Karibu blog! 

Karibu may be one of our most used Swahili words, because it means both “welcome to..." and “you're welcome". That and asante (“thank you"), asante sana (“thank you very much"), nzuri (“good"), nzuri sana (“very good"), poa (“cool" or mandatory response to mambo/“hello"), pole (prounced poh-lay, meaning sorry for your unfortunate experience/pain/work... a very useful word!), pole pole (“slowly"/“slow down"... our go-to when we are being swarmed by people trying to sell us stuff), kidogo (“little"/“small", as in how much Swahili we can speak), and Kilimanjaro mbili tafadhali baridi sana kama barafu (two Kilimanjaro beers please, cold as ice)!

In just over two months in Tanzania, we have picked up on enough of the language to hold basic conversations, get around, stay hydrated ;), only complete with a lot of hand gestures and laughter. And now we're taking our learnings on the road! Sam and I just finished out our volunteer positions at the Mungere Secondary School and have two more weeks to explore TZ before returning back to the States.

Here's what we've been up to! 

(Finally can upload a blog because we are in a city with WiFi!)

A majority of our time in Mto Wa Mbu was split between the school and the staff house (our Pepto Palace), pictured here with a rainbow! The rainbow was due to one of the refreshing afternoon rainstorms, which were far less frequent than what is typical for the March-April rainy season. The unusually dry months impacted farming that relies on heavy seasonal rains all across East Africa. 

In the heat, our laundry could air dry within a couple hours.

Our living room doubled as a work-out/yoga studio and cribbage tournament arena, both of which were frequented daily. We even have a structured workout routine that we've been repping, and an epic cribbage tournament with a wager attached (current score: Caroline at 23, Sam at 17... pole!) 😉

We'd mostly spend time in here or the kitchen, where we really leaned into cooking delicious meals (and for Sam, taking time to “plate" each meal). So much so that I am going to post a separate blog on food and Sam's beautiful designs!

If we weren't doing any of these activities, or sleeping, we were out playing with these cuties!

(My attempt at the three monkeys🙊🙉🙈)

My ♡!

As for life at the school, our time was spent working together on projects and activities while trying to stay cool/hydrated 😅

We attended the second round of UMISETTA (district competitions for the students) and cheered on the athletes from our school. Sam gave some great coaching advice and support. I took pictures with my favorite students :)

Sam put in a ton of effort creating consistent structure and trainings for the sports program. Since they have never seen or played basketball before, he created a series of trainings that helped teach all the students (and school sports director) the basics. They picked it up quickly and after a couple weeks the best students competed in an all-school tournament, coached/refereed by Sam. 

It was a joy to watch them play, knowing how far they came and so quickly, with major props to Coach Sam for bringing them the excitement and skill of this sport. He also created an entire sports playbook for the school, complete with training programs and resources for the sport director to reference and implement moving forward.

I spent time collecting data around the farm and compiled information into a farm analysis with my findings and recommendations. Many of the projects will need to be managed on a long-term scale, but in the short-term we worked together to revamp the composting systems on campus.

As a team with the operations and grounds managers, we designed, built, and installed a new compost bin!

Couldn't have done it without our favorite... Freddy :)

A rewarding aspect about this project was being able to educate folks at the school on the uses of the compost bin and how the composted material helps improve the soil, and therefore the food they harvest and eat.

We also created a 3-bin earthworm compost system on campus for more of that nutrient-rich “black gold" soil and “compost tea". Sam and I had fun going with the students to collect earthworms from a nearby rice paddy... muddiness and jokes ensued!

The water projects are also underway! The team of fundi (“worker") men completed that massive 120,000L water tank I previously wrote about, and are now making progress on the new hand-washing station. (Ask me sometime about their method for installing the piping... I am constantly baffled by how construction works here haha)

One of my favorite places on campus was the rabbitry - especially when a new litter was born!

 😍

And more cuteness happened when this lil pup wandered onto campus one day! 

It took all my self-control to not try to keep this baby fox-like puppy for my own...

Easily the best day though was a couple Sundays back when we went on a wild adventure! Through the school headmaster, we arranged to rent two motorcycles for ~$10 each. And boy did we get our money's worth! We took off from our house in the morning and rode west, taking us up the escarpment ridge and to an overlook of Lake Manyara.

So far, so good! We both have had limited motorcycle experience in our lives, so it was a sink or swim reintroduction, and we were crushing it. Really embraced our inner wild hogs!

😆

We rode an hour or so to a town called Karatu where we found a beautiful lunch spot to stop for food and refreshments. We were also celebrating our 7-month anniversary that day so everything felt extremely special. (Yes, we have really only been together 7 months! It's easy to feel like it's been longer after all of our shared experiences here... you could say we have gotten pretty close throughout our time here 🙈)

We couldn't get enough and set off to ride all the way to the rim of the Ngorongoro Crater, a remarkable land feature and national park for all the highly sought-after safari animals. We were stopped at the first gate and informed motorcycles were not allowed to pass due to wild animals (elephants) in the road. We were fine with that and started on our cruisin' journey back through the beautiful countryside of the region.

