Back at Usa

Then, the next day, after a last swim in the pool: time to go back home. Only a scant three hour drive, mostly on tarmac, negotiating Arusha’s busy roads to emerge on the road to Dar-es-Salaam which goes straight through Usa River.

The grounds of Kennedy House International School are like an oasis. Turning off the main road onto a bumpy track, negotiating picky-piccy motorcycles, cars and trucks with inches to spare before driving out of the town. We return on 1^st January, Tuesday: so it is still market day. Women sit at the side of the road with piles of tomatoes carefully arranged on sacking mats; tins of beans wait to be bought; bananas, pineapples, potatoes, oranges... a plethora of vegetables.

Some of the shops are shut, including Supafast Internet. But otherwise, it could be any other day in Africa.

We leave the noise behind. The enormous gates slide open and we are once again inside a little oasis. Huge grounds, a full–length circular running track, a 25m swimming pool, silky oaks and fig trees gracing the compound.

Jonny and Adele’s house is a welcome haven: simply yet comfortably built, Adele manages their home with flair. We remember how filtering water was the norm; adjusting to power surges and low water pressure not uncommon.  We unpack from the safari, washing dust and smoke out of clothes and bedding, all the while thankful for safe travel and another exciting adventure.

The swimming pool has been a welcome ‘cooling off’ point. The birds – Wahlberg’s eagles soar over the playing field or perch in the tree by Jonny’s house; a  white-browed coucal and speckled mousebirds swoop across the lawn; black-faced Baglafecht’s weavers fly busily in and out of their nests hanging from the acacia tree; arrow-marked babblers chattering companionably together in the hedge. Fork-tailed drongos call long and loudly in the early morning as I sit on the verandah, feet tucked up on a huge African sofa made of roughly-hewn branches.

We watch the film of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society: jarring on many levels, not least that none of it was filmed on Guernsey and the scenery, to us, seems false. Yet it gives snippets of understanding the horror of life in Occupied Guernsey during World War 2 and is a delightful story of relationships developed and restored.

I find myself homesick.

It is wonderful to be here. The weather alone – the bright hot African sun, the heaviness of an approaching rainstorm, the violence of the rain itself flooding fiercely down -  this, in itself, if wonderfully reminiscent. I find myself remembering dark skies heralding the rain, a vivid picture of a life formerly lived, singly, in Western Kenya; sunshiny days filled with the delighted laughter of small children; the uniquely evocative, dust-settling smell of huge raindrops  on hot earth. This is worth travelling thousands of miles for.

More so, the time spent with Jonny and Adele, marvelling at how well-settled and adapted they are. Jonny’s ability to instantly establish rapport with the (many) policemen who stop us on the road: their response makes it look as if they are old friends, greetings so friendly that it seems almost abnormal. Where have you come from? Where are you going? Why? What will you do there? Happy New Year! I am again reminded of how important relationship is in Africa.

Adele’s creative gifting in establishing a wonderful little home, mastering the intricacies of shopping with ease and adapting to the challenges of unreliable internet, low – or no – water pressure, intermittent power cuts...

And, both of them, still highly dedicated, extremely hard-working teachers. I wonder if the children they teach and the colleagues they work with know how fortunate they are?