Blah

Forgive me, I couldn't come up with a good title for this blog!  We are all kind of in a "blah" mood today.  It is our first day back at school today and it was a little rough after two days off.  Plus, everyone else in Tanzania was celebrating Eid today instead of yesterday so the campus was a ghost town.  Literally there was no one around!  All of the restaurants on campus were closed and even some of the classrooms were locked.  We had class in a different classroom and our Swahili instructor decided to lecture for 4 hours instead of the normal 2 hours of lecture, 2 hours of small group.  Needless to say, we all walked out of there like zombies.  A few of us went to the engineering cafeteria for the first time, and it was decent.  We went in search of ugali (the staple food of Tanzania-it is a sticky cornmeal dough/mush) but they did not have any today.  We had rice and beans along with a beef stew type dish.  There wasn't a whole lot of meat in the stew but the broth was good!  This afternoon I went to Mlimani City to the mall to pick up some groceries for our 5 hour busride tomorrow to Tanga.  I got sandwiches (pre-made at the deli) and Spinach to make a salad. I'm so excited for leafy greens!  Let's just hope I washed them well enough so I don't get sick.  Right now I'm using the Godde's hot water pitcher to boil water for my water bottles.  It's much easier than pumping water!  Tonight I'll pack for Tanga and maybe practice some Swahili.  And tomorrow....Tanga! For those of you who don't know, Tanga is 5 hours north of here and has a bunch of caves that we get to explore.  We are all pretty psyched because we will be staying in a hotel, and plus, there are hot springs nearby! I'll take lots of pictures and hopefully will be able to post them when I get back!
Erin
P.S. I almost forgot the Swahili word of the day: ndizi - banana
You say it nnn-dee-zee, with the "nnn" part sounding like "mmm" but with an "n" :)