I’ve been incredibly lucky to meet a wonderful group of ex-pats here in Morogoro.  Through a crazy coincidence, an old friend from high school saw on Facebook that I was heading to Tanzania and put me in touch with friends of hers who were missionaries in Tanzania and just happened to be living in the same town I planned to study in.  Shantelle and the Boone family (Aaron, Stephanie, and their three girls) studied at same the language school as me and were finishing up their lessons when I arrived, although they live in town rather than on campus.  It has been great to meet some of their friends and find a little community here.

So far, it has been a little bit of a rough month, between frustrations with getting the permits I need for my research and feeling a bit under the weather.  I haven’t posted much, both of because of these issues and because my Swahili studies take up a lot of time.  Classes go on most of the day, and the homework and review I need to do at night have gotten more time-consuming.  I haven’t had a lot of new and interesting things to share.  I don’t claim this entry will be all that interesting, but hey, come on.  Who doesn’t like puppies?  As YouTube viral videos have definitively proven over the past few years, we are genetically programmed to coo and giggle over them.

The Boone family’s two dogs had puppies last month and today I had a chance to go over and see them again.  Their house has a pool, an added bonus in the unbelievably hot weather we’ve been having.  After a quick dip and playing with the kiddos, we decided to give the puppies a bath.  Other than nursing, they also eat ugi, a porridge-like substance.  And at this point, eating is not a terribly coordinated activity for them, so of course they were covered with dried chunks of food.  The only thing cuter than puppies, are puppies undergoing their first bath.

Shantelle and Stephanie often go to the local orphanage to spend time with the kids there.  I’ve been hoping to join them, but so far the timing with my classes hasn’t worked out.  Today, they brought three of the older boys over to join in on the swimming fun, which was a blast.  The boys were balls of energy, and quickly took an interest in the puppies as well.

We finished up the day by all going out to a local restaurant, Dragonaire’s, famed for their pizza.  It has a playground and little zoo (birds and turtles) for the kids, who still somehow had tons of energy to burn after the pool.  I played tag with the kids (which really consisted of me as the permanent “It” and them all shrieking whenever I ran near) before dinner for a while.  But, when the restaurant saw all of the kids, they brought out a Bouncy-House type thing to blow up.  I’m telling you, I’ve never seen a group of kids go from running around crazy-like to quietly sitting and watching intently faster than tonight!  It caused a lot of excitement.

So that’s all for now.  I’m getting close to the end of my time here in Morogoro, and have started thinking about making plans for moving on to Ifakara.  I really love it here and hate to leave, but the dissertation calls!