Stuck in Place

It is as if this rainy season in Dar es Salaam has clouded my mind.

The rains have fallen and as I have tried to walk through them, my feet feel stuck in the mud and the rain pounds down over me.

Part of me would like to think that I am stuck in the mud and I am standing still being washed by the freshness of the rain. However, I am just standing here. I am soaking wet in cultural confusion and personal reflection. It is like I am waiting for something to get me moving again.

I keep asking myself, what are you waiting for? Maybe I am waiting for my family to visit. Maybe this low key, standstill is teaching me some lesson that has yet to reveal itself. Maybe I am waiting to go home. Maybe I am waiting for the rain to stop.

Whatever it is, this Tanzanian life has got me stuck. There is so much to think about, reflect upon, challenge, accept, stomach, feel, see and do. I have seen Tanzanians in times of happy. I have seen death, watched mourning and prayed for those in pain. I have taught and I have learned. I have accepted hospitality and attempted to repay it. I have felt fulfilled. I have felt out of place. I have felt ‘in it’ and I do not know when that stopped but things seem to move slower now, fewer things excite my passions and the fire that urged me to get here and to be here is not burning as fiercely.

Tanzania is a wild place. It is not wild in the ways the TV and movies make it to look but it is wildly diverse, wildly dynamic and wildly interesting. Ideas of justice, fairness, work ethic, accountability, generosity, cooperation, community, gender, race, politics, food, religion, ‘The West’ and various other topics cloud my mind. How I defined these things 17 months ago have changed. I know I have changed. Most interestingly though, the question of: what do I do with this creeps up. Maybe this slower time is my chance to take inventory of the things I have witnessed, people I have encountered and emotions I have felt. I know that we all have ups and downs at every stage, in many places and at different times.

So I will stay for now, sloshing in the mud and waiting for that fire to engulf me into another rush of adventure. 

RAIN

As the rain pounds down onto the roof above me and I pull me blanket up over my shoulder, I take in a breath of cool damp air and remind myself how lucky I am. Eleven times zones away, back in Seattle, rain means something very different to me. Seattle rain is constant, enriching and relentless. It creates the beautiful environment of the Pacific Northwest. It shapes the land and determines how, when and where we can access that land. It decides what we wear. It keeps things fresh and green. It cleans, it calms and it is just always there. Rain is a part of life in Seattle. Growing up in the Northwest rain meant recess indoors and damp socks sloshing in my shoes. Walking briskly through soft mist wrapped in a raincoat with hot coffee in my hand are parts of home that I miss. The start of the rainy season in Dar es Salaam brings me back to those memories, habits and cold, wet comforts.

                                                                                                                           

In the early hours of a Monday morning thunder, lightning and sheets of rain creep over the unsuspecting district of Dar in which I live. Here, the rains are less welcomed and despised by those dwelling. This morning the lightning flashes through a greyish-orange sky producing a glow that in unexpected and haunting. The thunder thumps rhythmically as it trumps the morning’s usual sounds of a rooster’s call or a mosque’s call to prayer. The rain wisps its way onto the tin roves in a comforting tap dance echoed above and beyond. It cascades down and slaps the pavement, dust, brush and debris below in a percussive pattern that is deafening and engaging to the senses.

Laying in bed surrounded by, surrendered to and sensing the drowning environment outside, I think about the change that rains bring. The rain changes the weather, the air and the sensation of breathing.

My evening started as an average night of shifting in a light sleep entombed by my mosquito net and beneath a humming ceiling fan circulating a thick embrace of humidity. Drifting in and out of a distracted slumber, the heat and sounds out on the streets beyond my bedroom keep me half asleep and constantly coaxing myself to fall back to sleep. I wake up once, hot and sweating. I wake up again, roll over. I wake up yet again, there is a loud car driving past our house. I wake. I Snooze.

Then I wake up not by sound, not by sweat, not by an alarm clock ushering me up and out. I am not jolted awake. Instead, I slowly regain consciousness in a cold(ish), humming, thundering and pounding storm. The rainy season’s force has set in.

My sleepy thoughts of home, refreshing rain and a life that feels far away drift back into this life as I think about what rains mean in this space. Thinking about this city, my friends, students and coworkers, I realize that this storm is destructive and devastating for countless others. Rains mean water and lots of it in a short amount of time. Unfortunately, that water has no where to go in this city.

