Home Stay

Today I got a peek into the daily life of local Tanzanians. Me and another girl were assigned to Mama Beni's for the whole day. We left at 8 and when we got there were greeted by an older woman and an 18 year old boy, Christopher. We spent a majority of our time with Christopher because he spoke English very well. For the first two hours we just sat in their living room and drank chai tea. Christopher asked about how school works in the US and why we're always so busy and never have any time to visit family. After we finished our tea, he took us on a tour of his land. They had a large field of corn and barley and also owned several goats and cows.

Abby, the youngest daughter 

We then started on lunch, which took two and a half hours to make! Each dish was made over a single fire, so they have a lot of insulating cookware. Christopher has only recently learned to cook since it is usually viewed as a woman's job. He told us that if you're married man you are not allowed to cook. We cooked beef, rice, ugali (cornmeal) and cabbage. After lunch we took a walk to visit his neighbors and when we went to his relatives they insisted on feeding us again! We also got to see the other side of Moyo Hill and from the top you can see both Lake Manyara and Ngorongoro. We then walked back to his house and helped harvest beans before having some more tea. Christopher told us that he wants to be a doctor but he had to take a year off of school because he couldn't pay the fees. He has to wait until his sister, who's studying education, graduates university. We felt a little bad that the family wouldn't let us help in their daily tasks more, but I know they just wanted to treat us like guests. It was an eye opening experience and it was really interesting learning about what they think of the US and how different their lifestyle is.