Pole-Pole...

So what have we done since last time we spoke? Well lots! 

Checking out the local wildlife

On Wednesday we arrived at Chem Chem campsite ready for lunch, that had been prepared for us by the Mamas. We have eaten some great Chagga food and this was a fantastic greeting as everyone was pretty exhausted from the 36 hours of being awake and needed refuelling! We are all loving the local food which is great! I think Daps has surprised himself as he has tried lots of foods that he never thought he would like and has really enjoyed it all so far!

After we'd all eaten Dilly, who owns the campsite, came to welcome us and show us to our rooms (tents) for the next 12 nights!
Wednesday afternoon and evening were then spent relaxing and exploring the campsite to settle in. We spent some time on the rooftop chatting about our experiences so far and thinking about what the next few days hold for us!

Then for our first night in our new homes! This was interesting as it is rainy season here and when it rains, it rains!
We have our own watch guard during the night to look after us and he wanders around the site throughout the night which takes a bit of getting used to!

Thursday morning arrived and Sam woke up in a pool of water! Turns out her room wasn't quite water tight! Me and Lou decided to share a tent and have the other one as our dressing room, this also leaked! You will be pleased to hear the lads' tents were all fine! However they had a friend by the name of Mr Grasshopper who was singing to them all night!

Next for our first Tanzanian breakfast and I have to say it was delicious! Everyone loved it once again. There was toast that we cooked ourselves on an open fire and we had pancakes with fresh bananas from the trees on camp site! Yum!

It has now stopped raining and has warmed up but luckily not
too much as we have quite a walk ahead of us! We set off

up the hill from Chem Chem to meet David and John, who incidentally had a lovely night sleep in their warm cosy beds further up the hill in their houses!

We met them at the computer centre where David gave us a talk about VEPK and ran through our itinerary for the next couple of weeks! It sounds amazing! The computer centre is used by the locals  to access the Internet and do courses on computers and programmes.

We next went further up the hill (this is an amazing workout for the legs by the way!) to the vocational training centre and had a talk and a tour from Peter the principal, this was really interesting and also intriguing! Health and safety doesn't really exist out here let's just say!

We next had a long walk down to the town of Murangu for lunch and to see the market! Lunch was an omelette filled with chips! This is amazing and worth trying!!

The walk around the market was an experience and we obviously stand out from the crowd whether we want to or not! Everyone stares at you, not in a bad way but just in a interested way! The children are great! When they see us they shout "muzumba muzumba" which means foreigner! We have learnt some Swahili during our introduction and so are able to say hello ( jambo or shikamoo for people older than you).

Another thing we noticed about Tanzania is how laid back the living is out here, they have a saying, pole pole [ polla polla] which simply means slowly slowly! The whole atmosphere and way of life is so far removed from back home that it is hard to explain.

After the market experience we had a long walk back down and David took us on a detour to see a waterfall which was worth the extra walk, it was really pretty, we had a bridge we had to walk over that was the type of thing you see on Indiana jones with gaps all the way across - yet again another health and safety disaster but a beautiful one!

We made it back to Mama Mlay's coffee shop where she grows her coffee beans in her back garden! It would have been rude not to sample the coffee so we hung around there for a while! "Pole pole!"

We were out for the whole day and didn't return until 6pm and so we just relaxed until dinner at 7.30pm where John and David joined us for spaghetti bolognaise! Again very delicious!

Well I will leave it there for now, today we are off in to Moshi which is the nearest town - one hour away! Will report in later! Have a great day and remember "pole pole".