Dar es Salaam is a city with no formal garbage collecting system, there are very few drains and rivers are not reinforced with retention walls. Houses consist of tin roofs, open screened windows and shallow septic system. Then of course there is the unorganized, overcrowded system of roads. Infrastructure, or lack there of, is the main issue here. Lack of planning, corners cut and questionable city planning has set up Dar es Salaam situations that hurt people, harm surroundings and hinder development.

The rains are bittersweet. I long for cold afternoons back home but I feel deeply for humid downpours over the homes of my friends, co-workers and life-giving students here. Just as I have oftentimes felt torn between my worlds both here and there, I am torn between my initial emotional reaction to rain and the sad lived reality that it brings to this space and these lives lived here.  

we go, we do and we go to the next

In the states we are programmed and encouraged to seek spaces, places and experiences that can benefit us or provide us with some sort of an outlet. Maybe we seek an outlet to showcase a specific talent or it is a group of people that open our minds or maybe it is something that guides our heart to some kind of fulfilling experience. Whatever it is or who or where it is, we are on the move.

We travel to a classroom to learn. We go to the office to do our work. The church is for praying. The soccer field is for playing. Our friends are for venting to and our families give us stories to tell. We go to a theater to see movies or shows that provide a brief escape from our daily lives. We plug ourselves into iPods or step into art galleries to embrace something beautiful, expressive and creative. We go on vacations for something new and we seek reunions to remember the past.

We go, we do and we go again. The next space, the next place, the next experience.

When I was at Seattle University, I was always on the move. I was working in three different offices, learning various skills in each and balancing it all with the goal of being well rounded and grounded to the many skills, people and places. I worked in the admissions office to better understand professionalism. I went to the orientation office to work with people concerned about the process of transitioning. Then I would travel to the campus ministry office to plan prayers, to engage in discussions or to put together large scale retreats. Add other clubs, campus events, a social life and… academics and you can see how my college experience was about involvement and the going to and coming from all of the spaces. All of that fired my passions and challenged my evolving sense of self.

I do not think that I am alone in this either nor is it a phenomenon found only at the collegiate level. We are always going somewhere to get something, to see someone or to feel some way. As a child it was soccer practice, fieldtrip permission slips, brownie making for bake sales, safety patrol, play dates and Irish dancing competitions. What’s next? Where to? Are we running late? What time does it end? How much longer until we get there? What is the purpose of this? Did you read the invitation?

It would be silly to say that this train of thought did not follow me here to Tanzania. I jumped into my first year with hopes, agendas and idealistic plans. What did I find? The spaces felt different, the places looked different and the people reacted differently. Waking up in the morning, I was out the door and heading full force into my day of lessons, classroom drama mitigation, coworkers questioning, communities discussing and navigating Tanzania and me, then me and Tanzania. I was going, going quickly, looking left and running right toward that space where I could pour out my energy, invest my love into and strive to find that fit.

Did the planets align? Did my ‘going toward’ or make-it-happen-American-attitude manifest itself in the ways that I had expected it to? Nope. Well, in some ways it did. Hard work, a lot of planning, order and structure was a success in the classroom. On the other hand, fast walking, goal setting and scheduling did not foster many deep relationships. I attribute my love for and connections with my students to be at the heart of this contrast. My methodology was successful in the classroom but not necessarily in my life outside of Loyola.

I have been blessed with some wonderful relationships here in Dar es Salaam. They did not come about through the means that I had expected to make them. So, getting back to my original point, I found that my strongest relationships formed in the spaces between my going to and from. Taking the time to stop, say yes to a conversation, meal, cold soda or seat under the shade of a great palm tree, I was embraced unexpectedly by Tanzania.

On my way to school, stopping to speak to an elder, I gained a friend. Heading home from using the internet and saying yes to eating a meal with an acquaintance, I gained a friend. Going the market and inviting someone I encountered on my walk there to join me, I gained a friend. Sharing meals with neighbors enriched those friendships and diving into conversations in Kiswahili that were too advanced humbled me but then empowered my companions to teach, share more and… mostly, something for them to giggle at.

With ten more months to go, I hope to see the beauty in the spaces in between. A breath of fresh air on my walk to school, a greeting here and a phone call there sheds light onto the little moments of peace and an authentic presence here that make sense. I expect Tanzania will continue to open my mind to these spaces. I hope that this lesson stay with me and I take it home with me. I look to home, the space there and the space between, with appreciation, excitement and anticipation while I keep living into this very different, oddly refreshing way of existence.

I do not know what is in the space between Dar es Salaam and Seattle but I keep going, I will keep doing and then I will do whatever that is, next. 

