Moshi Day 1

We arrived at Kilimanjaro International Airport around 3pm local time (2 hours ahead of the UK and 7 ahead of the US east coast). We were both struck with a feeling of nostalgia for Jess and Kit – we had a family safari trip to Tanzania/Kenya for my 50th birthday (yes, 9 years ago!) We agreed that those years had passed way too fast.

 

Getting through customs was fairly smooth – pay $250 each for a working visa – and everyone is friendly!! We were greeted by our driver, Ashraphe, who took good care of us from that moment on. He sorted out local SIM cards with money on them, got us to a bank that charges least for withdrawals (this is an ALL cash place and get this, 22 banks!!) I sat in the car and just watched all of the people. The centre of town was a hive of activity. People walking all over the place, all sorts of dress (the women mostly in brightly coloured wraps and dresses -all long; the men mostly in jeans), people selling things, lots of motorcycles). Lots of small shops with corrugated metal roofs – not sure what they all sold. We parked next to two youngish guys selling shoes – they were diligently washing the dust off of about 10 pairs they were selling. Mostly noticed the dust – boy is it dusty and dry here!!

 

Ashrape then took us to Kilihub which will be our home for the next 6 weeks. Kilihub was built as a hotel but is a shared workspace that ANZA rents to people (like we have in London) to work. Several of the start ups sponsored by ANZA rent office space here, conferences can be held here and they rent out rooms. We are looking forward to seeing it in full swing next week – a real hub of energy! As you can see from the photos our room is not luxurious but has what we need and we feel cosy immediately! Andrew said – I think we will become very attached to this place!

 

Ani, who is the marketing director (from Manchester – engaged to Andy who also works with Anza), showed us our room and walked with us to town where we stayed for our first Moshi dinner – a long wait which we need to get used to. Tried the Tusker and Serengeti beers – both tasted FANTASTIC!! We laughed at the back of the menu! We were asleep by 8:30 and slept till 8 the next morning – lots of interesting malaria pill induced dreams!

 

On Saturday we went with a gang of people (Ani invited us) to a hotel a bit up in the mountains (still had not seen Mt Kilimanjaro itself due to cloud). The place was beautiful. Clean air, big lavender jacaranda trees, and I think persimmon trees (bare branches with green on the end and pink flowers-in the bottom photo). The food was great – a 90 minute wait!!And the pool was lovely.

 

So many names to remember – Elli (drove us, from Bristol, and works with a medical charity); Liz (an ANZA entrepreneur who hails from Canada), Camilla (from Boston,France and Canada who works with ANZA), Harriett (from the UK and works with Autistic children). We were fascinated with all the stories of how people arrived here and what they were doing. The government is making it increasingly difficult for people in these roles to get permanent visas – doesn’t make sense to us as who would do all this important work?

 

We also learned a lot about living in Moshi – restaurants, gyms, running clubs, tips for touristing. We were made to feel very welcome. We did turn down the offer to watch the British Bake Off (via internet – no tvs here) and came back to our place to work on our blog (not easy). We were too tired to go to town for dinner so cashew nuts and fried eggs. We decided we need to get better organised!!