Me with my sponsored children

Me with my sponsored children
Me with my sponsored children

Friday, December 10, 2010

Seasons they don't tell you about in Tanzania!

Everyone knows about the "rainy" season, and most people not brand-new to TZ have heard the difference between the "short rains" and the "long rains" (we're having the short rains now, FYI), but there are actually several other "seasons" I have found out about!

Back in September, just as we were coming into spring/summer, the winds really picked up, and so did the dust. Especially since we live just over the hedge from a dirt road that is used quite frequently, everything in our house got covered with a fine layer of reddish-brown dust. One week when I was heading to Karanse, I closed my bedroom windows in an effort to minimize the dust, but the wind blew so hard that dust came in through any available space where windows weren't sealed properly. When I got back, I had to wash bed linens, wash window sills, sweep my closet, of all things, and vacuum my floor. This was the "dust season."

We pretty much always have our windows open; thank goodness for screens! We also have several doors to our house that someone is always leaving open, and they don't have screens. A couple of weeks ago, I noticed a big increase in our fly population in our house. Joanna said this was "fly season," the weeks before the short rains come all the way up till Christmas! Today we had team lunch at our house, and I was so irritated by all of the flies that I gave Janet a job (since she was here early). I told her she couldn't eat until she had killed 10 flies! Joelle got in on that as well, and between them they killed about 30 flies!! Yuck!

I was telling Joanna last night my new discoveries of the seasons, and she said, "Just wait till locust season!" Oh, boy!!!

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