A Day Trip to Same on the Mini Bus

A Day Trip to Same

By Maureen Mescall

Once again I am here in beautiful Suji.   The five Irish teachers are leaving this very scenic mountainous area following one year teaching in Suji  Malindi Secondary School.   Jim, Aaron, Aine, Aisling and Belinda return to Ireland on October 26^th and I came over from Ireland to meet with  them and with the headmaster and the members of the school board to ascertain the feelings of all parties following the end of the school year.  More of that at a later stage but now I want to tell you of a trip I took to Same on Tuesday.

Suji is situated at an elevation of 8,000‘ in the Parẽ Mountains and is about a good hour’s journey from the main road which connects Arusha to Dar es Salaam.   The mini bus trip from Suji to Same takes Same, the nearest large town, takes about an hour and a half.    Mavura  the driver, leaves his on a home in Suji on a motor cycle  ( or Piki Piki as it is known here) around 4.50a.m to collect the bus, which is owned by Suji High School.   Johnnie the luggage organiser is on board by now.    At 5 a.m. he collects the first passengers, and then proceeds to Gonjanza where he picks up students for the High School, passengers for Makanya or Same and the bus conductor and Mr. Moneybags, Timo.   The final passengers are on board by 6.30a.m.and they may comprise of men with suits and briefcases, students in school uniform, women carrying babies on their backs, chickens, bananas, potatoes, mineral crates, oil drums  and small bags, big bags, suitcases and assortment of plastic bags which contain unknown hidden treasure.

Mavura shouts instructions to everybody while he answers his phone and blows the horn at the same time.  Johnnie and Timo hop on and off the bus to let people board, to greet people and to pick up those large plastic bags which are there on the side of the road but are destined for ??  - only Johnnie and Timo know the destination.  Everybody is chatting and laughing and it is one of those great sounds that stay in one’s memory.    Mavura is shouting back to Timo, Johnnie is pushing that man  further  in so that another  person can squeeze inside, but can we close the door though?   Even though I do not understand Swahili, I know some of the passengers are asking and wondering who the Mazungu (white person) is and why she is one the bus.   People are so friendly and want to make me feel comfortable and therefore endeavour to engage me in conversation which I truly appreciate.   The talk, the laughter and even some singing continues down the mountain. 

The road is un tarred, muddy, sharp stones protrude through the earth, and  extremely sharp bends with drains cut across the road in many places to take away the water.  At the moment the area looks barren and lacks water and the river beds are dry.  Even though it has rained each day for the past six days the area still looks as if it needs a very good watering.  The scenery is spectacular.  To our left we see a vast plane in the distance and to the right we see a very fertile valley.  There are many other hills in the distance and the galvanize roofs of the village houses may be seen in the early morning light.  As we look to the rear of the bus we can see that Suji village is shrouded in mist, which is drifting toward the villages situated to the west. 

The bus stops along the way to drop off a parcel, person or bag and to pick more people or goods.  The mini bus seems to be bulging at the seams as Mavura crunches the gears and slams on the brakes while all the time talking and shouting back to either Timo or Johnnie.   There beside me in the front seat sits Mamma Nardi, the woman who could easily run a country.  We have a great chat on the journey and I get to understand a little more of the culture of Tanzania under her tutelage.

We arrive at Makanya at 7.30 a.m., this is the first major stop on route so there is a lot of alighting from the bus, moving of material ( some goods taken off the bus and more put on),  and Timo has a chat with somebody while Mavura honks the horn at an alarming rate.  Finally we are ready to proceed on the final leg of the journey to Same.   Again we are treated to magnificent scenery.  Sisal fields at both sides of the road, lone hills standing proudly in the distance to the left of the bus while the Pare range continue on the right hand side.   A group of ten donkeys cross the road at leisure ignoring the lorries and coaches speeding toward either Dar or Arusha.   The coaches carry such names as “Glory to God”,  “Chelsea for Life”, “Be a good Person” etc.,  we see many herds of goats of goats with the goat herder sitting and watching as his stock graze.   Some sheep of unusual colours and size accompany some goat herds.   I think we only passed one herd of cows.  The cows here are very small and consequently the calves are miserable looking.

The lorry and coach drivers flash their lights at our mini bus and each vehicle we meet seems to know Mavura who in turn flashes his lights, honks the horn and puts his hand out the window and gives a sort of twist of the hands which is accompanied with a shout to the oncoming driver.  Of course if he sees a goat, cow or person who might even think of crossing the road in front of him they get the horn treatment with venom!    The tarred road finishes abruptly at each side and the embankment slopes off into a drain.   Periodically Mavura pulls off the tarred road to pick up or drop off a passenger.   On many of these occasions I had visions of the bus keeling over into the drain and I being on the left hand side would be underneath, the chickens, bags, potatoes and people, but somehow we all arrived safely and without incident.

