Domestic bliss

You see them all over town: old men, young men, sometimes boys, on bicycles; charcoal, packed and wrapped in sacks, the bicycle loaded with huge unwieldy parcels. Those struggling up the long hill from Mikindani, before free-wheeling down into Mtwara town, often resort to pushing these great iron mules.

Charcoal is the more common fuel for cooking, being significantly cheaper than electricity or gas and, in rural areas, the only source of fuel other than wood. Some research suggests that as urbanisation continues inexorably, the quantities now in use pose a serious threat to woodland and forests inland. Informal communities spring up around towns in every African city. They lack ‘formal’ services such as water or electricity, but they are removed from the rural area where they could be self-sufficient; hence, the demand for charcoal increases. At Staff House No 1 we have electricity and we could buy gas, but we wanted to try the most common form of cooking in Tanzania, the charcoal jiko. The great sacks of charcoal are to be seen all over town and one such trader arrived at our home last week.

Caroline bought one sack. A price was negotiated and a location for its storage at the back of the kitchen agreed; and then, rather than leave her the valuable rice sack, he emptied its contents on to the kitchen floor, leaving her in a cloud of thick black dust which covered everything in sight. He had wanted tsh2000 for his sack. William told us we should have a sack ready for him. Wise words, now. Instead, great billowing black clouds shrouded the pantry, leaving a dry acrid taste in our mouths and a jet black smudge on everything we touched.

It was a shame because it had been a good start to the week-end, revelling as we were in our killing of Ratty’s smaller, but equally avid, nest-building, potato-nibbling, plastic bag stealing, ultimately, fatally, greedy, cousin. It may have been the rat poison or perhaps the wasp spray, but we awoke on Saturday to the fetid smell of dead rat behind the wardrobe. Cleaning the bedroom of rat remains and the rest of the house of charcoal dust occupied a fair amount of time.

At the small market near our home, we’ve found an old wooden stall, more like a covered rickety table, where perhaps twice a day, a toothless old man sells fish. He usually has just two fish, filleted into small portions, usually selling at tsh1000 each. Last week I bought two pieces of changu, the other night, tuna. When I buy it at about five in the afternoon, I know it has been out of the sea for little more than an hour and once its fried and garnished with fresh lime, served with local rice and spinach, it tastes delicious and the swarming flies, his bloody blade and the filthy market stall are forgotten when supper is served.

Philibert’s mother died last week. She was eighty-one and died quite peacefully. Philibert made the two day journey to Songea by bus, his employer giving him compassionate leave but he still had to make the funeral arrangements with little access to money. Mobile phones now are the more common technology used for transferring money. One trip to the phone shop, to pay the money in cash, Philibert receives notice on his phone and collects the cash in Songea. Fast, reliable and cheap.

Life’s daily cycle turns with a warmth and regularity that is comforting. We listen to the sweeping of the yard by Anna at 5.00am, the washing of clothes, the cooking on the jiko, occasionally the watering of the banana tree and then the return of the children from school and finally the return of William’s hens and chicks as the sun goes down. William tells me he is lucky to have such hens, as they return, each evening, without need to chase them, to their bed in the back of his kitchen. Better to clean the hen muck each morning, than have them eaten by thieves or dogs.

“Your maize looks thin and limp, William”, I remarked.

He looked crestfallen, but managed a weak laugh and said he would start going to church. He has commented once or twice that he would go to the Lutheran church across the road and for some reason chose today to commit to going regularly. Malubiche tells me his maize is poor because he has neglected to use good quality fertilizer. ‘Biche’s maize is certainly a lot stronger.

Sister Herman is unequivocal. She showed me her tiny notebook in which she has kept note, with a scratchy pencil, of daily rainfall measurements for the last twelve years. She explains that we should have had much more rain than we have had. People in south Tanzania will go hungry this year as the maize and the millet fails to thrive.

The Sisters of the Holy Redeemer have been in Mtwara for nearly fifty years. Originally from Germany, they have three areas of activity: they have built and are expanding the Montessori College where women are trained as primary school teachers in Montessori methods; they run a small dispensary for the poor and sick on the edge of town, where they give food and shelter to several hundred people each week; and they are developing a 200 hectare farm to the west of here, towards the Makonde plateau. There they have found a good water supply 200 metres below ground and now need money to pay for the solar panels which will power the pump to irrigate the area. In time, this farm will feed several thousand people in sustainable small-holdings. They have good support across the area but still need funds to make things happen.

We have rid our house of almost all significant wildlife now. First, there was the rat, then the frog. Caroline gave a shriek of resignation as she swept our red and black frog from his comfortable home in the shower on to the baraza.

“Enough is enough,” she said. We watched as it sat, dazed, slow to recover, but then started to drag itself across the yard towards the large tree. Slowly, determinedly, as though it had been there before, it hauled itself up a metre of the tree to a fork in the stump to bask in a small puddle of water, which has escaped the harsh sun. Next came the over-sized cockroach, which although an asset in eating smaller flies and ants, is really too large and far too ugly to keep in the house. It was killed and swept into the yard. I watched the next morning as Lucas’ cockerel ate the dead cockroach in two large pecks – well one peck and a gobble. So, life’s cycle turns.