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.
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