Laura Lawler
I am a student going to Sarah Lawrence College in New York originally from Washington DC and Virginia. I study environmentalism, public health, and visual art--focusing where those fields intersect. I enjoy taking life easy, fishing, farming, getting into gritty political argument, museums, sensory experience, new things, old things, but mostly good things that are good not only for me but for the great --us-- that includes everyone visiting this blog and not. This blog is to keep up on my semester abroad at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. I hope its helpful and enjoyable to those of you who are curious about me and what I am getting into.Laura Lawler
I will be keeping up this blog for the summer 2007 as a return to East Africa for the pure sake of investigation, exploration, and travel.
Travel Blog Posts
August 10th 2007
The road from Dodoma northwards to kondoa was very bumpy and very dry. The houses are flat and rectangular and made of bricks by the warangi people mostly. Spent one night in this small town---walking around and spending lots of time speaking with the women selling fruits in the market. The bus to Babati and then to Arusha where I am now was also completely dusty though not crowded at all so enjoyable. I had to breath through a kanga most of the time and when i had to scratch my nose I ended up scratching my face---lots of bumps, no asphault. Houses became round, out of straw and mud---massai country. Took a try of a medicine for clearing the head from the massai sitting next to me. Played clapping games and footsie with a very ... read more
August 6th 2007
greetings from dodoma where i access the internet in two consecutive days! i only have some minutes so i will just write a little from the journal i carry: I love cheap hotels with verandas. It feels like a very noble place for only 6,000 shillings ($5.50) and now im settling in for a few days. my morning walk yestyerday was nice though most everything was closed except for the fabulous fabric shops none of which even tried to overchardge me. I had run out of shillings so I went to a fancier hotel to do some exchange since banks arent open. I saw 1 mzungu there and then a big group of them on the street, but i realize now i havent said more than hi to a white person in over a week. i ... read more
July 14th 2007
So I am typing at the computers at hall 7 of the university of dar es salaam where i have spent so many hours last year. its nice being back to something of a home. i collected on campus really nice small bright red seeds that i will use someday for something. yesterday i arrived in dar from zanzibar. i had spent my 21 birthday in the village of bwejuu in the southern east coast of zanzibar. i woke up in a beach bungalow/mzungu place with beata, sibylle, and their parents and was suprised at breakfast with champagne. then i went for a swim in the indian ocean and a walk in the town. we were the only ones at this bungalow place for five days. its a rasta owner and he had a beautiful cat ... read more
July 7th 2007
Im back! From washington dc to new york to amsterdam to nairobi, nairobi to samburu national park in middle kenya to lewa downs rhino sanctuary next to isiolo town from where you can see mt. kenya to massai mara. this was the luxery part of the journey so far. ive seen all of the animals. (kweli kabisa) I could describe all of these experiences, but already they seem far away and my head is clogged with new things. At Lewa Downs the whole birthday court of Nancy (turning 80--the point of the trip in the first place) attended the meat eating ceremony of Karamishu, a Massai friend of Nancy. We slaughtered two sheep and a cow. the massai drank the blood from the cows neck--literally. two men held down the cow and pushed on it so ... read more
January 8th 2007
After the trip back from Mbeya, I had one day to take a shower, say goodbye, went to my roomates mom's house which has a nice garden i wish i had known about and where her mom made me my last plate of peas and rice, and had a last dinner at angiti, a nice indian place where i filled up on delicious paneer before the midnight flight. the last tanzanian i spoke to was a rasta guy who was exactly like all the rest-clever and sneaky-always being mjanjamjanja, and he gave me a light up red heart pen that i then gave to someone else-maybe the man i went into amsterdam with or maybe a stranger-i dont remember. had a little christmas shot--- these were the things on my mind: quiet cars, smooth highways, unknowingly ... read more
January 5th 2007
I arrived in Matema village on the shores of Lake Nyasa/Lake Malawi and set myself up in a 10,000 shillings (9 dollars) accomodation right on the beach--it was a splurge of an extra five bucks or so because I was alone, there are only 3 accomodaton options, I didnt have my passport on me so I didnt want to make problems for myself with the border police, it was my last few days...After justifying the expense and realizing how disapointing it really is to not negotiate and argue and make up stories for the hotel-owners, I took my marimba (wooden hand piano with great atonality and lets you play the rythms of your body not just notes) and kanga and went to sit with the water at my toes. there were about ten children playing in ... read more
December 20th 2006
dont have energy to say alot right now being as i slept on the street under the bus last night. i just travelled in buses for 26 hours and the last four hours we had to stop because the police wouldnt let busses pass because it is around the christmas season and thus lots of armed robberies on the highways i guess, or at least a potential for. short trip summary: went to iringa by bus (6 hours) where it was quite cold, and host of one of the very few tanzanian movie theaters, beata and i saw "the truth about palestine." but only two tanzanians came and two other foreigners the mountains there look like ice cream cones sprinked with boulders. took a bike ride 15 kilometers to bizarre and amazing stone pillars (for those ... read more
December 11th 2006
friends moved into a house in kinondoni in a nice neighborhood with lots of small shops on an unnamed street and lots of delicious street-food. (one of the thigns i will miss most) went up to a table with chicken heads, chicken feet, chicken intestine wrapped in a ball, different organs, displayed in piles on newspapers. i stood staring for maybe five minutes after she told me the prices in luck, she also had bananna so i bought that. she put some delicious saucey on it and i didnt feel bad for starting. but i wonder---how can you eat a chicken head like that? can you just eat the whole thing once its been cooked even though i think there is no meet? and the legs...can you eat those whole or are they just for chewing? ... read more
December 1st 2006
yummy seafood in outdoor evening food market watched the fishermen bringing in hundreds of octopus all strung together ... read more
November 27th 2006
SO classes have slowed to a trickle and exams creep up next week, which gives me plenty of time now to daydream and nap and dance in my room. Last thursday was Thanksgiving and after class I went to a nice house in a neighborhood near campus where some foreign students live amongst chickens and children. tenesko. nice walk across a large soccer field for 20 minutes to get there. past one of the common roadside shops with lazy women behind bars passing water and beer between the bars to their customers who then hang out outside the shop for hours. I got to making pumpkin pie. bought a nice fresh, strange looking multi-colored pumpkin at the new Shop Right--the huge supermarket, well, actually the same size as an average grocery store in the US, but ... read more
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