The Man Who Saw The Moon.

Well we have all come across a very interesting Islamic public holiday today.

We were informed at the beginning of the week that Friday might be a public holiday...we more or less forgot about it until Thursday at the office and it needed to be determined whether or not we were to come to work the next day.  'Oh...I don't know', said our admin lady.  'Well....is it or isn't it?'  I asked trying to hide my smile...'Well...she said we won't know until late tonight.'  Now I began to realise perhaps she was serious.  'So how will everyone know whether or not to come into work?'  My colleague mumbled something and left me to figure out what it means that you don't know whether or not it's a public holiday until late at night.

Well...later on in the day another Tanzanian friend decided to take the time to explain it to me and all became as clear as mud.

'We won't know whether or not it is a public holiday until the man can see the moon', he said.  'The moon?' I asked...I had to suppress the urge to giggle...'Yes' he said.  'At eight oclock tonight an Islamic man will go outside and if he can see the moon it will be a public holiday...if he can't see it, we all come to work.' 

'Is it the end of the moon cycle?' I asked.  My friend replied...'Yes it is so it is considered special if he can see the moon - hence the holiday.'

So later on that evening when we were all at home group for church, we discussed this interesting way of forming a public holiday.  My house stuff had already told me earlier in the day that she wouldn't be in the next day because it undoubtedly would be a day off.  It made me doubt whether the Islamic man from wherever he came from would ever say 'nope...can't see the moon.  Sorry everyone - back to work!!'

As we were leaving home group I asked the guard at the gates - 'is tomorrow a public holiday?'  'Yes!' he replied...so there you have it.  Today we are all inside...we've dismissed our guard so the house is quiet from Tanzanians...well it was until a plumber turned up on our doorstep deciding to use this opportunity to catch up on his quotes.  So he'll be around but otherwise we are sitting enjoying the quiet, doing our school work and quietly being thankful to the 'man who saw the moon'.

A note from Amber...

I miss OZ alot. The most thing that I miss is the pool and the beach.  I miss my family alot as well.  And I don't really have alot of friends here because we have hedges around our house but sometimes friends come over.  

We have two sheep - a male and a female.  Four dogs - two females and two males.  Two ridgebacks and two just dogs - don't know what type they are.  Four ducks - one male and three females.  Chickens - one rooster and don't know how many girls but we have lots of hens.  Uhm...

We are building a tree house - it's at the way far back of the house.  We have a big back yard and from the tree house there is a log going across to a platform where we can look over the hedge to see the people.  Once we saw a dog that had two broken back legs.  Dad said that he might have been runover because he had a big patch where there was blood and no skin.  I felt sorry for it...these men were pulling it by the two back legs...I felt like getting down there and saying - 'hey stop picking on the dog - why dont you start taking care of it?'  

I ran into mum feeling sorry for it and I said to her 'there's a dog outside that has two broken back legs and a big patch on its back where it's skin has been cut open.'  Mum said that maybe the dog has been run over as well just like dad said and she said somebody might shoot it just to have its life over and done with so it doesn't need to live with pain until it dies. 

I've seen lots of blind people on our street - mum thinks past our street there is a home for them.  I've seen alot of people that like have their fingers chopped off or they're using crutches.  I feel sorry for them as well.  I dont know if they'll grow back?

I like learning the language here - it's really cool.  It's a good opportunity for me to come here and learn a different language and learn different cultures - not alot of kids my age get to do that - except Kirsty and her family [Mike and Lyndall Rothery's daughter].

I did have a chick once that mum and dad gave me for my birthday but I loved it to death - and it died.  Dad said that it had it's head going up and down and it couldn't hold it up for very long so they put him in their room to sleep for the night and in the middle of the night dad said it stopped cheaping and it died.  But now we have three chicks and one turkey chick- we did have two but one died.  So now we have one turkey - it's the male. 

We've connected with a school in Australia called SIDE.  To me it's really hard but I don't know how it is to Kia and Tahlia.  I need to probably do two or three or four pages of maths and handwriting - probably one page; and english I need to do probably five or four pages.  That's a guess!  But the good thing is SIDE is pretty cool.  It has lots of activities. 

This was Amber writing this...

Kwaheri! Tutuonana badai! - Meaning Goodbye!  See you later!  :-)

Things we see here that would not be in Oz

It's amazing the sights here...and I'm not talking about scenery although with Mt Kilimanjaro so close that is pretty impressive also.  Nine things...

1. We see taxis/public transport with so much decoration on their front windscreen that only a small spot for their face to see out is bare...Hmmm...

2.  Babies rugged up to the max in the middle of summer to prevent a cold - and I've been lectured also to put some clothes on my kids even though it's 35 degrees!!

3.  Trucks crabbing - I'd never heard that term before I came to Tanzania.  It's daunting to be driving towards a truck that has the back two wheels swinging a meter sideways to the front two tyres...

