Speaking of Misconceptions About Africa

True conversation with a Bank of America customer service representative just minutes ago...

Me: I live in Tanzania in East Africa and I have discovered some ATM fraud with my bank account which I’d like to report.

Service Rep: (With VERY strong southern accent) Now tell me, is it just beautiful over there?

Me: Parts of it sure are.

Service Rep: My mother-in-law has been trying to convince me to go over there to visit with her. She says she wants to run naked with the natives, but I told her that I’m not so comfortable with the idea of being naked with natives.

Me: Uh…I don’t think you’ll find people running naked these days. In fact, they are probably better dressed than you.

Service Rep: (Confused hesitation) Well… my mother-in-law died a few months ago anyway.

Me: Well good. Then perhaps I can report the ATM fraud?

Survival Skills

I am in the US on “home leave”.

When I tell random strangers in America that I live in Tanzania I often get back a look that has now become familiar. It is actually more of a question than a look. The question is, “That girl, she lives in a hut?”

Just a few days ago I was at the bank in my childhood home of Larchmont, NY trying to explain to a teller why I needed to get a new ATM card early (my current one expires in 6 months). I told her that because I live overseas, in Africa, it will be difficult to get me my new one without a lot of headache (and since I don’t have a bank account there I am entirely dependant on the card). The teller and other people working behind the counter – and even some of my fellow clients - immediately began to pepper me with questions about my life there.

In particular, people always ask me about the amenities. On this day, the staff and clients of Bank of America couldn’t believe that I have a house not all that different than a house in Larchmont (ok, slight exaggeration – but when the water and electricity are working that is essentially true). They couldn’t believe that I live in a suburb that has much in common with Larchmont (again an exaggeration – but Larchmont has overpriced restaurants and supermarkets and one single movie theatre – just like in Dar).

I assured them that I do not live in a hut, I have indoor plumbing (five bathrooms on my property, actually), and my life is comfortable and mostly secure.

These revelations always blow them away. And I leave these discussions feeling a wee bit superior, patting myself on my back for having done my public service for the day – like I’m a walking Schoolhouse Rocks.

But actually… perhaps I am really doing them a disservice? What do I really want them to believe about Africa and my life there?

How can I explain the conundrum of the life I lead as a rich person in one of the poorest nations on earth without sounding smug or insensitive? How can I make them understand that if I had to live in a hut, I wouldn’t be there either? How can I explain that I want to make a difference, but not at the expense of too many of the creature comforts I’ve also worked hard to be able to afford myself?

Even writing this makes me feel trite. It is the clash of my development guilt vs. my inner JAP.

In my thesaurus search for words to describe the incongruity of my life as an American in Tanzania I come up with: paradox, disagreement, opposition, inconsistency, ambiguity, and conflict.

In truth I feel all of these feelings more profoundly when I’m back in America – when I am forced to explain how I live and what I am doing. When I’m in Tanzania, it all seems quite natural. I’m surrounded by people of all nationalities living the same way as me – in our bubble on the Peninsula.

In Tanzania, if you let it all in, you go crazy. I’ve seen it happen to many people.- and when it does, they can’t survive there. They had to go home, back to the West, where they can dial up or down the amount of global suffering they let in based upon how much international news they watch or whether the gossip magazines are covering a story about Angelina Jolie’s lasted humanitarian jaunt. Re-reading this paragraph I sound kind of snarky. I don’t mean to. I totally understand it. It could easily be me – especially if I wasn’t distracted by work

But I don’t want to go home yet. Or rather, since I feel at home in Tanzania, I’m not ready to leave my home of the last 3+ years. Not yet.

At the bank they also asked me when I plan to come back to America. That seems to be the most frequent question I get when I’m on leave – and not just from my mother. When I tell strangers and friends that I’m not sure when I’ll be done overseas they go sort of glassy-eyed. I don’t know what my exit-plan is. I know it will come – but just not yet.

I guess I am ok living in a state of ambiguity. I’ve become talented at dealing with the paradox - good enough that the guilt and the complete lack of fairness and equity in this world doesn’t hit me as hard as it probably should until I’m actually outside of Tanzania.

This is certainly nothing to be proud of. But it is how I have survived and thrived.





My house, not long after we moved in. It is nicely landscaped now.

