Well Adjusted

Tuesday marked the half-way point of my trip. Six weeks here, six more before I leave. We spent the day in Sumbawanga and I realized for the first time that things aren't weird anymore. This is at least a little
scary for me because the last time I was here, I never reached this point. Which made going home, back to Burger King and Television and the endless competition for your attention and your senses and your
dollars, all the more easy. I never really left last time. Now, I am really here. I am here because I am adjusted. And being adjusted is troubling because it means I'm going to have to do it all over again when I get home. People say reverse culture-shock is worse than culture shock.

Things don't seem so different now. I am used to the taste of the food and the lack of variety. I am used to rice and beans for every lunch, and I did everything you can imagine to make it seem less like rice
and beans before I settled on just letting it be rice and beans. I haven't had breakfast cereal since early August. I think before I came here my consecutive mornings with cereal streak was running into the thousands. I am the Cal Ripken of cereal-breakfasts.

I am used to sitting idly by during conversations, since I can neither hear or speak Swahili well enough to participate. But if people speak slowly enough and gesture and point and write and grab a translation
dictionary for me, I can just begin to make out what they're talking about. Of course, eavesdropping is right out.

I'm also used to not knowing what anything is, and just assuming I am not supposed to touch it.

I am used to longer church services with louder and better choirs, and character-testing spine-wrenching benches.

I am used to being perpetually dirty, perpetually late, perpetually sore and knicked and bruised. I am used to not being able to move my arms because my clothes are stiff from drying in the sun.

I am used to hearing every bit of news well after-the-fact. (Little Mexico burned down! They will have to build it bigger, stronger… I guess they'll just have to call it Mexico.) Odds are, I'm not up on your gossip. If you're sick, I'm sorry. If you're engaged, congrats. If you're married, I'm sorry. I'm glad to hear about your new job or promotion. Once I get back, I guess.

I am used to the weather being infinitely more pointless a topic of conversation than it is back home. "Sunny again." "Yup." (Although, last night it rained and all of Jangwani and Mumba said, "Holy Crap.")

I am used to having flies around my ears and spiders on my walls and cockroaches on my floor. I am used to "inside" being a subjective term and it not being a refuge from African wildlife.

I am used to seeing white people and wondering what in the world they're doing here. I always want to ask them, "What in the world are you doing here?"

If my time in Africa is half gone, then my time in Mumba is just about over. This weekend, we're going out to show the Jesus film one more time in the Rukwa valley (like Mumba, but hotter with less mountains and more bugs and snakes.) Next week, I'm leaving to travel across the country, first to Mbeya, then to Dar, then to Arusha where I'll climb Mount Kilimanjaro. (I will probably see lots of white people there and
for once, I'll be the guy that knows all the Swahili.) Assuming I survive trying to climb to the highest mountain in Africa without any experience or reason, I'll meet the Shermans back in Mbeya and go straight to Zambia for the rest of October. I fly home in early November.

If I can ask a huge favor, and if you don't mind terribly, pray that I don't die on the mountain. Climbing Oct. 6-11, if you want specifics.

Thanks for reading this. I appreciate it. I'll keep you updated on the mountain stuff next week.

jim