Day Three- Rest of the day

12/4/2011

"Dear Journal,

It's 6:47pm and the electricity went off in Moivaro Lodge! I'm currently sitting at a table, writing by firelight (a candle)! As I just wrote that the electricity came back on! Hooray! It's nicer to have light ☺ On the mountain I will not have light, save for the setting of the sun and rising of the moon. The mountain, Mt. Meru, is pretty clear tonight. There is a cloud covering the top.

I had a filling breakfast this morning outside on the deck:

I had quite a nice view of Mt. Meru:

I had some of the local coffee- phew, it was strong, even with milk and sugar. I'm certainly eating more-and better-here. Herman and George got me around 9:15am. I asked if we could first go to an Internet cafe. They said, "sure." We tried the first one, but it was closed. While there, something happened to the truck terminals. George put Coke on the terminals because the coke's carbon takes away the atoms or something? With the aid of a few men and some pushing back and forth in the truck, we got the truck to start."

Oddly enough, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda is located in Arusha (the city I was in). I took a photo of the ICT building but was quickly told to put down my camera because you're not allowed to take any photos of the building. Oops.

To flashback, this was the sign Herman was holding for me upon my arrival:

We stopped at this memorial. Unfortunately, I don't quite remember what it is for:

 Herman and George took me to lunch at a local joint. Herman, my guide, is on the left. George, our driver, is on the right. They are both wonderful men. 

These are some road views from my seat in the truck (the first one is in the city, the second one is outside the city):

"Okay, well I think I need to go pack now. And shower. I heard from both mom and dad on e-mail, so I am comforted in the fact that they know I'm here and doing well."

"I climb tomorrow. I'm actually kind of nervous. We'll see how it all goes. I don't want it to rain, and I'd like to reach the top. I feel out of shape and fat, but perhaps I won't after this climb. I stayed at the lodge and took naps after Herman and George dropped me off this afternoon. It was pretty quiet around here- just me and a Canadian couple with a young boy. I wonder if he'll remember this trip. It certainly sounded as if they were packing a lot in- very action packed schedule.

Anyway, I ate dinner at the lodge tonight and got quite full. I had water, 2 cups of tea, a mango and avocado salad, tuna with rice and veggies and a chocolate pudding slice of pie for dessert.

I asked Herman what we do if we need to go pee along the way. He basically said go to a "bush." I hope I don't have to pee a lot.

Herman looked over my stuff this afternoon. He wondered if I had more pants. Nope. Sorry. I hope that I'll be warm enough. It sounds like we drink a lot of tea and eat popcorn. We stopped at a supermarket today for snacks. They were playing American music in the store. That was kind of surreal. I was like, "Where am I?"

Anyway, Herman's rules for this climb are to "enjoy it," "have a positive outlook"...I don't remember the others. Here's to a good night's sleep.

♥, K."