My Future Witch Cat

So, finally got some pictures posted--- Scroll back through the achieve to see pictures from the beginning...

September 10, 2008

This week was an interesting one. Standard 7, the last year of primary school were taking their exams to see if they could move on to secondary school. Five male testers came to our village to administer the government tests. During this time all of the teachers at my school were hanging out at the Mwalimu Mkuu's (Head Teacher) home. We were there all day cooking for when the testers came for meals and it was sort of a break time for the teachers.

First of all I want to say a bit about some of the teachers I have gotten to know. Of course there is Juster and Simon, both who I mentioned in my last entry. The Mwalimu Mkuu is brand new to the village and actually arrived after I did. He is a jolly type of man who is very patient and accepting. This week he really included me as part of his teachers, even though I have yet to teach anything. There are a number of teachers whom I know, but do not remember their names- so I will also have to update this list again at a later time. One teacher, that I have started to know well, is named Jen. She is Juster's best friend. Jen is 23 and incredibly beautiful, she has a heart shaped face and dresses like I did when I was six- wearing all shades of pink, red and purple together, giving her the appearance of a flower. She speaks English alright. But is very sweet and has an innocent yet intelligent demeanor.

Anyways, more about other teachers later, but I really like all of them. So, I should say that it is weird to be a white woman in Tanzania for many reasons, but mostly because their is a sort of hierarchy. White men are at the top followed by black men, white women, than black women. To be in between the two groups I spend most of my time with is tricky, because depending on the situation I am included in a different group. At all of these meals at the Mwalimu Mkuu's home- I was seated inside at the table with all of the male teachers and testers. So it was me and about 12 men. The female teachers and wives, ate separately outside and served us. It was weird to have Juster and Jen washing my hands, serving me food, etc. and I felt sort of Scarlett O'Hara about it (In a bad way). To have these men's colleagues serving them and then not taking part in the meal was slightly uncomfortable. Also, if we were going to be separated, I felt like I should be sitting outside too, and I would have rathered because the women are far more interesting and speak better English. So I spent 3 days in a row like this-trying to pay attention to a fast moving Kiswahili conversation among men. Each night at the end of dinner drinks were passed around. The first night, Mjema (One of the male teachers) offered me a beer and I was about to accept thinking maybe my Kiswahili would flow a little smoother, but then they all laughed and I remembered that only prostitutes drink beer in the presence of men in TZ. So I had a soda, while they all had beer, feeling like a child at the adults table. Almost a man, but not quite. (By the way, there are multiple ways to show you are a prostitute here. I have taken advantage of taking up most of them. Some of the ways are- having a tattoo, wearing pants, smoking, drinking, having a toe ring, or letting a man who is not related to you stay at your home. Apparently, they understand that white women are a little weird about this stuff- so I am hopeful that I won't get propositioned as a prostitute. )

Anyways, all in all good fun with the teachers and nice to be included in a group. One thing that got e through these dinner parties was the MM's cat had had kittens. There was a black one and an orange one. Tanzanians do not like cats. They keep them around to kill the rats, but they do not feed them. They also think it is weird when I talk to or touch a cat. So naturally, I sat at the table casually dropping rice on the floor for the hungry kittens to eat up. I am hoping the MM will give me both of them in a few weeks. I just wanted the black one, but I would feel horrible leaving the orange one. I think I could handle two. The cats here are different, they are scrappy little fighters. Anyways, I want both of them. I told Juster that I wanted them, and she said, "Oh no, not the black one, he has a bad color." It struck me as pretty funny that my black African friend was being racist toward a cat who can't help his color. She told me that he is a thief cat because he steals people food and doesn't kill the rats- keep in mine that this cat is starving and about the size of a rat, so I couldn't really blame him. I am choosing to see him as resourceful and opportunistic which are good qualities for anything to have that is living in Africa. Keep in mind that Juster categorizes herself as Roman Catholic, because she also told me that this little black cat has a witch's spirit inside it and it will bring me bad luck. Obviously, she doesn't know me very well because if anything that made the cat more desirable to me. A witch is embodying him... awesome. He will be named Pepo- which is Kiswahili for "spirits" or "winds". The orange cat I have yet to name.