At the College, they thought I--the only native English speaker on campus--should be the one to teach phonetics and phonology. Phonology is the study of the sounds in English, how you anatomically make them, and the rules about them. It’s not my favorite topic. It resembles science: you have to learn an entirely new set of vocabulary, and by the time you know the topic well, you’ve left out all the words from your previous life sitting dormant on a shelf. But I said, “Sure, I’ll teach phonology.”
The other day my class and I were learning about the “t” sound. (Since it’s been about 20 years since I studied linguistics, I’m including myself as one of the learners.) I was telling students about allophones – variations of a sound. For example, the “t” in “toe” is different from the “t” in “stow.” I told students to put their palms to their mouths and say “toe” and “stow.” The puff of air is less with “stow.” Since my Tanzanian students are game for anything, no matter how silly it looks, forty of us with hands in front of our mouths repeated “toe” and “stow.”
Then I told them about the “t” in “water.” I said while the “t” in “toe” is an aspirated stop, the “t” in “water” is an alveolar flap. With the word “water,” the tip of the tongue touches the ridge on the roof of your mouth right behind your teeth. “Flap” refers to the fact that your tongue does this much more quickly with “water” than “toe.”
Then I pronounced “water” for my students--wadder. Suddenly the room erupted in wadder-wadder-wadder-wadder-wadder. I wrote “wadder” on the board and then “water,” pronounced them one at a time and asked if they could tell which one I was pronouncing. They failed every time.
I had not realized how vital this difference in “t” was -- the aspirated “t” in “toe” and the alveolar flap in “water” --until I first arrived in Tanzania. I had asked for a "boddle of wadder" for the first two days and discovered no one understood me. I told my students this story. Then I heard boddle-of-wadder-boddle-of-wadder-boddle-of-wadder for ten minutes. Then I gave them the native version of “I want a bottle of water” –I wanna boddle of wadder.
With that, I lost all classroom control. They all flowed out of the room repeating, “I wanna boddle of wadder.”
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Through the metal grate
At the small shop near me, an iron grate set in a large window solidly separates me, the customer, from anything in the shop that I want. Many, and probably most, general stores here bar any customer entrance. All exchanges pass through the holes of that grate.
My shop is run by a young man who’s about 20 years old. In the rooms adjacent to the shop, his mother, father and sister come and go, cook, clean and do other living. But this boy runs the shop from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m. every single day. The exception is Christmas and New Year’s Day when his sister helps him run the shop from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m. This explains why the clerk returns my greetings when I approach the grate with heavy lethargy. When I tell him what I want–matches, soap, green Christmas wrapping paper, sugar, oil–he rises from his chair sloth-like. I don’t know if sloths rise but if they do, they look like this clerk. When I ask for a half kilo of sugar, he retrieves a wrinkled piece of wax paper and lets it flutter onto a metal scale, then plops metal weights on the other side of the scale, and pours the golden brown grains of sugar onto the paper. Three sugar grains before the scale drops down, he stops pouring and begins to shake the sugar onto the paper. The instant the scale has dropped, the shaking stops, and he lifts the wax paper by two opposite corners, pouring the sugar into a bag from a third corner.
Even though ten customers have arrived and shouted out their requests–I want a cigarette! I want a bar of soap! You didn’t give me the right change last time!–he moves through the weighing of sugar just as slowly as when he began. To assert their position in line, each customer thrusts his hand through the grate waving money at him. The customer returning an empty soda bottle shoves that through the grate.
But while the customers and their demands with their thrusting hands are gathering like thundering clouds, the clerk is sorting in his mind who he can get rid of quickly and whose demand will take time. The soda bottle comes first, the cigarette comes second. The right change will take some thinking, calculating and jousting.
Requests for cooking oil or kerosene are usually last on his list because those, like the pouring and weighing of sugar, take time. Though the customer has brought her own container, the shop clerk has his own standard measuring containers–a soda bottle for the oil and a beer bottle for the kerosene. With a small metal dipper, he pours the oil from a large drum into the bottle through a funnel. Not one drop of either oil or kerosene is spilled onto the floor. (He does not work for British Petroleum.) After he’s poured the liquid into his soda or beer bottle, he pours it into the customer’s container, usually a left-over jug of oil bought a year ago. Both the clerk and customer deliver the jug, which usually doesn’t have a lid, through the grate at the only angle it will fit without spilling a drop.
