Culture Night...by Leo L

Hello friends and family, this is Leo. I’m blogging about Wednesday the 30^th! In the morning we all woke up at the same time as usual, 7. We had a nice breakfast and then the whole group went off to the orphanage because of the religious holiday that caused the school to be closed. While we were at the orphanage, another group of about 25 students from Ireland joined us and helped us take care of the children. At first they stole all of our thunder with their fancy balloons and bubbles, but eventually the children made their way back to us! After leaving Upendo we ate lunch and headed off to do our daily labor. It was a bright sunny day and we all worked our tails off trying to keep up with all of these ladies. We helped them to pick all of the weeds out of the farmland and help them hoe it. These ladies are at least forty or even fifty years older than us, and can kick our butts in just about any sort of labor possible! After we were finished we had our culture night. The food that was prepared for us was traditional meals that the Chagga people eat daily. It had some odd dishes, and also some wonderful ones. One of the talks of the night was the minnow salad that was set out for us to enjoy; I’m not sure many people enjoyed it as much as they were dreading trying it. We also had some ugali, which is basically a mix of corn meal and water. We got some vegetable curry to add a little taste to it but it still is very thick going down. We got to try some traditional cooked banana stew, which was very tasty. Of course we had some rice in this meal, which we have had in just about every meal since we got here except for breakfast. They also prepared some coleslaw and different types of fruit for us to have. After we were finished enjoying our traditional food, we waited for our “dance instructors” to arrive along with the wonderful drummers. After they came in and got set up it started. We had three types of dances that we learned but they all seemed to be similar in some way. For the first dance we were to sit off to the side and join the women and one man after they took our hand and brought us into the circle. Once everyone was brought in, we continued to walk in a circle around the drummers while dancing. You could tell some of the people in our group were a little more comfortable with it then others but everyone who participated loved it. After the first session of dancing for about 15 minutes ended, we got a well-deserved rest period. I don’t think I’ve seen some of us so tired and sweaty but still enjoying ourselves. Then the second session started, the boys and girls were on separate sides of the room facing each other. It started with one lady grabbing a boy to come and dance with her and then the boy would grab another girl to join in and then the girl grabbed a boy and so on till we all were dancing. This was more of a classic Prom or Homecoming type of dancing where everyone was just doing his or her thing. It was very impressive to see these ladies dance. I swear that twerking originated here in Tanzania, and the twerking here is more family friendly then what most of you are thinking right now. After the second dance was over we had another well-needed break. During this break we were told to go get any tips that we wish to give the drummers. We set all of our tips on a blanket that they laid out for us. They would then take one bill at a time and place it on the floor and do something I will most likely never be able to do. They would put their hands behind their backs and slowly do the splits until they reached the point where they could pick up the money with their mouth. One of the men even did it in jeans. It was very impressing. After that we had another break and got to dance again! This one was very similar to the first one. We were all off to the side and started dancing in a circle once they pulled us in. After the dancing was supposed to be over, it wasn’t for some of us! We were having such a good time that we decided to go onto a small section of the roof that had some chairs and a table on it. We moved those items aside and had a dance party of our own, with American music this time. We spent sometime up there before Baba Dick came up and reminded us that it was going to be another early morning with a lot of work ahead of us! We listened to a few more songs and danced harder then some of us have before and went to sleep. All around it was a wonderful night and I was ecstatic to be a part of it!

I’m having a wonderful time so far and I’m happy that I decided to come on this trip. I am loving everyone that is here and have had little to no problems with anyone because everyone is so easy-going. I met a little girl named Irene at the orphanage and she won’t let me leave her side. She likes to wear my hat so I make sure that I fit it to her head and make sure none of the other kids steal it from her! She doesn’t like it when I try to play with other children or try to hold them so I mainly just stick to her! She is very easy to have fun with and is very relaxed. She is going to be missed tremendously once I am back home. I have to say though I am missing some things back home. Mostly just hockey and my dog Rocky… But I guess I miss my family and friends too! If all of you can just come here and bring a sheet of ice with my life would be perfect! Thanks for reading.

                                                                                                            With Lots of Love!