Getting off my Butt - Trip to Iringa

The Baobab Forest

About six months ago I changed jobs. As Chief of Party (wish it were as fun as it sounds) for a new initiative, I have been working hard in Dar es Salaam to get the project up and running. My staff have pretty much spent most of the last six months in the field – mostly in the region of Iringa – the place in Tanzania with the highest HIV prevalence (about 15%) and a region which is spectacularly beautiful (mountains, tea plantations, and lakes) but requires an eight hour car ride on the perilous Tanzanian National Highway if you want to get there.

I have taken the trip many times – the first time being about 12 years ago. It never gets easier seeing the carcases of fatal car accidents on the narrow two lane highway that weaves itself dangerously up mountain passes and down along sheer cliffs that drop off into rushing rivers. Passing trucks and speeding buses pose the most danger. I never feel comfortable taking that trip – especially when I’m not driving.

Mind you, I have many many friends and colleagues who have done this trip and no one has ever been hurt or in a serious accident. But I sit at my desk in Dar and read the newspapers over lunch. The English papers are great at reporting on highway accidents (but other more serious news – not so much). Sitting there, month after month, I managed to work myself into a wholly inappropriate tizzy about going out to Iringa to see the fruits of my staffs’ labour. I’ve been delaying it and delaying it.

But alas... I could delay it no longer. It became politically necessary for me to go. It helped that I travelled with an excellent driver and interesting colleagues…but really… the best part of the trip was that I got to reconnect with Tanzania. Sitting at my desk I had kind of forgotten why I was there.

Thanks to Iringa, now I remember.

First of all, the trip was as beautiful as I remembered. To get there one passes through the teaming exurbs of Dar es Salaam into an area of arid farmlands and medium sized villages. About half way through, one enters Mikumi National Park where on a good day you can zoom along the highway and spot giraffes, elephants, buffalos, and sometimes lions. (I suppose on a bad day you would get a flat and have to change your tire in the presence of these same wild animals.) I wasn’t so lucky in that the grass was high from the recent rains and there didn’t seem to be many animals alongside the highway other than baboons and herds of giraffes on the distant plains.

After one leave the park the highway climbs over another set of hills and deposits you in the beautiful arid Baobab forest. The Baobabs in this forest are old and huge and absolutely everywhere. At night I’m sure the trees feel like them come alive a la Wizard of Oz, but during the day they are stark and startling and just plain fascinating.

Then it is time to climb… up into the mountains I described above. It can be slow and scary – but when I managed to catch my breath and appreciate the landscape it was also lush and tropical and beautiful. After about 90 minutes of climbing you reach the southern highlands plateau where the weather is finally cool and beautiful and the earth is a most beautiful colour of burnt orange. To get into Iringa town you have to again drive up a twisty hill filled with people dragging bicycles, produce and miscellaneous packages up a steep incline. On the early morning we left Iringa, the hills were swarming with women in colourful clothes carrying jerry cans of home brew on their heads, making the journey up the hill to the informal bars in town.

Once in Iringa I checked into the preferred hotel of most of my staff – a clean place with tiny rooms and the hardest beds ever known to man. (At least the hardest beds ever known to Hally.) I didn’t look – but I’m pretty sure there weren’t really mattresses under the sheets. Other than the hard beds, another inconvenience was the Pentecostal church next door where hundreds of parishioners were singing, praying and speaking in tongues (seemingly as if in my bed with me) at the bright early hour of 5 AM during three of the four mornings I was there.

Outside of Dar there isn’t much in the way of restaurants – and so you either eat at an informal street café (and play intestinal roulette) or spend night after night in the same restaurant eating the same dish of chicken (koko) and rice (wali). Chicken and rice twice-a-day for four days in a row is a hardship – but I tried to be up for the task. In the evenings I hung out with the rest of my staff… eating our dinners and drinking beer – lots and lots of beer, in some cases – which for many people is par for the course in Tanzania even on a weekday.

And oh yeah… I was there for the work. We were running two workshops while I was there. One was for about 40 health providers from the regional hospital to train them on how to offer and conduct HIV testing for their patients as a matter of normal course. The other workshop was for a group of small NGOs (many of them NGOs of people living with HIV) who are about to receive grants from us to do HIV testing with marginalized and/or difficult-to-reach people. Some of the people in the workshop were clearly very sick. You don’t see so many walking skeletons these days – not like two or three years ago – but there were one or two in this workshop and it was a stark reminder of the reason for our work. Other people just – well – stunk. Body odor is an issue for some people in Tanzania - so when you put 40 people in an enclosed space for hours at a time, it can result in quite the bouquet. I try to not let it affect the work – but the olfactory assault can be distracting.

