mbwa ndogo

Vote for Jamara!

2011-02-18T12:02:00.003-05:00

One of Jamara's pictures from Tanzania is a finalist in a National Geographic competition! Right now she's just a few votes shy of first place.

Vote here:
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/chasesapphire/entries/rate/chase-finalists/

The title of the photo is "Dust Dance". Thanks for your support!!

Tucson Exhibit

2010-11-13T23:52:00.001-05:00

The photos are now hanging in the Kachina Lounge at the University of Arizona in the Union building. They have been there since April 2010. We had an opening reception which the university sponsored with food and flyers. Martin Klabunde from the Dambe Project donated his time and came for an hour to play African music.

Golden Belt

2009-12-05T11:45:00.001-05:00

Golden Belt created a slide show of the Durham exhibit from March 2009. Check it out:

http://www.goldenbeltarts.com/photoGallery_events2009_WatotoWanapigaPicha.shtml

Multimedia

2009-07-07T00:49:00.002-04:00

I created a ten minute video piece for my final class at the Center for Documentary Studies. Check out the link and you can see images taken both by myself and photographs that the children took. Enjoy!

http://www.viddler.com/explore/jamknight/videos/2/

Photography Exhibition--Watoto Wanapiga Picha

2009-03-18T10:08:00.004-04:00

I secured a gallery space at Golden Belt in Durham, NC to hang the children's work and writings. Check out the invite below.

http://tiny.cc/watoto

You can also look at the exhibition description on Golden Belts website:

http://www.goldenbeltarts.com/newsEvents_featuredEvents.shtml

The show will be hanging from March 20th through April 15th. Then there is a possibility the show will move back to Maryland to an elementary school that has been learning about Tanzania.

Kid's Photos

2008-12-21T20:53:00.003-05:00

Here are a couple of photographs that the children took. One was during our class and the other was taken in the girls bedroom. They are going through photographs with a woman who works at the orphanage and does a great deal of the cooking and washing clothes.

A Final Show

2008-12-16T20:07:00.004-05:00

Our last week in Mwanza was quite a hectic one trying to finish our last projects with the kids and plan our next travel adventures east. I worked with each child to chose and write about their favorite two pictures. I then had them enlarged and laminated. I hung the photographs in a pizzeria in town. I might mention that it is the only pizzeria in town and popular with both the locals and foreigners traveling through. For that reason I typed up the children's writing in both English and Swahili to cater to the diverse audience. I was thrilled with the responses I received while just hanging the photographs as several people asked me the meaning of the photographs. I was relieved that people were interested since there is very little art in Mwanza. The images were there for over a week and then I had to leave before I was able to bring the children to see their hanging work. Fortunately for me another volunteer at the orphanage was able to bring them in and the kids ate pizza and took their work back home with them.

So now I am in the process of digitizing the majority of their negatives and trying to have a show of the children's work here in the States. If anyone has ideas of where might be a good place to exhibit their work, please let me know. Asante.

We're Home!

2008-11-30T20:36:00.000-05:00

And exhausted, so more will come later...

2008-11-30T00:49:00.000-05:00

Apologies

2008-11-16T22:54:00.002-05:00

I realize we've been slackin' recently on our blog posts. Our last week in Mwanza has been rather hectic and we needed to focus on getting out of here with everything in order. I hope you all understand. Yes? Hopefully we will start posting some more stuff soon!

Field Trip and Photo class excursion

2008-11-11T04:39:00.003-05:00

Last weekend we planned with the other volunteers to take the orphanage to Tunza, a restaurant/lodge that borders Lake Victoria. We also wanted to give the photo class a chance to take different pictures in town. We struggled to make a concrete plan since the rainy season has started and we didn't want to bring them to the lake if no one could swim. In fact it had been raining for almost three days straight. Had we chosen the wrong weekend? I couldn't sleep that night, a mixture of worry about the rain and a building excitement about the field trip. We rented two daladalas (vans) and picked up the kids who waited anxiously at the gate. They were in their best clothes, the same dresses and shirts we see them wearing to church. We packed them into the daladalas like sardines, one child on top of another, about fifty kids in all. In addition to the children we packed five volunteers, our one Maasai guardsmen who helped us arrange the daladalas, two daladala drivers, two daladala driving assistants (usually the ones who collect money), one orphanage director, and (grudgingly) one friend of the directors. We headed down the dusty bumpy roads for a twenty minute drive, the kids singing nearly the whole way.

