I Know This is Home..

This feels like home to me. I can be me- ni kweli- it's true- I can joke with and tease my neighbors using Swahili and English. I feel so comfortable with them and I don't feel like I am putting on a facade. I feel like I am part of the community. I can visit neighbors at any time. When I am sick they care. The old mamas greet me as though I was their daughter- various neighbors have told me I am like a daughter to them..binti yangu..my daughter they call me..some even reference the song "Anita" by Matonya saying Anita wangu..my Anita. I have friends around my age that are Tanzanian. I have mentors in the female Tanzanian professors. Various neighbors want to actually learn how to make cookies and cakes from me. Students are my friends and some of them like a younger brother/sister but at the same time I am their teacher as well. When my neighbors see me they offer me beans from their farms. It is bean harvesting time here, I have so many fresh beans (the beans are in pods) offered by my neighbors that I think I will be eating wali and maharage (rice and beans) forever- which I don't mind as I don't eat meat. If you have any recipes involving beans email them to me..I will try and make enchiladas, chili, minestrone, maybe even some more red bean buns...

Kuwa na Moyo- Have Heart

Even if one needs one will give- this is so true. I was greeting a local farm worker the other day, she knows me pretty well. She showed me a bag of beans and 2 mangos and said "kupe" which means give you. So she gave me those items, I felt so bad as she could have sold them and made some money instead of giving it to me for free. . Later I was hiking Loleza peak with a student and I related my story to him. He said that there is a Swahili proverb about the heart and even if one is in need they give. I don't remember the exact proverb otherwise I would write it down. Tanzanian people here have so much generosity, even if they don't have they give. When I visit people's houses I am not intending on being fed, but they feed me even if they weren't expecting me. You would never see this in the States. You can see here community is important.

Sasa Hivi, Bado Kidogo and other TZ Sayings/Doings

So here in Tanzania they say sasa hivi or bado kidogo..when really it is not right now or just a little bit longer..it is sometimes 30 or more mins longer! Why do they say that you ask? Because they don't want you to lose hope. They feel if they say it is not too much longer than you will think that it will happen at some point and it is not never going to happen. But in a sense you lose hope because you know that it won't happen right now. I am bad explaining this feeling, but you will know what I mean if you experience it. But I guess it is like in the US when we say, "one minute"..instead of something taking one minute it actually is 5-10 mins..kinda like sasa hivi..right now..

We'll see each other tomorrow if God wishes. This is self explanatory. They love to say this to me when we end our day.

Be free. Meaning don't worry about being polite just do what you want to do, we are family so we don't care about formalities.

This one is not a saying but an action. Raising your eyebrows means yes. This is going to get take some getting used to and I can forsee if I get into this habit it will be hard for me not to do it once I get back in the States. Though for now my reaction is to laugh whenever I see this though it confuses the person saying the yes with raised eyebrows. In the States raised eyebrows usually means confusion or asking the question "What?" or "what did you say?"...so when I see it I want to repeat my question when in fact I should keep my mouth shut because they said yes. :)

Kuwa kali kwa sababu wasichana wanaweza!

On the 13th of Feb I attended a NGO meeting that some fellow health volunteers in the region organized. It was regarding HIV/AIDS and what we can do to help the NGOs promote their organization and to help them with teaching prevention to citizens. The other facet was to help people who have HIV/AIDS learn useful skills..this is where I can help..one of the useful skills they want to teach is computer skills in order to help people with this disease get jobs. They want to build a computer lab in mjini in order to teach these skills. I hope that we can do it and I definitely will give any knowledge I have to make this happen.

But the 13th of Feb brought a topic I was totally excited about and knew I could help with: Girls Empowerment Conference. The health volunteers wanted to get the girls around them preferably in Form 1 or Standard 7 (like 6th or 5th grade) to come to a venue to learn about life skills. They plan on doing this in June and I offered the idea as the institute as a place where we can have it. They want to teach them about careers, life skills, and their bodies and HIV/AIDS (many girls in poverty resort to getting money by other ways). We can also let them play computer games as many of these girls probably have very little access to computers. I have spoken to various women professors at the institute and they are excited about the idea and willing to help. My neighbor is one of these women and she is one of 2 female professors that attended a conference on how to counsel young girls so I can definitely see her having an impact. The director of studies (DOS) is also a woman and she is excited to help to get more females interested in math. She feels that math is the simplest of sciences and most gals feel like it is hard but if you can tell them it is not that hard and make exciting activities you can gain their interest. We were talking about involving female students at the institute in these activities in order to let the young girls see girls that they can relate to like themselves. I have written a letter to the principal to request use of the facility and hostels and I think the response will be positive.

