Last day in Africa

I’m staying with Lisa for another night in Moshi at the foot of Mt Kilimanjaro. Lisa is a friend of Mark’s (my brother) from Berlin. She works here with the Kiliwater company. They provide a lot of education about water and hygiene for the people and villages in this part of Tanzania. She just moved to Moshi at the beginning of February and is here until April when her contract ends. She’s got a cool pad which has been very welcome both coming from the farm in Uganda and the camping adventure. I was able to leave a bunch of things with her that I didn’t need on the safari including my computer. The drawback of that is that I’m way behind in my writing now.

Moshi is a cute little town. I can hear singing off in the distance at the moment from my bedroom window. It sounds like it might be coming from the church that’s not too far away. You can hear both the church bells and the call to prayer here. It’s a mixed town. There is also quite a Wazungu culture here. (Wazungus are white people, or more accurately white English speakers. The singular form is muzungu). Here they are mostly hip outdoor mountain climber dudes. Or people working here in NGOs. I’ve met many on my travels about. Staying at Lisa’s and having been in Africa long enough to basically get how things work is cool because I can walk around Moshi and feel at home, especially when I have the key. And even though the few words I’ve learned in Kiswahili aren’t enough to get me by. Lisa’s amazing at it. Fortunately most shopkeepers speak enough English.

Yesterday I did my laundry, all by hand. It took me three hours. My clothes were filthy after two weeks of camping. Some things needed particularly hard scrubbing. My white silk sleeping liner had turned beige. But I did a very good job. The whites look particularly great. Barbara and Vennie would be proud. And the hot African sun that dried everything helped with bleaching too. It’s hot here. Low to mid thirties at least. Sorry Papa! I can’t believe the winter I’m not at home they have record snow. Last year I used my boots once. It sounds like this year I would have worn them out. But I’m not actually complaining. Thanks to everyone for sending me regular reports.

Today I’m packing, organizing a couple of things that still need to get done and then tonight I will start my grand odyssey to Australia. Tonight I’m flying from Kilimanjaro to Dar es Salaam. I’m staying overnight at a hotel and then leaving early in the morning from Dar to Johannisburg then on to Sydney and finally Adelaide. I will arrive in Adelaide on Monday night. I’m sure by then I’ll be nice and tired. Maybe I’ll have some writing time in all of that.

It's been nice to spend my last day with Lisa. It feels strange that I'm leaving and I've had my last Miranda Fruity soda. :-( Lisa and went to a great Indian restaurant, all pinkly painted...Sonya would love it! And then we went to a hotel roof top patio to see if the clouds would lift from Kilimanjaro at sunset as they apparently often do. We didn't have all luck but we got a few glimpses of the peak here and there. I had Kili beer though to compensate.