The transition of a community.

As many of you know, I am here in Tanzania working through the Jesuit Volunteer Corps. One of the many things that makes this program great and one of the top reasons I decided to apply to this specific program is the two-year mixed communities for first years and second years. JVC International is set up in a way that allows part of the community of volunteers to welcome, incorporate and share what they have learned in their first years with a fresh group of new JVs joining midway through the experience. Last December marked a pretty significant transition.

Yes, I hit the one year mark. One down, one to go. That day of accomplishment was not celebrated by cake or fireworks (shocking, I  know) but it was instead focused on the arrival of two, new members to my community, my life here and the vast network of Jesuit Volunteers.

Bethany Killian and Caitlin O’Donnell arrived in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania on December 5^th, 2011. These two wonderful young women have refreshed this space, my reality with new perspectives, excitement and a willingness to join and enrich my life here. While much of my time here has felt unreal and extreme, the work schedules and expectations of JVs in Dar are based on a long tradition of young men and women serving this small section of Dar es Salaam, namely, Mabibo. That said, I fell into a routine and a way of existing that was both beautiful and challenging.

The things, people and situations that challenged me most last year came at me from unexpected places and I expect new challenges to arise in my second year. It is, however, nice looking forward into the months to come and knowing that those things that weighed me down in the past have been liberated in a way, with time. With more time, the effects of living here will become clearer to me, I hope. I still am unsure as to what I am ‘doing’. What does my post-Tanzania life look like?  What will I put on my resume, for example? Life skills include: a little Kiswahili, taking bucket showers successfully, baking chocolate cakes from scratch, creating lesson plans about basic English or St. Ignatius, sitting on 10 hour bus rides and the ever useful skill of sweating profusely.

I guess the answer lies in the wait. I will wait to see where this second year, this second chance takes me. I will wait to see my family, my friends, my dog and cheap Chinese food. I will wait to understand my place here in Tanzania. Heck, I will wait to see where I truly fit in America. I will wait for employment in the States next year. I will wait to see what this puzzling life I have constructed for myself will look like in one week, one month and especially in one year!

Until then, I will be here in the small section of Dar es Salaam with my new community living into the newness that is this second year.

Think. Fikiri. Hope. Tumaini. Question. Uliza. Wait. Subiri.

I am days away from the one year mark.

I think. I hope. I question. I wait.

Thoughts and reflections from the past year flood my mind. Thoughts of disappointment, struggle, fear, shock and worry overwhelm me. Have I accomplished what I came here for? What have I accomplished and what did I even want to gain from all of this? Am I so blinded by my American desire to gain, achieve and grow that I am missing the day to day successes that confront, challenge and change me for the good?

It is true that my students LOVE me and their English is improving daily. I have friends here. I laugh everyday. I am still fascinated by my Tanzanian host culture. I am learning a new language, seeing a completely different side of the world and getting to know more about myself.

I still find that everyday I hear that small inner voice inviting me home, home stateside.

I think about the people, places and comforts of home constantly. I think about grabbing a beer with my brother and sending my sister a silly text message whenever I want. I think about brisk fall weather and swaying evergreen trees. I think about the holidays up ahead and a world that feels for far away from my current reality.

I think about joys in the waiting. I wait to discover new joys. I wait to receive new joys. I wait to construct new joys.

I think about my new JV community saying goodbye to their families and preparing to join me here. I think about another Christmas away from home. I think about the family dog, Coco. I think about family, their ups and downs, struggles and triumphs. I think about communication, cross-culturally, cross-continentally, criss-crossed and continuously interesting.

I think about constantly learning and the new lessons that a second year has to teach me.

I think, maybe too much, about the future and the evolving sense of home that awaits me in one year from now.

Then I think about the fact that I am here. I remain here while my heart balances gently between a home of raincoats and coffee cups and this space of unending thoughts, hopes, questions, waiting and an ever so slightly, changing Shea Patrick Meehan.

Think. Fikiri. Hope. Tumaini. Question. Uliza. Wait. Subiri.

My life here in NUMBERS

1          times during the week when I use internet.

11        number of monkeys I have seen.

1          number of camels I have seen.

1          number of times, per week, that I eat fish. Every Friday night at dinner with the Jesuits.

6          number of months it took me to realize that the mystery meat served on Tuesdays at school lunch is in fact liver.

4          number of times I have eaten whole boxes on Mac & Cheese sent from home… all by myself.