It was a blast. The kids swam, then sat at the shore shivering dispite the glaring sunshine. (Tanzanians get cold very easily. It is not unlikely to see people wearing puffy down jackets in the middle of a hot day.) After swimming, volleyball, leisurely sipping on sodas, and watching the kids twist in the swing and then drunkenly stagger about, we walked a good distance to a local stand that makes chipsy mayai or what we might call greasy french fry omlettes. It took the stand a while to fry up 50 but honestly I was impressed with their effeciency. Then we jumped back into the daladalas and drove downtown to the photo store where we have been developing all the film at a discounted price. It is run by a very sweet older middle eastern couple who not only speak English, but were the only ones willing enough to give us a lower price. We brought the photo class, all 15 of them inside the tiny store whice is about the size of a small kitchen and includes a space lined with blue fabric for headshots, all the large machines for processing, as well as the counter for customers. We gathered there as one of their workers explained in Swahili the entire process for developing color film. I was very proud of the kids in that moment for their curiosity and although I understood very little of the Swahili, I knew they were asking good questions. One of the kids even asked if he could get a job there. The worker explained that you must learn chemistry in order to work there. My kids rock!

The other good news is that we have found a space to show the children's enlarged photos and writings! I had to harrass them repeatedly and nonstop, but alas my determination has shown results. It is a nearby pizzeria which is a hot spot for not only tourists, but the locals. So now I am in a rush as it is our last week here in Mwanza to get everything organized for the show and push the kids to write about their images in both Engish and Swahili. Wish us goodluck!

Fire in the Disco (well, okay, not really)

2008-10-31T05:26:00.002-04:00

Monday we were wrapping up our town trip and getting money to pay for the pictures we were about to pick up when we saw a fire truck zooming past. I couldn't ever remember seeing a fire truck in Mwanza before so I was a little surprised/curious, but then I quickly forgot about it. As we started walking toward the photo store we saw the woman who works there standing outside looking up the street. We turned in the direction she was looking and saw a huge cloud of black smoke rising up from the street. It was coming from the roundabout where we usually catch the daladalas home to Buswelu. There are two gas stations there and my first guess/worry was that it was coming from one of those. As we looked closer, that seemed to be the case. As far as we could tell, it was actually a large truck at the gas station that was on fire, but I can't be one-hundred percent sure. We joined the gathering crowd of people for awhile and watched as the fire trucks started getting the flames under control. Then as we started to head back towards our errands first one fire truck, and then another, raced past us away from the fire. I realized that they must need to leave the blaze to refill their tanks with water. By the time they returned the sky was filled with smoke again and the fire looked almost as big as before. Still, they managed to keep the fire from spreading and within an hour and half they had put it out completely.

Swahili and English Alphabet

2008-10-27T05:34:00.002-04:00

Last week for the photo assignment we divided up the letters of the alphabet and had the kids take photos that represented those letters either in English or Swahili. Here's some examples of their work!

A-for arm
B-for bus
C-for chupa (bottle)
D-for duck
E-for embe (mango)
F-for feed
G-for girls
H-for hold

Scaring Children

2008-10-27T05:31:00.000-04:00

Yesterday we were walking home from the orphanage, my body exhausted from trying to tame the kids in my classroom, and trying to ease the jumping toddlers back to safe ground, and trying to escape the girls tugging at my wrists to hold me captive: I was very tired. A group of about seven or eight younger boys fell in step behind us, very close, too close. I was trying to ignore them and walk home but they were very persistent and kept talking to us in Swahili. Who knows what they were up to...well I had had enough, so I jumped around and screamed “Rawr!” with my very scary mzungu face and the boys screamed and scattered then regrouped laughing and replaying my victory.

