OMG I don’t even know where to start!! 

Yesterday, was our first Non-Program day, but it didn’t feel like much of a day off because we had so much going on.  We slept in an extra hour and a half and then we got up for breakfast.  After breakfast Nina, one of the staff members here, agreed to take us up to Moyo Hill.  Moyo Hill is a small hill next to our camp, but we can’t go up there by ourselves because occasionally there are hyena up there.  The walk took about half an hour and the view was great.  We could see the mosaic of farms and pastureland of the valley where we live as well as the mountains of the Great Rift Valley in the background.  Nina told us that he will try to bring us up to Moyo Hill early one morning, because in the morning its clear enough that you can see Mount Kilimanjaro!

After our excursion to Moyo Hill we all got in the cars and went into town.  Rhotia is the tiny little town closest to us, and we can walk there from the center, but in order to go shopping we needed somewhere just a little bit bigger.  By a little bit bigger, I mean if you sneeze you can still miss it, because its so small but they had a few fabric stores and I bought a really cool print. Hopefully I will be able to get to the tailor in Rhotia some time this week so that I can have it made into a skirt.  One of my favorite parts of Karatu was getting to practice a little bit of my Kiswahili.  The venders swarmed us as soon as we got there, because we are so obviously tourists, but they are good fun.  One of them taught me an expression that means, “cool like a banana in the fridge.” I think I’ll try to bring that back to the States and see if that catches on! Haha Unfortuanately, I jinxed myself in my last post.  I was so good about sunscreen on my face and my arms all week, but then I forgot the back of my neck yesterday.  So I’m a redneck now too…womp womp I also got my first mosquito bite of the trip (not bad if you ask me…one bite a week).  After shopping we went to Happy Days to do some dancing.  So overall, it was an awesome Non-Program day. 

Today was my first trip to the national parks.  We went to Lake Manyara National Park, which is about 15 minutes from the center.  It. Was. Awesome!

Our assignment for today was to take field notes on the interactions between animals and record the different species that we found.  I was ready with my safari hat, shirt, and pants!! A few people in the group even donned safari vests. (I was impressed).  We popped the roof up in our car and stood on the seats as we drove through the park.  It was nice, because everybody could really see pretty much everything.  I must say I got pretty into it.  I had my binoculars in one hand, my camera in the other, and my field notebook on the top of the truck.  We saw a lot of animals for our first trip out. 

We saw: Olive baboons, vervet monkeys, blue monkeys, dik-dik, African elephant, wildebeest, zebra, warthog, Thompson’s gazelle, bushbuck, impala, flamingos, cattle egret, giraffe, ground hornbill, white stork, grey crowned cranes, cape buffalo, monitor lizard, and a few other species of hornbill that I forgot to write down. 

All of the monkeys were everywhere.  We say many groups of all three species, and they are all so fun to watch especially the babies! We saw large herds of the wildebeest, zebra, impala, and buffalo out on the planes all just milling around and being animal-y.  The elephants were a nice surprise on the way out, because we saw three of them as we were driving and they were kind of far away and hard to see, but then just as we were leaving the park we looked over and we saw this huge family of about 15-20 elephants with little baby elephants in the trees right next to the car! One of them was about 10 feet off the road! Very awesome!

The flamingos were incredible.  You would just look at the horizon and see this line of pink and if you whip out your binoculars (which I did) and get a closer look you find that the line of pink is thousands upon thousands of flamingos just chilling out and being pink. 

So even though there were no big cat sightings, I would say that my first day out was a success! Tomorrow we are heading back to observe baboons and follow them around! When was the last time your homework assignment was follow baboons around for two hours?!?!?!

Africa Rocks!

Christine

Oh yea, and I got involved in planning out our garden for this semester.  Specifically, I’m on the team organizing the compost…I just couldn’t resist an opportunity to make compost! haha

Mambo! (That’s one way to see hello in Swahili)! I love my Swahili class so far we learned 2 songs!  My favorite one is this welcome song…

Hujambo! Hujambo bwana habari gani,
Nzuri sana (x2)
Wegani, mwakarbishwa Tanzania yetu!
Hakuna Matata

(That’s right I speak the language of Timon and Pumba… and it actually means no worries!)

I’m starting to get settled in here, and I am absolutely loving it!! The internet is soooooo slow.  I’m going to try to upload some pictures, but I don’t know if the Internet will be able to handle it. I have been messing around with the settings on my camera so that by the time I go on expedition, I will be a pro! We head to Lake Manyara National Park on Monday and Tuesday for our first field exercise which involves observing animal interactions and then doing a write up on them.  It is supposed to help us master both observation skills and good field technique as well as scientific writing.  I am so pumped, because its going to be awesome! 

