#saba saba

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In honor of the souls lost and stolen innocence today.

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Sorry for the blurry nessss lost the original :(

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Tujja Babya

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Photos: Chameleone fills stadium in one man show

Photos: Chameleone fills stadium in one man show

Legendary star and artiste Jose Chameleone last night held his much anticipated annual concert dubbed Legend Saba Saba where he gathered masses from all parts of the country. In an exhibition that saw no curtain raisers or any other announced singers, Jose Chameleone performed to a full Lugogo Crickey Oval with revelles singing in chorus song after song.

Chameleone performed for three straight…

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Chameleone list of songs to perform at concert leaks

Chameleone list of songs to perform at concert leaks

While at his rehearsals we managed to have a peep at the list of songs Chameleone is rehearsing for and these are some of them.

Which one do you think he should add to the list?

Beyi Kali

Nekolera Mali

Fuga Bi

Ekinuma

Balangire

Nkusaba

Bayuda

Katupakase

Technology

Kuma Obwesigwa

Basiima Ogenze

Sanyu Lyange

Gwenafuna

Jamila

Tubonge

Moto Moto

Mukisa Gwo

Nkwagala nyoo

Daniella

Tolina Kisa

Gimme Gimme

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saba saba. market. wow.

So I know it has been quite some time since I posted – I’m already a week behind and that is what I wanted to make sure I did NOT do while I’m here. Right now, it’s Sunday, July 20, evening. We don’t have internet; it’s been out since yesterday so I think we’ll hopefully get it back tomorrow when school resumes from the weekend. Figured now is a good time to catch up on this stuff and I’ll post it when we have internet.. eventually. But as a brief aside, I really am loving it here so far. Being with these girls is just amazing. They’re so sweet. And even though they’re in secondary schools (ages 12-18, for the most part), they still have their innocence. They love singing “BINGO” during English class, and while they talk to me about boys, they’re always goofing around like little kids. I love it. When I was home, 5 months of life in Morogoro just seemed so long and daunting but now it doesn’t seem like nearly enough time.

Okay, last weekend. My first weekend in Tanzania. Saturday morning, I spent the day shadowing the other volunteer, still getting to know everything. A few of the forms have extra tuition on Saturdays which just means extra classes, so there are still a lot of teachers on campus on Saturday, which is nice. The girls also have a lot of chores they have to do – maintaining the garden, cleaning the chicken coop, doing their laundry, and lots of other things. But between their chores and class on Saturday, they do have time to relax. For them, relaxing is literally just hanging out. They don’t have televisions, computers, or games at their disposal. For fun, they just talk, joke around, maybe play some netball or soccer. Weekends at home seem so different. Life is much simpler here.

Anyway, back to my weekend. After we finished up the work we were doing to prepare for the visitors that were coming to Sega that next week, I ended up eating lunch with some of the girls. Nusura, the student who I met in the states when she was in Connecticut after going to school in Philadelphia, helped me get food and I sat with her and some of her friends. Many of the students are Muslim and celebrating Ramadan, so a lot of students are fasting during the day. Nusura hasn’t been fasting, though, so I was excited to spend some time with her. Lunch was ugali and beans. Ugali is like mushy, flavorless polenta. I don’t really like it because it’s just completely flavorless (keep in mind, at the school, they’re making it for 152 students and staff, so I’m sure when they make it for that many people it may not be as good). Nusura ate it with her hands, which was actually kind of cool because she made the ugali into a little spoon which she scooped up the beans into. It has a weird, moldy texture. I don’t really know how to describe it. It’s big in Africa. The countries that eat that type of starch, it’s cornmeal, mixed with water, mashed up into a weird consistency, all have a different name for it and a different take on it. Everyone I’ve talked to here like it, but they kind of know that most tourists don’t like it. It’s just so bland. And thick.. SO thick.

After chatting with Nusura at lunch (I love this girl, she’s such a sweetheart, she’s smart, studious, always happy to help with anything, and her English is incredible), she invited some friends over and some just sat down when they saw me with her. Nusura left to do some work, but I stayed and hung out with a few of the girls. They were all different forms. Nusura is in form 3 and is 17 years old. The other girls I was with were in forms 1, 2, and 3. They were all joking around with me and asking me questions about my life. I was telling them about my family, and as soon as I told them I have a dog, they immediately asked if I had pictures. As you all probably know, I LOVE talking about my dogs and showing pictures of little Ryder. So I ran to get my phone to show them a ton of pictures of him. They thought he was so cute. Pets aren’t really a thing here. Dogs are used to guard crops, for protection, and to herd goats and sheep. But at Sega, there are 3 dogs – Bingo, Neptune, and Jupiter. I’ve heard that sometimes when the girls arrive at Sega, they tend to be afraid of the dogs at first, which is so sad. But they get used to them. Everyone here loves the dogs and takes good care of them. Jupiter had to have one of her legs cut off because of some infection she had, but she’s still the leader of the pack. Bingo is the sweetest. She’s one of those dogs that is always asking for attention. And then Neptune just does her own thing. Unless there’s food, then she begs. All 3 of them do.