When the bread man delivers 25 loaves of bread on his bicycle stacked sky high with milk crates full of bread with more loaves tied and swinging on the crates’ sides, each of those 25 loaves is passed one at a time through the window grate. The clerk could let the bread man through the back door to deliver ten loaves at a time, but he doesn’t.
In this way, we do our small shopping.
My shop is run by a young man who’s about 20 years old. In the rooms adjacent to the shop, his mother, father and sister come and go, cook, clean and do other living. But this boy runs the shop from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m. every single day. The exception is Christmas and New Year’s Day when his sister helps him run the shop from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m. This explains why the clerk returns my greetings when I approach the grate with heavy lethargy. When I tell him what I want–matches, soap, green Christmas wrapping paper, sugar, oil–he rises from his chair sloth-like. I don’t know if sloths rise but if they do, they look like this clerk. When I ask for a half kilo of sugar, he retrieves a wrinkled piece of wax paper and lets it flutter onto a metal scale, then plops metal weights on the other side of the scale, and pours the golden brown grains of sugar onto the paper. Three sugar grains before the scale drops down, he stops pouring and begins to shake the sugar onto the paper. The instant the scale has dropped, the shaking stops, and he lifts the wax paper by two opposite corners, pouring the sugar into a bag from a third corner.
Even though ten customers have arrived and shouted out their requests–I want a cigarette! I want a bar of soap! You didn’t give me the right change last time!–he moves through the weighing of sugar just as slowly as when he began. To assert their position in line, each customer thrusts his hand through the grate waving money at him. The customer returning an empty soda bottle shoves that through the grate.
But while the customers and their demands with their thrusting hands are gathering like thundering clouds, the clerk is sorting in his mind who he can get rid of quickly and whose demand will take time. The soda bottle comes first, the cigarette comes second. The right change will take some thinking, calculating and jousting.
Requests for cooking oil or kerosene are usually last on his list because those, like the pouring and weighing of sugar, take time. Though the customer has brought her own container, the shop clerk has his own standard measuring containers–a soda bottle for the oil and a beer bottle for the kerosene. With a small metal dipper, he pours the oil from a large drum into the bottle through a funnel. Not one drop of either oil or kerosene is spilled onto the floor. (He does not work for British Petroleum.) After he’s poured the liquid into his soda or beer bottle, he pours it into the customer’s container, usually a left-over jug of oil bought a year ago. Both the clerk and customer deliver the jug, which usually doesn’t have a lid, through the grate at the only angle it will fit without spilling a drop.
When the bread man delivers 25 loaves of bread on his bicycle stacked sky high with milk crates full of bread with more loaves tied and swinging on the crates’ sides, each of those 25 loaves is passed one at a time through the window grate. The clerk could let the bread man through the back door to deliver ten loaves at a time, but he doesn’t.
In this way, we do our small shopping.
Friday, December 3, 2010
Shine
The guest for dinner that evening was named Shine (pronounced SHEEnay). He was a third-year Bachelor Degree student who had sticks for limbs; the largest part of him was his smile. It wasn’t my home we were having dinner at. Edda, the bursar at the Mwika campus, and her husband Godrick serve as my hosts every evening, my own house lacking cooking equipment. Edda introduced Shine as the minister of housing for the students, and I wondered why the student government needed a housing minister.
I also wondered how one might put more meat on Shine. So did Edda. She heaped his plate with cooked bananas and stew until Shine’s eyes became larger than his smile.
It turns out Shine had the monumental task of finding housing for degree students. Ever since the government of Tanzania restructured its loan program last year to provide more loans to anyone majoring in education, the Mwika campus has been inundated with degree students. Instead of 35 education students, Mwika now has 250, but doesn’t have resources and time to build on-campus housing.
Shine’s job was to go from door to door in local villages and ask if people would be willing to rent a room to a college student. Very likely not everyone would say yes although many would want the extra income. This meant Shine would have to knock on many more doors than 250. This, I thought, was not a good way to add more meat to Shine. He would dissolve into thin air. But Shine had already found rooms for 75 students. Perhaps he had begun the week a clothes-size larger.
The next morning I saw Shine on the main road on the back of a friend’s motorcycle, venturing out to knock on more doors, still smiling.
I also wondered how one might put more meat on Shine. So did Edda. She heaped his plate with cooked bananas and stew until Shine’s eyes became larger than his smile.