There were also meetings with regional and district officials. The work they are doing is really commendable and I am honoured to be part of it. Spending all those months sitting in my office, and getting myself worked up about driving the highways, I forgot about how happy it makes me to be in the field – closer to where the work is being done. And I was very proud of what our team has accomplished in just a few short months.

Part of the reason I moved to Tanzania was to be closer to the field, but the truth is that in Dar es Salaam I’m still not really in the field. I left Iringa promising myself that I would get out more often - to better appreciate the wonders and challenges of my home, Tanzania.

Angels vs. Demons

I had no idea that the existential struggle of good vs. evil began at age five.

Sure… I overheard, and sometimes participated in typical kid conversations about all sorts of interesting moral issues. Some examples include:

-Good genies vs. bad genies (depends on the color of the rug they are flying on, evidently);

-Superfriends vs. the Hall of Doom (had to correct the cartoon induced misunderstanding that ugly = evil);

-Good banana trees vs. bad bees (who set up nests in the flowers of said trees in our yard – setting up an interesting conversation about whether there is good and. bad in nature);

And the ever popular:

- Why do we have so much money and other people don’t?

On these issues, I had plenty to say. And I thought that by talking freely about these things I was/am providing the kids with a good ethical foundation for their lives.

So I was completely unprepared when Jaden and Rowan began to articulate their views about God and religion.

See, I am an atheist Jew. I don’t believe in God. But I believe in Jewish culture.

In order for me to stay connected to my Jewish culture I decided long ago that I need to participate in the important religious ceremonies and perhaps even say and repeat words that I don’t necessarily believe it, but that keep me spiritually connected to my ancestors and my heritage.

And yes, I realize that this is an oxymoron of sorts. But it represents 41 years of negotiation between my upbringing and my inner-self and I am frankly quite comfortable with it – for me.

But the problem is the kids. What to teach the kids?

I firmly believe that they need some sort of progressive Jewish education – similar to what I had. During/after that they can then decide for themselves whether or not they believe or in God and all the other various associated moral and ethical issues. And if it turns out Rowan is really at heart a Zoroastrian, so be it.

So then the second problem… we don’t live in a place where I can give that to them. If we were back in the US it would be easy. I would shell out big bucks for Sunday and Hebrew School and they would get properly indoctrinated and I wouldn’t have to do a thing other than hold a Sedar or two and save up for the Bar/Bat Mitzvahs. But here they are just about the only Jewish kids they know, and I have been remiss in teaching them because, well… , I don’t really believe any of the religious part. Up until recently, Jaden’s and Rowan’s religious education consisted of the cartoon movies Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and the Prince of Egypt, and lighting candles and eating latkes at Chanukah. (Well… not only… but you get the drift.)

Rowan started the search for answers when, after watching the Prince of Egypt just before Passover this year, she asked me why God would do such a horrible thing as to kill all the first born of Egypt? After all, she said, Moses and God were trying to get Pharaoh to stop doing bad things, so why did they do a bad thing themselves? Why would God kill babies?

At first I was beaming from ear to ear, since she stumbled upon the ultimate existential question of all Western religious thought. And at such an early age! But then I panicked. In order to answer this question I had to talk about God. And this talk about God led to lots more questions about God… like: Where is God? Is God a boy or a girl? Is God good or bad? Does God know I’m here?

I tried to do my best answering these questions without telling her that I didn’t believe any of it, but it was very hard for me. I felt like I was lying to my daughter. I couched my answers in statements like “Well we are Jewish, and Jews believe that…” But it wasn’t good. It didn’t feel right, not right at all.

It was not long after that I realized that most of what I was saying wasn’t quite getting through in any case. I overheard Rowan having a conversation about God on the swing set at school, insisting that God lives in Egypt and nowhere else.

(What the F? She’s having conversations about God at school???? I’m thinking I need her to spend more time with our Danish and Dutch friends who also come from atheist stock.)

A few weeks after that, Jaden and Rowan came home from a play-date with their lovely Kenyan friend talking about Jesus and, well, the apocalypse. This very sweet boy lives with his grandparents here in Dar and the family seems very involved with a born-again Christian church. Clearly, someone had been telling stories… and after this event… I heard lots of tales about things that are completely abhorrent to my personal beliefs. For Christ’s sake, the crows were evidently going to be punished by God for killing smaller birds. And God, as it turns out, was watching our every move to see if we were good or evil and rewarding or punishing us accordingly.

