Hello all! Happy April Fool's day, and happy are we who are wearing masks and snorkels. Dar is under water and we are soooo happy.

I returned from the upcountry of Tanzania, mainly Moshi and Arusha. Leonard, my roommate, and I spent two wonderful weeks with various family members in those two cities. The one-hour up-hill walk from the main road to his village was too much. He tells me that these are the beginnings of Mt. Kilimanjaro, so technically I can say I climbed (on) Mt. Kilimanjaro. I do believe that I have had more bananas that I ever had previously in just two weeks. Banana-meat stew, banana-bean dish, fried-bananas, fresh bananas, and the traditional banana beer. The views from the village of the land below and above were amazing. No Hale-Bopp, just the zillions of stars in the un-polluted-by-city-light skies. Actually, the only distraction was the moonlight reflecting off the snows of Mt. Kilimanjaro above.

In Arusha there wasn't much to do if you don't want to spend a lot of cash to go on safari. I ended up spending a week sitting in on the United Nations Rwanda genocide trials and also got to say hello to the First Lady and Chelsea at some hotel. They invited me for coffee, but I had.... One of the happiest things I saw was on a television [broadcast] of Dar streets flooding. I was also looking for the newest Africarriers Commercial which Leonard and I took parts in the filming for a little vacation spending money before we left for our break.

All in all it was a wonderful spring break and the only bad thing was returning to a mildew covered room. Oh well, no big deal in the magnitude of it all.--John

Return to Letters from Africa

Return to the Academic Home Page

First Online Edition: 22 July 1997
Last Revised: 18 May 2024