The girls got really excited about something else, and one of them, Rosie (Rosemary), ran to get a game she had made, from her dorm. The girls said they don’t have actual sets of cards or games, so they resort to making their own, sometimes. We have a ton of games for them in the volunteer house and storage room, but sadly, I’ve heard if we just leave them out in the open for them, they won’t come back. It’s a shame. But anyway. She had made cards from cardboard for her game and one of the cards said “diamond,” 4 of them said “New York,” 4 said “Australia” and another 4 had “Ethiopia” written on them. You play with 3 people. The diamond card sits in the middle of the circle. It reminded me a little of Goldfish. The objective of the game is to have 1 set of 4 in your hand – e.g. all of the “New York” cards. Once you do , you have to take the diamond card, but if someone sees you taking it or thinks you have a set, they try to take the diamond card before you, so you don’t win. The game starts with one player passing a card to another person, and the cycle continues. You don’t ask for particular cards like you do in Goldfish, you just give one away after you get one from another player. 

After playing a couple rounds and chatting a bit more, I was exhausted and went back to the volunteer house (which is right by the big banda.. everything on campus is close to each other, so when I say I went home, it was right there).

Then, it was time for laundry. I have to say, I really hate doing laundry here. One of the things I already miss from home is the luxury of a washing machine. Here, you use powder laundry detergent, put some in a bucket, mix it with water (which by the way is cold, so if you want hot  or warm water for your laundry, you have to boil water from the tap), put your clothes in, maybe put some more detergent on top of your clothes and then scrub. You scrub hard. If you don’t scrub hard enough, your clothes won’t get clean. I’ve learned the art of soaking my clothes for an entire day, maybe throw some bleach in there and bam. Does the same thing. But that first day of doing laundry I had no idea what I was doing. The detergent wasn’t foaming up. I was obviously doing something wrong, I’m honestly still not sure what. And scrubbing each article of clothing is really hard. Plus, let’s be real, it’s hot here and I have to cover up because Tanzania is very conservative, so yeah, I sweat and smell. My clothes needed way more scrubbing than I gave them. Soaking all day, really does work though, thank god. So once you’re done washing them, you rinse them out and hang them on a clothes line outside. It’s good to do your laundry early in the morning so they can be outside in the hot sun and dry by night. You really shouldn’t leave them out overnight because the bugs will get ‘em. So I hung them outside with clothes pins and hoped for the best. They came out clean, but were so stiff from the detergent and I don’t know what else. Oh so, I forgot to mention, but I wash my clothes in my shower, where there’s running water. The girls get water from a spout and wash them outside. A lot of them just hang them to dry on the grass or on bushes. They’re pros at washing their clothes. There is a beautiful laundry building that was recently built, with deep sinks and running water, so once that’s done, the girls can do their laundry there, rather than outside!

I should also mention that there are two types of water on campus. One is called “sweet water”. Sweet water is what’s used in the kitchen, what everyone drinks, it runs through all staff housing, and is used for the organic garden. The other type of water, I think isn’t filtered, is what runs through the student dorms – it’s what they shower with, clean their dorms/bathrooms with, and do their laundry with. However, whatever is in this water, makes it more difficult to do your laundry and shower. Soap doesn’t foam up with it, so it just doesn’t do a good job cleaning things. The  girls have been getting in trouble a lot for stealing the sweet water (we have a well with 300,00 liters of it). Sega has to buy this sweet water from town and have them fill the well if we haven’t had enough rain. So if the girls steal it, the entire school won’t have any to cook with, etc. Tap water – something I definitely took for granted at home. Another thing I now consider a luxury that I miss from home. I don’t think the tap water here is completely safe to drink, so I’ve been boiling all of my drinking water.

Whoa my phone just started blowing up.. internet’s back on!! I have no idea what happened.. life in Tanzania, I guess.

Also, for showering, we don’t have a hot water heater or anything so it’s cold showers all around. I don’t mind washing my body with cold water, but I can’t wash my hair with cold water, it’s too painful. Instead, I boil a full tea kettle for water, mix it with some cold water in a bucket, and then pour it on my head with a pitcher. I honestly am just remembering how amazing hot showers feel. Again, I definitely used to take for granted always having hot water come out of my shower. Except for that like week in the middle of winter in Boston when our boiler was broken and we had no hot water (or heat) in January. Good times.

So that was pretty much my Saturday. I read, relaxed, and went to bed. I actually just finished this amazing book, “Wonder,” my mom and sister recommended it.. it’s kind of a book for younger kids, but it’s incredible. I cried. A lot. And it takes a lot to make me cry, but this book was so sad and heartwarming at the same time. Everyone should go and read this book.