And this, my friends, was a big wake up call.

I tried the handy, “Well, we are Jews, and Jews believe…”

But this time it didn’t work. My noncommittal generalized responses couldn’t cut through the (evidently) very passionate beliefs pitched by their friend. Jaden insisted to me that I was wrong and his friend knows better. It was actually the first time that I couldn’t get them to believe me over someone else. It was sobering.

I stuck the Prince of Egypt back in the DVD player so I could have a minute to think and attempt to begin the re-education process (even though perhaps it wasn’t an idea re-education).

Truth is I’m stumped. I feel like I’ve somehow missed the boat – and if I don’t swim out and climb on NOW the kids are going to develop worldviews that risk being fundamentally opposed to mine. I’m perfectly prepared for this to happen when they are emancipated adults (OK, after 13). But I’m not prepared to cede my influence at this point in their lives. I just have to come up with a way to do it that feels authentic to me.

Does this mean making Friday night Sabbath dinners? I don’t think so. That would interfere with our regular Yacht Club night – which is an important family ritual, too.

But I do know that I have to find a way to create more meaningful moral/ethical Jewish-oriented lessons out of our everyday lives even though this might mean exposing them more to the cruelty of the world I have protected them from for the past five years.

Because we are so isolated from the rest of our cultural community I am the only one who can do it. I hope I’m up to the task, kenahara.

Matzo ball soup from Passover

Top 10 Semi-Lame Excuses Why I Haven't Posted in Six Months

10. I Have a New Job

Back in September I left AED/T-MARC and took a job with Jhpiego – an affiliate of Johns Hopkins University. The new job comes with more pressure, less time to blog from work, and a new boss. And although she happens to be a good friend, she also reads this blog, and I guess I’ve been a bit shy – not to mention completely balled over by work – to post during daylight hours.

9. I Have a New Drug

The stupid indispensible BlackBerry Pearl has taken over my life. I work from bed, I work while the kids take drama class, I work poolside, and when I’m not working I’m reading CNN, the NYTimes or TMZ on the stupid little machine that now rules my life.

8. I Have a New Creative Outlet

Facebook is my mistress. I use her or abuse her at my whim. She doesn’t require me to entertain her with thoughtful stories about life as an expat in Tanzania. And although sometimes I ignore her completely, thanks to the stupid indispensible BlackBerry she calls me like a jealous lover, all day and all night. I can’t seem to shake her.

7. I Have a New (Old) Weekend Activity

For those of you who remember when my beloved Sea Cliff Hotel burned down… well… 18 months later (and one big insurance check – although I have my serious suspicions about the “accidental” nature of the fire) the Sea Cliff has reopened for business and the kids and I can be found every Sunday holding court with good friends and an interesting cast of international characters like Canadian soccer teams, Ghanaian princes, and South African hunters.

6. I Have a New House

But actually… first I should say that we were homeless for about two months. I decided to move to a slightly larger house with a much much larger yard (more than an acre) but the house wasn’t ready yet and my old landlord decided to kick us out before we were ready to leave. So the kids and I stayed with Jane and family for about five weeks, and we stayed with Laura and Carl for about two weeks, and we house sat for another three weeks (during which time I am positive the kids and I had the Swine Flu – I promise you – it came to Africa this past flu season before it made it to Mexico). It was a tough transition but completely worth the wait. It is a great house for us – high ceilings, three bedroom/three baths inside, and an extra 5 bedroom Swahili-style house on the property that now is a laundry/storage/nanny house. The yard was essentially strewn with construction debris when we moved in, but thanks to friends with green thumbs, gardeners with the patience to plant grass one blade at a time (seriously that’s how they do it here), the rainy season, and the amazing growing power of tropical plants our yard is turning into a lush paradise giving us fresh bananas, papayas, and flowers daily. Unfortunately, paradise comes with snakes. One fell off a tree and onto my security guard’s head just last Sunday. Jaden, who was in the yard working with the gardener at the time, helped kill it with a shovel. Ah… the life skills my children are learning here on the equator.

5. I Have a Newfound (Unfortunate) Love for the TV

During the first 2.5 years I lived in Tanzania I rarely turned on the TV at night. I’d come home from work, play and eat with the kids, and then sit at my dining room table and work/recreate on the computer. Now, because of the configuration of the house, and the fact that Rock of Love, Dr. 90210, The Girls Next Door, American Idol, Dancing with the Stars and a few British programs (like the one where hundreds of guys are auditioning with Andrew Lloyd Webber – over several months a la American Idol - for the opportunity to be Joseph in the new West End production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, or the British version of Nanny 911 which uses the same British nanny as the American show) are on every night I find myself more and more gravitated to the boob tube. I know I should be embarrassed confessing this to you. But after a day of being the boss at work, it is nice to be completely mindless in the evening, blog be damned!

