10 days....

I leave for Tanzania in 10 days. Its unbelievable. The past several weeks seems to have been consumed with preparing at a deeper level for my experience. I realized that I virtually knew nothing about Tanzania besides what I had seen in the Darwin's Nightmare so I began to do some research. While I am trying to go into this experience with as much as an open mind as possible, there are some facts and ideas about Tanzania and its culture that really excited me such as:

*Of the 274 seats on the National Assembly, 232 are elected by popular vote, 37 are women appointed by the president, and 5 are members of Zanzibar's legislature.

I would like to somehow research gender politics and gender identity and how the male dominated National Assembly contributes to these dynamics. As a Women's and Gender Studies major I tend to focus on women's experiences and how gender contributes to an individual's experience within a given society. For this reason I am actually really excited about two of the classes I am taking this semester: Tanzania in the Midst of Peace and Conflict and Gender Analysis in Development Projects in East Africa. The first is the required course for all of us on the program and according to the syllabus we are going to study gender as it relates to human rights and conflict. I am assuming we are going to focus on rape as a weapon in conflict. The second course excites me because it involves a 10 week field study component during which we visit different development projects and NGOs and study gender dynamics. (The other 2 courses I am taking are Health Issues in Africa and Elementary Swahili.)

I've also been trying to pick up a little bit of Swahili before going but so far I have really only been able to pick up how to say "how was your trip?" (Habari za safari?) I'm sure I'll lean a little more while I'm actually surrounded by the language!

More to come....