a Tamil station. I have to say that the Hindi soap opera I saw yesterday was even more fun to watch than Mexican ones- more slapping, more supernatural events, more explosions- they’re great. And did you know that there’s a ‘Big Brother’ for India? And a ‘Who wants to be a Millionaire’ too?)
A Pakistani channel
3 Arabic channels (one being Al-Jazeera at least part of the time)
An Egyptian channel
A Kenyan channel
A Turkish channel
A religious channel where people call in and have their problems solved by God. (Though I’m not sure which God is solving the problems.)
and I think the last channel is a Tanzanian station
So as you can see, there’s both nothing and tons to watch. I’m sure the TV would become much more interesting if I learned Hindi, but at the moment I’m having enough trouble with KiSwahili.
13 January 2007
headlamps and bed bugs
Well, it’s been an interesting week, to say that least. The good news is that either it’s gotten cooler or I’ve started to get used to the heat. It’s quite bearable if you’re not in the sun and if you’re near a ceiling fan. When you walk outside it’s a different story, but for the most part is seems to be pretty bearable.
At the moment I’m sitting on my bed – it’s about 7:15- and I’m working on revising case report forms. Which is relatively easy to do, just time consuming since they have to be formatted and checked for coding errors. However, the catch is that there is no power- it went off about 30 minutes ago. I have about two hours left of my laptop battery, so I though I would take a break and update this blog. (Though seeing as there’s no power, there’s also no internet. So this will get posted eventually.)
Power- yes, the power does in fact go off here. So far the outages have been relatively short- an hour on Wednesday night and about 2 hours on Thursday night. Both of those outages where between 1 and 4 in the morning and the only reason I knew about them was because of joyous jetlag. But seeing as I slept 14 hours Friday night, I’m about adjusted to the time here.
So yes, what does one do when they’re no power? Good question. The first step is to grab your headlamp and look like a total and complete dork/idiot. A headlamp is one of those lights that people who go hiking/caving attach to their foreheads. And I have to say, it’s the coolest thing right now- so practical. The light automatically shines in whichever direction I want to look (it being attached to my head an all) and it leaves both my hands free for typing. Kudos to the person who though this thing up- I owe you one.
After grabbing the headlamp I discovered that there is one major drawback- when you turn it on, you suddenly become the only light in a pretty wide area, which means that previously confused bugs which had no light to hover around now get excited and decide to hover around your head. Not cool, trust me. But since they are now your captive audience, it does make it easier to kill them in quick succession. Unfortunately for each one you kill, 3 more appear (no, make that 5). Killing bugs here is the most futile exercise.
So on the whole, the headlamp is a pretty cool invention, though I know that if any of you saw me right now you would laugh really hard, and probably keep laughing for at least a few hours. I know how bad I look, but I don’t care.
Bugs… I imagine that I’m going to have a few entries on them over the next few weeks as I alternate between hating them and learning to ignore them. But let’s talk today about bed bugs. I bet you didn’t think they were real- that they were just the end of that bedtime rhyme your parents told you. (goodnight, sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite.) Alas, I have to break your bubble regarding bed bugs... 1- they exist and 2- they do in fact bite. Now of course since I’ve discovered that bed bugs are real, I now have to reevaluate the status of the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, and of course the jolly guy in red. Could they be real too?
At the moment I’m sitting on my bed – it’s about 7:15- and I’m working on revising case report forms. Which is relatively easy to do, just time consuming since they have to be formatted and checked for coding errors. However, the catch is that there is no power- it went off about 30 minutes ago. I have about two hours left of my laptop battery, so I though I would take a break and update this blog. (Though seeing as there’s no power, there’s also no internet. So this will get posted eventually.)
Power- yes, the power does in fact go off here. So far the outages have been relatively short- an hour on Wednesday night and about 2 hours on Thursday night. Both of those outages where between 1 and 4 in the morning and the only reason I knew about them was because of joyous jetlag. But seeing as I slept 14 hours Friday night, I’m about adjusted to the time here.
So yes, what does one do when they’re no power? Good question. The first step is to grab your headlamp and look like a total and complete dork/idiot. A headlamp is one of those lights that people who go hiking/caving attach to their foreheads. And I have to say, it’s the coolest thing right now- so practical. The light automatically shines in whichever direction I want to look (it being attached to my head an all) and it leaves both my hands free for typing. Kudos to the person who though this thing up- I owe you one.
After grabbing the headlamp I discovered that there is one major drawback- when you turn it on, you suddenly become the only light in a pretty wide area, which means that previously confused bugs which had no light to hover around now get excited and decide to hover around your head. Not cool, trust me. But since they are now your captive audience, it does make it easier to kill them in quick succession. Unfortunately for each one you kill, 3 more appear (no, make that 5). Killing bugs here is the most futile exercise.
So on the whole, the headlamp is a pretty cool invention, though I know that if any of you saw me right now you would laugh really hard, and probably keep laughing for at least a few hours. I know how bad I look, but I don’t care.
Bugs… I imagine that I’m going to have a few entries on them over the next few weeks as I alternate between hating them and learning to ignore them. But let’s talk today about bed bugs. I bet you didn’t think they were real- that they were just the end of that bedtime rhyme your parents told you. (goodnight, sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite.) Alas, I have to break your bubble regarding bed bugs... 1- they exist and 2- they do in fact bite. Now of course since I’ve discovered that bed bugs are real, I now have to reevaluate the status of the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, and of course the jolly guy in red. Could they be real too?
09 January 2007
first impressions
My first impressions of Tanzania aren't that insightful, but I just wanted to let everyone know that I still have internet access and haven't fallen off the face of the Earth.
So my first impression after less than 24 hours: it's really humid and hot.
So my first impression after less than 24 hours: it's really humid and hot.
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