Maybe it’s me, not Africa

I seem to always have stories of crazy things happening rather frequently to me. (Though not enough time to write about them all.) And I also tend to assume that these things happen because I live in Dar and well, it’s Dar. (Not better, not worse, just a different latitude.) But this past weekend I realized that maybe it’s me, maybe it’s not Africa.

To make a long story short I was in Spain recently. And for those of you that know anything about world events, the final of Euro 2008 was at the same time- Spain against Germany being played in Vienna. I would have loved to be in Germany seeing as I’m a huge Germany fan (largely due to the fact that my future husband is captain of the German team- and coincidentally a Chelsea player), but I was in Spain with my cousin which I wouldn’t trade for the world.

To start the trip my bag was lost en route to Madrid. The printer at the ticket agent counter in Dar wasn’t working properly so the baggage tag didn’t actually have a complete barcode or number on it which made it rather hard to transfer the bag in London. But bags are sent to Kalamazoo all the time on accident so I didn’t think much of it. And the beauty of Madrid more than made up for the clothing issue. I have to say that the atmosphere in the Spanish capital was electric, with people wearing either red or their Spain jerseys on Saturday around town (I’m glad I wasn’t watching the match next to those people on Sunday) and Spanish flags flying everywhere- attached to car antennas, balconies, backpacks, etc.

Sunday arrives and all anyone is talking about is the players and injuries and experience and who will be starting for both teams. Despite the fact that I was offered money to wear a Germany jersey to watch the match, I chose not to. Yes, I did recently purchase a dirt bike and I’m planning on riding it in Dar, but I do in fact value my life- and wearing an opposition jersey in a football-crazy country that hasn’t won anything significant in 44 years is a pretty sure way to die a rapid death. So no Ballack jersey for me, just clean clothes from my finally-arrived suitcase.

I headed down to the bar a few hours before the match because there was no question that I was going to get a prime seat. I seated myself front and centre and proceeded to drink delicious Spanish wine while the bar filled up with locals. The match started and was enthralling. Granted, I would have been happier if Torres hadn’t scored, but he’s one of my favorite young players and he deserved his moment of glory.

Half-time started and I decided to change (Spain is cold compared to Dar!). I get in the elevator, push the button and then suddenly movement stops. I push a few buttons, nothing happens. I push a few more buttons and still, nothing happens. Broken elevator.

So there I am, stuck in a meter by meter and a half elevator and it’s the beginning of halftime of one of the biggest matches I’ve ever watched. The two teams that I was most hoping made it to the final were actually playing in the final. And I was in an elevator with halftime ticking down.

I ask you- how frequently does an elevator break in Europe? I can’t imagine it’s a very common occurrence. However, there I was- the beginning of the second half and I was still stuck in the elevator. Still there 10 minutes into the match. 20 minutes… still there.

So what does one do while stuck in an elevator listening to the crowds watching the match? She texts friends for updates on the match. It was, to say the least, torturous to be laying on the floor of the elevator and listening to near misses, yelling, excitement and the general roar of the crowd in the bar. (And some advice, choose carefully who you want to give you updates on scores… some people are downright evil!)

40 minutes into the second half… the elevator finally creaks to life and moves a few feet thanks to a technician who at the moment he got my call from the elevator started cursing the day I was born. The door open slightly and the elevator is between floors so I climb out and race back downstairs, only to see that the score is still 0-1 Spain. My heart breaks just a little watching Ballack collect yet another 2nd place medal this season.

But the next time the power goes out due to a blown transformer only my street (which has happened twice in the past 18 months) or the rain floods our yard and the pump doesn’t work, or the store is out of the only type of cheese that I like… I think I should consider the fact that it may actually me… not Dar that is causing these stories.

But just in case its not only me, remind me not to get into an elevator in Dar...

Drunk Ants

I think I may have mentioned ants and bugs a few times in my posts since they are such a large (and unwanted) part of my life here. I love the house I’m currently living in, but it does have a lot of ants. Many of the ants met a not-so-unfortunate death during the time we had lake-front property, but unluckily for me there were still many that survived. And now that it’s only raining a couple days a week the yard has completely dried out and the ants are free to multiply again.

But at the moment I would like to honor a few intelligent and worthy ants. (I hope that’s the only time in my life I use the words ‘intelligent’ or ‘worthy’ with respect to ants.) I’ve mentioned before that psycho-mutant Tanzanian ants eat everything and if you leave anything open or on the counter they pretty instantly manage to find and devour it. But there are a few select ants that deserve credit.

