I've skipped over Monday, as some of the events were too sensitive to publish in my blog.

Arusha, Tuesday, January 31, 2017

It rained a lot during the night and continued raining most of the day.  While this impinged a bit on what we chose to do, it felt wonderful to have a much cooler day and to know that finally so much badly needed rain was falling.  When John and I finally went over to the garden veranda as we do almost every morning, there were a couple of monkeys frolicking on the roof—which is metal— and the noise was thunderous. They ran back and forth, jumping in and out of trees, and making enough racket for a herd of kudu. Maybe they were happy for the rain as well.

Near noon, John decided to walk downtown and go to a place which seems samosas and buy some for our lunch.  I stayed with the monkeys and eavesdropped on the two Dutch guys and their African friends? guides? who were talking to them as if they were idiots. I have no idea how two adults could have arrived here with less awareness of where they were going and what they might be doing. How they ended up with this particular nefarious pair of Tanzanians is also a mystery. Still, I felt I shouldn’t break in and warn them how gullible they are being or tell the Africans to stop being such con artists. They are all consenting adults after all.

Soon John was back with some absolutely delicious samosas, which were still nice and hot because they had been freshly made for him, and he took a taxi back to Kundayo. There are few things more delicious than a hot, crispy samosa, and we each had three. I decided that for dinner in the evening, I would use the last of our carrots and potatoes and make beef stew with meat I had bought at Meat King last week, so we would get at least one vegetable for the day.

Last week, Agape had said she would find out if Rebecca had any second hand sports shoes she would sell me.  Around 5:00, the two of them showed up, so while we had tea and cookies, Rebecca showed me her wares. There was one fairly worn pair of New Balance shoes which fit me quite well, and I decided that even though they were a bit shabbier than I had hoped for and were camouflage fabric, they would be okay for the next 6 weeks. I didn’t bother to bargain, but paid the first price, which delighted Rebecca, and then I gave Agape a finder’s fee. I felt very pampered having my own personal shopper coming right to my home.