Usangi Primary - Usangi

Aaron O'Dowling-Keane Oct 08 - Apr 09

The dalla dalla is crammed, there’s a man half sitting on my lap to my right, a small girl wedged between me and her larger than life mother on my left. A chicken tied up in an old biscuit box is squashed between a bag of green oranges, a bunch of bananas and a sack of onions at our feet. Bongo Flava mixed with reggae mixed with Rihanna blares from the tape deck. At every bump the chicken squawks, the music cuts and the fish tied to the windscreen wipers flounder mid-air, momentarily reanimated. Everyone else is resigned to the rollercoaster ride as the dalla dalla (blessed by the blood of God) speeds around and around, spiralling its way up the mountain. As we lean into a sharp bend (I wince as the man’s elbow digs into my ribs) a vast panorama unfolds below the precipice, an enormous lake glistens in the late afternoon sun, reddy-orange houses nestle between luscious greenery and the sky is a brilliant blue. The dalla dalla bumps, the music cuts and a cow can be heard mooing down in the valley. Welcome to the Pare Mountains, Mwanga District, Kilimanjaro Region. It’s a beautiful place.
Over the past five months I’ve worked here as a primary school teacher (attempted a special needs support class which turned out to be far too difficult), run English classes at the women’s pottery co-op, taught computers from my living room, encouraged the setting up of a library and have instigated a young girl’s football team at school. The girls love it, headdresses flying they form a moving dust cloud around the ball and don’t stop chasing it until the bell goes. Maybe football is too strong a word to describe what they do. But their enthusiasm is contagious and the teacher’s think I’m beyond odd when I lace up my runners and join the cloud of dust. At this stage I’m used to people here thinking I’m odd. I am mzungu, mwalim, madam, sir, sister, white man, teacher, Aaron (my actual name), Ireni (by everyone in the drunken village), Ellen (by everyone at church) and now sometimes I’m Dee (another female volunteer, often confused). I am the recipient of a hundred thousand daily habari’s, mambo’s, pole’s and little lessons in Swahili, Kipare (the local language) and life.

Walking to the village after work one day a young man sitting on a rock, contemplating existence no doubt, sees me, yelps excitedly, runs down and gives me a stick. Here the language barrier whooshes between us. As he mimes eating the stick, I shrug my shoulders in lack of comprehension. I’m a vegetarian but even we don’t make a habit of eating sticks. But patiently he perseveres by ripping off the outer bark revealing the white inside which is to be chewed. Sugar cane! We laugh, go “cheers” with our respective canes and I continue my walk to the village munching and spitting with a smile. If giving food is a sign of goodwill, the Pare people are giant pantries of welcome.
Expressing my delight to Mr Ishmaeli one day after discovering pineapple bushes (who knew pineapples grew on bushes?) on my way to work, he says “Ah, so you like pineapple mmm?” and waggles his eyebrows good naturedly. From that day forth he was like a pineapple demi-god humming as he appeared each afternoon with a plate of pineapple offerings. Saidi, his son, is then the patron saint of passion fruit. Flashing his brilliant white teeth he reaches into his rucksack producing passion fruit like a magic trick.
Not long after I arrived in Usangi, Saidi brought me, Emily and Philippa (two volunteer friends from Longido) up Mount Kindoroko, the highest peak in the Pare Mountains. On the way back Saidi’s friend who’d accompanied us invited us in to their house and it’s without judgement I say his friend and his family weren’t well off. But they found cups for all of us, serving the most delicious spicy tea and insisted we stay and have traditional Pare cake. I must say I was very excited about cake. It had been a long day climbing and a long, long time since I’d had cake. But there are many occasions where you realise that English vocabulary is entirely unsuited for the African equivalent, for example, when having a shower is tipping water from a bucket over your head. Pare cake is beans and bananas heated, mixed and left to cool into a solid, pink, lumpy mound. This family were giving us all they had and we couldn’t say no. With weak smiles we ate a big spoonful each, toasted his wife and then gulped down as much tea as we could. Not one of the recipes I’m going to take home but another example of the Pare people’s infinite generosity.
At church, there are three collections. If people can’t afford to contribute they often bring food from their home, some fruit or maize or grass for the cow, and at the end of the service it is auctioned to the congregation. And this is why I can now say a reverend bought me two eggs. Attending service one Sunday with John, we were given front row seats, a Swahili bible to follow the service, an introduction to everyone at church and a number of prayers dedicated to us. Everyone was incredibly kind and welcoming and the singing was really beautiful. Then the food auction took off and before I knew it I had two eggs in my lap and another parishioner had bought me two pineapples. In an attempt to get involved I bid on three pomegranates until I was out-bidded by the gentleman in the back row only to be given the pomegranates regardless. Walked back home after service that sunny Sunday with a bag of food. The Pare pantry of welcome strikes again.
The other day as I was heading home from the village, do not underestimate the thirty minute up hill slog that “heading home” entails, I was greeted by two men with a jackfruit sitting on a step. “Karibu” they invited, “Asante” I acquiesced. So the three of us sat in the shade of the afternoon and ate jackfruit. A number of people passed us and they too were invited to have some, which more often than not they did. And as I sat there with my fingers covered in the sticky latex gloop of the super sweet fruit, companionably chatting about nothing at all, I thought how lucky I was to be living in the Pare mountains.