4. My Kids Have More Interesting Social Lives than Me

And there are two of them and only one of me. Like all 5 year-olds they have busy social schedules that require some level of parental involvement and carpooling. Rowan is loving karate and takes it three days a week now. Jaden has a series of best friends with better toys than him and therefore requires out-of-house play-dates. With this new emphasis on friends I’m also finding plenty of challenges. Of Jaden’s two best friends, one is a Kenyan born again Christian who has been talking with Jaden about Jesus and also divine retribution (like the crows that are evidently going to hell for killing/eating smaller birds). The other best friend is a lovely Tunisian Muslim kid who tells stories about good and evil genies and magic carpets. I tried adding stories about Passover into the mix, and I think some of it sunk in. I overheard Rowan adamantly correcting another friend that no, god isn’t everywhere. God lives in a bush on a mountain in Egypt!

3. I Have a New Love of Parenting

Well perhaps I shouldn’t call it new. Parenting continues to grow on me – and for the past year or two it has really begun to flourish. Even 5 years into this parenting experiment I still sometimes wake up with a start that, holy shit, I’m actually responsible for birthing these amazing kids. Don’t get me wrong – I also suck at it. They still end up in my bed by 3 AM every night despite my best (ok, half-hearted) efforts at preschooler sleep training). And they don’t particularly like it when I plant myself in front of the computer in my off hours. In a bid for some sympathy/time I bought them each their own learning computers. For about a week they would sit next to me on my bed (where I do must of my computing these days) and work on their very noisy computers while I tried to get work done on mine, but alas, they have seen through my plan and are now back to demanding my undivided attention. And in a new development, I don’t much mind turning off the computer and devoting myself completely to them instead.

2. This Blog Was the Victim of Antisemitic Hate Mail

During the Israeli offensive against Gaza in December/January I started getting some threatening Antisemitic responses to some of my older posts about the Jewish community in Dar. When I looked online at my sitemeter I could see that during the course of several days hundreds of people in India, Pakistan and the UK were reading my Jewish-themed blogs. I talked to some friends (and later officials) at the US Embassy about it and all agreed that since no specific threats against me or anyone else were being made (even though the comments felt pretty offensive to me) there was nothing anyone could do. I thought about it long and hard and decided that although there was likely no real threat to me, there was an outside chance that there could be to some of the people and places I write about (like the Israeli restaurant that serves as the center of what little Jewish life there is here in Dar) and so I took down my blog for about two months. I know that some of you tried to look at my blog during that period and couldn’t find it – and this is why. A few months ago I put the blog back up and everything has been quiet since then – until now at least.

1. I Haven’t Had Much Need or Ability to Procrastinate

And although I love communicating with the outside world (you), to do it I need time and lack of motivation to do the million other things on my list. Truth be told, I’ve also been intimidated by my own established bar. Up until now, pretty much every blog post has been a three page essay with a coherent start, middle and end. It is a high standard to meet when you are busy and not procrastinating much. So… my new promise to you (and me) is that I will try to start posting now even when I just have a few thoughts to share – and not a fully developed enlightening story. In return, I need you to please give me feedback. It isn’t much fun to put a lot of creative energy into a post only to get one or two comments when I know that many more people are reading the blog. So… I’ll keep posting if you keep commenting and hopefully that will keep me up late at night – it is after midnight now – or make me turn off Britain’s Got Talent so I can tell some stories about the Mahlers on Safari in Tanzania. Deal?

44

A billboard in Kisumu, Kenya - as if

Obama has been running for president there!

Wow.

I am exhausted.

I am exhausted from caring so much about this year’s presidential election.

My computer is exhausted from all the late nights we spent together – only looking at the websites that told us Obama was ahead and ignoring the negative naysayers – who may have had their points – but we (my computer and I) decided long ago to only live in positive lala land.

My Gmail account is exhausted (and full) from the never-ending e-mails from the persistent folks at MoveOn.org, Joe Biden, David Plouffe, Michelle Obama, and Barrack Obama himself (judging from the e-mails we are already on a first name basis…. Dear Hally. Let’s make history together…) for ever more and more money.

