After a good night’s sleep and partial recovery from our bus ride both Eric and I woke up feeling sick, tired and otherwise out of it. My cold and his flu/cold had pretty much thrown us both for a loop. However, this didn’t change the fact that when we didn’t find real coffee at breakfast there was a dire need to search it out. At Aunt Marg’s we had bought grounds and used a campfire method to make coffee every morning which Aunt Marg thoroughly enjoyed. No longer having a stove and grounds of our own we had to resort to walking the streets in search of a coffee shop. As we set out we had no real idea of where we might find this but at the corner a man named Nelson started talking to us and soon offered to show us to the nearest shop. This was a little questionable because in Arusha EVERYONE wants to sell you something or be your friend and so we weren’t sure of his intentions but it turned out he was a very nice man who gave us some other great tips and when asked said we could pay him whatever we liked for the service. Nelson eventually led us to The Patisserie, a great little bakery and coffee shop which is highly over priced in local standards but still cheap in ours. The coffee was hot, tasty and served with care.
We spent a few hours after coffee searching out the local museum, where Eric accidentally broke the law by taking pictures without paying. Thankfully we got the pictures we wanted before someone noticed and told us we had to pay. We then found the UN building where they are currently holding the tribunals for the Genocide in Rwanda. If we had more time here (and I wasn’t sick) I would most definitely love to go watch some of the trails which anyone can do. After this we followed some UN workers to a cafe in behind the museum and had pretty darn good lunch.
This morning we took a taxi to find a ticket to Nairobi on the bus and then again went for coffee. We walked back from the coffee shop and in doing so you have to go through the Clock Tower Round-About. This is where the fly-catchers congregate in hopes of catching you. They wait silently, sizing you up to see what approach will work and then they pounce, “Jambo, How are you? I have beautiful things, no? Are you looking for a taxi? Hapana Asante? Why no thank-you?” With their hopes dashed they scurry back to ‘their spot’ and the next one crouches in anticipation of the pounce. It’s an interesting game and you find yourself wondering how best to look completely unapproachable. Thankfully I have become moderately adept at the ‘been-traveling-too-long-to-fall-for-your-crap’ stare and it seems as if daily our quotient is much reduced.
We are both feeling much better but really aren’t that motivated as yet. I’m honestly ok with that as it’s kind of fun to do nothing. In the interests of not wasting all our travelling time in Africa we have made some plans to spend two days here on the way back from Nairobi. This will also allow us to break up the mind-numbing bus hours. While here, we’ll spend some time on a walking safari and a culture tour. The doorman here is Daniel and he’s been exceptional at finding us great people to make plans and help us out.
Tomorrow we go to Nairobi and stay at the Mayfield guest house which we were in with the Kenya team. We’re going a day earlier than expected but will be glad to see a familiar place. We’ll also get to see a bit more of Nairobi and hopefully Michael our driver. We’ve learned to value his adept skills of the road even more after seeing some of the alternatives. Luckily driving in Tanzania for the most part is actually quite tame compared to Kenya. On the drive here it was interesting to see the driving styles/roads change the closer we got to Kenya. I expect tomorrow we’ll see even more of this.
Tonight we’re off to a local ex-pat haunt for Greek food. EXCITING!!!!!
Things we didn’t expect to hear: A chain saw running all day for two days off in the distance.
Things we didn’t expect to see: An older Muslim man driving a VW Hippie Van adorned with large colourful flowers through the streets of Arusha.
Eric 16 Lisa 9.250
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