chakula nzuri [good food]

Woooooow.  I feel like I just started a brand new life!  Where to start, where to start...

Yesterday I arrived in Zanzibar (for the second time) and was greeted at the airport by MYDO, the organization that I'll be volunteering with.  Mikuguni Youth Development Organzation (MYDO) aims to encourage youth in the area to participate in economic, social, and political development.  Over the next six weeks, I'll be helping them update their organizational structure, volunteer policies, communications, and fundraising strategies.  I'll also be trying to organize some sort of environmental and waste management workshop for the community.  A big issue here is that the municipality only has the capacity to collect 25% of the waste to bring to the dump, so there is trash all over the place.  Definitely not something that I can solve in six weeks, but perhaps I can try to make some sort of impact!

I'm living with a local family in an apartment just outside of Stone Town.  It's a third floor apartment near not too far from the hospital, the dala dala station (public transportation), and the Zanzibar Weightlifting Association -- all essential amenities.  My first goal in this town is to not get lost.

The mother of my homestay family, Mwana, is a local artist.  She has four children: Muhammad (age 4), Mudhakir (age 11), Fatuma (age 16), and Msomething-I-can't-pronounce-or-spell-but-should-probably-learn-soon (age 19).  The children all go to school in the morning, but are home by 12:30 or 1:00 each day.  In order to increase enrollment, schools in the area have two shifts -- 7AM-12:30PM, and 12:30PM-6PM. This way all the children can have a chance to go to school.  Even still, in most primary schools a single class might have up to 100 students.  I haven't met Mwana's husband yet because he is away for work until Friday.  There is a nice old woman who comes in and out of the apartment to help out.  I call her Bibi (grandmother), but other than greetings, so far we are having difficulties breaking the language barrier.

It's going to be a challenge living with a Swahili-speaking family!  Mwana speaks English quite well, so long as I speak polepole.  Msomething also speaks English really well, but as he is 19 years old and has friends and such, he hasn't been home much.  Everyone else mostly just speaks Swahili.  I'll have to learn quickly!

Mwana is an amaaaazing cook.  I've only had two meals cooked by her so far, but wow!  I am so glad to be living on the spice islands!  Everything is packed full of flavor.  This is something that I didn't experience the last time I was in Zanzibar because I was so excited to have access to pizza and brownies again after three months.  Mwana makes fantastic tea as well.  Green tea in the morning and for lunch, black tea at dinnertime.  The green tea is picked fresh from Mwana's garden, and then she prepares it with fresh ginger, cardamom, and whatever other spices can possibly be delicious with tea.  Mmmm.  And the juice!  Fresh mango and passion fruit juice!  Okay, enough about food -- I'm getting fatter just typing!

I have my own room with a nice big bed.  The bathroom is something to get used to though... The toilet has neither a toilet seat nor a flusher... Lucky for me that girls don't poop!

I'll try to put up some pictures of the apartment soon!  Maybe this weekend.

I hope all of you are fine and dandy!  Send me some love in the comments or by email!  Sometimes it's nice to hear from the outside world.