We finished out the day with a sundowner beer at a lodge on top of the escarpment and a ride down the ridge during sunset. We stopped again at a creek to see migrating yellow-billed storks flocking and nesting. There were thousands of these beautiful pale-pink birds and reminded us of how wild this place we were living is.

Our curiosity of this creek that we'd never seen before led us to ride up the rode next to it, taking us to a beautiful spot called Migombani Camp. This camp is mostly occupied by folks passing through the area to go on a safari, plus the occasional family making an adventure of their weekend. Our eyes lit up seeing this place. Not only did it have incredible views, an infinity pool, and a gorgeous baobab tree and swing, but it had GRASS. Green, lush grass... a luxury we never knew we'd miss so much. Sam was particularly fond of this amenity for the potential to run and play sports all over the place. 

And that's exactly what we decided we'd do the following weekend.

We planned out our meals, shopped and cooked, packed swimsuits and sports equipment, borrowed some camping gear from the program, and set ourselves up in our new home for the weekend.

It was heaven. We swam and made fires and swung high and climbed higher and played on the grass and hiked and cooked on the fire and stargazed and drank real coffee and played some more. Our friend Will (teacher in Moshi) was even able to join us Saturday night for the fun!

It was incredible. And definitely had its “Africa moments"... like when were relaxing by the pool and a large male baboon appeared and started approaching Sam for his apple (which Sam promptly chucked away), only to return with his whole family to enjoy a drink out of the pool! The camp staff shooed them away before I could get a picture (plus I got tf out of there fast.. baboons are very intimidating).

When it came time to leave I was definitely in denial, but was also grateful to have had a much-needed nature reset. We got a head start down the road by carrying out all our “glamping" equipment which I'm sure looked ridiculous and hilarious.

Those two adventures were critical for us to find a sense of adventure and connection to the beautiful, wild place we were living. Being able to explore on our own, without a guide or outside influence, was empowering to say the least. And spending uninhibited time in nature is where I feel the most alive and the most myself, so having that back felt like I was home again. 

With these positive experiences in the bag, we were propelled into a fun final week in this little home-away-from-home of ours. We made a final to-do list, which included tying up loose ends on our school projects, getting and giving gifts, packing and cleaning, and making some final memories with our friends both big and small.  

Thursday is the big market day and people come from all over to sell and buy goods. It's also a fun day to get together over some post-work drinks and eats. We motivated all the staff to come out for our final Thursday in town and got some refreshments. Sam and I treated them to their favorite local delicacy - fire-roasted goat leg, dipped in salt and pili pili (chili sauce). I was persuaded to have a few bites but still find after two years of not eating meat I still struggle with stomaching very much of it. The teachers (and Sam) thoroughly enjoyed it though 👌

Friday morning rolled around, and we caught our final sunrise commute up to the school. We watched the morning assembly, Sam tried hard to blend in...

“Easiest game of Where's Waldo ever" - Sam 

😂

We collected a group of students who were done with their finals to finally guide us to the famed waterfall by the school. 

Even though it took us to our final day at the school to go on this kind of adventure with the students, it made for the perfect sendoff activity. I can't think of many ways I love exploring nature more than a beautiful waterfall hike, and this morning really scratched that itch. 

We meandered through banana tree farms, big canopy tree groves with monkeys swinging in the branches, and over streams up to the waterfall. (We learned there is an even bigger one further upstream, but a staff ran into a massive snake there in the past, so we were fine with just going to this one haha)

Made it!

Mother Nature always has a way of pulling me back in so wondrously and graciously. Some of the students were starting to play closer to the water, eventually standing all the way in the falls... too tempting not to join!

Such a magical place to close the chapter on our time there and get a fresh start for the next!

We finished up the day getting some photos with all our favorites 💕

As one final sendoff from momma nature, a massive dust storm blew in right as school was ending, so we hulled down in the classrooms with the kids (who all seemed used to this kind of weather). The winds brought the rains so we ran into a bigger classroom to close out the day and say our goodbyes. We received some kindhearted words from the headmaster and were given the floor to express our gratitude to all the students and staff. There were cheers and tears and lots of hugs as we left, and we are still feeling bittersweet about parting ways, but leave with so much gratitude for getting to be a small part of these amazing kiddos' lives.

We are now back in Arusha, the big city between Mto Wa Mbu and Moshi. We're staying at our favorite place, Waka Waka Hostel, before heading to Moshi for the week. And then to really close out this “vacation" portion of our African adventures, we'll be flying over to the white sand beaches of Zanzibar for a week! We are feeling the wakes of transition and embracing this shift towards a fun, free, adventurous time in this beautiful country. 

💙💚💛