Hello Africa.

Holly Guacamole, I made it to Africa. 

I flew into the Dar Es Salam airport in Tanzania and landed at 3:45am local time. When you first arrive in the Dar Es Salam airport, you are immediately directed to the customs section of the airport where you fill out 2 forms – one for visiting East Africa that is blue and a general immigration form. Both ask about the same standard questions, how long are you staying here, where are you staying, what is your passport number, etc. After filling out those forms you then give your papers plus $100USD to the immigration officer where she looks over everything to make sure that it is correct. If it is, she then gives it to someone behind one of the glass booths that line that back wall of the building. After this step is complete, you then wait in large group of people that somewhat resembles a line but is more like a cattle-corrael until they call your name to come and get your visa. When they called my name, I went up to the window where I was fingerprinted and they took a picture of me. The whole process takes about 10 minutes to complete the Visa and then you are on your way.

After getting my luggage, I headed to the transfers section of the airport as I would need to catch another flight to Iringa. Little did I know that you actually need to transfer airport terminals. After a few confusing minutes I was able to find a taxi and head over to the other airport terminal. At this point it was about 4:30am when I arrived and actually had to wake up the airport workers because I was the first one! I waited for about 1.5 hours until someone else came to the airport to catch the plane. The plane ended up being a very small plane – similar to a chartered private plane in the states. On the flight there were 6 of us, I was the only women. Here it is pretty uncommon for women to travel by themselves. After a 1.5 hour flight to Iringa from Dar, I safely landed closer to my final destination of Njombe. From the airport in Iringa my friend Kayla, whom I would be staying with my entire time in Africa, arranged for a taxi and bus to take me to Njombe where she would meet me at the bus stand.

This is the view from the airport in Iringa.

The drive from the airport to town was stunning. It was my first introduction to Africa. There were lots of people walking on the road, beautiful flowers and scenery to look at, and several small huts were people lived lined the roadways. Once I was in the Iringa town, the taxi driver arranged for me to take a bus to Njombe. In the US buses very closely follow a schedule of when they depart and leave, here not so much. I waited on the bus for about 2 hours before it left. This point it was around noon/ 1pm. We finally left when the bus was full to drove to Njombe, a 4 hour bus ride. One thing that was very eye- opening is that bus drivers are like race car drivers! I was put in the front seat where I had a front-row view of the driver weaving in and out of traffic, barreling down the road, to try and get us to our destination as fast as possible. Sometimes the road would become a 1 lane road because they are widening the road here and we would sit for a while (30 minutes) to wait our turn to be able to drive. While we were waiting people would come up to the bus and sell snacks such as potato chips, drinks, knick-knacks such as socks, cheap jewelry, and wallets to us while we were waiting. Once it was time to go it was a race to see who could get out of the line first to be on the road. Complete and utter collective chaos. Drivers frequently use their bus as a weapon almost, honking as they pass and getting close to other vehicles to inch them off the road. The ride took about 4 hours and I was finally in Njombe.

View from the bus in Irina before we left for our bus ride to Njombe. This is what the market looks like. 

After finally getting to Njombe, I needed to take a Taxi to my friend Kayla’s house. This proved to be a bit of a daunting task because it had rained and the cells towers were down. It is not uncommon here to loose power throughout the day, especially when it rains. I waited at the taxi stand for about 45 minutes until my friend was able to come and get me; finally we were on our way to her house after a long day of travel. While waiting, I met my first suitor in Africa. As he attempted to speak English to me, I could only make out a few words as he was speaking in Swahili, the language of Tanzania. Numerous times he asked to add me on Facebook or what my phone number is, after several tries he finally gave up and moved on. While all of this was going on the 2 women that were working the bus ticket station let me sit behind the counter so I won’t be cornered by this would be suitor. Luckily Kayla came just in the nick of time to pick me up and we were off.

The taxi ride to her house was only about 10/ 15 minutes. Once we got to her house I took a nap and she headed off to a friend’s house for a gathering of the local ex-pat community. Now it was about 7/8pm. I woke up when she came back around 10/ 11pm. We stayed up chatting until 2am, catching up about everything under the sun! At one point while we were talking, the power went out so we conversed by candle light. The power in Southern Tanzania can be very unpredictable at times. Whenever it rains or the weather gets worse that sunny and clear there is a change that the power will go out.