Camera Obscuras

2008-10-23T07:37:00.001-04:00

This past week I went over again how a camera obscura works. I have an example made out of a pringles can, but if any of you have other brilliant camera obscura or simple pinhole camera ideas I would love for you to share! Send me the link or directions on how to make them! I want to show them more than one example but I also have limited resources. Thoughts? Suggestions?

Photo Class

2008-10-23T07:35:00.001-04:00

First a Kiliwian goat and now a chicken!

2008-10-23T07:28:00.002-04:00

Our last morning in Kiliwi, we were awakened by the usual children staring in at us from the curtain-less windows. So much for sleeping-in and privacy! We went outside to find many gathered around. I got out the cards and played a simple card trick on the children that consisted of them drawing one card, me finding it, then somehow distracting them and sticking it to my forehead. John then insisted that we go for a walk to visit the oldest woman in the village. We walked past many rice fields, and through a neighbor's yard to finally reach her house. She had the older version mud hut. Instead of bricks made of mud and a thatched roof she had a wooden house lined with mud on the inside. We were told by John's brother that they changed to mud bricks as the wood supply diminished. It was a small hut with a sitting room big enough for four of us to squeeze in. There was a mattress in the other corner with a small storage space for their dried sweet potato slices. The daughter gave me one to try and so I politely nibbled the tasteless chalky sweet potato. They offered us their only sitting chairs, mini squatting stools made of wood. Then they brought us a bucket of peanuts. The woman thought maybe we had never had peanuts, so she showed us how to open the shell. As we sat their eating the nuts John then explained that the nuts were a gift and what we could not finish we would bring with us. Just as I marveled at the amount of nuts she gave us in walked the woman holding a chicken. Since the woman did not speak Kiswahili or little, we thanked her in Kisukuma. It was one of several words that we had learned in our Kisukuma crash course over the past couple of days. “Wabeja” we said as she handed me the clucking chicken. John gathered us together to take a picture and goosebumps rose on my entire body as I stood next to her. The chicken's bony warm body pressed against my arm and the thought of her giving nearly all that she had pulled at my heart. I fought my tears. We thanked her again and were on our way, this time through a different, muddy route. I took off my Chaco sandals as they advised and let the mud slip in between my toes. We greeted the herdsman and his cows as they passed. The cool Tanzania earth beneath my feet made me want to run and leap but I rooted myself looking behind me to Shawn, who now carried the chicken. She stepped cautiously, cradling the chicken so comfortably that it now became drowsy closing its eyes and giving in to its new owners.

When we came back the women chuckled at my mud caked feet. Really, a Mzungu with brown feet? We had a late breakfast that morning of fish and rice, then we bathed from a bucket, the water heated over the fire. Not too long after breakfast they gave us lunch insisting that they didn't want us to be hungry on the journey back to Mwanza. We ate lunch in a hurry, quickly packing our bags to leave. I gave out a few necklace gifts then we were herded into the vehicle with the whole town waving goodbye. I was secretly grateful that they had forgotten the chicken but about an hour into the trip after a good sized bump I heard a distinct squalking from the back.

On our way we stopped at John's relatives' home. We exchanged greetings and before we knew it we were served lunch again! We told John we could not eat any more food, that we were so full from breakfast and lunch. He told us it was too late, that she had offered us food and so we must try to eat it. With our heaping plates of rice we were able to put some back into a shared bowl. Shawn was the last to give back some of her rice to the communal bowl, and by now it was not just a bowl full of rice, but a mountain and she was trying to stack more on top without having a rice avalanche. Apparently Shawn put too much of her rice into the communal bowl because she promptly got a firm elbowing from Mama John. Grudgingly we spooned rice and chicken into our mouths and just as we saw an end nearing John's relative sent her children out to buy us Fanta sodas. Shawn and I vowed to not mention dinner that evening to one another.