0          number of times I have driven a car in the past year. 

25        approximate number of cards I have received from my Aunt June and Uncle Tom.

2          number of poisonous spiders (the size of my hand) that I have killed. Number of those I have seen… countless.

3          number of jelly fish stings I have gotten while swimming in the Indian Ocean.

2          number of motor cycles I have been on.

4          times in the past year that I have watched the movie “Love Actually”.

4          number of seasons of Heroes (the television series) I have watched in TZA.

4          number of seasons of Brothers and Sisters (another television series) I have watched in TZA.

4          times during the year when I take de-worming medicine.

4          times during the year when I am supposed to re-apply mosquito repellant to my bug net.

1          number of times I have had malaria.

2          number of times I have had to give stool samples. 

4          number of hospitals I have visited.

6          number of days I have worn contact lenses.

1          days of the week that I shave my beard, Monday mornings.

22        approximate number of pounds I have lost in one year.

2          number of belts that I own which have saved my life this year.

9          number of months since I last cut my hair.

3          number of average of times during the day when a student or stranger touches my hair.

3          number of times I have been to Moshi, Tanzania.

2          number of times I have been to Dodoma, Tanzania.

1          number of times I have been to each of the following places around Tanzania: Zanzibar, Tanga, Lushoto, Sanya Juu.

5          approximate number of visitors coming to Tanzania in the next year.

3          number of books I am in the middle of reading.

2-3       number of scoops of instant coffee I add to a frozen water bottle that I consume each morning. Iced coffee is wonderful.

5          number of minutes it takes me to walk to work.

1,320   number of students at Loyola High School, dare s Salaam.

153      number of students I teach.

153      number of students who constantly remind and redefine my ideas of patience, determination and love.

39        number of students that I am the homeroom teacher of.

45        number of students in Arts & Design Club of which I am the club patron.  

4          number of days I have spent in parent-teacher conferences.

1          number of staff meetings we have each week.

8          number of Jesuits who work at Loyola.

60        approximate number of teachers at Loyola.

7          number of older women who work at Loyola who have crushes on me.

2          number of those women who are nuns.

2          number of school-wide, outdoor assemblies we have each week.

3          number of students who have promised to come home with me next year.

12        number of students who performed songs, dances or poems in our last class together. Celine Dion, Justin Bieber and Lil’ Wayne never sounded better.

4          number of co-workers that I can call my friends.

6          number of students who have requested to be my friend on facebook.

0          number of students I have accepted to be my friend on facebook.

10        (in the AM) time of the day when I have my favorite meal: Tea Break. Tea with milk and doughnuts.

26        number of lessons per week I taught last term.

12        number of English Writing classes per week.

6          number of Oral English classes per week. 

6          number of Values classes per week. 

2          number of Catholic Religion classes per week.

3          number of people in my current community/house.

9          number of Jesuit Volunteers currently serving in Tanzania.

4          number of people who will be in my community/house.

3          age of the person I last celebrated a birthday with.

3          number of guests who came over to celebrate my birthday last October.

300      amount in Tanzanian shillings it costs to take a bus into town.

9          number of Maasai shukas I own.

2          number of articles of traditional-ish clothing Muslim men wear that I own.

980      number of songs on my iPod.

76        number of Christmas songs I have in my iTunes account.

5          number of times I have gone out for dancing.

3          number of memory cards full of pictures I have taken.

6          number of shirts I have made out of CRAZY Tanzanian fabrics.

45        number of pairs of socks I brought to a humid, tropical country.

20        number of pairs of socks I have yet to use.

3          number of hours on average it takes to wash three weeks worth of my dirty clothes by hand.

2          number of hours on average it takes for the sun to dry my hand washed clothes.

2          approximate number of gallons of water an average bucket shower requires.

4          approximate number of hours it takes to collect, boil, cool and then filter drinking water.

3          approximate number of hours it takes to sort rice and beans for rocks, sticks or insects, to cook and then prepare for a meal.

14        number of bus rides lasting more than 8 hours I have taken this year.

105      number of minutes an average Catholic mass runs.

4          number of guests we had over for Thanksgiving.

7          number of dishes served at our Thanksgiving this year.

2          number of new tattoos I want to get when I return home. Sorry Mom/Dad.

7          days of the week that I think about something relating to Disney movies or parks.

2-4       number of meals I prepare from scratch per week.

5          number of days it usually takes three of us to finish a jar on peanut butter.

3          number of times I have eaten Ethiopian food this year.