Also those two professors and I were talking about starting a women's group here at the institute beginning with a study skills and mentorship session during orientation week to retain female students at the institute- kind of like SWE or WISE. Also about having female students and professors going to local secondary schools in the area to show them that girls can be scientists and that science is fun in order to attract girls to enroll in the institute.

The DOS showed me some research she did on the number of women entering the institute. Apparently they started offering a short course to people before attending the institute to teach people math skills if their math was poor. If they pass the course then they may be accepted at the institute. She was showing me that because of this course there are more female students here, but because some can't afford it they were trying to get some scholarships so they can allow these females to attend this course for free. I am so excited for this positive response from various teachers here. I feel like this will be a sustainable activity because there is this interest and motivation.

I am doing my little part in trying to befriend the various female students around here..though they aren't as talkative to me as the male students are. Hopefully having cooking parties and running with these girls will let them open up to me more. As we pound up those hills and they start to quit because they are tired the Anita Hitler in me (my former running partner Elena G has coined the Anita Hitler nickname in endearment of course :) ) tells them "Kuwa kali kwa sababu wasichana wanaweza!"...be fierce because girls can! :)

Cultural Exchange Through Cooking and Hiking

On Sunday the 22nd, I went hiking with that fellow student in addition to that saying about heart (see a previous post) we talked about listening, respect and tolerance. We were talking about this in regards to the student debate club. The guy was saying that he watched CNN and he was amazed that when they debate that they actually wait for one another to talk before talking (well they do to some effect). At the debate club at school the students try to rile up the debater by interrupting him/her before he/she finishes. This is because in secondary school they did this to have fun, but he thinks in their culture people like to put one another down when arguing to say that their point is right. I told him though in order to be effective at debate, you need to listen to the other person in order to prove their points wrong (you can do this once you know their reasoning behind their points) and in order to come up with a solution or compromise. So we both agreed that respecting and tolerating someone's opinion by listening and not just saying you are right without reason is the best way to become better at debating. And that got us on a different topic of cultural exchange when it comes to being on time as many students aren't on time for these debates. As a different student keeps telling me "There is no hurry in Tanzania". Tanzanians aren't punctual in general but those in the States are. So if someone was doing business with the States they should know that one should be on time. But at the same time an American should be tolerant of Tanzanians when they show up half an hour to an hour late.

On Saturday the 21st I had the students that I run with at my house in order to teach them to cook "American" food. We made egg noodles (from scratch) with pasta sauce, garlic bread, and peanut butter cookies. I showed them oregano and basil and they died and went to heaven when they bit into peanut butter cookies... We also talked, danced, sang, and I got to know them better. I am trying to get the token guy student that runs with us interested in cooking so far he tells me that I should teach him how to make peanut butter cookies. I plan on teaching them to make pizza next! :)

Conflict Resolution Management

I am not a conflict resolution manager or career counselor but last week I felt like one. The head of dept was letting a teacher know about something that he didn't like about this guy's performance. So he calls me into the room with the other guy because he felt like I was a third party and could give objective advice. Myself, though, I felt very uncomfortable because I did not want to offend either party by my advice. But in the end I successfully managed to give advice that didn't offend any of them by telling them that it all boiled down to communication. My advice consisted of the following:

A manager needs to communicate announcements timely to his subordinates and his subordinates should not be afraid to tell the manager when they could not complete a task. If you can't complete something you should communicate and tell the manager you can't get it done instead of not saying anything. If you don't say anything then the manager will think you didn't even start the task and he or she will get annoyed at you or even think you are performing poorly, when in fact you did start the task you just could not get it done. Also one should tell the manager about any problems one is facing so that if one needs help the manager can help find the resources in order to get the task done. At the same time a manager needs to create a friendly environment so that his subordinates aren't afraid to tell him any problems. I am thinking in this case the culture in TZ is to not be direct so as not to offend anyone so I am guessing the guy was afraid to tell the head he couldn't get his task done for that reason. But the head went to school abroad so he has adopted this direct manner of communication so he expected his subordinate to be direct with him. Open, honest communication- it is important in the world. But at the same time understanding culture matters in order to work effectively with one another.

V-Day

We made a Chinese New Year dinner at my house (yeah we celebrated it kinda late) complete with red bean buns, stir fried egg noodles (a la longevity noodles), and spinach/ginger dumplings. It was a definite yummy delight. Later that night we watched as students participated in an English debate club. Hope everyone had a valentine's day filled with friendship or love..whichever the case may be.

Engineering and Science

Last night the mama I was talking to was telling me about how engineers in TZ are not awarded for their hard work so most TZ people end up going into the arts and commerce as it is easier to study and they end up making more. There were more details to the talk, but I can't go into it here on my blog. Today afternoon some other woman was telling me the same thing and that she would like to change that, she would like to see more and more students go into science and engineering. And to that effect she would like the government to encourage this by creating more research opportunities and to encourage secondary students to go into math/science.

