Last Wednesday and Thursday, the whole group went to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) which is only about a 15 minute walk from my apartment to watch and listen part of court proceeding. It was incredibly strange to be just one glass window away from a man who is on trial for being responsible for so many deaths in the Rwandan genocide. While I enjoyed being in the building and having a first hand experience of justice, I could not follow the witness's story and found myself frustrated by the whole proceeding. Maybe I'll go back and give it another try in a few weeks.
On Friday, I gave a group presentation with 3 other of my classmates about Tanzania and conflict in Tanzania. I really enjoyed learning more about the political and religious conflicts within this peaceful country. I now have a much better understanding of the election process in Tanzania as the country prepares for the 2010 elections. In short, Tanzania technically has a multi party democratic system but there has only ever been one party in control since the establishment of multi party elections in Tanzania. This party is named CCM which stands for Chama Cha Mapinduzi. While there are opposition parties with large followings, it seems the general sentiment is that they have no chance against CCM. In Zanzibar, CCM has been accused of rigging elections and manipulating votes in order to maintain control. The true American in me is outraged by this longterm control by one party, I can't help but support CCM because one of their presidential candidates is a woman which is huge in Tanzania where women can not run for parliament, they can only be appointed by the president.
The national elections are in October so campaigning is in full force in Arusha. I woke up on Saturday morning to BLASTING MUSIC from a truck covered in the CCM colors of green and yellow. It turns out there was a huge rally that day in support of CCM.
On Saturday, a few of us went to this snake zoo and a masaii museum. It was nice get out of town for a few hours and see a different part of the area. The most beautiful part of the drive was seeing the acres of coffee fields. It made me crave fresh coffee rather than the Africafe instant coffee... Oh well!
The power has been off and on all weekend but I have hope for today that the power will remain on! When the electricity goes out I just have to go into the "pole pole" state of mind that seems to be that of all Tanzanians. Pole pole (pronounced Po-le po-le) means slowly, without worrying. Hakuna shida is another phrase that can be used here which means no problems. I'm learning how to take a deep breath and think of everything as another part of the adventure!
Today is the first day of a normal class schedule so I don't have class again until 3pm so I'm off to the craft market with a friend of mine to find her friend a birthday present. I'm going to try to take more pictures, I promise!
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