Livin’ Large in DSM

DSM, January 2007

So, no doubt, as you settle into bed at night, you think to yourself, "self, I wonder what the heck Peter's up to right now..." Well, since this blog is being sent out to the *world* wide web, I'll keep it clean.

First, we have a big ol' house. If you know my haus stateside, this one is bigger, much bigger (but not like the phat pads that my bro and cuz live in!). Though it's awful hot out and our place is sans a/c (save in bedroom), the airy design and ceiling fans keep things quite pleasant, so we haven't used a/c once. Though when the power cuts out, that changes. We've had maybe 6 blackouts ranging from 10 minutes to 5 hours in our 3 weeks here.

We sleep under a mosquito net (that I've ductaped a bit) and Heather looks quite fetching modeling it all at our flickr homepage.

We live on campus, amongst a block of houses that are rented to higher-up admin peeps and faculty. I forget if I mentioned that one of our neighbors was a Law prof. until she became Foreign Minister--and was appointed Deputy Sec-General of THE UN just a few weeks ago. From our house, we can walk to the univ. chapel or mosque in 3 minutes; we have yet to do take advantage of our proximity. Scattered about are some dormitories. The scenery is quite lovely, hilly, and lush and you see landscapers working constantly; imagine waving a scythe-like object back and forth for hours to cut the long grasses. No fat-arses sittin' on J. Deeres!

We walk on this sprawling campus to the bus (daladala) stop in 5 minutes, library in 10, and Kiswahili building in a bit more. In under 15, I'm at the History Dept. where I share an office w/ a linguist. No fan or a/c but lotsa windows. And I pick up the wireless hotspot from nearby Nkrumah Hall (legendary Pan-African leader from Ghana) in my office.

Oh, we have a TV and I actually watch it. No NPR and web-based news is spotty in being able to access. I've quickly learned what everyone else knew: CNN sorta sux and BBC is way better, though this whole spat over some Bollywood star being dissed by some white English chick on some lame Brit reality show is way old already. The rest of the channels are in Kiwahili, play English soccer, and American R'n'B music videos that are typically distorted.

Though we are among the elite, locals gather firewood in the bit of woods near our house. And just 30 mintues ago, some random locals knocked on my door with a bunch of buckets and asked for water. It probably did more good for them than the money I give to Oxfam...

Food, you ask? What does PJ eat? Well, that's another entry in da blog, doncha know. Peace out!