2          number of times I have eaten pizza this year.

1          number of cheese burgers I have had this year.

1          number of times I have carried a goat into a wedding.

1          number of times per week that I eat French fries for dinner.

358      number of days I have lived in Tanzania.

384      number of days I have left in Tanzania.

A Ride of a Lifetime?

You may have running water and dependable electricity but you do NOT get random days off in the middle of the work week for Muslim holidays. Today is a Wednesday and I am sitting at home cooking rice and beans and enjoying a wonderfully relaxing day off.

Life in Dar es Salaam is moving along in what feels like slow motion on the daily but when I look at the calendar I realize that my time here is flying by! Sometimes I think that being at home with Iced Americanos and all of the cheese that I want would be great. Things here just do not come easily and while I appreciate that haunting realization that ‘I am probably becoming stronger and a more well-rounded as an individual’ I still yearn for many of the comforts back at home in the States. I am not saying that things, foods and comforts of America are the true source of happiness, mine or others, but I miss certain things that I took for granted.

Prime example: Transportation

I miss the freedom of getting into a car and going somewhere on a whim. Leaving the one-mile radius of my home is an all day adventure by bus usually involving a goal of buying an item for our house, a trip to the post office to send a letter or the occasional trip to visit students, beaches or a new part of the city. Buses are crowded. Buses are crazy. Buses are called Dala dalas. Buses drive on sidewalks. Buses don’t follow stop lights. Busses ARE urban Tanzania and very much so a part of my reality here in Dar!

Buses are recycled school buses shipped over from China. The busses were meant to carry very small children to school. (It is common to find painted walls depicting playgrounds, cartoon animals and the like on the insides of these moving mad houses). Each bus has about 25 seats (usually bolted to the floor) but the average trip into town packs close to double the capacity. These human sardine cans of wheels serve as the main form of transportation for the inhabitants of Dar.

One learned and observed realization of this place has showed me that Tanzanians pride themselves as being a peaceful country founded on the ideas of harmony and unity. Interestingly, however, if you choose to board a dala dala during rush hour, prepare yourself to experience the unexpected! Old women being elbowed, children being stepped on and drivers stepping on the gas while patrons are only halfway up the steps and onto the bus! There seems to be no mercy on these buses.

Oh, and did I mention that people pay to ride these buses!

So, with my knees jammed up against the half-bolted seat in front of me, it is the norm to share that bench with one or two others. There is almost always a small child within arms reach (or resting on my own lap) staring at or crying on account of my presence. (Mind you that child is crying because my skin is the oddest/scariest thing he or she has ever seen). All of that just to buy sponges to wash dishes or to send a letter.

To add to the fun, children are not the only ones staring. It is extremely rare to see a white person, mazungu, riding a dala dala. So, not only am I holding a strange child who is crying at the sight of me but I am sweating in a seat made for a tiny Chinese child while dozens of Tanzanians look at me like: ‘wow, he must be lost’. On a recent trip back form the beach I even had to ask a group of women to stop pulling on my hair… At first I thought that it was the wind blowing my luscious locks but when the brushing feeling on the back of my head shifted from stroking to yanking… I knew that something was up. I turned around to see a woman chatting it up on her cell phone and confused as to why I was upset about her pulling on my hair. I told her to stop, immaturely reached out and touched her hair and turned back around leaving her confused and shocked by my own reaction to the situation. (Yes, I pulled her hair. Not my most shinning moment but I had to show her how awkward the whole thing was and… that was the first thing that came to mind!)

Best ways to find humor in the situation include:

1. Making faces at children.
2. Staring back at the Tanzanians who think I am lost and then greeting then in Kiswahili.
3. Joking with old people. (I find that this is a cross-cultural trend that old people just like to talk and have young people listen to them).
4. If the children do not respond to jokes or faces, I find that pretending to cry myself usually confuses them so much that they stop crying.
5. Looking out the window. This is my standby. I never fail to see someone or something interesting, entertaining and unexpected walking the streets of Dar.

Anyway, back to my original thought: that ability to go anywhere, whenever I want is seemingly impossible. Mobility in this life is limited in terms of experiencing other areas, realities and sites outside of my immediate neighborhood without hassle! At the same time, I am blessed by the people of this neighborhood. I am energized by the mamas cooking on their doorsteps, the children playing soccer against our front gate and seeing the shift of people as they stop staring plainly at me as an outsider and start seeing me as a part of this small, bustling part of Dar es Salaam.