As we approach Same, the roads became busier with many people walking, driving in cars and lorries and many, many  Piki Piki’s.   We pass the Elephant Hotel on our right hand side which is the scene of many Heineken with my friend Professor Kilonzo.    We arrived at a large bus station which must have about fifty mini buses, coaches and jeeps either standing at bays, or coming in/going out to/ from either Dar or Arusha.   It is very busy and the sounds of traffic as well as the voices of sellers fill the area with air and sound pollution.   Mamma Nardi and I decide that breakfast is the first thing on the agenda so we head for the Parrot Hotel.   This is not really hotel at all.  It has an eating area at the front of the building with red plastic chairs and tables.  Just inside that is a shop which has a good selection of goods for the traveller and each item has a price tag which is unusual as most goods in the region are without this important detail.   The coffee is good and for a change very hot.  We get chapatti’s and  ????.   The ???? is a hardboiled egg covered in lightly spiced mince meat and then coated with mild bread crumbs and then fried.  Delicious!  We had two each!

We parted company and I carried out the business that took me to same.   The mini bus would not leave Same for Suji until 1p.m so I thought it would be good to watch life go by in this town.   I took up position at a large pub/restaurant and with Coke in hand watched the colours of Africa pass by, the lilting sounds of voices shouting and singing in Swahili, the aromas of coffee and spices, the flirting of the women with the well upholstered bottoms with the men on the nearby building site and the constant ringing of the multi tonal mobile phones.   Everybody has a mobile!   There goes a man, woman and a little girl dressed in the robes of the Masaai.  The little girl spots the Mazungo and stares for a second and when I smile at her, her face lights up in a broad grin.  Her father then returns and waves to me.   What a lovely gesture?

I returned to the bus to find people loading up their goods.  A man arrived with a box of chickens and a hen.    Periodically the hen stuck her head up through the hole in the top of the box and had a good look around.   The owner of this consignment of fowl proceeded to check the chicks at intervals and then gave them a good feed of meal.   The interior of the bus was getting hot and an overpowering stink began to ascend from the box.   Luckily I had a few facial wipes with a nice perfume which I stuffed under my nose.  Then I thought to myself “you are reneging on your rural background girl” so I threw away the wipes and suffered the consequences!   The bus gradually filled up with bags of maize, rice, wheat, potatoes, bags and people.    The laughing and talking continued all the way back to Suji while Mavura laughed, honked the horn and flashed the lights.   Of course it is all up hill this time so the mini bus creaked, groaned and at times objected to the load of people and goods but finally Suji was in sight.  Goodbyes, handshakes and see you again from everybody for the Mazungo and a little hug from Timo.   Great trip but tiring.  How do the staff do this every day of the week?

Coming Back to Suji Malindi

Coming Back to Suji Malindi

By Maureen Mescall

The five graduates from NUI Galway who have been teaching in Malindi Secondary School for the past twelve months are due to return to Ireland on October 26^th so I felt it was an opportune time to visit, meet with them and with the headmaster and the school board.   I arrived at Dar es Salaam airport on Sunday Oct 2^nd where my friend Margaret was waiting for me.  I stayed with her for three days and we had many things to talk about as Margaret has been living in Dar for over twenty five years.  I have known her family back in Ireland all my life so we had lots of stories and lots of “tracing” to use an Irish expression.   I find Dar very hot and humid and hate when the mossies begin to attack the ankle!  My destination was Suji so I decided to go there on Thursday as Margaret was travelling to Arusha so it was great that we could have a few more hours together to really get to grips with all the Irish news. 

Moody the taxi driver arrived for us at 5 am and we went to the coach station on the Morogoro road.  Even at this hour there were many people on the road and as we drew nearer to the station everything was in full swing.  Hundreds of people were going about their business; some with hand carts, some with goods on their heads, cars and motor cycles in abundance.  The system for getting a ticket is slightly different to ours in that a person sits there at the side of the road and sells the tickets to Nairobi, Arusha, and Kampala or to any required destination.  The coaches for the different cities reverse in to the parking spots and there is a scramble to get the bags, boxes and assorted items in the luggage compartments.   One is allotted a seat number and mine was by the window by instruction of the conductor while Margaret had the front seat.   I settled myself in and organised my glasses, book and bottle of water and then a girl arrived and said “that is my seat”.  I asked her to show me the number on the seat but she just said it was hers and that seemed to be the end of the discussion so rather than cause any upset I moved to the aisle seat.    It was most uncomfortable so I asked the conductor if I could move at the earliest opportunity so I ended up with two seats to myself.  Great, now I could view the country side.   We left the station at 6 a.m.

