Goodbye SFS

There are three days left of my program here in Tanzania so things are really starting to wrap up. It’s amazing how fast the time went by! The last two and a half weeks have been spent researching, analyzing data, and writing a paper for our directed research projects. We were all split into groups based on the three main subjects Wildlife Ecology, Wildlife Management, and Environmental Policy. We were able to request the project we wanted to work on but there had to be an even number of students working on each project. My first choice was Wildlife Ecology because the professor is really interesting and he was working on two projects involving elephants. One was about the Maasai use of and beliefs about elephants and the other was about elephant demography. I ended up getting my second choice which was the Environmental Policy project involving interviewing the local people about their knowledge of climate change and the effects its had on their lives. I’m so glad that I ended up working on this project because I think it was truly a unique experience to meet and talk with so many of the local people. Within the group we all decided to look at different aspects of the local peoples’ knowledge. I focused on their knowledge of changes in water availability in their area, changes in agricultural production, and any strategies they used to increase productivity. Others were looking at knowledge about environmental conservation, climate change, effects of climate change on pastoralists, and on gender roles. The 8 days of research we did were full days out in three different villages with a partner and a local guide. We would go from house to house and interview whoever was there as long as they were older than 18. One of the first things that struck me was that this technique would NEVER work in the US. It really exemplified some of the cultural differences. First, there was usually someone home at every house we went to and second, most everyone was welcoming and willing to be interviewed for about half an hour. I think if anyone tried this in the US the majority of the time doors would be slammed in your face and if you were able to ask questions they would have to last no longer than 5 minutes. The hustle and bustle does not exist in daily life here, people are laid back and don’t always have somewhere they have to be. We interviewed such a variety of people from different tribes, some mothers who were our age, some ancient men and women, young Maasai moran, and there were always adorable children. I was able to photograph everyone who would let me as part of the research too!

Our guide Julius and I walking to the next boma for interviews

One of my favorite pictures of an 84 year old woman we interviewed named Elizabeth

The most interesting responses to our questions were about what climate change was and what caused it. There were very few people who understood climate change on a global scale. However, the majority of people understood it to be the changes in rainfall and temperature that they had experienced. Some knew that it was due to environmental destruction, a few mentioned the industries of developed countries, many believed that it was the work of God and we had a few responses that in order to reduce the effects of climate change, a goat should be slaughtered as a sacrifice. The younger people we interviewed who had attended secondary school generally seemed to have been educated about the environment more. However, the majority of people we interviewed had only completed primary school, the equivalent of elementary and middle school. This experience impressed upon me one of the most powerful things I think I’ve learned so far here, that climate change has real effects. Hearing person after person talk about how the lack of rainfall was affecting their agricultural production and therefore leaving their family hungry really began to make me angry. So many people in the US deny climate change or even if they believe it they won’t make conscious decisions to change their lifestyle to be more sustainable. We Americans don’t care enough because we don’t feel any of the effects. Maybe there are a few more natural disasters these days but it obviously hasn’t made enough of an impact for people to change or demanding the government to make changes. The Tanzanians that we interviewed here may not all know what climate change is, but they see its effects daily. The people here live very sustainably compared to us. They walk or bike everywhere and eat food from their own farm so when our interviewees would ask us what they should do to reduce the effects of climate change, all we could really say was plant trees. It's frustrating that they are not the cause of the problem but feel all of the effects.I could probably rant for a while about it, but I'll leave it at that.

The interviews were always interesting but definitely tiring since we were out in the sun all day walking around. For my project we also mapped some water sources using GIS, so I learned a tiny bit about using the program. Our last day of research was especially fun because we were mapping a spring at the bottom of the escarpment. It was an hour long hike to the spring through a palm forest, a banana farm where we saw marijuana growing, and along the rocky banks of a river. We had to wade up a small creek and scramble over some boulders. It felt so great to be hiking and the spring was beautiful. There were streams flowing down a rock face and big fig trees on the banks. A wonderful way to end the research before beginning the analysis and writing!

Chrissy and I with our guides Cecilia, Harry, and Emmanuel from left to right at Miwaleni spring

The rift valley escarpment, a view from our hike

We’ve had a few non program days in the last couple weeks as well where we’ve explored Mto wa Mbu and Karatu more. Becca and I visited the same guy (Steve) who had made us a CD before and spent most of the afternoon trading music with him. I traded songs from De la Soul, Tribe Called Quest, Jurassic 5, and more that he had never heard for Tanzanian hip-hop. It was a great way to spend our time since we weren’t trying to spend more money shopping in Karatu. We learned that he was actually a local DJ as well and his DJ name was Blackzungu, combining his skin color with the Swahili word for white person (mzungu). Earlier that day we had visited an organic coffee plantation where we were finally able to try some real Tanzanian coffee. It was delicious, especially compared to the instant coffee that is available in camp! On the most recent non program day we were able to go on a bike ride through Mto wa Mbu and out to Lake Manyara. It was a beautiful ride but a somewhat painful experience because the bike frames were all too small and the seats were really hard. We rode close to zebras, Thomson’s gazelle, and wildebeest. Then we were able to walk up to the lakeshore and watch the flamingos feeding in the lake. The tour also included visiting a place where people from the Makonde tribe were making the wooden carvings that are popular throughout the shops of Mto wa Mbu. It really was impressive to see the people actually carving such intricate pieces. We also stopped to see artists painting and to learn about how the local banana beer was made. Definitely worth the sore butts to see everything! I spent the rest of that afternoon with Becca playing Cardi Moja outside of a store with some of the guys that show us around the town and try to sell us stuff. They were really good at the game and definitely gave us some competition.

Becca and I with DJ Blackzungu in his shop 



Our bike ride by Lake Manyara

It’s been a great end of the semester and now we just have the group presentations to the community left. Then everyone will fly home and I will travel to Moshi to climb Kilimanjaro! Since no one was interested in climbing in my group I asked people from the other group of students who switched with us to go from Tanzania to Kenya. There were 3 of them who were already planning on climbing so I was able to join their trek. We are doing the Machame route which is a little more difficult than the most popular route up the mountain. I’m very excited and hope that I’ll be in good enough shape for the hike! After the 6 days it takes to get up and down the mountain, I’ll be meeting up with the family I will be WWOOFing with in Moshi. Their farm is 150 km from the town and I will be helping them start a tree nursery and set up an irrigation system. From email correspondence with the owner of the farm, the family sounds very welcoming. I am very excited to live in an African household and try to speak only Swahili, although it’s also a little nerve-wracking. After WWOOFing for about 12 days I will bus to Nairobi to meet with some of the Save the Elephants administration to learn about the research going on in Samburu. The next day I fly to Samburu to begin my month long internship! So many things to look forward to, but it will still be so hard to leave the family that my group has become here. Now it’s time to begin packing and hoping that all my stuff will fit in two manageable bags for travel..