Well, I've booked my climb of Kili - heading off on 12 September, and am now wondering about the sense of taking on the biggest physical challenge of my life… Am thinking it would have been far more sensible to treat myself to a luxury safari for my 34th b-day rather than face the -37 degree summit. The Guardian here (that's the Tanzanian version and nothing like our very own Grauniad) reported the other day that 2 men lost their lives for a $3 duck. They tried to steal it and an ‘’ enraged mob ‘ took them down and beat [View Full Entry]

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The title of this blog is the same as the bumper sticker on one of the land cruisers my tour group spent the best part of week travelling around in and it truly became our motto for the week. There was never a hurry and there was never a problem ("hakuna matata")! I have excluded the details of the first 36 hours in Africa (from my arrival in Nairobi through to my entry into Tanzania) from this blog simply because it was entirely painful - switching hotels, transfers not on time etc. Thankfully, once in Tanzania, the trip was very smooth. [View Full Entry]

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i lied because kigoma and lake tanganika are not options. i am in kigoma. this is the real africa, thats all i can really say. the train, it was bush the whole way long. 2 days of the train and all there was was bush and the occassional small village. now i am in kigoma. real africa here. lots of congolese refugees and burundi people and its a totally different atmosphere. mountains on the lake. my internet is out so i go for now. but my god i am glad i did this trip. dar is a bubble. [View Full Entry]

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After a long drive through Kenya we crossed the border into Tanzania and headed for Arusha. Another beautiful sunset from the truck meant we again reached camp after dark. This meant pitching our tents for the first time without being able to see what we were doing. Fortunately, the new additions to our tour had just returned from a fortnight’s camping to see gorillas in the Congo, and were more than willing to help out us newbies. Little did we know that this was going to be the least of our worries… At about 10:30pm most people started to feel some [View Full Entry]

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It's been an eventful week, full of the unexpected - bumping into people, going to weddings, meeting up with AIDS consultants and gathering material for the library/reception at Kinshai. As ever, nothing ever quite goes according to expectations. So, having gotten to a conference in Swahili, one of the things I did was take advantage of the location and go for a hike in the Uluguru hills. These are about 3 hours south west of Dar. I was taken up by a guide - 26 year old James, who wanted to know why I thought some people are poor and some [View Full Entry]

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In an attempt to get in shape for Kili, I’m going to be running a 10km race on Sat and probably another one in a few weeks. I reckon it will be kill (me) or cure, particularly after some overindulgences in Dar. I’ll be raising money for Kinshai, so I’m looking for sponsorship. To remind you, here are some of the things Kinshai does: * HIV testing and counseling in the offices in Moshi * Family planning education * Care of HIV positive babies * Adolescent health and condom negotiations * Education and support for people living with AIDS * [View Full Entry]

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Day 83: Sunday, August 13: Nairobi to Arusha, Tanzania I met up with our truck, guide and most of the people on the tour. A lot of them have already been together for about 2 weeks, checking out the gurillas and Maasai Mara. There were 8 of us that are new and another 10 or so leaving in Zanzibar with 10 more joining up. So its a bit of a hop-on/hop-off kinda tour, which I think is okay because it just means a bunch of fresh new faces. Once on the road, I quickly learned about truck life. The roads are [View Full Entry]

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Now that we have the dropping off done, we are under control and ready for the next step. Joshua is settling in his new home for the next 4 - 6 - 8 years …. (Yikes!). As you can see there isn't much space. Anthony, being the handy man that he is, has built some shelving that we are taking down this weekend for the guys to have at least some way of organizing their mess. I was stunned they wouldn't let me color coordinate their clothes or alphabetize their CD's, but maybe this will at least get it off the [View Full Entry]

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Hello Friends and Family! Well, I am pleased to report that no one became the meal for a hungry something. =) Our adventure started with visiting Lake Manyara where we were introduced to the art of watching wildlife.....see where the other trucks are parked, and go join them. I kind of felt like we were part of a giant herd of metallic wildebeasts! We saw some baboons (even baby ones, giraffes, elephants and flamincos, but the real animal watching started when we continued on to the Serengeti National Park. We all became adept at scanning the grassland and shouting out if [View Full Entry]

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Well in case any of you were wondering, it's now official -Jasons gone completely nuts. Cabin fever, boredom, crazyness or my personal favorite: plain and simple insanity now officially reign supreme. It's been exactly two weeks now since my passport vanished without a trace, and I've yet to confirm there to be any real progress in its replacement. I'd love to give my home government workers the benefit of the doubt, yet something inside me says that I'm going to be waiting quite a bit longer. I know that in a previous entry I already went over my daily routine in [View Full Entry]

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