To Pose or Not to Pose

2008-10-23T07:19:00.001-04:00

We teach the photo classes to standard 6 and higher (up to the fourth year in high school) but there are huge gaps in their English levels. Even within the levels you will notice large differences in English proficiency. This range is attributed mainly to how long the children have spent at the orphanage. Some have resided there for years, exposed to the many English speaking volunteers, while in contrast one 15 year old girl arrived our second week and requires one on one English sessions. This has made it difficult to teach the photography classes. I will talk about being in and out of focus, the history of photography, parts of the camera, camera obscuras, or speeds of films, then ask the children questions to find a quiet class staring back at me. Ahhh! Best case scenario I have the older boys answering the questions, but it is always the same few. The first few classes went well since the eldest boy translated the most important aspects of the class. However, I don't want to overwhelm him as I know from experience how difficult it can be to try and soak up the information while simultaneously spitting it back out in another language. So we are finding that some of the children do not understand. We are trying to incorporate Swahili words as well as encourage the children to reply and write in Swahili. Even still their self-portrait rolls came back with group shots and other unrelated items. We've noticed the girls seem to take pictures at the same time, often ending up with similar posed pictures.

I have to remember that in a place where cameras are far and few between taking pictures of people who are not posing might seem extravagant. I bring copies of photographs to every class to talk about the images and the composition. The children are most always in consensus...they dislike the images where the subjects are not looking at the camera. Where do they get the idea the one must always look at the camera? (Seriously...the kids don't have magazines!) How can I expose them to a new way of shooting? To more of a documentary approach to taking pictures? To be spontaneous?

I am hoping our trip to town and the lake next week will encourage this. So far we have taught five classes but we want the kids to have a chance to take pictures outside of the orphanage compound. Aside from going back and forth to school it seems most of them don't have a chance to get outside the cement wall that surrounds their home.

Kiliwi Day 2

2008-10-20T06:41:00.001-04:00

Our second day in Kiliwi really began in the middle of the night. After dinner the first night, John and his family plied us with cup after cup of chai. Naturally, by 2am I needed to use the bathroom. The only problem is that their bathroom was outside behind the house. So, I roused Jamara and we made our way through the dark house, found our shoes, and headed out to the bathroom. Outside the clouds from the earlier rain had finally cleared and the sky shone with more stars than you can see pretty much anywhere in U.S. Since the moon was almost full we could see nearly as much of Kiliwi in the moonlight as we could during the day. It was gorgeous and almost hard to leave to just go back to bed.

Over breakfast in the morning John told us that according to their tradition they should present us, their guests, with an animal for us to slaughter and then bring home the skin with us when we left. Luckily for me, while I was still wrapping my head around how I would even begin to slaughter an animal properly Jamara had offered herself to do the slaughtering and decided that she would rather have a goat than a sheep.

A few hours later we were standing next to our goat and a man with a very large knife. Jamara managed to convince everyone that she is not the slaughtering kind and so one of the men was put in charge of the task. At John's insistence, we posed for several photographs with our newest animal friend before it was taken behind a tree for the messy work to begin. To be honest, the slaughtering was not such a fun experience for me even though I tried to stay behind Jamara (who tried to stay behind her camera) the whole time.

After the goat, our car arrived. After a short round of shopping at one of the large nearby markets, we drove to visit another brother of John's. This brother lived high up on a hilltop next to the school where he teaches english to primary students. We had plenty of time to wander around the school and enjoy the gorgeous vistas of the surrounding area before they presented us with lunch (at about 4pm). As soon as we finished eating, storm clouds rolled in and we rushed to say our goodbyes before driving back in the rain.

Back at John's house, we were exhausted and still full from lunch, but it was almost time for our special goat dinner. Since we had our late lunch both of us had secretly hoped that maybe the goat needed an extra day to cook and that we would be done eating for the day. No such luck for us. It was after dark so we ate with light of just one kerosene lamp. That meant we couldn't see what parts of the goat we were eating. It also everyone else couldn’t see what a bad job we did of finishing all our goat.

