Priscilla Had Babies… and Then Stole My Spatula

 

Priscilla is the name I gave to the mouse living in my kitchen (Penny, her best bud, has taken up residence in my guest room).  Without my permission, Priscilla decided it would be okay to have six babies and continue living under the sink rent free.  Two of those babies have since drowned in buckets of water. I guess the fact that I didn’t try to save them made Priscilla angry because not long after, she took off with my only spatula.  I’m not kidding.  On many occasions, I have woken up to find that the spatula I left on the stove the night before had been dragged across my kitchen.  On this occasion, I woke up and it was just gone.  I have been looking everywhere for it for the last week and it’s nowhere to be found.   

In addition to Priscilla’s babies and party guests, other critters have started showing up again.  I saw my first monster cockroach of the season today.  This means two things: one, monster spiders are right around the corner (they eat monster cockroaches), and two, it’s starting to get hot again.  When it starts to get hot again, it means that cashew season is coming and my skin, eyes, and throat have made it very clear in the past that I am, in fact, allergic to cashew oil.  Cashews are one of the biggest crops in this area and the harvesting process is actually pretty cool to see, even to a victim of its torture such as myself.  First they collect all of the cashews from the trees (ok, ok, duh).  The actual nut that you eat is protected by a hard shell and biting into this hard shell induces an allergic reaction for everyone, not just me (I have a friend you can ask if you don't believe me).  The best way to remove the nut from the shell: fire.  During cashew season, when you walk around the village, you can see Tanzanians standing next to enormous pots with fire blazing out of the top.  It looks awesome and even better, everything smells like cashews.  After the cashews have been blazed, they’re dumped on the ground and the hard shells are broken off.   Voila! Delicious cashews ready for you to peel and enjoy.  Little kids walk around the market selling them on big pizza-pan looking plates.  They’re all separated into little handfuls and sold for next to nothing.  If you don’t feel like buying any, just wait, someone will probably just give them to you.  It’s a pretty sweet deal and I took full advantage when I got here.  Then I broke out in hives and have had to abstain ever since.  I’ll tell ya, it’s been rough because I love cashews.  Did you know that cashews are in the same plant family as poison oak and poison ivy?  Cashews... no not cashews, cashew oil causes me the same problems that the oil from poison oak does.  When cashews are being roasted, there’s no way around breathing in said oil because it rises into the air and its everywhere.  This, of course, means that there is no way for me to avoid my allergic reaction and therefore also means that this year’s cashew season is my cue to leave.  You know, just in case the unbearable heat, mice babies, and monster insects didn’t do it for me.

On September 15^th, I will leave this house and go to the city to sign paperwork and get told I haven’t contracted any terminal illnesses (I hope).  As of September 20^th, I will officially close the book on my Peace Corps service and I will be on to my next adventure.  Needless to say, this will be a bittersweet event for me.  There are people here that I feel like I should be able to know for the rest of my life.  Somewhere along the lines, my Tanzanian friends became just my friends and I talk to them about a lot of the same things that I would talk about with my friends from home.  I’m really sad that leaving here very likely means leaving these friends for good.  No more random dinners or watching movies or talking about the future or even bonding over the fact that we don’t like our supervisor.  See, sounds a lot like America, huh? These are friends that I have interacted with and lived next to every day for two whole years.  That’s a long time considering all the places I have, and will, live in this decade.

While saying goodbye to these school friends will be rough, I have been aware all along that the parting was coming.  The realization that blindsided me the other day, though, was the fact that I would be leaving the people in the marketplace as well (Duh, right?).  Two or three times per week, I go to the market and I always hit the same stands.  First I visit my banana guy, then my onion/garlic/green pepper people, followed by my egg guy, and then my tomato guy.  After that, I just walk around so that I can say hi to the old man that is always sleeping at his rice table and the group of old men sitting at the chai tables doing nothing.  On days when I don’t feel like cooking, I always go get rice and beans from Mwanahamisi and on my way there I greet the man who sews my dresses and the guy that sells me phone credit.  On my way home, I stop at another stand to buy water and sandwich cookies, and the sandwich cookie boy always gives me an extra package for free.  With my friends at the school, I know I will be able to interact with them through email because they know how to use it.  The Tanzanians in the market, though, have never even heard of the internet and many of them never had the opportunity to learn how to read or write.  That means that when I say goodbye to the people in the market, I am really saying goodbye and that will be the end.  Done. No more interaction.  That realization was like a punch in the gut..especially since I didn’t think about it until I saw my egg guy’s face when I told him I was leaving.  So now I am trying to prepare my heart for some serious hurt. 

I did, however, say that my leaving would be bittersweet.  The downside is saying goodbye to some insanely wonderful people.  The upside is that I am being met on the other side by some more wonderful people and between leaving and arriving I have some awesome travel plans with even more wonderful people.  Man, I love my life.  On October 2^nd, I will leave Tanzania and begin my trek back to the US.  My first stop is South Africa where I will meet up with a friend from Michigan Tech who is finishing her Peace Corps service right around the same time as me.  We will stay in South Africa for a night and then begin our 30+ hour journey to Paraguay.  We’ll spend a week there with another of our Peace Corps friends before heading to Panama via a long layover in Peru for lunch.  We’re going to get to Panama just in time for the World Cup Qualifier between USA and Panama and we will be there just long enough for the Festival of the Black Christ (look it up, it’s going to be awesome!).  We have a friend finishing her Peace Corps service in Panama while we’re there so she is going to come with us afterwards to Costa Rica and then on to the Dominican Republic.  Three blondes taking on the tropics.  Sounds fun, right?  The Dominican Republic will be my last stop abroad before I touch down stateside.

As you can see, I have plenty to look forward to once I finish my Peace Corps service.  Exciting travel plans and then my amazing family ready for me once I get home.  I can’t wait to give them all hugs.  I am so incredibly grateful for all of the wonderful opportunities, hard lessons, fantastic memories, and amazing people this experience has brought to my life.  My time here has definitely shaped me as a person and I know it will have an enormous affect on what I do and who I become in the future. Tanzania and the friends I have met here will always have a place in my heart and I will miss them dearly but all good things must come to an end, right? It is finally time for me to be home again.  Ready or not, here I come!