In a direct corollary to this, my bank account is exhausted from all the donations we’ve made – most of them small, one of them large. (I wanted to be the person to put the Obama campaign over the top financially. Me. And let me tell you – I was a sucker for those financial appeals.)

My colleagues are surely exhausted from listening to me talk incessantly about the US presidential election every single day at work. (My new staff and I have been sharing a conference room while we are waiting for our office to be renovated.) Every lunch hour has been spent explaining the Electoral College or some other such American institution, ad nauseam, for the past several months.

My household staff are exhausted from washing all of the various Obama paraphernalia I’ve picked up over the past several months – T-shirts for the kids and I, stickers on the car, and even an Obama kanga (piece of cloth women wrap around their waists as skirts) that I proudly wore in all my free time last week – Obama’s face proudly plastered on my considerable ass.

I’m exhausted from the fear-mongering and divisiveness I’ve witnessed – at McCain rallies, from Sarah Palin trying to put the terrorist label on Obama, as BBC crossed America on their bus collecting the opinions of “real” (small minded) Americans, and most horrifyingly from the race-baiting and hateful viral e-mails I’ve been forwarded by friends who have relatives back in Red states who actually believed their content (e.g. that African-Americans will riot no matter what the results because that is just what they do, or that NY liberals are trying to destroy the very moral fabric upon which our country is built (although I admit to feeling the same way about them)).

My friends and I here in TZ are exhausted from going over and over the different paths to victory in the Electoral College; and from wishing we were back in the US for just this one day so we could celebrate with loved ones and feel closer to what we all felt was the inevitable history that would be made today – even though we rarely allowed ourselves to believe it fully – just in case we jinxed it.

Tanzanians are exhausted from caring so much about an election so far away but in a land that has so much influence over their present and future. The past few weeks have been punctuated by parties and events attended by a mix of Tanzanians, Americans and people from other nationalities – electrified by the hope of a new, more reflective, more attached to the rest of the world America (which to me is a clear reminder of the pedestal upon which many people here have put America). And of course, the idea of a black African American (no hyphen because indeed he is African by only one generation) is even more mind-shattering here then it is in the US. The big joke in Kenya at the moment is that only in America can a Luo become President. (Because the Luo – the tribe that Obama’s father comes from – is politically marginalized in Kenya – and the idea of a Luo President is unfathomable for many people. Nevertheless, Kenya has declared tomorrow a national holiday.)

I’m exhausted because I only pulled myself off my computer at 11:30 PM last night and then woke up and planted myself in front of the TV at 3:30 AM this morning. Just as I started watching the election results the skies opened up with torrential rain and thunder and lightening (which is rather unusual here) – a cleansing, if you will, of the political environment. The satellite was in and out – and I missed whole blocks (sometimes 30 minutes) of CNN and Al Jazzera coverage because the weather was so bad the satellite couldn’t get a connection. At some point, rain started pouring through the ceiling in my living room – right next to my TV (I just moved into my new house, which is a brand new house, so this was the first major weather it has had to endure) so I got a bucket and kept on watching until about 6 AM when I went over to my friends’, Jane and Gunnar, to watch the end with them and other friends.

And then, around 7 AM this morning, East African Time, Barack Hussein Obama was declared the President-Elect of the United States.

Today, I’m exhausted, but ecstatic.

Unlike John McCain, I haven’t always had faith in America and my fellow Americans. I think we’ve made plenty of big mistakes – including most of what has happened these past 8 years.

And I’m sure that in a few months I’ll be complaining about Obama’s stance on gay marriage, or the war in Afghanistan. But I’m going to try give him the prerequisite 100 day honeymoon period.

Nevertheless, today I am inspired by the new American electorate – younger, more liberal on social and economic issues, and a place where millions and millions of White, Hispanic, Native American African Americans and Asian Americans voted for a Black man to lead our country.

Today I have faith – and lots of it. I feel so proud.

And I am proud of number 44 – Barrack Obama. He has the hopes of the whole world on his shoulders and I wish him luck.

Hoping for Nirvana

This morning I drove over the speed humps into the guarded parking lot, showed my passport at the heavily fortified door, went through a metal detector, had my bag confiscated, walked down a long walkway through another bomb-proof door, and then through another metal detector and announced,

“I’m here to vote!”

The room at the American Consulate was filled with others who – like me – requested their absentee ballots weeks ago, but had not yet received them. There was a special form for us, and books to help us find the addresses of where our absentee ballots should be sent (by county). The nice counselor officers helped us look up online whether or not there were Senate races in our states and the names of the candidates for the House of Representatives from our districts. The ballot was entirely “write-in” and we could only vote for national offices.