It turns out Shine had the monumental task of finding housing for degree students. Ever since the government of Tanzania restructured its loan program last year to provide more loans to anyone majoring in education, the Mwika campus has been inundated with degree students. Instead of 35 education students, Mwika now has 250, but doesn’t have resources and time to build on-campus housing.
Shine’s job was to go from door to door in local villages and ask if people would be willing to rent a room to a college student. Very likely not everyone would say yes although many would want the extra income. This meant Shine would have to knock on many more doors than 250. This, I thought, was not a good way to add more meat to Shine. He would dissolve into thin air. But Shine had already found rooms for 75 students. Perhaps he had begun the week a clothes-size larger.
The next morning I saw Shine on the main road on the back of a friend’s motorcycle, venturing out to knock on more doors, still smiling.
Friday, November 5, 2010
Practicing English
I did not know what my students and I would talk about at lunch, but I figured if we had nothing to say, we could at least eat.
I have learned that the opportunity to practice speaking English with me elicits two responses: terror and delight. This group of first-year Diploma in Education students had been thrilled the week before when I asked them. So thrilled they were sure that Mama Somebody who runs the off-campus canteen would bring the food to us in our classroom. It seemed a huge inconvenience for that mama, so I nixed the idea, especially after Malekea, the guy who sits in the back of the room where the sun beams the brightest, shook his head. Of the 12 or so students in the room, his feet were solidly on the ground.
I could’ve planned topics for discussion, but that seemed like work. Plus, if I plan things, it limits the possibilities of what can happen. (I do not apply this same rule to my classes, though I have abandoned parts or all of my plan after discovering students didn’t understand something critical.)
What did we talk about on the dusty road to Mama Somebody’s canteen? Njau wanted to know how I could expect to teach English and learn Kiswahili at the same time. Based on the fact that he asked this same question 26 times, I decided he really wasn’t interested in my answer; he wanted to practice asking the question. By the time we hiked up the steep short hill to the canteen, he was still asking that question, and suddenly and fortunately, he disappeared.
Outside the front door, Mama was serving food from steaming tables. Inside were about three coffee tables and one tall bar table. Ten of us joined the 3 or 4 people who weren’t expecting to practice speaking English while they ate. Neither was Mama Somebody, judging from her own startled look.
I wasn’t sure about the canteen’s serving system. People were clearly going out to the mama and ordering what they wanted. Bongole was eating rice and meat with sauce. Joseph was eating rice and banana stew. I announced I wanted rice and meat. I stood outside thinking there was a line of people waiting to order and collect food right by the steaming tables and Mama Somebody. But no, Bongole told me to sit down and after a while, the food was brought to me. (I’ve discovered if you don’t know the main language spoken in a country, events appear surprising, fraught with either divine mystery or frustration. Today it was mystery.) All of this was part of a whirlwind of excitement. Bongole, sitting beside me on the bench against the wall, launched into a series of statements about not knowing the local tribal language, he was from the southern region of Iringa, and so on. When I asked him how long it took him to travel to Mwika, he said he didn’t understand the question. Irambo, sitting across from him, did. But Irambo had a mouth full of rice and meat. And apparently, judging from the silence in the room, he was the only one who understood. So we waited.
When Bongole finally explained that it took him 14 hours to travel to Mwika, three other students began to argue, calling him a liar. Bongole, an excitable guy to begin with, could not be contained in his space on the bench. I had to tell him to be quiet three times in English and finally when I said it in Kiswahili, he stopped. Kissima, sitting at the bar table, explained that she had just made the trip from Moshi Town to Iringa and it took her ten hours. After sorting out the details, it was revealed that neither Kissima nor Bongole were lying.
From there we hopped around topics. By the time we had walked back to campus, I was explaining how our large buses in the States have toilets--I used the word “latrine” because they’d just learned it that day. Temba wanted to know where the poop went. How much were people paid to remove the poop? Bongole said he would never do such a job. Kissima said he would if he were paid good money.
At that point, our roads diverged, mine to my apartment, theirs to their next class. Next week, I will write down Mama Somebody’s real name.
I have learned that the opportunity to practice speaking English with me elicits two responses: terror and delight. This group of first-year Diploma in Education students had been thrilled the week before when I asked them. So thrilled they were sure that Mama Somebody who runs the off-campus canteen would bring the food to us in our classroom. It seemed a huge inconvenience for that mama, so I nixed the idea, especially after Malekea, the guy who sits in the back of the room where the sun beams the brightest, shook his head. Of the 12 or so students in the room, his feet were solidly on the ground.
