Haraka haraka haina baracka

I just walked to the Patisserie (the internet café) by myself for the first time. Albeit, I was practically across the street, but it was still my first time walking alone. The weekend was an eventful one... it's funny how the words "eventful" and "busy" are so relative. When I'm busy back home, I am running around with so many things to do, but here "busy" is actually really laid back. We visited the Arusha National Park yesterday where I saw all sorts of animals: monkeys, baboons, giraffes, zebras, wildebeasts, and all kinds of birds. (Yes, I will post some pictures!) A woman asked me to take a picture of her and her child at the top of a small hill, to then be emailed to her, which I obliged. Her name was Queen and she was very beautiful, the word in Swahili being "wazuri."

We've done two teacher workshops so far which went really well. We did exercises in reading photographs and telling stories from photographs. The actual photo part of the workshop was on "Misemo" (Swahili proverbs). The first day, we chose "When elephants fight, the grass suffers." Mary and Rosemary chose to explain this proverb through a story about two parents that fight and have many miscommunications. The mother finally takes off, leaving the children to suffer. They took 3 pictures to tell the story. The second day, we chose "Haraka haraka haini baracka" (Haste haste has no blessing.) Mohamed and Stewart chose to create this proverb using 2 photographs: one of a person holding too much stuff in his hands, walking very fast, about to trip; the second of the same person fallen on the ground, papers flying in the air to show that he had just fallen. I will keep that proverb in mind for the rest of my life, with those images in my head.

I learn so much every day, how could I not be excited for tomorrow?




(the following photo for pronoy :)