Kiliwi Day One

2008-10-16T02:00:00.003-04:00

We became friends with John this past August while working at Duke University. When I first met him (over lunch at the Golden Corral) we talked about Tanzania. As soon as I told him I would be staying in Mwanza his face lit up and he exclaimed, “That's where I'm from!” He then preceded to ask me if I had ever been to a real village and invited me to his hometown to see “real Tanzania” and meet his mother.

So, two months later, John stayed true to his word. He came to Buswelu to pick us up at around nine in the morning and then we drove to the city to pick up some supplies for the weekend. Then we were on our way! He told us that his village, Kiliwi, was roughly 100km (62 miles) from the city center. Since the majority our drive took place off the main road (not to mention the many seemingly random stops we made) we arrived in Kiliwi between one and two that afternoon.

On the way, we passed a town called Misasi about 20km (12 miles) from Kiliwi. It is as close to his village as the daladalas (local buses) stop. John told us that when he was in secondary school he had to walk to Misasi to catch the daladala to get to his school in Mwanza. Since he had to catch the first bus in the morning, he had to walk through the middle of the night, usually leaving just after dinner. As we drove through the windy, muddy “roads” to his village it was hard to imagine taking that walk at any time, but especially at night in a place where electricity is non-existent.

When we entered the village I immediately noticed the first building that we had seen in probably 20 miles that wasn't constructed solely of local mud-bricks. It turned out to be John's mother's house, newly built just two years ago just next to the mud-brick home he grew up in. After we got out of the car, people slowly started coming towards us – first his family and then, seemingly, the whole village. We were introduced to his family and as we talked (or tried to, there was quite a language barrier) dozens of people stood around us and just stared. If we tried to say hello to the children, they would hide behind the nearest adult. After being in Buswelu where the kids run from their homes to yell to us or grab our hands, being surrounded by children mute with shock was a bit strange. When I asked how often white folks come to this part of the country, John's brother told us that is very rare and, as far as he could remember, it has only been priests.
Later that afternoon, as we took a short walk down the main road, all the village children seemed to gather behind us. If we stopped, they stopped. If we walked faster, they walked faster. If we turned towards them, they ran away and hid! As rain clouds seem to speed towards the village we decided to head back to the house. When we were several hundred yards away, the rain started to fall in large drops. By the time we reached door it was beginning to pour. As we gathered inside to escape the rain, we learned that visitors who bring rain with them are considered lucky. It rained all three nights we were there, so I guess they must think we are very very lucky.

Pictures!

2008-10-04T05:00:00.002-04:00

Photo Project

2008-10-04T04:47:00.002-04:00

For a few days I thought it wouldn't happen. We arrived on a Saturday to teach the first class, our backpack heavy with cameras. The older kids weren't there. We waited for three hours until giving up to go home and rest. On Monday we were back and surprisingly everyone was there and ready. We taught them the basics of how the first cameras worked, talked about images, and what they were interested in learning. Then we passed out the cameras and loaded the film. We are certainly starting from the basics! I was reminded of this when one girl tried to look through the camera but kept closing the wrong eye. That was adorable! The children were very excited and gave us handshakes, but what stuck with me for the rest of the evening was their genuine thank yous. So to those who made this project possible I want to extend the thank yous your way with a steady handshake and smiling Tanzanian eyes.

So far we've focus on lines and shapes, shadows, and taking pictures of people. I can't wait to develop their 2nd roll of film!

It's 4am. Do you know where your politicians are?

2008-10-04T03:57:00.003-04:00

If you're in Tanzania (like us!), that's the local time of the three presidential debates this fall. Since we were still in our hotel for the first one, I managed to wake us up and tune into the action from our room. We are not sure what we will do for the next two, but the option of booking a room for a night is always there. Since the second one is coming up in a few days, I guess we need to brainstorm.

On a related note, while I was reading up on the VP debate this morning a man came up to me and asked if I was from America. He then told me (claimed?) that Barack Obama is his nephew! So, Jamara gave him an Obama sticker which he found very exciting.

