I HAVE A DEMANDING FRIEND IN ALBERTA WHO WANTS TO HEAR ABOUT MY LIFE SO HERE IT IS!

Ok so this post I will pick up where I left off. The plan to go to the genocide trials sort of failed the day we went it turns out that the last trial was the day before...... bollocks. Anyways I may not be able to see the trials but I will be able to see the Genocide memorial itself next month as I'm going to Rwanda with two other people from our group, Ed and Simran so now I have a choice of husbands!

Now to the interesting stuff, life in Arusha. The last few weeks have been busy with teaching and plasterhouse. My kids are great that I teach there all very polite and helpful and a lot of them are incredibly clever. They have monthly exams coming up next month so we are just doing revision for that at the moment.

Plasterhouse is going great but it can bve tough some days not because of screaming kids but because of the stuff you have to see. For example,the reaon why most of the kids at plasterhouse are their are because of disabilites( usually the legs) caused by the Maasai inbreeding, some of them have no feet, some of them have disfigured feet. Most of the cant really walk properly cause their lower legs stick out almos A shaped if you can picture that, so alot of them get surgery and then are bed ridden and in casts.

Baba is one of my favorites hes about three years old and is a very happy little boy who loves sitting on your lap and singing. He always runs up to me when I walk in the gates and gives me a big hug. On the weekend he got surgery and was in casts in his bed crying and sad because the casts where too tight which was quite difficult to deal with because you cant really do anything other than rub their heads and go "polle sana" ( im really sorry) I sat and drew with him for a bit which cheered him up.

I have a feew favorites and the plaster house and then there are a few kids that no one likes. My favorites are Baba, a little girl called Naanoori who is very happy and really enjoys cuddling, a little girl called Katrina ( who went home on saturday) Sabina who is about 8 years old has had surgery twice and is ridiculously clever and 1 leg Barracka. If the term "Cheeky Basterd" becomes and official term in the English language there will be a picture of 1 leg Barracka next to it. He had to have his right leg amputated in Janurary cause he had an over sized foot but he can hop around pretty fast. One time he some how ended up on top of a bookshelf with no shorts on someones water bottle and was pretending to be a water fountain.

There are a few kids no one lifes Elias and The One Whose Got Four Names But No One Knows Any Of Them So He IS Just Called the One Who Always Whines. Elias just causes trouble and urinates every where so they put him in dresses a lot of the time as well as alot of the little boys. The One Who Always Whines, cries when you go near him and cries when  you dont go near him.... no one likes him at all.

Life in Arusha is good outside of work, minus the water never working..... ever. We have gotten a bit desperate and have resulted to going to the village  pub for number twos and when we get really desperate we are going to put on our sunday best and go use the posh hotels toilets across the street.

Our local pub is called BIG Y and is cheap and good and we go there with the other Brits living near by quite a lot. One of the guys who says he owns it  bu we figured out he doesnt actually hes just the Old Drunk Guy that tells everyone what to do at the pub but doesnt actually own it or work their.... basically hes the village drunk.

Our village is lovely there are kids everywhere 45% of Tanzanias population is under 15 and you can really see it all around here. I have come up with the white person in Tanzania drinking game, everytime someone says "MZUNGU" you have to drink..... basically you will be permenantly sloshed the whole time you are in Tanzania.

Chasing the serengeti sun

This weekend we went on Safari in the Serengeti and Ngorongoro crater, we were told that now was the only time to go because of the migration the weekend after woulds and it was unbeliviable. The serengeti in Swahili means endless and the serengeti really is endless. You get a it of an adrenelin rush from safari, when you are going 80 miles an hour in a jeep , standing on your seats with you head and upper body poking out as you play with exposure and shutter speed, needless to say this weekend has given a whole new meaning to the term bus surfing.

There is so much natural beauty here it is not even funny,in the landscape and the animals you see its quite incredible, we were drsiving towards the Ngorongoro crate and we came across somewhere between 20,000-50,000 wilderbeasts running across the road which was amazing. Having seen them up and close I can now safely say that Wilderbeasts are the ugliest animal in the animal kingdom.

