There's a lot of buzz outside right now while bus companies collect their passengers and strap our luggage to the top of the bus. I'm extremely thankful that I packed everything in plastic bags and that my bag itself if water resistant. It could rain for part of the way. Everything gets covered in what looks like a canvas tarp, but it seems inevitable that water gets in.
As instructed by the guide book, I'm sitting on the left of the bus for the best views. There are rows of two seats on the right and a row of single seats on the left. Perfect. The bus seats about 22 people, and at the moment, it's only 2/3rds full, but the driver just started the engine.
I took my first malaria pill and I'm about to slather my arms with some insect repellent. A man outside the window is selling bracelets to a group of ladies. Time to put my seat belt on. Twendai!!
When we got to the border, I got my Tanzanian stamp and a really cool visa that had my picture on it. (It's a terrible grainy black and white photo, but still a cool addition to my passport pages.)
Next stop... Arusha, then on to Moshi. I took a few photos out the window along the way, and slept quite a bit too.
I just arrived at the hotel in Moshi, and it's very nice. The room is very clean and it has its own bathroom. The bus/shuttle ride here from Nairobi was long and bumpy. Once I figured out how to open the window, I took a few photos along the way. At one point, we passed a giraffe right there on the side of the road, eating a tree, totally unphased by shuttle buses passing no further than the space of 3 lanes away. I didn't snap a picture of him, but I did snap some pictures of beautiful Massai people and a few bomas.
There was a man on the shuttle stinking up the place to high heaven! I think he had a gallon of cologne on, and then his friend used his phone to blare music for part of the trip. It sounded like the sound track of an old Bollywood movie.
The only other interesting character on the bus was a woman with way too much cleavage. I mean, come on now; she was about to fall out of her top! When she was receiving her giant backpack from the roof of the shuttle, every eye was on her because we all thought for sure those puppies would be out of the gate. Somehow she kept it all in.
When I finally arrived in Moshi, after a few stops, Godfrey was there to meet me along with his father and a driver. I felt shy (I know, you're wondering "what the hell?!") So we didn't speak much. They brought me to the hotel and then went over a few things with me. Godfrey's father did most of the talking. They gave me a sheet with basic information I was already aware of and let me know that we would depart at 9:30 tomorrow morning.
They asked If I needed anything else or wanted to do any site seeing in Moshi. The only think I could think of was postcards and more cash. While I benefited with pounds when I bought my Kenyan visa, I lost my ass when I had to use pounds to get a Tanzanian visa. First off, it was $100 U.S. ($50 for a Kenyan visa) I paid 20 pounds in Kenya & 80 pounds in Tanzania. 20 pounds is roughly $32 U.S., so essentially, I paid $128 to get a Tanzanian visa. The only thing that would have helped would have been purchasing a visa in Nairobi. We would have done that on Friday had we didn't think about it in time & Monday was a holiday.
All of this wouldn't be such a big deal if it weren't for the amount of tipping I am still anticipating at the end of this trip. Since I am Godfrey's only client on this trip, I don't have anyone else to pool money with. I'm also not sure if I have to pay again to enter Kenya or London for that matter.
We stopped at the ATM first and that's when I discovered that not all shillings are created equally. It's about 80 Kenyan shillings to a dollar and 1000 Tanzanian shillings to a dollar! I really had no idea how much to withdraw, so I went with the largest amount of 400,000 Tanzanian Shillings, but my Visa rejected that request, so I went with 150,000. Not enough, I'll need to go again.
For dinner, I had chicken masala, jeera rice, chipati, and a Crest ginger ale for what I think was $12 U.S. According to the menu, 1,000 Tanzanian shillings equals a dollar. Of course, I have no idea what the exchange rate is here.
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