I could’ve planned topics for discussion, but that seemed like work. Plus, if I plan things, it limits the possibilities of what can happen. (I do not apply this same rule to my classes, though I have abandoned parts or all of my plan after discovering students didn’t understand something critical.)
What did we talk about on the dusty road to Mama Somebody’s canteen? Njau wanted to know how I could expect to teach English and learn Kiswahili at the same time. Based on the fact that he asked this same question 26 times, I decided he really wasn’t interested in my answer; he wanted to practice asking the question. By the time we hiked up the steep short hill to the canteen, he was still asking that question, and suddenly and fortunately, he disappeared.
Outside the front door, Mama was serving food from steaming tables. Inside were about three coffee tables and one tall bar table. Ten of us joined the 3 or 4 people who weren’t expecting to practice speaking English while they ate. Neither was Mama Somebody, judging from her own startled look.
I wasn’t sure about the canteen’s serving system. People were clearly going out to the mama and ordering what they wanted. Bongole was eating rice and meat with sauce. Joseph was eating rice and banana stew. I announced I wanted rice and meat. I stood outside thinking there was a line of people waiting to order and collect food right by the steaming tables and Mama Somebody. But no, Bongole told me to sit down and after a while, the food was brought to me. (I’ve discovered if you don’t know the main language spoken in a country, events appear surprising, fraught with either divine mystery or frustration. Today it was mystery.) All of this was part of a whirlwind of excitement. Bongole, sitting beside me on the bench against the wall, launched into a series of statements about not knowing the local tribal language, he was from the southern region of Iringa, and so on. When I asked him how long it took him to travel to Mwika, he said he didn’t understand the question. Irambo, sitting across from him, did. But Irambo had a mouth full of rice and meat. And apparently, judging from the silence in the room, he was the only one who understood. So we waited.
When Bongole finally explained that it took him 14 hours to travel to Mwika, three other students began to argue, calling him a liar. Bongole, an excitable guy to begin with, could not be contained in his space on the bench. I had to tell him to be quiet three times in English and finally when I said it in Kiswahili, he stopped. Kissima, sitting at the bar table, explained that she had just made the trip from Moshi Town to Iringa and it took her ten hours. After sorting out the details, it was revealed that neither Kissima nor Bongole were lying.
From there we hopped around topics. By the time we had walked back to campus, I was explaining how our large buses in the States have toilets--I used the word “latrine” because they’d just learned it that day. Temba wanted to know where the poop went. How much were people paid to remove the poop? Bongole said he would never do such a job. Kissima said he would if he were paid good money.
At that point, our roads diverged, mine to my apartment, theirs to their next class. Next week, I will write down Mama Somebody’s real name.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Wake, awake!
The Mwika campus is an active one. It’s a combination of two or maybe three educational institutions – Lutheran Bible School, a school of theology, and a third campus of Stefano Moshi Memorial University College. At its center is a church. There’s also a kindergarten and just beyond that past the hedges is a primary school. All of these form a collective routine.
At 5:00 a.m. the church bell rings, signaling all sleepers to wake up and pray. It rings 100 times, and then we are wide awake. At 6:30 a.m. it rings again. Perhaps that’s when our prayer should end. Or that’s when the hard sleepers should wake up.
At 7:30, the school bell is sounded. The bell is actually the rim of a car tire hanging from a tree. A teacher takes a stick and whacks away at it, but there’s a rhythm to the clanging. First, two short clangs when the rim sways. Then there’s a clang!clang!clang!clang!clang!clang!clang! finalized by CLANG CLANG.
At lunch, we hear the same clang thing all over again.
At 4:00, the primary school assembles outside and a student or two with snare drums tap out a cadence that the children sing to. All over Tanzania, children are taught to sing with all their might, which comes across as a sing-shout. This means that each song has the same melody and differs only by rhythm. At 5:00 p.m. a small brass band practices outside the church. They also have drums. By 6:30, the only ones left singing are the cicadas, who will sing all night.
At 5:00 a.m. the church bell rings, signaling all sleepers to wake up and pray. It rings 100 times, and then we are wide awake. At 6:30 a.m. it rings again. Perhaps that’s when our prayer should end. Or that’s when the hard sleepers should wake up.