We didn’t finish a bottle of red at dinner the other night (sacrilege I know) so we left it for later- put the cork in the bottle and left it on the counter. I grabbed it last night and found a tiny hole burrowed in the cork with cork dust on the edge and counter around the bottle. On further inspection there was an ant crawling into the hole and another ant crawling down the bottle who was having a lot of trouble making it down in a straight line.

After my first flash of anger at having my wine ruined, I realized that these few intelligent ants knew that one of the true pleasures of life is a good red wine. And instead of being angry at them I should celebrate our common love. Unfortunately for the dozen or so floating in the bottle, some of them don’t seem to be smart enough to swim. Alas, I’m sure they’re not the first souls to meet their demise in the pursuit of good wine. But knocking the drunken ants out of the gene pool just means more wine for me!

Kansas 2003 National Basketball Champions

2003, March. National Championship Game between Kansas and Syracuse… two seconds left on the clock with Kansas down by 2… Hinrich shoots a 3 and… scores!!!! Kansas wins the National Championship title!!!! Blue and white confetti falls from the ceiling, suddenly all the players and coaches are decked out in shirts and hats that say ‘Kansas National Champions 2002-2003’ while cutting down the nets. It’s a happy moment for all Kansas fans.

Only, wait… I seem to be revising history. In reality, Hinrich twisted his ankle earlier in the game and his final shot was off… Syracuse won the title. The shirts and hats that suddenly appeared were orange and blue and had Syracuse written all over them. But haven’t you ever wondered what happened to the Kansas hats and shirts that almost magically appeared? Or to all the other ones that are printed for various other championship games or league titles? ‘Patriots perfect season’… they’re out there somewhere.

Well, wonder no more. At least not about one shirt- it managed to make its way to the east coast of Zanzibar and be spotted by one of the few people in the world that would actually know it was incorrect. How it got there is still up for grabs. But this seems to be the part of the world were tee-shirts, shall we say, make their way to die.

Surplus shirts- either from sporting events or from family reunions or from whatever- seem to make their way here. Charities frequently bundle higher-quality/rarely worn (i.e. family reunion) shirts and sell them to wholesale dealers. A buyer here buys a bundle, usually having no idea how many or what type of clothing is inside, hoping that the quality of the bundle is high. He/she then sells the individual pieces, and since this is Dar, they’re usually sold on the street. It’s a win-win situation since the charity earns money and is therefore able to continue its work while a job and income is created for both the middle-man and the final seller.

I would love to find the KU or ‘Patriots Perfect Season’ shirts, but despite looking at all the shirts I see, I haven’t found a fun one yet. My guard’s favorite shirt is ‘Parker Family Reunion Atlanta 2001’ and when I explained the meaning of the shirt he thought it was funny

And somewhere there’s a Parker that’s probably blissfully happy to have the extra closet space while simultaneously hoping that his/her family doesn’t discover they no longer have the all-important family reunion tee-shirt.

I always wanted a lake-side house

Before I start this post, an apology...

Yes, its been a wee bit of time since I last wrote or updated this blog. Please accept my apology. I have no good excuse except to say that since I last wrote, I've moved into a great house and started working more normal hours so I'm now sane and have time to sit and think about writing posts that hopefully aren't torturously boring.

So for those of you that have faithfully stuck with me, thank you. I've got lots of good stories waiting to be posted.


Last week I woke up to a beautiful lake view. A lake surrounded by snow-capped mountains, with the sun rising over the mountains on the western shore, painting the snow and its reflection in the water a rose colour. Today I'm looking at another lake view. Only this lake is my front yard. And back yard and side yard.

It rained Wednesday- the first hard rain of the season. (To recap, there are four seasons in Dar- the hot season, the long rains, the cool season and the short rains.) And it really does get cool in the cool season. 75 as a high for the day sometimes- we all put on jeans and long-sleeve shirts. (Yes, it really does feel cold, I'm not the only crazy one.)

So first I should point out that I arrived back here Tuesday morning at about 9- and at about 10 a transformer blew in the neighbourhood and the power went out. As everyone put it... welcome back to Dar. Shockingly enough when I climbed out of bed today, hoping to start the weekend on a good note with power, well... there was no power. But a story about a 5th day without power just wouldn't be interesting.

