Mwaka Moja
One year
The sparkle has long dulled and somewhere along the line, the thrill of the change became the ebb and flow of everyday life. As I reflect on this year and all that I have learnt about myself and this country, I realise there is still much to learn and much I still need to accept.
I’ve also learnt that a year is a very short amount of time.
The interesting thing about a two-year contract in a country that is not your own is:
1. That you’re here long enough to call it home; but
2. You’re still considered a transient presence.
I forget that I am a visitor here in the grand scheme of things. As much as I love this country and being here right now, I know in a year’s time I will be moving on to my next thing, whatever that may be. A transient person is such a common thing in Arusha, amongst the gaggle of tourists and three-month-volunteers, I understand how hard it must be for those that truly call Arusha home to continually have to say goodbye to new friends. It must be exhausting, yet there are some that still make the effort and I am extremely grateful to those who have allowed me past the sunny welcoming demeanour that all Tanzanians share to the multi-layered and insightful humans underneath.
There is an art to feeling at home in a place where your visa will expire. A certain acceptance of the impermanent nature of your reality is needed. An acknowledgement that the present is all that you have. Sometimes I’m quite good at this. And sometimes I am not.
A friend of mine got a tattoo whilst in East Africa. It is the word impermanence in Pali. I really like his tattoo. The irony of it is quite nice also. I’ve been thinking about it recently and he describes it as a reminder that all things pass. Emotions, experiences, connections. All impermanent.
This has helped me to frame my time here. I continually try to accept the bad with the good and try to be present as often as possible. So thank you Jordan for your little bits of wisdom interspersed amid your large open laughter.
This year truly has been a wonderful learning experience because of the people here. There are so many things that I have learnt from them that I think I’d like to do another blog post just on these fantastic humans. For now, let me be self-absorbed and assume you want to know what’s going on in my life:
- I am still enjoying my role at St Jude’s, every day I work with different people whether it be the students, marketing or rotary clubs here or overseas. I must remember that this job description was basically what I used to do for free and although any 9–5 job becomes tiresome at times, I am lucky to be doing something that I would do for free.
- I’ve started studying part-time. Working here I’ve found out that I’m quite alright at seeing patterns in data and making connections. This led me to an online graduate certificate in Evaluation from Melbourne Uni. Hopefully, at the end of this, I’ll have another qualification so I can continue working in development and maybe even in social impact.
- I’ve been drawing a lot more.
(see the bottom of the post for my favourite squiggles so far) - I’ve (more recently) found a piano that I am allowed to play which is splendid news.
- My Swahili, though not as good as I’d hoped, is still improving
- I’m living in a giant white mansion because rent is cheap
- I’m living with a bed and couches made of pallets because furniture is expensive
- I eat out more than I should (So I really haven’t changed that much)
- And I dance/boogie as often as I can.
Overall I’m quite happy which is nice. There are many things I miss about Melbourne, most notably the people, and second-most notably the Asian cuisine. But hopefully, these things will still be there when I get home.
So for now, it’s nice to know I’m not done yet. If I felt like I was a pragmatic person before moving to Tanzania, then I didn’t really know what pragmatism was. I moved here with a shiny, sparkly idealism that was hard to acknowledge in myself.
I’ll say that although my optimism is still shiny, it is no longer so sparkly that I can’t see reality accurately reflected in it. There are still many opportunities here to do meaningful and impactful work. I am going to try and use my time doing those things and learning from the people around me. I hope I will look back on these two years and be proud of how I spent it.
So far, so good.
I appreciate those that have scrolled to the end. If you are enjoying my writing, click follow. I’m going to try and write more this year. xx