On that note I found these opportunities for higher learning institutions to get funds after talking to the mama about USAID, this is especially important here in TZ. The institute I work at might have a computer lab but here they have no where near the equipment that higher institutions of learning have in the States:

http://www.africa-initiative.org/

http://cit.aed.org/center.htm

http://hedprogram.org/

Ndiyo wasichana wanaweza!

So on Monday no one showed up for running except the guy. He apologized and today morning 2 out of the 3 gals (these are the faster women runners at the institute) showed up! We ran about 8 kilometers and it was awesome! I really want to encourage them to keep it up and I really want us to run in Moshi next year. In TZ running is not the norm..it is not like Kenya or neighboring African countries. Women are not running here as there is some stigma with it..I haven't understood it though as it is not seen as a bad thing..just not done. So for that reason I want to encourage these gals to run for health and for competition. Although some of these gals run in jeans or shoes that are too tight. If anyone out there has any old running clothes or running shoes that they no longer use (as long as they aren't broken)..please send them my way! Let me know by email...I think there are flat rate boxes for $11 to send international stuff in. My address is to the right.

On another note, yesterday I invited my neighbor to my house and I cooked us Indian food. I plan on eating with her again tonight as she is staying alone like me (she is a mama..older than me) because her daughter is in boarding school. We had some interesting conversations..she is an electrical engineering lecturer at the school and she raised her children on her own (she has 2). She put her daughter in the best boarding school because she thinks if a girl goes to day school than they can get into trouble (lot of men chase after them)..so it is better for a gal to go to an all girls boarding school so there is no trouble. Like I said this woman is awesome and she is a modern woman. I seem to meet alot of them around where I live but it is not suprising because I teach at the institute.

There is another couple that I visit frequently both have PhDs with a strong woman in the family. The man is so funny because he complains that his wife is so busy working (she has a high position at the institute) that she doesn't have time to cook for him. But he is joking..of course, I can see that he loves her. :) And she doesn't put up with his joking, she is a strong woman and stands up for herself. At the same time he cooks or helps around the house sometimes when she is busy. They remind me of some people close to me in the States...

Pili Pili Sauce

Another favorite of mine. Cut up an onion, a few cloves of garlic, and a small piece ginger. Fry the onions in oil till brown. Add ginger and garlic and fry till cooked. Add a tomato or unripe green mango (I use the unripe green mango for a different kick). When tomato or mango has cooked down add hot peppers to your desired liking. Squeeze a juice of one lemon. Cook for 5 more minutes. Your pili pili hot sauce is useable with all things now. Taste real good with rice and beans!

Pumpkin Leaves with Peanut Sauce

So I really like this recipe and if you can get this at home try it out..it's a recipe here in TZ..but I think it applies to alot of countries in South/East Africa as they eat something similar. Usually you are supposed to grind peanuts but I just dissolve one tablespoon of chunky peanut butter in a cup of hot water (preferably the water you boil the pumpkin leaves in) since I don't have a blender. You need about 5 stalks of pumpkin leaves, 1 tomato, 1/2 an onion, and 1 Tbsp of peanut butter. Remove veins from pumpkin leaves and chop off any tough parts to the stem. Then cut the leaves in ribbons and finely chop the stems. Cover and boil it in water with salt for 5 mins. Drain the leaves. Reserve 1 cup of the liquid and mix with 1 Tbsp of peanut butter. Chop onions. Peel the tomato and chop. In a seperate pan fry the onions in oil when brown, add the tomatoes. When it begins to look like a sauce (tomatoes cook down), add the peanut liquid. Add salt to taste. Boil for a minute and add the pumpkin leaves. Boil until liquid is reduced. Serve with rice..yum!

Research

This weekend I attended a workshop at my institute turns out they want to do more research here so they were talking about writing a proposal, coming up with an idea, collaboration, etc. At the end of the discussion it was our turn to come up with research topics that people were interested in. Some research topics were more like projects like getting a better road to the university (a civil engineering project), but some were very good like sustainable renewable energy...it seems everyone all over the globe is interested in this topic. Some other ones were more social in nature like preventing poverty, having a better infrastructure in Tanzania, preventing HIV/AIDS, etc. As I participated I realized I am not in a normal PC assignment: the people around me are all educated, they all are able to eat meat every night with their meal, they all have progressive thinking and optimism that they will succeed in life and that they can achieve higher goals, etc. In a way my assignment doesn't have the frustrations that most volunteers are facing but at the same time I have the little ones like things not getting done in time, things that are comitted to get done are not always executed, etc. I don't know whether to be happy or sad about this..in one aspect it would be nice to be able to have little and make a big change (though how realistic a big change would be is very uncertain..but at least a small change would be nice)..but in another it is nice to be here and to know that there is this side to TZ..that there exists people who have such thinking to want a better way of life and who are willing to execute in order to achieve their goals. And it is refreshing to see that the stereotype of Africa being undeveloped is not entirely true. If someone told me to live here for good, I probably could do it though I would miss my family back home.

