As the sun set, I took a photo facing the west and a bush fire revealed itself against the fading
sunlight on Mtuzu Hill, famously known as Vodacom hill. Fires are sometimes intentionally lit to clear farmland, but the fires become uncontrollable and can burn for days.
August 6, 2010
A guest from the United States asked me
to take him to a traditional healer before his departure from
Butiama. The traditional healer prepared her tools of
trade and changed into special attire before sitting down to hear what ailments my guest was suffering from.
She doubles both as a traditional
healer and a soothsayer, and is supposedly able to discern from
patterns of finger millet spread out on a wicker container the ills
and misfortunes that could be preventing her clients from enjoying good health
and happiness.
The healer spoke in the local dialect, Zanaki, to the person who took
us to her house; the person
translated to me in Kiswahili, and I translated to the American guest
in English. While I feared the message could have been lost in the
translation, the guest later reported that the healer was correct in
her diagnosis.
August 26, 2010
I came across the voting card of
Tanzania's founding president, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage
Nyerere dated 24th July 1985, 3 months before he voluntarily stepped down after 23 years in office.
He
most likely casted a "yes" vote for Chama cha Mapinduzi's candidate Ali Hassan Mwinyi in that
year's elections on 27th October 1985 in which President Mwinyi, the sole candidate in one of the last elections in which CCM was the only political party contesting, won with a 95.68 percent margin. Voter turnout for the presidential elections was 75 percent.
August 28, 2010
Someone brought his domestic chores to
"the office". I was locking my car about to walk to a campaign meeting
of Chama cha Maendeleo na Demokrasia
(CHADEMA) when this young woman called out: “Uncle!” She is one of my nieces, daughter of one of hundreds of my cousins.
At CHADEMA's meeting, held by its candidate
for Musoma Urban constituency and one of my cousins, Vincent Nyerere, all the political
parties, except Chama
cha Mapinduzi, were provided space to display their colours.
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