This day started off with a very early breakfast as our shuttle was scheduled to meet us at the Guest House at 7:00 am. Getting an early start doesn’t mean getting anywhere early. The traffic in Nairobi has most certainly picked up over the last few years. Hopefully that is a sign of increased prosperity with more and more being able to afford cars. Having said that though, something has to give! A city like Nairobi will find it most difficult to move forward if people can’t get from one place to the next in a timely manner.
So with questions running through our minds of “Will we ever get there?”, it was a bit of a surprise when we finally ended up travelling down a straight highway, through dryland, going east in the direction of Mombasa. It was not long to the turn-off towards Arusha, Tanzania.
A last minute pull-off just before the border gave us all a chance to stretch (and a few shopping opportunities at the Curio Shop.) I hope the batik purchases will work out well in some new creative project. I can hardly wait to see!
Getting to the Kenya/Tanzanian border introduced our learning tour participants to a whole new level of aggression. It was clearly obvious to each of us that these hawkers were not new to their trade.
After going through customs and leaving our cash donations with the border folks, we headed off under the capable leadership of Erwin and Krispen from Global Service Corps – a partner of MCC, as well as Simeon who is a service worker for MCC Tanzania. We were most certainly humbled by their commitment to the people as well as their knowledge of the context in which they work and the programs they support.
Our first stop in Tanzania was to visit to sand dam #2. This dam was built just this past November and had not yet experienced a good rainy season as the last one had been somewhat disappointing.
The biggest challenge that they faced was pulling together the communities to work on something so new. Sand dams are not yet as well a known entity in this part of Tanzania as they were in the Kola area of Kenya. On top of this, might it be true that the Maasai in Tanzania are shyer, more individual and perhaps even more traditional than those we met in Kenya?
The visit to sand dam #1 was interrupted by a bit of a break for lunch. This was our introduction to goat. Needless to say, the noodles went over big time!
Sand dam #1 was also built this past November, so it also was waiting for more rainy seasons before it would be functioning at capacity.
"Might he get sick from drinking this water?" I asked. The answer was "Yes!" "Have they ever heard of the simple technology called SODIS which uses the sun's UV rays to purify water?" There was much interest and this will be worthy of a follow up when I return to the office in Winnipeg.
As we continued on to Arusha, we also made a stop at a model farm. Tanzania projects seem to be more based on working with individual farmers who will then become promoters for other farmers in their area with regards to innovative technologies that make farming in dry land areas possible.
The farm we stopped at had an inground reservoir (upper centre of picture) that was used to store water, covered with a sheet of black plastic to reduce the evaporation.
Kitchen gardens (also referred to as keyhole gardens) were an innovative way of concentrating nutrients and plants in small areas. More on these later.
Kitchen gardens (also referred to as keyhole gardens) were an innovative way of concentrating nutrients and plants in small areas. More on these later.
We finally arrived in Arusha and settled in at the La Jacaranda Hotel which would be our home for the next three nights. Dinner with everyone was up in the open air restaurant. This is a great group to be part of!
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