This coach is known as the “Dar Express” but I am afraid there is little of the “Express” about it.  On the outskirts of Dar we stopped to take on people who dropped off about one hundred metres down the road.  This continued for at least five miles and I thought to myself that at this rate we would never reach Suji but once we left the outskirt we moved quite quickly.   The coach struggled on the hills but went quite quickly on the flat smooth roads.    By 11.30a.m I began to worry if we were ever going to stop for a refreshment or toilet but ten minutes later the coach pulled off onto an un tarred side road and we arrived in a nice courtyard which had food, shops and toilets.   Many coaches were either  leaving or arriving at the place and there were lots of people taking a break, eating or just taking a breath of fresh air.

 On the road again and the conductor asked my destination and when I told him Suji he said I must get off the bus at Makanya and when I told him I was meeting some people in Same he said “no you must get off at Makanya for Suji”.  He was correct but my arrangement with my friends was for Same.    He was extremely helpful and insisted that he must put the “Wazungo” on the right track!  Anyway we finally settle on Same but when we arrived in Makanya there was the Suji mini bus so I hopped off.  What are these Wazungos like?   They don’t know what they want.   I was greeted by Timo (the conductor) with a great hug and a “Karibu Tena” – Welcome Back!  So we sat there and waited while some people loaded up their goods and themselves.    Then a coach arrived from the same direction and who alights but Aisling, Aine, Sabrina and Peadar, the people I was due to meet in Same.  Would this happen in Ireland?  The mini bus would depart on schedule in Ireland and it would not matter how many people needed to get on it.   Aine and Aisling were two of the Irish teachers who had been in Suji for the past year, Peadar is a film maker and had started a film about the Irish teachers and life in Suji in 2010 and was now here to finish the story.    I was really delighted to meet them all again and we had a great chat on the way up the mountain.   The girls looked great and had a wonderful colour.  Aaron and Belinda were back at the house in Malindi and Jim was away for a game of golf in Moshi.

Arriving in the village after a year away was really exciting and it was great to see the building that we had constructed the previous year.  The inside was now plastered and the floor was finished and both pieces of work were of a very high standard.  The window frames were in place and the next job was to fit the glass and the doors.  The Irish men who worked on the project will be delighted to see the pictures.  

 Rahema was there to greet me (the cook for the men and the teachers).  She has looked after the teachers for the past twelve months and they all loved her and appreciated her very much.    Some of the boys from the school were around the sitting room watching videos, chatting with the teachers and chatting among themselves.  It was lovely to see such a relaxed relationship between the teachers and the pupils.   George, Antonio, Eneza, Godfrey, Abihudi, Richard were all there and as the evening progressed more boys arrived.   There were very few girls about and I wondered if the attraction for the boys was the girls, the TV or the computer. 

The new arrivals; Peadar and Sabrina were installed in the available beds in the teacher’s house so I asked the former chairman of the school board Mr Nyange if he had a bed for me.    I moved into his house and have been there for the past week; treated like a queen, hot water for my morning ablutions, boiled eggs and coffee for breakfast and yesterday the best pancakes I ever had.   More about Mr. Nyange later.  

                                                       Mr. Nyane Relaxing

  Aine, Belinda and I walked through the village to the vegetable shop to purchase the potatoes and veg for the dinner.  I have to admit I felt a bit breathless going up the slight hill as we were at 8000’.   Girls are now well able to make their purchases through the medium of Swahili and were greeting and were greeted by people all along the route.  During the evening I had several chats with the girls who gave me the low down on the school year – the ups and the downs of things.  There were many stories both good and bad.   

Throughout the last week I renewed many acquaintances including Mamma Nardi, Namchani and her parents, Benjamin, Richard, Amos and many more.   I walked on the lovely hills, ate natural food, and walked for a mile to get coverage to call home.   So a slight inconvenience for me – so poor me but what about the people who live here permanently?   They may have electricity for four days and they may not have electricity for two days; they may have water for six days and they may not have water for two days so how do they cope?   They manage and are organised.  On the days they have water they fill buckets for the days of shortage.  They do not waste a drop and re use water for toilets and for watering gardens and plants.   When the electricity is off they use candles and some have gas lamps.   One of the great sights here is to look over the valley to the next hill and see the lights of the houses.  Last night the full moon came slowly up over the hill and was a sight to behold.

The sounds of the night are wonderful.  Here there are no cars or lorries, no street lighting so one can actually hear the flapping of the wings of the horn bill as he flies to the Guava tree for more fruits or the squeal of the bush baby.   The baboons stay in the distance but when there is plenty food about they can be heard and seen but unlike other countries the baboons here are shy.   The sound of singing is a constant both day and night and everybody seems to be able to sing.  Esther, our little neighbour aged five has a beautiful singing voice and her sister Nati has a voice that brings emotion to the surface.  

