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This time a week ago Moshi was a broiling, dust-covered city covered with parched, seemingly long-dead grass. The bushes outside our front doors looked unsalvageable. One sees clearly why, when the rains fail, as they did two rainy seasons ago, it is a complete disaster. Basically every species of plant here has evolved to barely survive 10 months of desert-like climate and hang on just long enough until the water comes in late March.
Then, suddenly, the skies opened up and it feels like we’re in County Cork by comparison, though only to eyes that haven’t seen color in a while. First came a handful of showers, with most of the water running quickly over the rock-hard dirt. Then, over the last three days, a series of huge deluges. The grass quickly revived and the bushes perked up. On the downside, all the dust is now mud. More regrettably, virtually all of the desperately needed water is wasted. I drove out again this morning to Mtakuja, the village I wrote about last week. It had even rained there, and hard. The roads through the villages and the TPC sugar plantation were washed out and even in our SUV we eventually had to turn around. Joris, the project leader, shook his head and said he hadn’t seen anything like this in his two years here. The irrigation canals built by the plantation jumped their banks and flooded numerous villages and settlements along the way. But there was virtually no way for these villages to capture the water, which was already evaporating in the hot sun and running off the roads in rivulets into the drainage ditches used by the planters. Children dipped their large plastic containers into the muddy brown muck, grateful for a temporarily plentiful supply, and splashing around. It would be a happy site but for the knowledge they were collecting the water to drink it.
In our neighborhood, called Shanty Town (though actually the upscale part of Moshi), the streets have turned muddy but the weather has gotten a bit cooler. In the evenings, we sometimes walk around as the sun is setting and take in the view of Mt. Kilimanjaro, which now has quite a bit of snow (sorry Al Gore). One of the neighborhood sights is the Maasai, whose warrior ethos has found one of its few modern-day outlets in the industry they have come to dominate: security guards. Most of the nicer houses hire an “eskari” (guard) to stand watch at night, and more often than not these are Maasai. In the evenings, as everyone else commutes home, they walk to work, identifiable by their height, distinctive faces, jewelry and most notably the fact that they still wear their traditional dress of long, colorful robes. That is how you see them — more often than not also engaging in an activity that still looks fairly jarring considering their outfits: talking away on their cell phones in the one form of modernity virtually everyone has adopted here.
Speaking of the Maasai, our landlord Dr. Oneko has a Maasai friend who works at the hospital and has managed against great odds to build a career for himself that is basically akin to the job of physician assisant in the United States. The Maasai have the lowest educational attainment of any of Tanzania’s major tribes, so this is fairly remarkable in and of itself. He has a good career and a steady income. He reports, however, that his family has simply refused to accord him any status or acknowledge or even genuinely believe he is successful for one simple reason: he had no cows. His degrees, home, income all count for nothing. Finally, he has given in and bought a few cows, partly to diversify his wealth portfolio but mostly for reasons of domestic politics. But with his busy modern career, he is entirely too busy to keep track of them and accompany them on their foraging, and they have become a colossal headache. He often calls his friend from his cell phone. “Oneko,” he says wearily. “I have once again lost my cows. They could be 20 kilometers in any direction.” His herdsman’s blood cannot help him, and he seems understandably flabbergasted at his fate.
We’ve made plans for a 5-day drip to Rwanda over Easter. After reading a number of books about the country — its horrible history and its remarkable comeback — I’ve decided it’s a place I’d like to see and I don’t expect to be anywhere nearby again soon. Will offer photos and a full report when we return. We have also been busily negotiating with safari companies for a series of trips in the coming months as Maria’s family comes to visit in April and my friend Dave Scott in June. All of this again falls under the category of “probably unaffordable but when else will I ever do this?” But it also feels like the beginning of the end of my time here. After Rwanda, it will be just two weeks until a quick safari, then my long-planned month-long Return to Civilization trip to Europe, then back here for just a few weeks in June before Dave’s arrival and my departure soon after the end of that trip. The finish line is in site.