At 7:30, the school bell is sounded. The bell is actually the rim of a car tire hanging from a tree. A teacher takes a stick and whacks away at it, but there’s a rhythm to the clanging. First, two short clangs when the rim sways. Then there’s a clang!clang!clang!clang!clang!clang!clang! finalized by CLANG CLANG.
At lunch, we hear the same clang thing all over again.
At 4:00, the primary school assembles outside and a student or two with snare drums tap out a cadence that the children sing to. All over Tanzania, children are taught to sing with all their might, which comes across as a sing-shout. This means that each song has the same melody and differs only by rhythm. At 5:00 p.m. a small brass band practices outside the church. They also have drums. By 6:30, the only ones left singing are the cicadas, who will sing all night.
Friday, October 22, 2010
Waiting for change
Hilary, the provost’s personal driver, had stopped the SUV at a butcher’s shop. We were on the way to Mwika, to the third campus of Stefano Moshi Memorial University College, where I would begin my second year of teaching. All of my belongings rattled in the back because Hilary still had the SUV in idle while he talked to the butcher. In a few minutes, Hilary returned, and we waited in the car still burning up fuel.
We were not waiting for meat. The butcher owed the provost money. A few weeks ago, the provost had wanted four kilos of pork, but there were only two kilos of pork available. The butcher also did not have change that day. He promised to return it another day.
Hilary had tried to get the change from the butcher on previous trips, but apparently the butcher had had enough warning to run away before Hilary’s arrival. Today Hilary had surprised him. Now the butcher left to collect the change, going from place to place asking others for donations. (He was probably telling them he’d pay them back later.)
Once I rode in a taxi and upon giving the driver my money, he said he didn’t have change. There were two other passengers in the taxi waiting to move on, and rather than argue with him, I left seething.
After about 15 minutes, Hilary turned off the engine, resigning himself to uncertain fates: the engine might never start and the butcher might never return. A collection of children arrived and stared at me for a while. Some dared to greet me and then ran away. Others with courage stayed behind. Hilary got out of the vehicle and talked to the butcher’s friend who’d been standing at the counter. Finally the butcher arrived with the change, but it wasn’t enough. This was all he could get at the moment. Hilary told him to get some more. We waited.
On another day, the taxi incident still sizzling in my memory, I rode a bus that goes up to Masoka, but I got off in Moshi Town at the Uhuru Hotel. I handed the conductor a 500 shilling note and asked for change. He said there was no change. He asked other passengers, and at that moment, no one felt like coughing up change. I said, “No change, no money!” I grabbed the money I had just given him, and repeated, “No change, no money!” I stared at him with nostrils flared and eyes bulging, waiting for a protest.
Inside the bus, the passengers were saying, “What did she say? What did she say?”
“She said, ‘No change, no money.’”
The bus roared away, the passengers roaring with laughter.
Somewhere inside of Hilary, a clock was ticking, and he decided he’d waited long enough. The SUV started with only a hiccup, leaving the remaining change to fate.
We were not waiting for meat. The butcher owed the provost money. A few weeks ago, the provost had wanted four kilos of pork, but there were only two kilos of pork available. The butcher also did not have change that day. He promised to return it another day.
Hilary had tried to get the change from the butcher on previous trips, but apparently the butcher had had enough warning to run away before Hilary’s arrival. Today Hilary had surprised him. Now the butcher left to collect the change, going from place to place asking others for donations. (He was probably telling them he’d pay them back later.)
Once I rode in a taxi and upon giving the driver my money, he said he didn’t have change. There were two other passengers in the taxi waiting to move on, and rather than argue with him, I left seething.
After about 15 minutes, Hilary turned off the engine, resigning himself to uncertain fates: the engine might never start and the butcher might never return. A collection of children arrived and stared at me for a while. Some dared to greet me and then ran away. Others with courage stayed behind. Hilary got out of the vehicle and talked to the butcher’s friend who’d been standing at the counter. Finally the butcher arrived with the change, but it wasn’t enough. This was all he could get at the moment. Hilary told him to get some more. We waited.
On another day, the taxi incident still sizzling in my memory, I rode a bus that goes up to Masoka, but I got off in Moshi Town at the Uhuru Hotel. I handed the conductor a 500 shilling note and asked for change. He said there was no change. He asked other passengers, and at that moment, no one felt like coughing up change. I said, “No change, no money!” I grabbed the money I had just given him, and repeated, “No change, no money!” I stared at him with nostrils flared and eyes bulging, waiting for a protest.
