Early morning in Morogoro is lovely, with a cool breeze coming in the windows and the sun not yet at its strongest. Morogoro town is, I think, among the ten largest towns in Tanzania and is situated at the foot of the Uluguru Mountains. Anywhere one goes in the town the mountains can be seen, and they are beautiful. This area is know for its wonderful vegetables and fruit, grown in the mountains and brought to the town for sale.
I notice a slower pace, fewer people, a bit less congestion in comparison with Arusha. The people here seem more friendly and open; I suppose that's all due to the smaller town. Tuesday morning I spent with Janet as she did some beginning of the month things, like paying bills and shopping. She spent about one hour at the bank, just to get cash. Then it was off to Vodacom to pay the telephone and internet bill, then to Tanesco (electric company) to try to pay the bill and get connected with a new meter. That didn't work and she was told to return after 3.00 p.m. So we shopped for some food items in an Indian run "supermarket", which had four aisles. There are a lot of things to buy there, many of them imported and therefore expensive; we stuck with the local goods like yoghurt and chicken. Some of the imported things come from Kenya but many from South Africa.
By this time the sun had gotten quite hot and there were a lot more people on the streets. One more stop before the market was a fish shop, and that had frozen fish from both the ocean (Dar es Salaam) and Lake Victoria (Mwanza). Finally we went to the market and that was really crowded. It seemed as though so many more stalls had been added (we used to stop at this market when returning to Singida from Dar es Salaam) and there was hardly room to walk in between the stalls. But the produce is wonderful and reasonably priced. I probably should say "cheap" since for about $.40 we could buy a pineapple, or a kilo of potatoes or a bunch of 10 bananas or two avocados -- well, you get the picture.
As I was waiting for Janet at the Tanesco office, I was looking across the bicycle path and saw a typical business, a way that many women make a living, especially in towns. There was a lean-to made of poles and cardboard and that was where the cooking was being done. Customers came and sat down on an old tire that was on the ground outside the lean-to. The woman came out and offered water for washing hands, and then brought out a plate of food for each, setting the plate on the ground. And there was the restaurant. I couldn't see what was on the plate, but I assume it was rice and beans. When the men finished their meal, she came to collect the plate and spoon, and offered each a cup of water. They paid her and off they went. And outside the lean-to was her little girl, probably about 15 months old, sitting on the ground and playing with a couple of cups. Sometimes men come to the towns for work and leave their families in the villages, so they often use these outdoor restaurants for their meals, quick and cheap.
In the afternoon we spent another two hours at Tanesco until the business was finally completed. Some things take a l0000ng time here ..... Then we drove to the outskirts of town to see Sokoine University, the agricultural university of Tanzania. It has a lovely campus with the mountains towering above; everything looks very well kept and clean. We saw sections for Horticulture, Animal Husbandry, Pest control, Crop Production, Food Science, and there were probably others we didn't see. On our way out we stopped at a canteen and enjoyed a drink with some roasted bananas. Nice.
Morogoro is about three hours from Dar es Salaam on a very good road so it has become the home for many, many Catholic religious communities who do the formation of their candidates here. There are probably more than a dozen congregations with large campuses, and there is certainly some pooling of resources, i.e., professors, etc. The Maryknoll Sisters who live here in Mororgoro teach, among other places, at a Wholistic Centre, which is for Sisters of many different local communities. In the past many of the Sisters' communities didn't put an emphasis on education, and so that is now trying to be corrected and education of different kinds is being offered to these Sisters. Many, many Tanzanians continue to join Religious Life and the Priesthood, in both local and international communities.
I'll try to post again before leaving for Dodoma and Singida on Monday.
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