There was something about actually writing the names…

Barack Obama/Joseph Biden

AND

Nita Lowey (my district’s fabulous liberal Congresswoman)

… that was whole-body satisfying – especially after 20 years of voting in DC where I suffered from a severe case of taxation without representation.

__________________________________

The past few weeks have been rather exciting for American political junkies in Tanzania.

Firstly… all my morose friends who have been predicting another four years of doom and gloom (“I don’t think Obama can pull this off.") (What would we Democrats do without our self-doubt?) have finally turned a corner and gotten excited and, dare I even say it…. confident about this election. Too bad it took the economy tanking to perk them up.

In the last week there have been two Barack Obama fundraising events for Americans living in Tanzania - complete with really cool t-shirts. One event, put together by my friends, was a combo fund-raiser/debate-watching party – and it was fun to see the candidates spar while drinking South African beer, sitting among my fellow partisans, on the top floor of an Irish pub, here in Dar es Salaam.

Since I’ve been homeless for the past several weeks I’ve been staying with my friends, Laura and Carl, who are part of the US Embassy community. They have a special cable TV package called the Armed Forces Network (AFN). For those of you not familiar with it – let’s just say it is an intoxicating and toxic mix of the best and worst of American TV programs and sports (OK- no The L Word or Will and Grace) meets scary over-the-top commercials about how to avoid a terrorist attack by staying under the radar when leaving your home. My favorite spot features a guy and his buddy just back from over there (presumably Iraq or Afghanistan). The buddy seemed not quite right in the head, but his friend was trying to distract him from his suspected post-traumatic stress by taking him on a relaxing hunting trip.

Precious, yeah?

But the reason I’m telling you this is because AFN has a “news” channel that is switched by the big satellite man in the sky from CNN to Fox News, to ABC and others… seemingly without rhyme or rhythm, except that Fox seems to ALWAYS be on at prime time here in TZ (and presumably also prime time in Iraq and a big chunk of Europe).

For me it has been fascinating watching the American news channels cover the election and the economic crisis. And while it is scary to see how badly stories are distorted from one network to another (Fox News being the biggest violator, of course) overall I’ve been really having fun. I was up at 4 AM last Friday morning to watch the Biden/Palin debate. And I’ve already set my alarm for 4 AM tomorrow so I can watch the second Obama/McCain debate. Somehow, seeing the actual American news makes me feel more connected to the election. It has also made me angrier… but that’s another story all together. Hell... I even pulled out my credit card and made another $250 contribution. Have you? You should.
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If it is true that absentee ballots are only counted in tight races, then it is unlikely that mine will ever be opened. In 2004, Westchester County, NY went 58% for John Kerry, and Nita Lowey got more that 60% of the vote in 2006. (I can’t remember the exact figure).

Nevertheless… it felt good to glance over at the other 10 or so people sitting at the same table as me, from states as varied as West Virginia, Florida and New Mexico, all of whom had filled in Barack Obama/Joseph Biden under President/Vice President on the blank line of their ballots.
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If only the population of Americans living in Tanzania actually reflected the population of Americans in general… Sure, there would be some conservative religious types, some people in the military, and a group of security-conscious folks (we call them “third floor” here). But there would also be a big group of civic minded folks who have a great understanding of how our actions as Americans affect our image abroad and the lives of everyone else in the world. (You don’t think America’s economic meltdown is just affecting the US, do you?)

OK… I’m waxing poetic, or perhaps even pathetic. But it can’t hurt a girl to dream, can it?
I’ve got my eyes on a big win on November 4th. I can’t wait to feel the joy

Rosh Ha Shenanigans

Shmuli with Jaden and Rowan

Don’t ask me why, but I’ve come to treasure the regular visits the Jewish “community” in Dar has been getting from the ultra-religious missionary Chabad these past few years. I suppose the kitsch value of a pair of Hassidic rabbis walking around the streets of the city is not lost on me. These guys show up – from what feels like the planet Mars – but with an earnestness and sincerity that I find attractive, even if their brand of Judaism has absolutely nothing to do with mine.

Last week I was at an Obama fundraiser and debate-watching party on the roof of the Irish Pub when I got the call from our resident Israeli Jew-organizers that the Chabad was back (earlier than expected – I was told they were coming for Yom Kippur) and that they were trying to organize an event for kids the next day.