4.  'Dudu's - or bugs that lay eggs in your drying clothes on the line.  They do their deed at dusk so if we don't get the clothes in time the eggs implant themselves in our skin resulting in a nasty red sore...

5.  Amazing and powerful Boab trees - they're just incredible...all over the place.  Except here they're called baobab I think...

6.  Dulla Dullas - Toyota Hiace's painted beautiful with the driver's favourite pop star or Jesus picture.  Each one has amazing slogans on the bag - one I saw when directly translated was - 'worrying - intelligent yes!'  There are lots more that escape my mind...Dulla dullas typically will carry around thirty people - or should I say sardines!!!

7.  Half finished houses.  Most people can't get a loan for the bank so they start the house then come back several years later when they have saved enough to put another tier of bricks on...

8.  Penda Taxi - a massive version of a wheel burrow where by some poor man and possibly his friend carts huge loads or bricks, wood or whatever their client is wanting them to carry.  They have no brakes or steering - just an old tyre at the back that they rest the back end on to slow it down - a little...Many deaths result from the usage of these.

9.    Ach...can't think of any for now, but I'm sure I will the next time I leave home!!

everyday life...

On one hand it's amazing how very little changes in day to day living here...and yet on the other - SO much is different!!...Hopefully this will give just a snapshot of the similarities and differences we face each day...

We've stuck to the 7am wake time for the kids...that gives me a chance to have quiet time etc before the house gets noisy...Roosters start way before that though at around 5am...including our own.  Our chooks live in a chicken house - locked away all night to escape 'genet's' - blood sucking wild cats.  Similarly the ducks and sheep are locked up too.  Darran has acquired all of these animals that they might one day multiply and give us food...for now though they're fertilising the garden, ridding the plants of the humongous slugs here, and keeping the lawn nice and clipped.  So in total we have a duck house, chook house, dog house and kid house...hee hee...only kidding about the last, although sometimes it would be nice to...STOP.  must stop dreaming now...

Just some of our animals!!  The two outside pups here are our little monster Ridgebacks.  We're hoping they'll grow up healthy and strong and be good guard and family dogs.

I've gotten stuck into kids schooling now...we've signed up for the curriculum from SIDE which has been interesting...Trying to figure out how to teach three different grades at once is hard work!!  I totally admire teachers who do this for a living...although this is me now also!!  The first week was terrible but it's now getting better as we get into the swing of things...So school goes from 8:30am - 2pm ish (depending on how well they all apply themselves).  We have converted our dinning room into the school room with a nice 'L' shaped school desk that we all sit at.  I've decorated the room with nice posters of Phonics, Tell the Time, Class room Rules, Months of the Year etc...it looks like a regular classroom - except with less students!!

Michiah's Food Train.

Amber painting a mural of a truck...

Tahlia learning to balance...

Kia's first attempt at building a city.

Lunch consists of bread sandwiches still...only Vegemite doesn't go too well with this bread as it has humongous amounts of sugar in it.  Sigh...we can get 'sugar free' bread in town but that requires a journey of about one hour to a place about 4kms away.  There are bitumen roads the whole way once we get off our road, but the traffic is something else to be described in another email.

In the afternoons the kids either play in their huge tree house that Darran's built or we go out to various mother's group, home group, visit friends etc...it's good fun.  We've made a nice group of friends here - mainly white people.  The difference in culture between us and Tanzanians is amazing...rarely a day goes by we are not asked for money for something.  People with deformed body parts bail us up in our cars asking for money for doctors, house helpers ask for money for hospital bills for family, people constantly asking jobs, loans for houses, loans to visit sick family far away...the list is endless and it's exhausting.  It's hard to embrace the principle of 'give the shirt off your back' when if you did you'd be left with nothing in a matter of a week.  Besides...it doesn't actually help by giving handouts...somehow we have to work with people to teach skills, money management etc...so much to be done and yet so little resources to do so.

This is our guard/gardener - Samueli.  He's Darran's right hand for outdoor things at home...

This is the alternative way to carrying kids...not one we've embraced!!! Hee hee...he actually got Kia up there too - just amazing.

Evenings we sit down to a normal Australian meal.  Our house lady (Anna) used to cook us Tanzania food but the variety of only 3-4 meals soon wore Darran down so ... now I'm back to cooking!! Anna loves cooking and so is learning to cook our meals...she is up to about three meals she can do on her own which comes in so handy when I'm out late.  Anna is the most amazing person I know - she somehow magically transforms my house each day from an absolute mess to a sparkling shiny house.  I will never cease being grateful...

Kids are in bed by 7pm so Darran and I crash soon after.  We have no TV so there's little to sit in the lounge for...we generally hit the sack around 8pm and read or watch DVD's on our laptop.  we've been able to pick up some TV series on the roadside which is fun.

Sleep is interrupted constantly by dogs, beeping horns, crying babies etc.  We've managed to block it out, but I fear what it must be like for our guests when they come - we definitely recommend ear plugs!!

That's our average day...lots of details not included of course...they'll come another day...

Erin :-)