The hotels we stayed in were ridiculously nice, that it was a bit uncomforable to say the least. When you have been in a country for 10 days and been surrounded by absolute poverty and then your in a hotel with a bunch of loaded American and European tourists with ridiculously nice cameras they have no clue how to use and are there on a package holiday. Whats even more sickening is when you find out the people working there make 10,000 shillings a week (4 pounds a week) who work ridiculous hours.

Regardless Safari was amazing and a great way to spend my birthday. We are all now back in Arusha and back to work which feel good because I missed my plaster house babies. I really like my life here its quite rewarding and i enjoy the simplicity of it. People often mock African efficiney but i would easily say public transport is more efficient than Vancouver. You get around here mainly by Dala dal ( mini bus which seats 16comfortably but usually has about 25). they continueously come which is nice. Piki Piki is also big (motorcycle taxi).

I am currently in an Internet Cafe trying to plan a trip around lake victori through Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda and Western Kenya. Any of my UWC friend reading if you anyone in any of these places thats would be willing to show myself and one other person around or if they are feeling extremely generous a couch please message me.

There is a UN court here in Arusha where the Rwanda genocide trials are being held and its free for the public to come watch as long as you show your passport so that's the plan for the weekend. 

TIA, lovely people avocados and divine beauty

It was a night flight from heathrow, flying over Benghazi, North Sudan, Darfur and Ethiopia, starting your descent into Nairobi and seeing the moonlight reflect off a tin roof and thats when it hits you. " Holy Crap this is real." We landed in Nairobi cleared cusatoms and got on the bus to Tanzania. Kenya is a beautiful country the whole 5 hours I spent there. The culture shock wasn't as big as I was expecting which is a good sign. The biggest shock came with a guy carrying an AK 47  in kenya who just jumped on the bus to welcome us to Kenya. As they say TIA- This is Africa. Clearing immigration at Tanzania was fine as well and we are now officially residents of Tanzania... get me im so posh!

Tanzania is an amazing country filled with a beautiful backdrop, and people. We met the other volunteers here who took us for a night out on the town. Canada and England you should be ashamed of yourselves, the beer here is cheap and ridiculously good and the entire night out including taxi cost about twenty dollars. I made friends with one of the local bartenders who use to live in vancouver, His name is Alli and he is also a hair dresser and we bonded over our love of drag queens, If anyone who went to apokalypstick is reading this i know your all laughing.We went out a few more times once for the anniversary of Bob Marleys Death and one night we went out dressed up as maasai's ( a tribe here) which was a good laugh.

I started teaching thisw eek which was terrifying but i like it alot the kids here are great i also work at the plaster hous a center for children who are recovering from surgery its an amazing prodject and its alot of fun.only problem is its hard to tell whose a girl and a boy... oh well TIA.

Im off on Safari this weekend which I cannot wait for!!

write soon,

Anna

Victorian England to Modern England in the course of 48 hours.

Its May 8th today, departure date for Tanzania and it hasn't quite hit me yet. It probably wont until I land. Anyways the past two days have been a good laugh back home in the motherland. Grandad came for a sunday roast and it was really lovely. Sunday roast fill you up nicely and put you in a bit of a daze/high/ coma for the rest of the day and everyone tends to pass out on the sofa. Especially when grandad puts the snooker on.

We ran out of hot water so we were forced to go back to Victorian time using the kettle to boil the water and filling the bath up with that. Poor Emily, Jessica's sister had to use Jessicas dirty bath water one day... poor child. The resort ended up  being going to the gym with no intention of doing exercise but using the shower instead.

We are all a bit addicted to the game draw something, granted I am positively shit at it but its still fun. we basically spent all day yesterday sitting round the kitchen table drinking and playing draw something against one another. Ladies and Gentlemen I present to you the Modern British Family.

The sun is shining today which is lovely, England is quite beautiful on a sunny day but I know Tanzania will be more sunny and more beautiful than England. It still seems a bit weird thinking that I'm leaving today. Im looking forward to meeting everyone today at the airport  and tomorrow once we get to Tanzania and meet the volunteers already there. Im really curious to see what everyones like and if we are all quite similar or if it will be a bit like Come Dine With Me where we are all very different from each other but have a common bond..... well I suppose its not really a common bond on come dine with me its more like they all think they're really good dinner party hosts.

Anyways, if anyone is actually reading this, next time you hear from me I will be in Tanzania adjusting to my lifestyle there and living as a Tanzanian.

