Kilimanjaro and Speed Bumps

It's Tuesday evening and we're sitting in the living room watching the news on Aljazeera. It has become a nightly ritual for us to watch the news after dinner (providing we have power), even though it's becoming more and more depressing. There is so much unrest in the world, especially over in these parts, and at times it gets scary to hear about it all. But I feel more connected and informed about what is going on over here than I ever did at home, so I guess it's a positive thing.

It's pretty windy tonight and we're hoping that means there's a rain storm coming in. We like it when it rains for two reasons: one, because the weather gets much cooler and there is less dust and two, because the roads go from bumpy beyond belief to muddy and slippery. I'm sure the muddy roads are more dangerous to drive on, but we have a lot more fun when we're sliding all over the place than when our brains are rattling out of our skulls due to the bumpy roads. Have I mentioned anything about the roads yet? They're insane. There are 12 inch pot holes everywhere you look. And on top of that they've put massive speed bumps every few meters on all the roads, as if anyone can go over 15 mph with all the pot holes anyway. They're very unnecessary and annoying. We had quite the run in with one last week. James was driving us home from the orphanage and we were on a bumpy dirt road heading out of Newland village. He was hauling toward this speed bump and simultaneously talking to some people out the window so he didn't see it coming. Mark and I were watching out the windshield and knew that we were going to hit it, seeing as how we were about ten feet away and still saw no signs of the car slowing down. Finally, James saw the bump and slammed on the breaks, but it was too late. We hit it going about 25 mph and flew into the air. We're pretty sure James' car has no shocks and we're also pretty sure all four tires were off the ground at one point after we hit the speed bump. We all flew up and smashed our heads on the ceiling and everything in the car went flying. When we landed Mark and I started laughing, but all we got out of James was a little chuckle while he said, "Goodness! So sorry, I did not see the bump." We're still laughing about that one.

We went on a walk to the market yesterday evening and the sunset was beautiful. The mountain looked incredible, covered in fresh snow and framed by fluffy white clouds. I still can't believe sometimes that I can walk right out my door and look up into the peaks of Mt Kilimanjaro. I'll miss that when we're back home. I'll also miss a few other things here, like riding to town in a dala dala, being fed delicious food three times a day (and not having to do our own dishes to boot), and having fun teaching all the adorable little students - one of which got excited beyond belief during a math lesson yesterday when he asked me if I like "the milk of goats" and I said yes.

Tanzania has been so great to us. I'm glad we still have a few more weeks to enjoy it here.