DallaDalla Ballas

A general recap of last weekend: cre cre. Due to some unfortuante circusmtances, SIC is a bit low on trucks right now. The result: even volunteers who are reallly far away from the main road had to find hteir own way back to Arusha. My group was one of these lucky winners. We were also told that hte only direct way of getting into town was taking this huge yellow bus in. The catch: THe first one leaves at 7am, and the second, iffy one leaves at 2pm...or 4pm...or never pm. Not to mention this is all first-come, first-served. Now mind you, this was to get back to town after our first week in the village, ie our longest week in teh village. We got a call form one of hte other volunteers at 8:30pm the night before suggesting we all meet up by 7am on the main road to catch the bus. My roomie and I eagerly agreed. What this meant for us, however, was that we would have to rerck for an hour to get to the main road by 7am. So we took our flashlights (it was pitch black) and ran next door, where 2 other group members are staying, to tell (not ask) that we would all ahve to be ready to peace out at 5:45am the next morning so we were guaranteed a seat back to town. Then we ran back and maoned and groaned about packing for the weekend and ahving ot fit everything in the backpacks we'd be carrying on our backs for more than an hour. The quetion of whether to bring an umbrella came up. "Naw, I'm not," I replied. "It hasn't ranied yet. What are the chances of it raining now?" WIth that, I crawled into bed for what would prove to be a restless night, prematurely terminated by my alarm clock screaming at me at a painfully early 5:15am.

My group set off with stuffed bags on our backs nd flashlights in our hands, as it was pitch black at 6am and the sun doesn't come up until around 6:30am. Mind you, the path was lined with dust and rocks and I'm sure firnedly critters we coudn't see. As if that wasn't bad enough, it sparted spinrkling. My roomie and I looked at each other, both thinking: fml.

Luckily the sprinkling never turned to rain and quickly subsided. We reached hte main road, panting and sweating, a few minutes after 7am. We waited for a little bit, bu tno yellow bus came. There were about a dozen of us now, and we were determined to get to town. SO we jumped in some dalldallas. What are dalldallas, you ask? THey're sort of like old school mini-vans tha hey stuff as many people as possible into. Though perhaps a bit squishy, they were definitely one o fhte fastest modes of transportatin available. The only catch is that you may die or run something over. I wasn't kidding when I said they were fast. Speeding, riskay passing, 2-lane roads, and dalladallas = an exciting trip to sayteh last. SOme volunteers almost shat themselves. One took solace in grabbing my pinky, of all things, when she thought she saw her life flash before her eyes (I continue to tease her about this). What can I say, my pinky is jacked. I personally find these rides rather thrilling. Maybe my life is way duller than I thought, bu thte racing and passing, the bumps an hte near-death scenarios are the cloest I'm going to get to a roller coaster this summer, and I find it really gets my adrenaline pumping.

Needless to say, we got ot town just fine. Stay tuned for a recap of the ride back.

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Fast forward to Saturday. This was the day to take car eof long weekend trips. I'll be going ot Zanzibar on the second long weekend--absolutely can't wait. One of hte other volunteers and I decided to be proacive and check out flights first. We were pretty sure hte long weekend was Fri-Mon, so we checked for flights to Zanzibar leavin gon Friday. THey wer eavaiable, adn pretty cheap. Before we paid, I wanted to confirm that hte long weekend was in fact Fri-Mon and not Sat-Tues. I called one of the SIC pcoordniators, who informe dme that it was actually Sat-Tues. Oh shit, good thing we checked, I thought. So we looked into Saturday flights. THere are three, the PRecision AIr employee informed us, but they're all full. Wtf we thoguht. It was not worth throwing a few hundred dolalrs down for what would not even amount to two full days. Needless to say, we were pissed.

I and the other vounteer had really been lookin forwad to this vaca, so we weren't willing ot let it crasha dn burn. So we called back andtried to negotiate adn rationalize leaving a day early. Long story short; no dice. We were annoyed, but we haxc to think of optins. We went across the street toanother airlie to be told that htey didn't flyu to Zanzibar. Tanzania and Coastal airlines probably do, the lady told us, but it's a Saturday so they closed at 1pm. I looked at the clock and read 1:09pm. Fuckk. We had to figure out our flight situation that day. Who knew if anything was open on Sunday. Besdies, we'd be back in our vilalges by imd-afternoon. We proceeded to spring down 3 flights of stairs and across hte street where cards do not (I repeat, do NOT) stop for pedestrians. We made it ot tzanania AIrlines and hte door was open! Can you please please give us some flight info? We begged the dude SUre, I'll tell you from memory since the computers are already off. He informed us that we could get ot Zanzibar on Sat afternoon, but there was no continuous return flight. WSe went next door to Coastal Air. Their prices were redonk. Defeated, we started walking and decided to eat our feelings at a burger stand. We bitched and moaned while stuffing our faces. Twas beautiful.

I had barely begun driinin gmy cold Coca Cola in a glass bottle when we ran into some other volunteers who informed us that we had been right all along: the long weekend WAS Fri-Mon. We started laughing. What a shitload of anger and frustration gone to waste! And now we can't even book our flights because Precision Air closes at 2pm. I looked down at my cell phone. 13:53, it read. We have 7 minutes! I shouted. let's do this! I took one sip of my Coke returne dit so they wouldn't lose profit on the bottle, and went running into the streets with the other volunteer, with a pack of others trailing behind us. I'm sure people were like, dude, wtf is wrong with these crazy mzungus (Swahili for white folk), watchign su running through the streets like we were in Home Alone and about to miss our flight. Two f us slid in just as hte guard was closing hte office door. It's these pathetic two again, he probably thought. Panting once gain we looked behind us to find that everyone else was standing outside, locked out. With some persuasion, we were able to convince hte guard to let htem in and we were able to book our flights. I was relived to be rid of hte wad of Tanzanian shillings I had been carrying around in my purse.

Alright I'm tired of writing and you're prob tired of reading, so I'll end by saying that the ride back was 17 (no fuking joke, 17) of us, plus bags, stuffed into one SIC truck for over an hour. Luckily I didn't have to sit in anyone's lap, though occasionally my ass fell asleep and I felt like I couldn't breathe. It was fun though, especially when we hit those curvaceous triple speed bumps.

More to come soon.