We did get pulled over once for "over speeding" but we didn't get a speeding ticket for reasons I will not say, but a speeding ticket here is like $10. To pull you over the cop literally stands in the middle of the road... That can't be safe. Also it doesn't seem like anyone comes to help you if there is an accident. We saw one crash and everyone was just kind of sitting there. We went over a super narrow bridge with all sorts of caution signs around it, a little bit of a thrill on a long drive. I asked Richard how long I would need to hold it to wait for a toilet that flushes with toilet paper and he told me about 2.5 hours so squat plate it was. We also stopped in a beautiful town up a mountain called Lushoto. There were houses terraced up the side of the mountain and views of the savanna that went quite far. The sunset was gorgeous.
Once we got closer to Same, we picked up Richard's nephew who is a judge in one of the nearby towns. He lives in Same so we gave him a ride... But we stopped at the Elephant Motel first. The first person I saw was Kazoka, who was with us back in 2014. We were so excited to see each other! He grabbed me by the hand and took me to the terrace where the rest of the group was. It was great to see some familiar faces and some new ones, I love hearing about people's first experiences in Tanzania.
So I was graced with an upgrade to the Executive Suite, as they had no standard rooms left available. It was quite nice by Same standards, with 1.5 baths and a living room.
So the next morning we set out for the site bright and early. It was about a 10 minute drive from the hotel. The students had already poured the concrete foundation so the next step for us was to start with some block work. We used compressed block that was about 9"x18" and came in 5" and 6" thicknesses. Unloading the truck was exhausting, as they were at least 50 pounds per block.
Our task for the week was to construct and build a sign at the gateway to campus. The 3 students on the trip (Emma and Leah are in structural engineering and Kevin is in electrical engineering) calculated the forces and designed the footings and structure. We had rebar coming up from the foundation and through the wall to accommodate and we needed to mix mortar for the joints between all the blocks. The biggest challenge besides the weight of each individual block was that we had no power tools so we had to do everything by hand. We ran out of sand and ended up taking a couple buckets to an area by the side of the road that had more sand to improvise. We had to bring all of our water to the site as well.
Filling all of the cracks with mortar
So the project was a great lesson in building in Africa. It took us 2 days to build the block structures and they were considerably modified/reduced from the original design. Richard was with us for the first day. It was so fun to have him there, although I am sure he had a few moments where he was like, wtf are these crazy Americans doing? Africans are NOT accustomed to being in the sun all day, as you can see by the amount of verandas and canopies they have in the cities and towns. And there was no shade to be found anywhere on our site.
Richard actually started sweating at one point, which is a big deal, because I can count on one hand the amount of times I have seen a Tanzanian sweat. Back in Dar, Violet kept her air conditioner on low the whole time. I turned it up one notch from low one time and she was like, it's so cold! Anyone who sits near me at work will appreciate that since I am always the one who hates the air conditioner.
The evening after the first work day I went with Richard to Padeko to meet up with his nephew for dinner. This is the local watering hole, that has live music on the weekends. Richard asked me if I wanted to have mutton for dinner, because it is supposed to be a good food to have after you have been out in the sun (not sure where that theory came from). We got to the bar which is basically a big covered indoor/outdoor space with a gated bar in the corner, a stage on one side, and plastic tables and chairs all around. David ordered a big platter of mutton, which came as large bite sized chunks with lemon quarters and a bowl of chili sauce. The waiter came by before we ate to wash our hands (basically he poured water over a bowl, like they do in church with the priest. I had a LOT of mutton (in my opinion),which ended up having quite an impact on my digestive system (thanks Kevin for the 3 days of Cipro). Although when I was done Richard and David were both like, you hardly ate any! In Tanzania, it is polite to eat a lot and if you don't, they assume it is because something is wrong (this is really difficult for me, the picky and light eater that I am). So we stayed for another bia (beer) and headed back to the elephant motel.
I had also brought a ton of little gifts for Richard, a backpack, an architecture book, art supplies for his kids, and some Halloween costumes (Richard remembered Halloween from when he lived in the US as a kid). I also brought a bunch of tshirts for various people, as I know they are well received in Tz. So I gave Richard the remainder of his gifts and headed off to bed. It was a great way to end the day.
At the end of block work days
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