My Life, A Safari

Mt. Kili

I am a little bit behind on my blogging but I wanted to let you know that I am now a successful Mt. Kilimanjaro climber and expert Masai market trader :)

Yesterday (Wednesday) we took the day off of school to go climb Mt. Kili which is the tallest free standing mountain!! If you have been keeping up with my safari you will know that I am pretty excited about this. Our professor hooked us up with a 9,000 ft day climb up the mountain. There are many different routes to get to the summit. However we took the Marangu or “Coca-cola” route because it is the most gentle trip for unexperienced climbers ;) However, this 9,000 ft trail/climb was exhausting!! The rout is judged as 3 hours to the camp and 2.5 hours back down. We crossed the starting line feeling pretty confident. Booking it because we were so excited! This was very short lived because after 20 minutes of hustling at 10:30 in the morning, already developing an intense case of back sweat...it was time to go “pole pole” (in tanzanian that means slow slow) especially since it would take 3 hours to reach the camp! The guides in the back were even getting out of breath haha So I decided to lag behind and enjoy the beauty!

We were seriously walking through a rainforest! No joke. It was so beautiful! I still can not get over how huge and grand the trees were. The trees were covered in moss and twisted and turned in all sorts of directions. I felt like we were walking through the jungle of Tarzan. It was so neat and defiantly not what I was expecting to find in Africa. We saw saw of blue monkeys and waterfalls as well. The climb was pretty intense...there was a path which was nice but there were some definite steep parts in the trip. Oh, and there are seriously man eating ants!!!!!! Shannen and I stopped to take a water break at one point. We set our back packs down. We stopped and drank for probably 20 seconds when all of a sudden I feel a pinch on my foot. And sure enough...ANTS! This was the second time that I have gotten attacked by ants and it is seriously terrible. These ants swarm your feet in a blink of an eye, and are really buggers! They practically clench your skin so you cant brush them off! One ant found its way up into my pants which added to the adventure. We eventually made it up to the camp a good half hour after the first group :) I didn’t think I was that out of shape, but the air really is thinner up there. It was hard to catch a breath and even when you would take in a deep breath, it felt like you didn’t get any haha Cant imagine what the summit would feel like!

We had lunch up at the camp then ventured to a little crater that had a great view point of Kili :) After this, we started our descend down the mountain. The climb down probably took 1.5ish hours and I was sooo impressed that we all made it to the top after seeing the terrain that we climbed up. It was quite the accomplishment and I am excited to say that I have climbed a mountain ;) haha The ride home was pretty quiet as we were all so pooped! It was a blast!!

Today, we did not go to school also because the students have been doing their monthly examinations at school. Since we were not teaching, our professor allowed us to take the day off to go to Shagga. Shagg is such an awesome place that employs physically disabled Tanzanians. Shagga started with a couple of Tanzanians that noticed that people with disabilities had limited opportunities of work and life which is detrimental to their survival. Therefore, they started a small business where they created an environment for physically disabled people to come and work. At Shagga, the workers do all sorts of unique crafts. They blow glass, make fabric, make their own beads, sewing, aluminum molds, jewelry ect. The vibe at Shagga was so positive and warm and the people loved what they were doing! It was awesome to see that people noticed a need and did something about it. Another neat thing that is cool about Shagga, is that they make a lot of stuff out of recycled materials. Schools, businesses and safari companies donate glass wine bottles or paper to Shagga where they are able to melt down these pieces for glass to make beads or glasses. Shagga also gives back to the community schools to aid students with disabilities. Shagga is an awesome and uplifting place!

We also got the opportunity to go to the Masai market :) After today I am an expert trader ;) For example, I was able to trade an unopened anti-diarrhea medicine, for a soap stone hippo. Good deal. Or a Colmen 10 pack capsules that turn into towels when wet, for a soap stone bowl. Good deal. It was a ton of fun and it made me realize how much people just want to talk and build a relationship. I pretty much had all of my souvenirs that I wanted today, so my goal was to just get rid of my stuff. The tanzanian way of life is very pole pole and hakuna matata, which I love! It was very evident today at the market. I found that when you are not in a hurry and just talk to people, they create a bond which is actually precious. They could care less about what they are selling really. I think it is just nice to have somebody new to talk to haha But then you get the crazy vendors that want you to trade your iPhone for a Tanzanian flag. Crazy!

Well tomorrow is the last day of school for us :( These kids are so precious! We will see how it goes!

Much love!

xoxoxo