The day starts here in Malindi when the cocks begin to crow about 4.30 a.m.   The first motor cycles may be heard around 5 am followed quite quickly by the mini bus and the lorry on their way to Same.    Just before 6 a.m. we here the gentle singing of the people as they make their way to their places of work and their gardens.  The children begin to walk by around 6.45 on their way to school carrying their bags and a stick for the fire at school in order to cook dinner.   (Most of the cooking is carried out by sticks or charcoal).  Classes start at 8 am but some children have long distances to walk to reach their school.   The local shops close at 8 p.m. by which time the village is in darkness.   The shops are small and carry the essentials and if they do not have something in stock it will be ordered from Same and be in the shop the next day.   A cow is slaughtered in the Halal method ( meaning lawful in Arabic and the animal is killed by slitting the throat with a sharp knife and draining the blood) at 6 a.m. each Sunday and the people from the village go there quite early to purchase their meat.  Aaron is a dab hand at the Irish stew now!   There is an unhurried gentleness about this village which greatly pleases me.

I am getting a little side tracked so back to the teachers.   The three girls and Aaron are in their early twenties and have grown up in an Ireland of the Celtic Tiger; electric cookers, fridge freezers, washing machines and dryers, liquidizers, electric kettles, washed and prepared vegetables and potatoes in the supermarket, pizzerias, chip shops and restaurants of all descriptions.   Now here in Malindi vegetables were available if in season and were organic and much cheaper.  Cooking was done in the open over a fire made of wood.  Clothes were washed out of door in a bucket and dried on the old fashioned clothes line.   No hot water in the tap for bathing so they had to boil some water over the open fire and wash from a bucket.   There was one toilet bowl and one Asian toilet (hole in the ground) in the house.   Now meeting the four teachers it looked as if they had been used to these particular circumstances all their lives.   They were even getting their shoes repaired with the local shoemaker.   Do we still have such people in Ireland or have we become too posh to repair our shoes?

It was also obvious that they had carried out great work in the school and that they were extremely popular with all the students whose standard of spoken English had improved enormously.   The exams for the fourth form students have just ended and we look forward to hearing their results next February and hope that many students will go forward to fifth and sixth form.    In Malindi Secondary School students are educated up to Form Four which means four years in the school.   If students get good marks in Form Four the Government may choose them to go forward to Form five and six and will pay both their tuition and accommodation fees for them.  Only the best students are afforded this opportunity.   Some students if they are lucky may get private sponsorship or their families may be in a position to send them for further education.   For those who do not manage to go forward the outlook can be bleak up here on the mountain with subsistence farming being the main option.  Some will leave and go to Moshi, Arusha or Dar to seek employment.   The girls will probably marry somebody locally and become pregnant quite early in life.

There is a private missionary school here in the village also called Suji High School.  This school is both a day and boarding school and caters for pupils from all over Tanzania.  There are over eight hundred pupils attending and around five hundred of these are boarders.  My good friend Benjamin who helped us with the building last year is a pupil there and I look forward to following this bright boy’s progress over the years.   This school is extremely well organised and run by a very efficient headmaster; Nicodameous Mashauri who has a teaching staff of twenty four.  A big difference between this private school and the government run Malindi Secondary where there are only two native teachers.   All pupils in both primary and secondary schools in Tanzania receive lunch which is prepared on site each day. 

Professor Kilonzo and his wife Susan arrived in the village on Saturday evening following their long drive from Dar es Salaam.   It was really exciting to see them here in the village as neither the building or the teachers would have occurred without them.  They were the catalysts which inspired our charity to come here.   On Sunday afternoon the village people held a party to say fare well to the teachers and as is the custom in Tanzania we had wonderful food followed by many speeches and presentations to the teachers.   Peadar showed his film of the building of the extension, local farming practices and the teachers arriving in Suji to the locals and they all gave their opinion and offered much valued comments on the production.     Peadar is now finishing off the film by adding footage one year later.

The three girls decided to take a few days break in Zanzibar prior to flying home so they invited Rahema and her family as well as Eneza’s family to dinner on the previous evening.   Purchasing, preparing and cooking dinner took five hours.   We had a most wonderful evening with the children translating for all of us.    The Tanzanians sang their songs and the Irish sang theirs.  This is what life is all about – sharing food, song and laughter.   Many tears were shed by all and we were treated to the great warmth of Africa by each of us receiving a much treasured gift. 

Oh I forgot to mention Aaron is now in the poultry business!   Five hens and rooster and joy of joys five chicks.

       There are chicks there under mother!                                 

                                                                                  Cockeral and other hens

Goats and a cow next year?

More Later describing a trip to Same and return to Dar