(And yes, we are voting from here. We sent our absentee ballot requests before we left. If they don't arrive soon, we will start harassing them.)

Good News and Bad News

2008-10-04T03:49:00.001-04:00

Good News: I found an internet cafe with computers that will read my flash drive!

Bad News: I still haven't been able to upload pictures onto the internet.

At least there's hope now!

Teaching

2008-10-04T03:21:00.003-04:00

Teaching English and Math at the orphanage has been extremely frustrating. To start there are six different levels of children that we split up ranging from standard 1- standard 6. And there is also a large group of children at the preschool age which have a Swahili teacher, but are somehow overlooked by the volunteers. Not to say that they don't play with them, but from what I can tell the volunteers in the past have not been getting them together to have a structured class. This bothers me especially since I spent my past year working at a Montessori preschool and seeing the developments and achievements that an early childhood education can help foster. More frustrating is the fact that there is no set schedule or structure that helps us know when to teach class. Sometimes we show up and our kids are not there...at school, or somewhere else. Other times they are working, doing chores, and we can't gather them. It might be harsh on my part to say there is no structure at all since things certainly get done. For example, the older children cut wood for cooking, feed the cows, chickens, and roaming goats. They also help make porrige in the morning and the huge pot of ugali that is stirred and stirred over the hot coals. They assist the younger ones in bathing and I am sure there is a whole list of items I am unaware of. The younger kids sit for long periods of time patiently taking the heads off tiny fish that they serve at lunch. If a young girl poops her pants, well then another will help her wash her clothes and clean up. So there is no doubt that there is cooperation and that things get done in this community. It is simply hard to have so many things I want to do with them and feel like I am often waiting around to gather my students. But then I remind myself that whether I am in the "classroom" or not, playing is learning and spending time with them is the most important.

Muzungu--We are famous!

2008-09-19T09:07:00.002-04:00

Muzungu, like gringo or farang, is the local way of saying white person/European person/foreigner. We walk about twenty minutes to get to the orphanage and on the way there adults and children yell Muzungu at us. Shawn and I have decided that it is the first word that children learn here. When we pass groups of children, the youngest ones who barely speak manage to shout out Zungoo zunogoo. We were really convinced that it was the first word children learn when a mother with a baby tied with cloth around her back stopped us to show us her child and say "Muzungu". The baby looked at us with big round eyes but thank god said nothing. Sometimes I swear even the goats say it as we pass, thats how famous we are.

Tanzania: The Land of Slow Internet, Old Computers, and Broken Keyboards

2008-09-19T09:04:00.002-04:00

Last Saturday when we posted, we were splurging at the Hotel Tilapia in honor of Jamara's birthday. Even there, although wireless, the internet was too sluggish for us to post any videos. Now we are at the standard internet cafe (although my old favorite has closed down!) Even though they've raised their prices, their speed hasn't increased at all. Plus, I think some of these computers are the same ones I used 3 years ago. Ugg. This does not make happy. As a consequence, my computer won't recognize my flash drive which means no pictures for you. Therefore, you shouldn't be happy either.

Hands of Mercy

2008-09-13T09:22:00.002-04:00

Yay! We arrived. We met with the new volunteer coordinator and discussed the photo project. He thought it would be great to do with the secondary kids which is roughly middle school and high school age. We taught our first English classes this past Friday and I was surprised at the level of English that the 5th graders have. I would like to speak with the owners of the orphanage before we get started and to get their input, but so far we think we will have two photo classes per week. One in the evenings after they return from school and another on the weekend. But for now we are just trying to adjust and settle in.

Highlights:

The first visit to the orphanage a group of younger children sprinted towards us as we entered the compounds red metal door. One girl ran into me so hard I thought she would fall over. By the time we left the orphanage my cheeks hurt from smiling.

We spent one day exploring the nearby area. We stopped at a local "restaurant" to get food and started playing cards. A woman there came up and started teaching us a game. It was a comical moment as she spoke very little English and we very little Swahili. In a matter of minutes we had four others playing cards and at one point in our trying to understand the rules we all started laughing and the one woman laughed so hard she began to cry. We've decided to bring cards with us everywhere as an icebreaker, a way to meet people.

