What It's Like to Not Be Working - by Keith

By Keith
Before coming to Tanzania, my biggest concern wasn’t being robbed, contacting Malaria, or some other life threatening condition, but instead it was that I wasn’t sure what I was going to do to prevent being bored.  Well that hasn’t been a problem so far.  Without much trying, things just seem to have fallen into my lap including:

Mungere Middle/High School Building

• After a site visit in September, I evaluating and recommending improvements to school buildings at the Mungere Middle/High School which is in a very rural area about three hours east of Moshi.  See this link for more info on the non-governmental organization (NGO) that is building this important school.
• Working on our back porch to fix about eight mountain bikes for our neighbor and friend who uses them for biking tours around Kilimanjaro Mountain.
• Speaking English and teaching about using the Internet almost every Saturday morning with Albert who is the the 16-year old son of our housekeeper.
• Starting out as a volunteer and becoming the coach of the Ultimate Frisbee team at Ian’s school since the coach had to go back to the States. I’ve learned a lot about Ultimate and have improved my forehand throw.
• Trying to fix a 30-year old jukebox for a friend
• Helping build a pig barn for our housekeeper (see Carolyn’s new blog on this)
• Going back into my geotechnical (soils) engineering days as a “volunteer” consultant to the TPC, a local sugar cane production company and a major employer in the area.  They have about 20 kilometers of levees/dikes that were overtopped by a nearby river earlier this year. I’ve been helping them to raise their levees and also evaluating the stability of the existing levees.  I haven’t practiced this type of geotechnical engineering for over 13 years so it’s been fun to relearn many very technical aspects of the field.
• Helping to alleviate flooding of farming fields and village roads in an area south of Moshi and near the TPC sugar cane fields.  Last week five students from Tu Delft University arrived from The Netherlands to spend three months designing solutions to help prevent flooding of farming fields and roads in a rural area.   The flooding prevents farmers from harvesting their crops and prevents children from getting to school for up to a week at a time.  The students don’t have a geotechnical engineer as part of their team so I’m helping them in this area and teaching them about the field.  They’ve set up a nice website for their project which can be found by clicking here.  

  

  Flooded fields and road near TPC last week

Mountain Biking with Carolyn

Besides the above, Carolyn and I go on a walk or mountain bike ride one or two times a week, I go out on my own looking for birds, and I also spend time catching up on emails and planning for trips in Tanzania or after we leave Tanzania.  I think both Carolyn and I knew we would be spending more time together, but we’ve been surprised just how much time from Monday to Friday.  It’s been good for our relationship with lots of time to talk.  Lastly I also enjoy reading the papers in the morning and reading a book or two a month.

Overall I've really enjoyed having this time without work.  I like not being as planned out and being more flexible to go do things when the pop up.  Even with all the above things I have to admit that occasionally I get anxious that I should be busier, but then I try to stop and remember what things were like just four months ago and these feelings quickly fade away.  I try and keep in the forefront of my mind that this is a treat for my mind and body and to resist the pull back to the way I was in the States.  I feel much healthier including better sleep and less teeth grinding.  I guess this may be what retirement is like.