breakfast at our cute hostel in stonetown, and then we set out on foot, weighed down by our backpacks, determined to master the maze and find out way to the ferry. success. we made it onto the ferry just as the rain started coming down. a storm blew over the whole island and followed us most of our way back to the mainland. it was a choppy sea and the huge waves made for a wild ride that pushed the majority of the ferry passengers to grab the plastic vomit bags and let loose. it rivaled the ferry ride in southern thailand where almost every passenger was puking as huge waves overtook the windows on either side of the ferry. as for the three of us, thu was asleep (not new, that girl can sleep through pretty much anything), I was digging the wild ride (big waves are fun and I like the rocking feeling that stays with you after) and amy was mustering everything she could not to spew everywhere. she was taking such deep breaths I couldn’t decide if I was more concerned she was going to vomit or pass out from hyperventilating. luckily, she made it, and we all stepped uneasily onto solid ground. we decided to walk to a hostel we had heard was not far from the ferry dock – the YWCA (not to be confused with the YMCA). they had one three bedroom (complete with bathroom) left and we got it!
dar es salaam is a crappy city. I see no reason to visit it and I’d like never to go back, though we’ve heard from a local that it can be sweet if you have the right person to show you around. as we saw it, we were staying in a hostel so ghetto it felt like welfare housing in one of the poor inner cities in the U.S. – take your pick. the city noises were so obnoxious, loud honking and the screeching of brakes, yelling, animals, cars, pollution… not my cup of tea.
we wanted to explore so we hopped a bus out of town to a place where we had heard there’s a maasai market (as if we haven’t already gotten enough of that, but we didn’t know what else to do). it was maybe a 45 minute bus ride standing and trying not to fall over. we made it, and eventually found the market after some struggle and asking directions from about half a dozen people. the market was fun and I picked up a few gifts to bring home.
as I was walking to the next booth I noticed an ominous cloud overhead. my mom and I always say it’s possible to smell when rain is coming. I could definitely smell it. I looked around and realized that suddenly the market had become frantic, the stall owners were running into their shops, grabbing plastic and hastily trying to hang it at the entrances. I turned to look over my shoulder for amy and thu and there was the sheet of rain about to overtake me. I ducked into a shop just as it hit with such force and so suddenly I wasn’t sure the plastic would withstand the wind and rain. I stood there with a few locals trying to hold it down and keep the rain out, then retreated deeper into the dark shop, careful to avoid the leaky spots in the roof. the rain was thunderous and coming down so hard I couldn’t take my eyes off the street outside. I asked how long it would last – two hours, the woman calmly replied. two hours?! I had no idea where amy and thu where, I was trapped by the downpour in a tiny shop with a guy, who confessed he was only 19, and kept offering to give me an umbrella and carry me to the stand where I soon realized amy and thu had taken cover across the way. he was about a foot short than me and I politely declined. eventually the rain let up enough that we could walk in it without getting too soaked. lucky we’re oregonians used to such weather. we went on a hunt for the bus back home, got lost, tracked down by one of the rasta men who I had bought earrings from and who had given me free bracelets earlier, and he led us to a bus and directed us onto it saying ‘one love man’. where do these people come from?!
back at the YWCA we met up with kent, our friend from stanford who had stayed at centre house with us and who was headed home after his summer working on making ice from sun (yes, he’s an engineer and their current project is solar powered fridges – pretty cool to hear him talk about). we were relieved to have a guy around, and one who knew the city a little. we went to dinner with him and three canadian law student guys we had met at our hostel in stone town. kent told us the story over dinner about matt, his friend who we had also met at the hostel, and the bat bite incident they had on safari. here’s the gist of it:
matt and kent’s first night on safari they were having dinner outside. matt noticed something moving in his pants and started freaking out, he did the ‘get out of my pants’ dance until a small bat can tumbling out of his pant leg. he wasn’t sure if it had bit him, but he definitely had open wounds on his legs from bug bites and often bats’ teeth are so small you can’t feel the bite, plus it was behaving strangely so they caught the little creature and proceeded to try to explain the severity of the situation to their safari guides. the guides weren’t really getting it, but eventually agreed to drive them to a middle-of-nowhere clinic that night. the doc there wasn’t too helpful either. they walked in, bagged bat in hand, and explained what had happened. She grabbed gauze as if you to bandage the non-existent wound, and then suggested she give him a tetanus booster. not gonna cut it. they got a hold of a doc in the states who said who said they needed to hunt down the rabies vaccine. Luckily matt had great travel insurance and a woman was able to track down the closest vaccine – unfortunately in nairobi. she booked him a flight and told him when he needed to arrive at the airport. they decided to part of the next morning’s safari – kent was into it all like ‘matt! check out the zebras!!’ while matt was basically rocking back and fourth nervously, thinking ‘im going to die, im going to die’. poor kid
they set off that afternoon for the airport, (their safari car was going on without them since there were other passengers). first they bummed a ride with some random africans, but when they got to the gate where they needed to pass out of the park and had no american cash. they took matt’s credit card and tried to pay – cash only. is there a cash machine nearby? no. they literally resorted to begging from other safaris, asking the people to let them borrow $100 US and saying they’d pay it back in arusha. finally they found some guy who cruised up in a pimped out safari luxury vehicle, just him, who offered to loan them the money and drive them part of the way. lucky! they eventually made it to the airport, only 40 minutes before the flight left. there were so many complications at the airport, they needed to buy kent a ticket as well, the place only accepted cash again, the money machine was outside and they had to come back through security once leaving. the plane was held about 15 minutes after departure time for them but they made it. talk about an adventure!
when they finally arrived at the hospital in nairobi the doc went to give the vaccine. He was going to give it IV and apparently matt wasn’t a little unsure about this so he called the doc back home and the doc said ‘whatever you do, don’t give it IV’ so at the hospital the doctor there was like, hm, ok, and gave it IM. oh boy. anyway, so matt is prophylaxed and not going to die of rabies and he’ll have a great story to boot! but poor guy…
we made it home to arusha safe and sound after wayyy too long on a bus – about ten hours. with a bathroom stop that involved the men going to the right and the women to the left and just squatting in the bushes on the side of the road. I was glad to be wearing a long skirt. we had pukers on the bus too… way too much vomit for one journey. the triple bumps of death coming into arusha were almost too much to bear in the back of that bus. we are relieved to be back at centre house and excited for the hospital tomo. back in action!
No comments:
Post a Comment