Sin day is the best day of the week...I feel sick though hahaha

The last two days have been kind of slow, hence the lack of posts hahahaha. Yesterday was a half day…again…since the Wednesday morning group didn’t show up…AGAIN. Elizabeth is definitely going to drop them next year now, which is a real shame. The lucky thing is, since they are part of a bigger group (their name is Upendo B, and the group came about as a result of the original Upendo group, which meets on Tuesday mornings, growing too large) the remaining members who are still really interested (there’s one woman who shows up each week) can simply move to the Tuesday morning group. So that’s good news! Yesterday morning, I also discovered that Michael (the guy who showed me around town on my first day) actually lives really close to the house where I’m staying. I saw him as I got to the main road to walk to work, and we walked to the office together, which was a pleasant surprise! Other than that, the day went as standard. We went to “afternoon” group at about 10:30 or 11 or so, and that all went pretty smoothly! I did my customer relations presentation for the final time! The women liked it, and they listened very intently actually! Then Marjolein taught them how to make minestrone! That was also the final time that she’ll teach that!

After that, we headed back to the office, and Yuta and I went to Lenana to get some lunch. I figured since it will probably be the last time I’m there, I should take some pictures of what chipsi mayai actually looks like hahahaha.

How it's served

How it's supposed to be eaten hahaha...covered

in tomato sauce and cabbage.

After that I headed home. The night was fairly quiet. I had an afternoon sleep, and then had dinner and went to bed soon after!

That brings me to today! I got to the office (no Michael to walk with) and we left to go the morning group pretty quickly! This is the group that meets in the make-shift church out the back of all of their houses. Yuta is sick today, so Cleo gave his presentation on bookkeeping while I taught Marjolein and Diane how to do the loan collections and bookkeeping. Today was Diane’s first day out on field visits. Anyway, after all of that happened, Marjolein said our farewells to the group, and they told us that we were very welcome to come back any time, and asked us when we would be back again! It was really nice hahaha. Then we headed off!

Soooooo…today…was Thursday…and Thursday…is Cleo and my “sin days”…which means we can eat as much as we physically can and not feel bad about. This is a tradition that started only last Thursday…you know why? AFRICAFE IS WHY! Yeah…we went back there for lunch today HAHAHAHHAA. I was too worried that I would get something that would be underwhelming that I just ended up getting the same sandwich I got last time hahaha. This one:

And I got a chocolate milkshake again! They’re really good milkshakes…and then afterwards, Cleo got pancakes again and I got a slice of Chocolate Fudge Cake, which was, for lack of a better word, AMAZING!

A standard casual picture of my cake

My inner instagrammer unleashed...

The thing is…we really lived up to the meaning of sin day…because after we finished (I didn’t finish the slice of cake and Cleo didn’t finish her pancakes…don’t worry hahaha) we were both sitting there, stuffed to the brim, and both sweating because we’d eaten way too much HAHAHAHHAHAHAH. It was a good lunch.

However, the mood was dampened when the human rights team showed up…Franca and Melany were both in tears when they arrived. They had been at court today, and had waited for 4 hours for their case to come before the judge. So, I’m not sure if I said this last week, but Franca said that the prosecution’s witness last Thursday had answered all of the prosecutor’s questions, but as soon as it was time for the cross examination from the defence, the witness suddenly felt too sick to answer any questions and had to leave. That same day, the judge also told the prosecution that they had absolutely no evidence in this case (it’s against a minor as well…I’m not sure what for though) and that they would never win the case. So…today…apparently after waiting for 4 hours, as soon as the case came up, the prosecution announced that they were dropping the case. Then, as everyone walked out the front door of the court, the kid was rearrested. This is a thing in Tanzania. It has a name, although I’ve forgotten it…basically, the prosecution side of any case can drop the case at any time, and then start the case again from scratch…and infinite amount of times. There’s no limit on it. So basically, the prosecution side of this case can simply keep restarting the case for as long as they like until they find a judge that will rule in their favour. What’s worse is that apparently this was the second or third time that this has happened in this case. There is absolutely no evidence for the prosecution, but they won’t let it go…something to do with the lawyer’s pride they said. What’s worse again is that what this means, since it happened today, is that the boy will spend Christmas and New Years in a prison cell at the local police station, since the next court date is next January…not even in juvie or anything…so he’s in terrible conditions for the next month…I totally understand why they were in tears. It’s so terrible. And I guess it’s these laws, like allowing prosecutors to essentially restart cases whenever they like, that really differentiate more developed countries from countries like Tanzania…it’s terrible.

After that, the rest of the day has been pretty sombre…we did the afternoon group, where Cleo did a presentation on marketing, and I did the bookkeeping while Marjolein and Diane did some interviews. It was a nice visit, but again we were all a bit down. Also, the reason it’s affected them so much is that it’s Franca’s last day, and Melany’s last day tomorrow…so it’s a pretty terrible note to end on. Oh well…that kind of brings me to now. Marjolein’s last day is tomorrow, and she’s going to run a new Dropbox folder template by Elizabeth, and then we can start reworking the Dropbox into a much more understandable and straightforward system. Fingers crossed it all goes well!

Anyway, tonight is social night. We’re going to eat at a place called Safari Bistro which is supposed to have really good pizza, and really good chicken curry! So, I’ll make sure to tell you about it tomorrow!

Oh well I’m gonna go get ready! See ya next time.