Inside the bus, the passengers were saying, “What did she say? What did she say?”
“She said, ‘No change, no money.’”
The bus roared away, the passengers roaring with laughter.
Somewhere inside of Hilary, a clock was ticking, and he decided he’d waited long enough. The SUV started with only a hiccup, leaving the remaining change to fate.
Waiting for change
Hilary, the provost’s personal driver, had stopped the SUV at a butcher’s shop. We were on the way to Mwika, to the third campus of Stefano Moshi Memorial University College, where I would begin my second year of teaching. All of my belongings rattled in the back because Hilary still had the SUV in idle while he talked to the butcher. In a few minutes, Hilary returned, and we waited in the car still burning up fuel.
We were not waiting for meat. The butcher owed the provost money. A few weeks ago, the provost had wanted four kilos of pork, but there were only two kilos of pork available. The butcher also did not have change that day. He promised to return it another day.
Hilary had tried to get the change from the butcher on previous trips, but apparently the butcher had had enough warning to run away before Hilary’s arrival. Today Hilary had surprised him. Now the butcher left to collect the change, going from place to place asking others for donations. (He was probably telling them he’d pay them back later.)
Once I rode in a taxi and upon giving the driver my money, he said he didn’t have change. There were two other passengers in the taxi waiting to move on, and rather than argue with him, I left seething.
After about 15 minutes, Hilary turned off the engine, resigning himself to uncertain fates: the engine might never start and the butcher might never return. A collection of children arrived and stared at me for a while. Some dared to greet me and then ran away. Others with courage stayed behind. Hilary got out of the vehicle and talked to the butcher’s friend who’d been standing at the counter. Finally the butcher arrived with the change, but it wasn’t enough. This was all he could get at the moment. Hilary told him to get some more. We waited.
On another day, the taxi incident still sizzling in my memory, I rode a bus that goes up to Masoka, but I got off in Moshi Town at the Uhuru Hotel. I handed the conductor a 500 shilling note and asked for change. He said there was no change. He asked other passengers, and at that moment, no one felt like coughing up change. I said, “No change, no money!” I grabbed the money I had just given him, and repeated, “No change, no money!” I stared at him with nostrils flared and eyes bulging, waiting for a protest.
Inside the bus, the passengers were saying, “What did she say? What did she say?”
“She said, ‘No change, no money.’”
The bus roared away, the passengers roaring with laughter.
Somewhere inside of Hilary, a clock was ticking, and he decided he’d waited long enough. The SUV started with only a hiccup, leaving the remaining change to fate.
We were not waiting for meat. The butcher owed the provost money. A few weeks ago, the provost had wanted four kilos of pork, but there were only two kilos of pork available. The butcher also did not have change that day. He promised to return it another day.
Hilary had tried to get the change from the butcher on previous trips, but apparently the butcher had had enough warning to run away before Hilary’s arrival. Today Hilary had surprised him. Now the butcher left to collect the change, going from place to place asking others for donations. (He was probably telling them he’d pay them back later.)
Once I rode in a taxi and upon giving the driver my money, he said he didn’t have change. There were two other passengers in the taxi waiting to move on, and rather than argue with him, I left seething.
After about 15 minutes, Hilary turned off the engine, resigning himself to uncertain fates: the engine might never start and the butcher might never return. A collection of children arrived and stared at me for a while. Some dared to greet me and then ran away. Others with courage stayed behind. Hilary got out of the vehicle and talked to the butcher’s friend who’d been standing at the counter. Finally the butcher arrived with the change, but it wasn’t enough. This was all he could get at the moment. Hilary told him to get some more. We waited.
On another day, the taxi incident still sizzling in my memory, I rode a bus that goes up to Masoka, but I got off in Moshi Town at the Uhuru Hotel. I handed the conductor a 500 shilling note and asked for change. He said there was no change. He asked other passengers, and at that moment, no one felt like coughing up change. I said, “No change, no money!” I grabbed the money I had just given him, and repeated, “No change, no money!” I stared at him with nostrils flared and eyes bulging, waiting for a protest.
Inside the bus, the passengers were saying, “What did she say? What did she say?”
“She said, ‘No change, no money.’”
The bus roared away, the passengers roaring with laughter.
Somewhere inside of Hilary, a clock was ticking, and he decided he’d waited long enough. The SUV started with only a hiccup, leaving the remaining change to fate.
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