So dutifully I schlepped my kids to over to Nargila – the Israeli restaurant which is the center of all things Jewish-Dar – only to discover that my favorite Chabadnick, Shmuli, was back! This was a big surprise, since only a week or so earlier Shumli sent me a mazel tov on my new job – but failed to mention that he was about to get on a plane.

I came close to wrapping Shumli in a big forbidden (the friendship that has no name) hug when I was headed off at the pass by Yaccov, Shumli’s traveling companion – and I’m guessing boss here in TZ.

Keeping a safe distance from me – a possibly menstruating woman – Yaccov offered me a warm virtual handshake (his words, not mine) and welcomed the kids and I to the pre-Rosh Hashana art activity.

I expected that the kids would be weirded out by the Hassidic outfits and long untrimed beards, but actually they seemed completely oblivious… and before long they were sitting with about 8 Israeli kids doing a complicated sand and glue project. And they particularly enjoyed their opportunity to blow (spit) into the shofars Shmuli and Yaccov brought out with them.

With this positive experience behind us, I returned to Nargila the next day for a Rosh Hashanah services.

Just like last year – it was touch and go for more than an hour on whether or not we would have a minyon. We had plenty of women (my friend, Laura and myself included)… but the men were only trickling in.

With the sun quickly setting – and still missing two men, the 9 year-old son of one of the families at the service was temporarily “deputized” as a “man” (the rabbis said it was an obscure Sephardic or Kabalistic rule that you could do that – but it seemed like a scam to me) while my friend Laura frantically called her husband, Carl, to get him over to Nargila in time to read the Torah.

Once the rabbis had gone as far as they could without a minyon, they got desperate and started telling us jokes. Shmuli told a joke only funny to a Hassidic rabbi:

A guy immigrating to Palestine (pre-Israel days) showed up with 7 refrigerators. The customs agent accused him of bringing the refrigerators in to sell but the man vehemently denied it. He explained that one fridge was for dairy, one for meat, and one for parve. When confronted about the remaining four fridges the man explained that Pesach was coming and he would need Kosher for Passover meat, dairy and parve fridges. And finally, when confronted about the remaining fridge the man explained that the seventh fridge is for the traif.

Ba-da bum…

Thank god, Carl, the 10th man, arrived just as Shumli was winding up for another joke. With Carl safely entrenched on the men’s side and handed a yarmulke, we were ready to being the Torah portion of our service.

Meanwhile, Penina, the outgoing and opinionated Israeli owner of Narglia set out on a mission to loudly complain to the rabbis about the fact that women don’t count.

Actually… I believe it would be safe to say that she heckled them for about an hour – including during the blowing of the shofar, the service, and even the Torah reading, with loud and wonderful zingers like (please use a strong Israeli accent to say these things in your head):

“Lucky I’m allowed to cook, thanks God. They spent the whole day standing over me like the police.”

“All my life I count – except when these nudnicks come to Tanzania”

Eventually she left the comfortable couches on the “woman’s side” and planted herself right in the middle of the divider during the reading of the Torah – staring over the Torah and watching the men on the other side. Despite pleas from the rabbis to please stop – and me pulling her aside to ask her why she hosts them every year if she hates what they are doing so much (to which she responded that she loves having them and learns so much from them every time they come), she continued to jar and tease and heckle.

It would be totally offensive if it wasn’t actually so hilarious. It was everything Laura and I could do to stop from doubling over with laughter as each comment was more outrageous than the last. And as if to highlight the points she was making, the rabbis put no prayer books on the women’s side until we complained after the service started, and eventually they threw the women’s side a bone, asking me to read a rabbinical commentary about how important women are on Rosh Hashanah, as evidenced by the fact that both Sarah and Hannah are said to have birthed babies on that day.

Lame, huh?

Let me just say that although I totally agreed with Penina’s sentiments about the exclusion and marginalization of women, I found the forum she chose to express them in rather inappropriate. This was a shit or get off the pot moment. Either participate and shut up, or boycott and stay out.

Nevertheless, the evening ended well with a small meal of delicious salads that Penina had prepared (overseen by the Kosher eagle-eye of Yaccov). All the participants were grateful for the hospitality, and even the rabbis seemed to relax a bit now that the show was over.

When I left I wondered how Yaccov and Shmuli would fare for the next 10 day until Yom Kippur living with Penina and her family.

Stay tuned here for the answer…. Yom Kippur is around the corner.