One group of farmers that I’ve been working with abused the funds we gave them for their project. Blatant stealing by the only two male group members out of 7. I won’t go into details. But there’s been a lot of complications and the big showdown is on Monday. I wonder how it’ll turn out. If you ask me, there were a lot of things wrong with how the project developed in the first place. But it still doesn’t make me feel […]
What is it that I like about Dar es Salaam? I don’t really have an answer, except that I feel as content as anywhere else I’ve lived. Isn’t that enough? There are ups. There are downs. There are happy moments. And sad moments. Good people. Annoying people. And everything in between. What is there not to like? ** well I’ve actually been a bit negative lately, mostly from stress of maybe being jobless soon and a bit homesick (or let […]
I’m super loving the in-season (for at least 1.5 months now) mangoes! I don’t think I can ever eat the pineapples, mangoes, or any other tropical fruit back in Canada anymore….so spoiled. The mangoes here are huge, juicy, fresh, sweet, and cheap…jealous yet? Indescribable taste and texture…mmmmm…. I’m think I should do a food post. I have some interesting food I like here :) I guess I just need photos of all of them.
Five out of seven days of the week, there’s no electricity from when work starts until the sun sets (8 am to 7 pm). Call it whatever you like – rationing, failure – it makes no difference. There’s actually a schedule put out by Tanesco (the para-statal that controls the electricity distribution) telling people at what time which parts of the city will have power cuts. In true Dar style though, the schedule is rarely followed. Currently, it’s the hottest […]
Land tenure in this city is just so messed up. Coming from two places where privatised individual ownership of land is the norm, it’s really, really hard for me to get my head wrapped around how badly the land reform was done in Dar es Salaam. The fact that the urban farmers I work with don’t actually farm on legal land is old news. But I recently heard that the ferry terminal downtown is going to be teared down, because […]
Sorry I haven’t been posting recently. I’ve been feeling a bit down; one part homesick and two parts stressed at what’s going to happen after this internship ends. As of now, I still don’t know if I would be able to stay here for another year. I would really love to keep my job, since it’s work that I’m interested in, can learn a ton from, and it’s in Tanzania! But it will all depend if we get funding from […]
