Rain

The rain keeps coming down. For the past five or six years there have been no short rains in Tanzania. The short rains are usually for about a month or two in October to December. When we arrived it was quite dry and dusty, but about two weeks into our time it began to rain. We have had many beautiful sunny days, but many days and nights of rain as well. In the city, you don’t really think too much about the rain. Maybe your shoes get wet and you get damp. Here, there is MUD. It cakes to an unbelievable extent on all of your shoes and they become very, very heavy. Also, because you must dry your laundry outside, it is at times very difficult to get your clothes dry. You must be very sneaky and beat the rain!

For those of you who don’t know, Tony has just headed back to the states and he wrote to me about a mud adventure he had on the way to Nairobi to catch his plane. Here is his story:

"the road was flooded an hour into the trip, so after thinking about the situation for a half hour our driver decided to follow some other coaster buses and take an off road route around the flood. except that he went head into another flooded area and totally got stuck. watched him enlist a bunch of dudes to rock the bus while he tried to back out and instead sink deeper into the muddy water. then he got a dude with a truck to tie up and pull him out, but just sank even deeper. apparently never occurred to him that the bus never moved in any direction but down. I was mostly just curious to know how long was gonna pass until he called for another bus or sent us with someone else. The show lasted another half an hour and then he put me on a Bobby Tours bus, which I took the rest of the way. the driver drove like a bat outta hell and we made good time, which was actually kind of a bummer for me. I enjoyed
watching the countryside a lot more than the airport. the best part of the trip was seeing a baboon (!!!!!!!) crossing the road ahead of us. we passed by it and I got a pretty good view of it. funny that it took me two months to finally see a monkey, and then the motherload. pretty great."

On the drive here, we had some crazy moments ourselves on the muddy track from the school into Monduli. Thank God for 4 wheel drive.

On the other hand, I am very glad for the farmers and pastoralists here; this rain makes the cows and goats very happy as well. Without the rains the land dries up and the people suffer. These other minor complaints are nothing next to the blessing that rain is for the land and the people. I wish you could experience the beauty of Monduli. Even in the rain.