About noon last Weds it started to rain. Not dainty rain, not even hard rain, but buckets of water. Buckets. Like in a bad Hollywood/Bollywood movie where all seems lost for the leading couple until the romantic lead runs through the rain to kiss the girl and wins her heart forever. Only in the movie the water never seems to be muddy and full of small, dead animals. And I imagine doesn't carry cholera and dysentery and other fun things. But I digress... suffice it to say, it rained a lot. Buckets of rain. Inches and inches and inches of rain.

I didn't think much of the rain (or the flooded streets, but the flooded streets deserve their own post) until I arrived home on Weds. My yard was full of water- flooded, just like the streets I had driven through. I live in an area called Namanga, which I've now found out is prone to flooding. 'Prone to flooding' is a bit funny for me to write after I've seen my guard wading through two feet of water in places the past few days. I think two feet of water counts as flooding, but I would almost want to be able to give it a stronger adjective- excessive flooding maybe. But I feel like I should save the term 'excessive flooding' for when I see four feet of water, which I'm expecting to see any day now.

Our house, as well as a few other houses around us, sits slightly lower than the road. You drive over a ridge when coming in our gate- the ridge is to keep water from the road out of our yard and it works surprisingly well. When I drove through the gate on Weds I was hoping to come home to a calm oasis in the storm. However, I drove into a lake. Or what I thought was a lake on Weds- I would now describe it as a pond. The house sits in the center of the lot and is on the highest point in the yard. The yard was relatively full of water, but there were still areas directly surrounding the house that were dry. The lack of electricity meant that there was no way to pump the water out of the yard, and therefore we had to wait until the landlord arrived with a pump to remove the water.

Thursday morning I went to work hoping the dark, ominous clouds would find another home before they decided to release their water. Sadly for me, at about lunch they decided to destroy my dream. The clouds opened and when I left work, I had an image of my roommate and I bailing water out of our living room. (My image of us bailing included me wearing my Wellington boots that I brought back from the states, which are the talk of the neighbourhood. Navy blue with pink edging, compliments of Gap, they are quite bright. And this week they were the most wonderful thing that I own, since they kept my legs dry and away from all the floating dead things when I had to walk through a foot of water in some parts of the yard.)

When I arrived home it was no longer a pond, it was truly a lake. (And let's all hope that I never start an entry saying that it was no longer a lake but rather an ocean.) But thankfully the lake was only surrounding the house and not inside the house. The house is rimmed by concrete and sits about 6 inches off the ground at its lowest point- the water was between 1-2 inches below the level of the porch and close to two feet deep around the edges of the yard. (1-2 inches below the porch may sound like a lot, but here that can be 30 minutes of rain.) The pump had arrived, but took awhile to get working since the first hose was too small, the second too large. Once the pump started, for a long time it looked like nothing was happening since the rain was coming down about as fast as the pump could remove water from the yard. But finally the rain cleared and the water started to slowly, slowly recede.

The irony of having water everywhere was that there was no water for the house. The way internal plumbing water works for many houses in Dar is that it's pumped from either a truck or the city system into a tank on the ground and from that tank it's pumped up to a tank on the roof. Gravity then forces it through the pipes and out the faucets. When there's no electricity, the water sits in the tank on the ground and there's no water for the house. Last night the water in the tank ran out, so I have no water.

As of now, I'm still living my life-long dream of a lake-side house. Though the water lapping at my porch maybe is a bit worrying and the fact that I have to wear my Wellies to get to my car is also a wee bit worrying. And of course there still isn't power and I'm terrified to open the fridge since we haven't been able to clean it because there hasn't been trash collection. And oh dear, it just started to rain again. Maybe I should put a bucket outside to catch some clean rain water to bathe.


An update...

I wrote this post yesterday morning and since then there have been a few updates. (Lack of power preventing me from posting in a timely fashion and all.) Yesterday's rain was minimal and power returned last night. We were able to pump water to the roof, meaning the internal functioning of my house is now normal. (Well, except for the fridge which can easily be classified as a biological hazard.) As for the lake, the water is still being pumped out of my yard. Yes, still. But hopefully enough will be removed that the sun can start to dry out parts of the yard. As for today's power situation... it doesn't seem to want to stay on for more than a few minutes. But hey, at least I'm not floating.

So if anyone's interested in occasional lake-front property... I can arrange a showing.