Computer Club

So yesterday I had my first computer club meeting which all the computer engineering students attended. In this meeting I taught them basic html some seemed to get the hang of it and some were slower but eventually caught on. I know I definitely need to slow down the pace of my English..especially when I am excited (in a good way)..when I teach I am excited so it tends to get too fast. I thought I would have problems with speaking in front of 50 kids but really I am very comfortable at doing this, I think part of the reason is that I am teaching not giving a boring presentation and they are all here with the intention of learning..or maybe because it is because I have authority as a teacher..I don't know what it is. Anyways I plan on teaching them Java Script next week. The computer engineering program is new at the institute so these are the first kids to graduate from this program. I will be there for their graduation. They will start learning computer programming as a class for their program next year but I am hoping in teaching them Java Script I can give them a head start in the basic constructs needed in programming (like control statements and variables). The culmination of all this is to have them start a student website for their computer engineering program. We will see where this takes us. For now they need to learn these concepts. I finally had to finish teaching because the electricity went off so with that they left.

On my way home the student who I befriended was so surprised that these computer engineering students actually wanted to attend this class even though it is not required for their program and he was surprised that I was teaching it (he thought I was working too hard). I told him I enjoy teaching but he now wants to learn this work ethic of mine (putting in effort and trying hard). He was surprised that I was not complaining or tired and I was happy to teach. Maybe I can teach students about work ethic by example. I do want to start teaching them a resume writing and interview skills workshop of sorts to help prepare them for getting jobs in the future.

Like I said many ideas..the nice thing about being here is that I can create and execute my ideas without having lots of red tape. As long as they don't require money I can do it, they just require time and I have lots of time to give.

Students Rule..well sorta

So many new things to report. I found a friend in one of the students..too bad he is one of my students but definitely think that it is a good thing. It all started when my running partner who coaches the institute's athletes invited one of the students to go running with us. Well he invited one of the good runners..this boy is fast. It turned out he was the same kid who gave me Obama's speech in my class. Anyways a few days later the same kid wanted me to help out with the English debate club at school on Saturday night. Saturday morning I ran 10 miles with the kid..I totally was slowing him down but he wanted to run with me so I let him. I mentioned to him that I wanted to get some gals running and he said he would try and organize it. I went to their debate club..it was amazing to see students being able to articulate on some of these topics. That night the topic was is the English language a disadvantage to third world countries...or something to that effect. The points and logic that these kids were making were awesome and some of them are such good speakers. One guy in particular reminds me of a preacher..he could probably get a job as one. That night I saw these students in a new light..but I also know that teachers can't be friends..but can give guidance. I know how it feels to be a manager now, you can be chummy but you still have to do your job. Anyways the point on talking about the gals running is that he followed through on it. This week he came to my flat with 4 gals and said they would like to run. We'll see because we start next week. My hope is to either get them to do the Moshi Half Marathon next year or something similar..maybe our slogan can be "Ndiyo Tunaweza"..ha..

On the downside today I gave my first quiz and I caught students teaching. Yup I had to be tough and give them zeros. So this is the downside of being a teacher..just like if a manager caught their worker not being productive. It hurts to tell a student that I have to give them a zero because here they are desperate to get a good grade...but desperation can lead to cheating. And that I cannot tolerate. It probably feels just as bad to lay someone off because you know that they have a family and need the money but they just aren't productive. So yup today was a sad day. Another funny thing is students try to play on the fact that some teachers are lazy. I told them that they have homework due next week. Well they told me is it individual or group? And I said individual but they said to me well if you make it group you will have less papers to grade. And I just laughed at that and said I am not a lazy teacher..this is an individual assignment. Like I said I gotta be tough! But the day ended on a good note. On the upside again is that when a student understands programming it makes me so happy. Today some students got the hang of programming..though I have had to dumb it down for them but to see them get the simple concepts is great! I see the thrill in being a teacher as well as the hardships..and that of managing as well. But I guess all this boils down to ethics.

So let me now talk about ethics. On Saturday we had a teacher's meeting and we discussed the ethics of teaching. I guess some teachers here just give students grades without really marking papers and give easy tests so they can pass everyone. Well we finally got around to discussing the normal distribution curve. And how it is important to be fair not too easy and not too tough because we want students to decide to come to our school so they can learn not so they can just get a good grade. I see how colleges think now..Michigan would say we need to make our tests tough so that the smarter students come to our school..and people who just want to pass and be lazy don't..ha..I could see it because that is sorta how we were discussing things then. And the best part was this "students are our clients, without students wanting to come here teachers wouldn't have a job so we have to provide a good service to our customers..the students." :)