A Volunteer of Many Names and the Demon Cat

It really is amazing what you become accustomed to being called when living in Tanzania.   If you have ever heard that song by The Ting Tings, "That's not my name," that song summarizes my feelings about living in Tanzania.   The Tanzanian people are very fond of calling people everything, but their actual name.  So far, this seems to not indicate whether that person knows your name, or they just don't like using it.  The following is a short list of names I have been called. 

1. Dada- this is Kiswahili for "sister."

2. Sister

3. Mama

4. Auntie

5. Mzungu- basically "wonderbread," "whitie," or "cracker" in Kiswahili

6. Teacher

7. Madame- how Tanzanian students address female teachers

8. Numerous names of other white, female Peace Corps Volunteers because all white people look alike. 

In further news, I really thought my body was rejecting Africa for a while.  It all started with a rash behind my left knee.  That rash looked like harmless heat rash until it spread all up and down my leg, onto my right leg, onto my stomach, and up my back.  A few days later, I started running a temperature and had extreme nausea.  Then just the other day, I woke up with one eye almost completely swollen shut.  I seem to finally be bouncing back though.  My rash is slowly clearing up, my stomach issues and temperature lasted only 24 hours, and a popped some allergy pills and my swollen eye slowly went back to normal.  Also, I am no longer afraid to stay up after dark because I now have a cat to protect me from the critters of the night.  Unfortunately after 3 days, it is very clear to me that our personalities do not exactly mesh.  The second night I had the cat, I discovered that he seemed to be suffering from some sort of separation anxiety when I shut him out of my room to sleep.  He proceeded to spend the night meowing at my door and chewing up various objects that were left out.  Luck for me, I had only left out some Ziploc bags and empty water bottles.  This cat also appears to be the most vocal cat in the universe.  It has the loudest, alien-sounding meow in the world.  Sometimes, I swear words actually come out of that idiotic mouth.  This morning, that lovely little feline decided my bed was a good place to take a dump.  Needless to say, I am currently looking for a new home for this cat, which is currently the bane of my existence, and am searching the market for a replacement kitten.  That has pretty much been my life for the past almost week, just hating this demon-cat.  Next week we are all getting together for Christmas so hopefully I will have some better updates.  

Karibu Mtwara!

So as you might assume I safely reached my permanent site.  The bus ride down was nothing short of interesting.  We did end up staying all night and at around 4:30 we started loading up all of our possessions.  We then had to all say our goodbyes to each other, which was about as much fun as getting a tooth pulled.  We got to the bus stand at about 5 a.m.  As soon as I got off the Peace Corps bus, someone promptly tried to swipe one of my bags, but lucky for me, one of the Peace Corps staff was on top of it.  Then, the bus people refused to put our bags under our bus so Katherine and I's bags got put up with all of the passengers and my name written all over the bags for a purpose I do not completely understand.  So now, my name is written in permanent marker not only all over my bags, but also Katherine's, including a big "K. Thill" written on her pillowcase.  We finally got on the rode and remained on the rode for the next 13'ish hours.    This would have been around a 10-hour ride if our lovely bus had not gotten stuck in the mud for 3 hours and pried out by our fellow passengers using big sticks and one shovel.  Happy Birthday to me...

So far I am really enjoying my site though.  I am in a bit of a bigger town than I first thought, but have almost everything I should want locally available.  Since I am in one of the bigger towns, I also have had a stream of other volunteers visiting, picking up supplies.  I have yet to go a day without seeing another volunteer.  Not exactly what I was expecting, but I'll take it.  Everyone in my 'ville has been awesome so far.  Even the crazies.  There is one man, whom I call "Bird-man."  I truly believe that this man is half bird because there is no way that a full human can make some of the bird noises he makes.  Also, the other day, he tried to catch a mango falling from a tree with his mouth, which proved very entertaining.  My site is almost perfect.  I can even see Mozambique from my house.  There is just one thing.  There wildlife has about made me wet myself on several occasions.  Now I'm not creeped out by most creatures, but my house guests are a bit much.  For one, my house and the surrounding area seems to harbor giant lobster-bugs.  These are humungous bugs that look like a cross between a scorpion and a spider and red-colored.  Basically they look like a small lobster.  I was later told that these were "just tarantulas."  Also, I share my home with some very pleasant rats.  I woke up to a living nightmare the other night when I heard a rat in my room.  I turned on my flashlight, trying to locate the culprit.  After a while of looking from the safety of my mosquito net, I finally saw it.  It seems that earlier that day I accidentally zipped a rat inside of my duffel bag while cleaning up and it was now attempting to escape.  I of course immediately slipped into a state of panic and lay in bed, sweating profusely for about 3 hours before I worked up the nerve to leave my mosquito net.  When I finally got up, I ran out, got the broom, used the handle to drag my bag out of my room into the living area, and slam my door, shoving kangas under the crack before jumping back into bed.  The next morning, the first thing I did was throw my bag into the middle of the courtyard and leave it there until someone else showed up to deal with it.  To deal with this problem, I have adopted a killer cat.  His first night in my house was a success.  His hit list included 1 rat and 2 lizards.  Well thats all for now.  Time will tell how this whole owning a cat thing goes.