And then it was Sunday. What a day. The other volunteers and I went to the saba saba market. I don’t really know what saba saba means (I think saba is 7, though?). I don’t know yet, my Swahili isn’t good. But they have saba saba markets everywhere and they’re all huge. People are selling anything you could ever imagine. But we went for clothes. They sell clothes for like 2,000 shillings, which is less than $2, it’s insane. With the clothes, I think it’s clothes that have been donated from all around the world, and then people will go to Dar es Salaam to buy some of it and sell it in Morogoro. So they have clothes from all around the world. Really nice clothes too. I found a few brands I recognized – you know, Old Navy, Hollister, H&M, American Eagle. But then there were like nice designers. All still so cheap. I was really overwhelmed, though. I just bought a really big man’s fleece jacket to sleep in because it’s FREEZING here at night. I was so not expecting the cold and didn’t bring nearly enough warm clothes. Really, though, I didn’t bring enough clothes, at all. So I still have more shopping to do at the saba saba.

I also think I now have like 10 Tanzanian boyfriends. No, not really. But I was picking through clothes and all of a sudden these younger guys (I swear, they had to be a bit younger than me), started talking me, asking for my name, telling me they love me, asking for my phone number. I told them my name, but they kept calling me Dina. One of them kissed my hand, and literally got out his phone to get my phone number. I lied and told him I don’t have a phone. No thanks. I walked away from them for a while, and when I came back, they all swarmed me again. One of them told me to come back and see him the following week, yeah, totally….

The market was PACKED. And so loud. There are people playing the radio, people screaming into megaphones. Not the most pleasant shopping experience.It was such a hot day, and I didn’t bring water with me, I thought I was going to pass out. We were there for a good two hours poking through everything. They even sold gorgeous Tanzanian fabric and congas. I’ll have to take some pictures and post them. I want to have a dress made out of these fabrics, they’re just so incredible. And I may be going to a wedding here, so I’ll need something nice to wear!

After the market we stopped off at a “bar” to get drinks. It was a small restaurant that was all open. SO MANY FLIES. I’ve noticed that a lot here, everything is open and outdoors, so flies are everywhere you find food, it kind of grosses me out, but I think I’ll get used to it at some point.

After that, we drove around a bit so I could see more of Morogoro. I don’t really know how to describe it, I’ll have to sneak some pictures without my camera being seen (thievery ain’t cool.). If you’ve been to Africa, it’s like any other African town/small city, at least Eastern Africa, from what I’ve heard.

We headed back to Sega, Alice drove one of Sega’s cars, that the volunteers can use. If you don’t have a car in Morogoro, it can be a bit difficult to get around. You have to take a dala dala, which is a little bus, or a motorcycle taxi, which is SO dangerous. People get into accidents on those all the time. One of the teachers at Sega, Kennedy, was telling us that another teacher’s (Hilda) brother was recently in an accident on one of the motorcycle taxis – he was hit by a truck, head on, and his eye legit came out of its socket and he’s now in critical care. And it’s been two weeks since the accident. SO SAD. And SO scary. I will NEVER take one of those. I’d be way too scared.

We got back, around 4:30, and had plans to go out to dinner with a few other expats in Morogoro at this restaurant, Dragon Air. It’s the only place in Morogoro that has pizza, and it only has pizza on Sundays. YES. It was about a 35 minute drive to the restaurant. When we got there, there were about 5 other people waiting for us, and then another joined. I was definitely the baby of the group. I’m pretty sure everyone else was 30ish. I felt SO young. One girl is engaged, there was one married couple, another girl, who also volunteers at Sega, is living in Morogoro with her husband, who was out doing field work on agriculture and food insecurity. Really interesting. Everyone we had dinner with had such interesting stories. A few people were doing a fellowship in Morogoro during their masters program, one guy was working on his PhD, another guy from England is teaching Physics at an international school. It was a lot of fun getting to know them. And there was beer. And pizza. Decent beer, decent pizza. But still felt like home. It was during the World Cup finals, but the game didn’t start until 9pm, Tanzania time, and we all had to get up early for work the next day. It was a really great night, though.

The restaurant itself, was really cool. It was huge. It had a bar with a pool table inside, and another bar outside. The outdoors part was covered and had a ton of tables. There was some game that you could pay money to play. It looked a bit like mini golf, at a glance, but definitely wasn’t.

It was decorated with a lot of lights. They had these really cool lights hanging on trees, that out of the corner of my eye looked like fireworks. When I got a good look at it, I realized it was more of like a pole with lights moving up and down.

Anyway, it was a really nice night! Such a busy day, I was exhausted when we got home, and my breath reeked of garlic. I poured so much of this garlic paste onto my pizza that, even after brushing my teeth 3 times and flossing, I could still taste it. Gross. 

So that was last weekend. Really awesome couple of days! I still have to write about this week and now this weekend, so I’ll get on that asap.

tutaonana bdai (I actually don’t know how to spell that, but if you sound it out, it means “see you later” in Swahili)

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Saba Saba: Nyanza divided over outcome

Saba Saba: Nyanza divided over outcome

KISUMU COUNTY: The outcome of Coalition for Reform and Democracy’s Saba Saba rally held at Uhuru Park last week has divided opinion in Raila Odinga’s Nyanza backyard.

While some political and religious leaders have lauded the rally saying it provided a platform for major reforms in the country, others feel its goals were not achieved.

CORD leaders had left their supporters guessing what would…

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