Living it up in the Ikohi Motel

2008-09-13T08:43:00.004-04:00

As it turns out, for our first 2-3 weeks in Buswelu we will not be staying with the other volunteers. It seems the normal volunteer house is overbooked at the moment, so we've been put in the nearby Ikohi Motel.
Its very nice and we're being completely spoiled. We have hot (well, at least warm) water, a private western-style toilet, and even cable tv. Honestly, it feels a bit weird to be in Tanzania and have the two things I missed most while I was here last time. I suppose I'll find some way to survive ;)

Mwanza

2008-09-10T02:21:00.001-04:00

We made it.

Dreaming in Doha

2008-09-08T23:11:00.002-04:00

Mmm... alliteration. Goes well with my vanilla latte. Sigh.
So, we arrived in Doha at about 9:30 PM local time and, without any fuss from us, Qatar offered to send us to the very swanky Grand Regency hotel and feed us. Unfortunately, by the time we made it to the hotel it was already close to 11:30PM and we had to leave the hotel by 5:00AM. Then we spent another half an hour trying to figure out how to turn the lights on and off! Needless to say, it wasn't as much sleep as we need, but it was still very nice to lay flat on a bed in a dark room. I think it recharged our batteries enough to get us to the train station in Dar Es Salaam. Unfortunately, due to our delay, we might either need to stay in Dar a few more days or find an alternate means to get us to Mwanza. Cross your fingers that we manage to catch our train in 11 hours!

We probably won't be able to post again until at least Wednesday. I hope you don't miss us too much.

Hotelini

2008-09-07T03:20:00.002-04:00

We are being taken to a hotel until the problem (still unknown) is fixed. I will be glad for the free food vouchers.

We're Back on Solid Ground. In Newfoundland.

2008-09-07T02:35:00.004-04:00

Yes, Newfoundland. Gander to be exact.
Apparently, there is some sort of "malfunction" with the plane. We don't really know anything right now though, as they are not sharing much with us. But Canada has free WiFi! Yay!

Once we get an update (and assuming we have a moment before we get shuttled on) we'll try to give everyone a heads up.

At the Terminal

2008-09-06T21:30:00.003-04:00

With less than an hour and a half before take-off, we have arrived at our gate and can relax a little bit more. As expected, our carry-on full of cameras earned us a little extra attention from the TSA screeners. The man who had to unpack and repack our 30 or so cameras one-by-one suggested that maybe we could have settled for one really nice camera for our photo project.

We have spent the last week taking care of all the "little" details for our trip. From getting our travel essentials (ie insect repellant and malaria pills) to last minute haircuts, we've managed to keep ourselves fairly busy. Now, I'm looking forward to watching movies for 14 hours in a cramped airplane!

Doha here we come!!

(note: posted after the fact from Gander, since Dulles does not give the free wifi)

For those who gave and for those who thought to give

2008-09-01T23:18:00.002-04:00

After a friend forwarded an email about the photography project and our need for donated cameras and film I was astounded by the number of responses that I received. My inbox flooded with mail from people living in the surrounding Durham area that wanted to give cameras to the children of Tanzania. Any photographer or project coordinator's dream. After a week the emails finally slowed, but they never ceased and continued to slowly trickle in even after I left North Carolina and could no longer collect cameras.

I met people in their homes, in coffee shops, and in their cars as they drove by my apartment to donate cameras. I spoke on the phone with local business owners who wanted to give advice on how to fundraise and folks who wanted to speak to their rotary club. People's grandmothers bought new batteries and strangers drove to my work to drop cameras off. My family as well as Shawn's family continuously ran across more equipment here and there. People sent me cameras in the mail and these packages sat at my doorstep waiting for me to get home to open them wide-eyed with excitement as if it were Christmas. A friend put a link on her website and collected cameras as far as Washington state and my mom bought out all the cameras at garage sales within a 50 mile radius. Is there anything I forgot?

