It's time for Africa!

Disclaimer: From here on out, I’m going to try to keep these posts short and sweet, but there was a lot of ground to cover from the first week on the continent. Now that the exploring phase is nearing an end and the internship phase is beginning, I imagine that my days will not be as endlessly diverse as they are now and that the small moments will become more blog-worthy than the tally of events. Thanks for your patience as I got settled enough to be able to write this first entry, and I promise more bite-size commentary in the future!

A man walks down the street

It's a street in a strange world

Maybe it's the Third World

Maybe it's his first time around

He doesn't speak the language

He holds no currency

He is a foreign man

He is surrounded by the sound, the sound

Cattle in the marketplace

Scatterlings and orphanages

He looks around, around

He sees angels in the architecture

Spinning in infinity

He says Amen and Hallelujah!

- Paul Simon

Mt. Kilimanjaro, from the plane

It’s hard to believe that I only arrived in Africa six days ago. At the same time, it has taken a while to realize I am actually here, as I’ve been lucky enough to be in great company since I touched down on Thursday afternoon. Most of my new-world experiences have come hand in hand with sharp and lasting loneliness, as I’ve processed each new shock without a friend as shelter or sounding board. But the MDP family is a beautiful thing, and I can say that I’ve never felt so comfortable a week after landing on a new continent.

After nearly 24 hours, 500 pages and approximately zero sleep, I was plopped into the laps of Jess, Monica, Phoebe, Francisco and Nico at the beautiful Wildebeest Camp in Nairobi. Starting my adventure in Kenya was a fantastic way to dip my toes into the development scene before arriving on site. My MDPeeps and I visited the MDG Centre to gain a macro understanding of the Millennium Village framework, hobnobbed with young NGO workers at a swanky expat bar, and stayed up all night challenging each others’ beliefs about the moral imperatives and gray areas behind development.* We also managed to see a giraffe, a warthog and a clan of baboons, plus watch Barcelona beat Manchester United over Tusker beer in a Nairobi sports bar.

*One of our most heated debates centered on whether it was right to visit Kibera, Africa’s largest slum. This argument deserves an entry of its own, so for now I will only say that I did go and that I’m glad I did. I’ll be posting my reasoning soon, and I hope you’ll share your thoughts, too. In the meantime, this short story about Kibera is one of the more compelling accounts I’ve read.

Impressions from Nairobi:

• Traffic. Good lord. Like nothing I’ve ever seen.
• mPesa, the revolutionary mobile phone-based banking system, is everywhere. Equity Bank makes appearances even in Kibera. Kenya really is an engine in the microfinance world.
• A palpable level of energy and hope.

The whirlwind tour of Nairobi ended after only three days, when I cleared my safari tent at Wildebeest and set out for Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. After a hectic slog through immigration and a heated argument in baggage claim, Saira and Hannah greeted me with open arms (and graciously accompanied me again three hours later when I was reunited with my suitcase).

I didn’t have high expectations of Dar – for me, the coastal capital city was merely a stopover on the way to Tabora, and I hadn’t even bothered to read about it. A surface glance revealed a city less developed than Nairobi but quite a bit more diverse, with the strong South Asian and Arab influence showing in the dress, the cuisine and the call to prayer.

But Saira, who had arrived in Dar a week earlier for a conference, had already scoped out our options and suggested that we take a boat from Slip Way and spend the day on one of the islands off the coast. After all, we’d be in arid, landlocked Tabora for the next three months, and we might as well act like tourists while we still have the chance.

Our perfect day in Bongoyo, ladies and gentlemen, needs no further description.

Coming soon: our adventures in Kiswahili, and a cross-country bus ride to Tabora!