life's a landcruiser?... enjoy the ride

i just had maybe the best car ride of my life (which is saying a lot, i've had some pretty stellar road trips in my life) this morning i woke up early already irritated. i had to make the 1 hour motorcycle ride + the 3 hour bus ride into town to go to the bank. Ugh. If you think banks in the states are annoying try one in tanzania. Lines are a fantasy, so put on your helmet and get ready for full body contact banking. my motorcycle ride was a half hour early so i went without food... i really like my breakfast. then i finally got to the main road to wait for a bus to take me to town and... of course, no buses. an hour later still no buses. a few cars passed but none would slow down for the pathetic looking, hungry peace corps volunteer crouched on the side of the road. i kept flagging each one that passed anyways figuring it couldn't hurt. and it didn't. low and behold after about an hour and a half of waiting a lovley landcruiser slowed down and rolled down its window. Two white faces peered back at me. Now, let me explain to you i almost never see white people, especially when i'm not in town, especially ones i don't already know. so this was a bit of surprise. I asked if they would be passing through Iringa town, they said they were. I asked if it wouldn't be too much trouble to give me a lift there, they said of course it wouldn't be. So i crawled into the 4 wheel drive, leather interiored land cruiser with automatic windows and locks, a functioning air conditioner, a cd player, and a jack to plug your ipod into. It was stepping into another world. One i haven't visited in a LONG time. As we got to talking I found out they were two south african men who worked for a company based in south africa that works all over the world looking for alternative energy sources. Graham and Louie. They were wonderful. We talked the whole way. Louie has been to 84 countries and shared fantastic stories. It was interesting to hear his take on Tanzania in comparison to other African nations and other developing nations on different continents. I was so excited to talk to someone about development work (literally so excited i realized i was trembling a little and couldn't wipe a goofy grin off my face)... what are we doing here? whats our goal? why is it working so much better in Mozambique and Kenya (2 of Tanzanians neighbors) and stalling here in Tanzania. There are so many reasons and here is a man who as seen a lot of countries and cultures and could make some educated comparisons. It was so refreshing and even a little relieving to know that my frustrations and challenges aren't necessarily because of something that i haven't done right. I have come to the conclusion (with the agreement of Louie and Graham) that development work here has gotten ahead of itself. the real problem is in the education system. Swahili is the official language of Tanzania and English is the second language and considered the language of the educated and powerful. In primary school children are spoken to and taught in Swahili, which can be a challenge in the more rural areas because before school many children only speak the tribal language. English is taught as a foreign language the way students in the states are taught Spanish or french in high school. When these Tanzanian students reach secondary school all subjects are taught in English.... and then we wonder why they don't really learn anything. imagine having taken Spanish in high school then going to college where everything was taught in Spanish and you were expected to understand complex subjects such as physics. A little tough right? I will say that their memorization skills are superb. But this is the root of the issues. We need to teach them secondary school in Swahili so they can understand what is being taught or we need to teach them English from the start. This is what Kenya has done and it has been largely successful. Many of the wealthier families send students to boarding schools in Kenya so that they can have a good education and truly learn.

But I digress, the point is that these men were wonderful. They stopped and treated me to a "spot of breakfast" along the way. It was a wonderful surprise and a perfect cure for the bad mood i had started the day with. Louie told me he has started traveling when he was 17 and hasn't stopped. "Its the best education there is." Its true, I've learned things i didn't know were possible to learn, and for better or for worse "you never regret travel." The trip ended with him dropping me off in front of the bank. I told him that i was going in an attempt to reclaim some mysteriously missing funds. His reply was "let me give you my card. if you have any trouble in there call me up. i know the manager and we go way back." this is what i love about life, you meet the most interesting people along the way.... so ya, its been said before but i'll say it again: life is a journey and we should, by all means, enjoy the ride