Aftur Heim.... or as they say in English coming home

It is currently 2:30 in the morning i'm sitting in a ridiculously comfortable bed, but alas I am un able to sleep..... bloody Jet lag. I flew into London yesterday from Vancouver,and adventures are now safely underway. The flight was not nice, there was a crying baby behind me the whole time and I was really tempted to turn around and tell the mum to give her kid some whiskey and make it shut up already. Instead, I was a good sensible Anna and decided not to. In addition to having a Baby thinking it was Adele behind me, I was sitting next to two Germans I was on the Aisle and they conveniently needed a wee every single time I fell asleep! The flight was a bit delayed getting into London but not by much.

I absolutely love Heathrow, because, customs literally takes about two minutes to get through if you're an EU national. They literally look at your passport for about 10 seconds, whilst talking to a co-worker about the football, sip their coffee and hand it back over to you. I got picked up by two of my best mates Jess and Naomi which was a lovely surprise and we squished in the Jess's little car. It was like I never left the UK, but it always feels like that, gossiping about what happened in the village discussing the telly, life, families and mutual friends and singing along to S Club 7 in the car. Our singing voices are all as equally horrid as they were when we were kids. However, this time we actually knew all the words and what the lyrics meant. Its quite weird listing to songs from childhood and actually understanding what the lyrics mean..... it's a miracle our parents let us listen to these songs as kids.

So far being back home is wonderful. I know most of you reading this find it odd that despite having lived in the land of maple syrup, snow, hockey riots, bacon and Moose's( or is it Meece?) and politicians with revolting haircuts.... (not like David Cameron's is much better but thats beside the point ) I still call this country is home. I suppose the reason is because its where I feel the most relaxed and the happiest, I am not sure but there is something about it that as soon as I pass through customs I know I'm home, granted it's never for a very long period of time but that doesn't matter.

Last night was spent around the dinner table with Jess and her family. We had a Indian take away, wine gin and tonics, and mini French larger's that Jess's dad always buys. It was so so lovely and felt extremely normal, like home. We talked about changes that have happened in the area, and how some things haven't changed. Changes in the village have consisted of, a few black people from Zimbabwe and Jamaica who are apparently really clever have moved to the village, some more Indians moving in, running a restaurant that now gives you free beer with you curry if you spend enough ( just 1 reason why I love this country). Other changes that I have noticed are there are considerably less adverts for car insurance on the telly (Thank GOD!), some new sofas, Jess is now driving , the pub down the road now sells fancy Coffee, and the country has gotten extremely patriotic.

Think of what was suppose to happen with Kony 2012, but instead take Union Jacks and put it all over every single shop and every single street in England, what with the Queen's Diamond Jubilee( 60 years our queen'y has been on the thrown she has and your money Canada, and Australia to name a few) and then the Olympics and then  the Royal Wedding last year. I think its a good thing for the county, the economy has gone down the toilet and things have been quite grim so i'm hoping that the Olympics will brighten some things up, and cheer people up a bit and hopefully revive it.

Although some things have changed some things remain unchanged. Booze is still cheaper, Curry is still better, the country is still more liberal than Canada, Chocolate is better, skies are grey, rain( but its different rain than Vancouver), roads are just as thin, American flag clothing is still fashionable in the summer, the chavs are still around, David Cameron is still a pompus twat, Boris Johnson is still the mayor of London and continues to be a hilarious muppet, and the gypsies still live on Oreston Lane.

Got a Sunday Roast tomorrow which I'm looking forward to it with Grandad and Jess's family. He's bringing half a cow so I'm looking forward to some yummy beef and having a lovely food baby before I go out that night.

It's 3 days till i'm off to Tanzania, and it hasn't quite sunk in yet that i'm actually going yet. It probably won't hit me till I actually get there, and realize that I'm a minority( not that I'm not use to that having lived in Vancouver for 2 years now). I'm really excited for it though, being a transient child of the world I enjoy change and adapting to local life styles and customs so, "being a Tanzanian/ African" for three months is something I cannot wait for. Especially, going to church and getting my gospel on, I'm not religious ,but I know churches in that part of the world are pretty much a continuation of saturday night which I quite like the sound of.

Hope this wasn't too long or dry.... well I am in England so it shouldn't be :P!