If you could see through my eyes

The five of us from the compound (so without Brandon and Rachel) drove to Slipway today. Slipway is a local market sort of area, a whole series of stalls and little shops selling bead work and carved pieces and artwork and clothing and all sorts of traditional Tanzanian crafts. It's a lovely place, I really like just wandering through there, but you tend to get a fair bit of attention. Not so much because of being white, it's an area catering specifically for white tourists, but simply because they want you to buy from them, and for that you need to be looking at their stall in more than a general context. This photo is of one of the Slipway artists working on a set of name plates in Tinga Tinga style. The artwork here is amazing, I have great admiration for their technique.


We had lunch at a place on the wharf. I gave some of mine to a stray cat. He wasn't as skinny as the cat that hangs round our place, funny that. I have a feeling he picks up lots of scraps from people. We were just leaving when I heard my name called out, looked round and it was Aishi and Dorothy and another friend of theirs. Had a bit of a chat to them - they were in town to sit practice examinations.

I look at Dorothy, and I see a tall, beautiful, native Tanzanian, star of the soccer team and a hardworking intelligent girl. She has two sisters, one who graduated last year, and Angela in grade four. Her father works at Hopac and by this has put the three of them through school. Her older sister won a scholarship to Harvard last year. Dorothy is likely to do very well too.

They don't have running water at home.

See what I meant when I said Hopac was an unusual school. To be offering not just an education, but an education at the level where students can compete internationally, is a pretty amazing thing.

The whole Slipway trip had taken longer than we thought, (correction, longer than we hoped. We're way past the stage of honestly expecting an excursion into town to take less than six or seven hours all up), and Zoe and I were due at the O'Neil's for dinner, so we decided to drive straight there rather than go home first.

Apparently it was the best day of Tommy's life. Makes you feel good hey. Played Yahtzee, In a Pickle, kids went to bed, chatted to Steve and Denae...