I am extremely grateful for everyone's support. Many of you shared with me your camera's story (where it had traveled, what it took photographs of, how long you had it, etc.) I thought it would be interesting to hear more of these stories, so if you have time, share with us your favorite photograph or your best travel moment. I want to return the favor by sharing with you the new stories of these cameras; what the children create.

In short thank you. Although I was not able to pickup all the cameras, I want to also acknowledge those who contacted me with donations. Please feel welcome to share your stories as well. Asante sana.

Cameras!

2008-08-12T17:06:00.003-04:00

You callin' me a Twitter?

2008-05-16T11:01:00.004-04:00

I am well aware of the fact that most of the people reading this blog are not as geeky as me (even though Mommer has recently lamented at my steady decline in geekdom over the past few years).

So, you might have questions about the new "Twitter Updates" section on the sidebar. Twitter is a relatively new social networking and mini-blogging service that takes advantage of that technology that many people already use throughout the day. Since we plan on picking up a Tanzanian mobile phone once we get in the country, this will allow us to use that to send brief updates to family and friends even in the absence of internet access (which will be most of the time). You can either just come to the blog to see our latest "tweets" or sign up with Twitter to be one of our "followers". Then you'll get a text message, IM, or email (depending on your preference) whenever we send out a mini-update. For example:
"on the train"
"still on the train"
"in Mwanza... finally!"
"Jamara's stomach isn't adjusting well :("
"face to face with a lion... jealous?"

.... you probably get the idea.
Since I am not currently a big Twitter user, this will be an experiment. I think it has potential though, so I hope you'll try to follow along.

Belated Good News

2008-05-15T16:45:00.002-04:00

Actually, scratch that, belated GREAT news!

We found out a few weeks ago that Jamara was selected as one of the 2008 grant recipients by the Clarence and Lilly Pickett Endowment for Quaker leadership. The Pickett Endowment annually funds (as stated on their website) "hands on service and research projects directly related to the quality and betterment of life for all humankind."

One of our big goals for this trip is to offer photography workshops to some of the children in Buswelu (similar to the ones Jamara taught in Washington last year). This grant will give us a big boost in getting this project off the ground in a sustainable way. So, needless to say, we are beyond thrilled about the generous support and confidence the Pickett Endowment has shown in our project's potential. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to the board of the Pickett Endowment!!

New Link

2008-02-16T00:43:00.002-05:00

The volunteer coordinator at Hands of Mercy sent me the address to their website earlier today. It has some more detailed information about the orphanage, along with some pictures of the facility and the kids. I've added the link under the Destination header to the left.

Karibuni!

2008-02-12T10:23:00.000-05:00

Welcome!

I've put together a list of some of the fun features currently in the blog. To some, this is probably incredibly redundant. Still, I'm guessing it will be helpful to at least a few of you:

At the very bottom of the page you'll find the current weather in Mwanza, along with a 3-day forecast.
At the top of the left column, there's a clock showing the current time in Tanzania. If you want to call us once we're in TZ, check there first that it's not 3AM (or some other un-Godly hour). We'd appreciate it.
Hopefully, you'll also find a bunch of other helpful information, links, and lists on that side of the page. So check it out!
If you don't want your finger to get tired from clicking on our page all the time just to see if we've posted anything new, you can subscribe to our RSS feed at the bottom of the left-hand column.
Just above that, you'll find a handy little countdown gadget to let you know just how much time we have left to pull ourselves together and make this trip happen.

**A note about browsers: I have not done much testing on this issue, but I have already found that some parts of the site do not look pretty in IE. You're not actually using IE though, are you? If yes, please click here. You'll thank me later. I promise.

Tunakwenda wapi?*

2008-02-11T11:26:00.001-05:00

*Where are we going?
See the red dot? That's (roughly) where we'll be.

It's official!

2008-02-10T18:01:00.000-05:00

Yesterday we bought our plane tickets. Reality check, for sure. We are really doing this.

Anyway... we will be flying on Qatar with a hella-long layover each way in Doha. Any tips?