2007!!

1^st - 7^th January 2007

The new year started slowly due to the large downfall of rain – apparently though it was only the short rains – which lasted for nearly seven hours at a time! It meant that we had to spend most of our time in the house. Thankfully we had electricity the new gas project provides electricity through TANESCO most of the evenings. Although there are still some areas of Mtwara that are still not receiving electricity. I was also able to go and watch a few football games due the rain intervals as Liverpool matches where been kicked off at an earlier time.

Our first week back to work after the new year should have seen us going to the training. However some issues they hadn't dealt with before the Christmas holidays meant that the camp, food and transport was not ready to leave this week. Instead the camp was now scheduled to leave the following week.

We celebrated a birthday party at our house, Harrison's brother – Jackson who was in Mtwara for the Christmas period. The house had made once again a lot of food and invited some of the local children around to join in the celebrations. The birthday parties take more or less the same format as other ones. Its just a little less formal than adult parties. The funny thing was that come the time when we would eat the food, the adults would take first while the children would wait until we had finished. However, when the children got near the food they took so much that I was so shocked at the portions they could eat, some even managing a second helping. No wonder the adults went first then.

Also when giving the presents, the parcelled ones would be handed to the birthday boy whereas money would be placed underneath a plate in front of him. Also giving birthday cards doesn't seem to be a big tradition either. Here only one card is bought and everyone who attends the party signs it whereas back home the person could expect to receive a lot of cards, also if money was to be the gift, it would be placed in the card and not shown in public.

Thankfully the weather returned to normal for the remainder of the week and we went to the beach to get some sun while getting funny looks from the locals probably wondering what we are doing. At the office we have also been playing a lot of table tennis. Annukka's father bought the set from Arusha for SDA. So we can organise tournaments in the near future. We have been playing most days and fortunately I have been winning most of them.