It is incredibly beautiful here.  The past few days there hasn’t been a single cloud in the sky.  Every morning I get up at 7:00 and get dressed for breakfast at 7:30.  After breakfast class starts at 8:00 and everyday my class schedule changes.  Then we usually get a break for a little bit, and then class again, and then lunch.  Today our after lunch break is from 12-4, so two of my banda-mates Chloe, Lainie, and I went for a walk around the area.  It was so nice, but a little hot…good thing I have my safari hat! 

We’ve been playing a lot of cards especially Go Fish and Hearts! Yesterday class was done at 4: 00 so we played a pretty intense game of Egyptian Ratslap and then played a super intense game of volleyball with a bunch of our professors and staff! That was a real blast. We don't have a ton of work yet, so I have pretty much spent most of my time sitting under a tree we named mti which means tree in swahili (real original right). It is quite comfortable in the shade, but it is super hot in the sun.  I haven't fried yet either, so that is a good sign (yes mom, I have been wearing my sunscreen!)

I think that's all the news for now!
Christine

I am here and it is so warm! 
We got in at about 9:00 last night and drove about an hour to a hotel in Arusha, because we didn't want to drive all the to the camp (not literally a camp, we have buildings) so late at night, because there are no lights on the roads making it difficult to drive at night.  I road with my head out the window the whole time just looking at the stars.  I could not believe how many stars there were, and you could see them going on for miles since it is relatively flat! Even in the pitch black night where you can't see anything, Tanzania rocks! haha It was pretty late when we got to the hotel, so we ate a quick dinner and then went to bed because we were all exhausted.
This morning we got up, got some breakfast, and headed to a touristy shopping center so that we could exchange our US money for shillings and get any groceries that people might need.  We also all got ice cream even though it was like 10:00 in the morning.  (It was delicious)
It took about 3hours for us to get from the shopping center to the station.  The landscape is absolutely fascinating.  There are wide up spaces with these huge fissures in them which I am assuming contain water during the rainy season.  Right now it is quite dry and the wind causes little dust tornados to spring up along the savannah.  As we got closer to the station the landscape has changed from these wide open spaces to a little bit more tree-y.  
Our station is wonderful! We live in little bandas (houses) with 8 people, four in each room.  So far, I really like everybody in the group and my banda-mates seem cool.  It is a bit overwhelming trying to learn everybody's name since there are 40 students and 20 or so faculty and staff members, but give me a few days and maybe I'll get it! 
I have not had a lot of time to explore yet, but it is very beautiful here.  The town right down the road seems really cute, and the center is on good terms with them.  Tomorrow we will go and get a tour! 
The food has been nothing short of fantastic so far, and I am looking forward to learning how to make some of it when I am on cooking/cleaning crew.  We all take turns helping with the meals which I think is really cool.    
You are all probably wondering if I have seen anything exciting yet in terms of animals...I've seen a cat (not a big one) and some crows.  So not yet, but it is only day 1 and I know that they are out there! 
I am now going to go hang out with the group so I'll share more details later, and maybe a few pictures!
Christine

Right now I am in the Amsterdam airport making this the first time I have ever touched foot on European soil (or concrete)!  woot woot Six hours down and 8ish? hours to go. (I actually have no idea how long my next flight is, but I think I heard someone say that it was around 8 hours). If anyone is planning on flying internationally any time soon I recommend KML airlines because that was the nicest flight I have ever been on! They gave us warm towels to wash our hands with before dinner and the food wasn't atrocious! The movie selection was pretty good too. I watched "The Perks of Being a Wallflower." I really liked it, and I thought Emma Watson did a great job, so if you haven't seen it I recommend it! 
Slowly I am meeting more members of the group, we've learned to just sort of find other people who look to be about our age and adventurous.  A lot of us had seats in the same area of the plane so we could chat a little then, and now we are waiting for out next flight which doesn't leave for a few hours. So far, everyone seems pretty cool.  
I can't believe that this whole trip has actually started, and that I will be in Tanzania within the next 24 hours! Th

Hey Everybody!

I have officially caved and will be attempting to maintain a blog (ew).  Blogging is not really my thing, but I'm going to give it a go, and hopefully it will be interesting!

I leave in t minus 1 week! Sooooo Crazy!! I have my shots, I have my camera, and I have my adventure pants...so I'm good to go right? 

Its hard to believe that I'll be heading off to a completely different world for an entire semester.  I mean I have been thinking about this forever, but now its actually about to happen! So pumped!!!

Christine