Home sweet home

Children working hard at the school in Muheza. As you can see the school is far better off than the ones I have been working with, but it is mostly funded by charity.
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 We headed to Pangani for the weekend where beautiful sunshine, sea and sand awaited us. As always we all appreciated the good food and a chance to top up our tans lazing by the pool.

Then, on Sunday it was time to say goodbye to my fellow volunteers, and Caroline. I had got in contact with a school in Muheza which was interested in setting up a link between themselves and Martins Wood, where I will be working again in April. The school is run by a Roman Catholic nun called Sister Gwyneth, originally from Wales. She set it up about 5 years ago, starting with one classroom for pre-school children and gradually building it up year by year using funds raised at home and a small fee paid by the pupils' parents. Everything is taught in English so it will be easy for the pupils to communicate with children in the UK.

I am constantly aware of how wealthy we are and what riches we are surrounded by. I miss the peace and beauty of Milingano.

Children at Muheza school teaching me one of their games.
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So, it was in Muheza that we said goodbye and I was left at the sisters' very impressive house. I was given a lovely little room in a bungalow separate from the sisters' house where the priests usually stay when they visit and was kept very comfortable for a couple of days. Eating with the sisters was a real treat after the bland diet I'd had for months. We even had sausages and roast potatoes!

On Monday I spent the day at the school visiting all the classes telling them about England and comparing lifestyles. They were amazed to hear that in England children can not go out to their farms and pick Jackfruit or papaya for themselves! Great enthusiasm came from the class I chose to write letters to children at home, telling them all about what they grow, what they like to eat, play etc.

Football training.
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Later, I was invited to the home of an Irish lady who is a long-term volunteer teacher at the school and has been living there for nearly 3 years. She thrust a beer in my hand as soon as I walked in the door, fed me delicious pasta and talked non-stop while we drank the remains of the wine she used in the sauce. I was a bit tipsy by the time I left!

Over the next few days it felt like one long continuous journey. I got a taxi for the 45min journey to Segara where I waited for over 2 hours for the Scandanavian Express to Moshi. I sat next to a very nice man with excellent English who turned out to be a preacher from Zambia on his way to Uganda , by bus all the way! Interested in his beliefs and the difference between the Pentacostal church and other Christian denominations I was happy to talk to him at first (and it was helping to pass the time!). He told me stories of how he has healed people by praying for them. He believes he healed a pregnant woman with HIV who tested negative after several months of his prayers. He told me about how he has been rescued by angels dressed like normal business men who disappeared before his eyes. After a couple of hours of him trying to convert me though, I felt I had been 'Bible bashed' quite enough and asked him to please put the Bible away! He obliged, but after hearing how religion is not as important to young people in the UK as it once was he decided that he must start planning a mission to England as soon as possible! I hope he doesn't try to get there just by bus!

children skipping
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After a night in Moshi staying at my usual hotel, I got the Riverside shuttle to Arusha where we waited for 2 hours before we could get on our way to Nairobi. Nine hours of sitting next to a nervous Swiss woman later, I arrived at Nairobi backpackers (the shuttle does at least take you door to door but don't expect it to stop anywhere for lunch.) This 'home from home' was as basic as my room in Mili, so I guess you could say the phrase was true. People were friendly enough, the outside shower was hot and the chef made a mean veggie burger, but I was pretty glad I had decided not to carry on doing the backpacker thing and head home instead, especially when the rats started making a racket in the roof! You might ask 'what do you expect for £10 a night?', but in Tanzania I had far better rooms for £3!

street in Moshi
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I had an evening flight from Nairobi which stopped at Dubai airport at about midnight. When I arrived it was like landing in a giant supermarket in the midst of Christmas shopping! Hundreds of people with trolleys frantically searched the shelves to the bleeping sounds of items being scanned through tills, only instead of turkeys and Christmas crackers it was bottles of perfume, booze and posh cosmetics.

The final part of my 35 hour journey home began when I boarded the 3am flight to London. As you can imagine at that time of morning all I wanted to do was go to sleep, so sitting next to a bloke from Milton Keynes who's body mass spilled over into my space, stinking of cigarettes and alcohol and speaking non-stop was pretty much a nightmare! He managed to annoy several cabin crew well before take-off by complaining about how naff the plane was compared to the last flight he'd been on. Several times he tried to get up-graded and I just thought 'if only' but there was no way anyone in business class would've put up with him. Through all his complaining I couldn't help thinking this man just does not realise how lucky he is, which really annoyed me but I decided the best thing to do was to bite my tongue, put my eye mask and headphones on and try to sleep through it. He soon woke me up having been for a wander into business class wanting to give me the low-down on what everyone is doing in there. After a bite to eat he wasn't satisfied that they got lasagne and we only got a sandwich so he went to complain again. Eventually I got up for a wander myself just to escape for a while. A man in a seat a few rows down from us stopped me and offered me his sympathy. He said he could hear the guy next to me talking to himself non-stop and at one point when I was asleep he was saying 'harder! Harder!' When I went to speak to the cabin crew they were really apologetic and clearly felt sorry for me after their own dealings with him and said if there were any seats free they would be happy to help me move. I looked around but unfortunately for me all the seats were full, so I sat back down and tried again to go to sleep. Not long afterwards I felt him leaning on me, his feet right over under the seat in front of mine! I asked him politely to move but when he dug his elbow into me and then started complaining about the plane that was it! I told him he had no right to complain when he wasn't having to sit next to someone who talks non-stop, smells of beer and keeps elbowing him when he's trying to sleep! That shut him up! He eventually went to sleep and guess what? He SNORED! Needless to say I was exhausted when I got home.

Th glamour of Nairobi backpackers single room with rats in the roof.
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Mark picked me up from the airport and we spent the day catching up after far too long apart. I had originally intended to come home in June, then changed it to April. I was going to do gorilla trekking and a tour in Uganda but decided I'd rather save the money and use it to go back to the village again in August. With it being mum's 60th birthday this week, it seemed the perfect time to come home and surprise her. So, on Saturday I bought mum a big bunch of flowers and wrote in the card – see you in a minute, I'm home! When Christine delivered them mum thought it was a joke, or that I'd sent a video message for her to watch until she looked outside and there I was! Judging by the tears she was pleased to see me and the secret had been very well kept between my sisters and brother as not even my dad knew I'd be home.

It's great to be home in many ways. I had a lovely weekend catching up with all the family and Mark. But I'm missing the village now. Life here seems so unbelievably materialistic when you have lived such a simple life. I am constantly aware of how wealthy we are and what riches we are surrounded by.

I miss the peace and beauty of Milingano. The ability to walk out of the house and breathe pure fresh air while looking up at green mountains and blue sky, surrounded by tiny children who are able to run around and play freely without their parents ever needing to worry about their safety. The beautiful black night sky littered with bright sparkly stars accompanied by the sounds of crickets and frogs. And I miss the people, the children, the community – my friends, my students, my surrogate family. The way everyone says hello or 'onga' everywhere you go, everyone knows everyone else. I don't miss the food though, or the dust, the heat, the insects, the drop-hole toilet, the lack of light in the evenings, or the constant worry of getting sick. And I don't miss being woken up at 6am by cockerels and house girls sweeping! Pros and cons. I'm still looking forward to going back and will never forget Milingano.