To the Roof of Africa

I arrived in Arusha after an 11 hours long bus ride from Dar Es Salaam tired and sweaty and with a headache bigger than my head. The bus had been comfortable, no complaints, but the strong cheap perfume someone had generously used and the not so great ventilation did it. I had looked forward to this ride because I knew how beautiful the scenery along the way was. To my frustration there seemed to be this stupid rule about having all curtains down. And I was sitting on the aisle feeling trapped. No views from Dar to Moshi, ie about 9.5 hours, but the loud sounds of a pretty dumb movie :-)

It was only in Moshi that more than half of the bus got off and I could swiftly move over to the window seat and pull the curtain away. Where was it? I had missed it in March and it seemed that I wasn't much luckier today. I was here to climb it. Was I going to climb the elusive mountain? The mountain you never got to see from the bottom? There were dark heavy clouds hanging in the air, graying the horizon, hiding the scenery and I sighed in resignation. Maybe I'll see it the day we'll come for the climb...
And then, somehow, this brighter top cloud captured my eye. WOW! There it was. YES!!! I jumped up. The big white top of Mt. Kilimanjaro was towering the clouds. It was all covered in snow and glittering. Oh, wow! I said to myself again. Was that really where I was going to be in a few days? The butterflies in my tummy seemed to multiply exponentially.

I have so far never freaked out in the mountains. Not that there were no opportunities but, somehow, my instinct told me that in those moments it would have been the worst thing to do. However, I freaked out many times preparing for the mountain. And the last few days in Cape Town when the butterflies in my tummy first started and just became more and more nervous, I was continuously on the verge of freaking out. I don't like to be unprepared, not when you deal with something as big and serious as a mountain, and so I never felt confident about whether I had the right gear, enough gear, etc. The expenses on my credit card and the pile of bills - I had never planned for - seemed to contradict my fears and reassure me. Eventually, I had to stop and get going. And now I was here 2 days away from the start of the climb.

Having a one day buffer before starting the trek was good. I walked around Arusha and discovered places I missed in March: the good coffee shops, the ice cream shop ... I went back to the Indian restaurant Maria, Spiros and I liked and I just indulged myself in fresh fruit juices. Hmmmm...

And yet, what I enjoyed most was just watching the town wake up in the morning: the people pushing or pulling their little carts loaded with fresh fruit or vegetables; the women in their strong coloured dresses carrying baskets of fruit or other stuff on their head walking towards the market; the people sweeping the main street clean in the early morning hours and everything else going on before the bulk of the people invaded the streets. I loved sitting and watching all this activity. There was nothing random there; there was a simplicity and a rhythm in the simplest tasks and movements that fascinated me. These were just snapshots of African life but I loved them.

The trip started at a luxury hotel, the Impala Lodge. I'll never understand why white people need to be spoilt in Africa. The room I had at the backpackers hostel was smaller than the bathroom I had here. It was all so shiny and expensive.
Shortly after I arrived I got a phone call from somebody from the trekking agency. I needed 5 minutes before coming down, I said, and I rushed. But once down in the lobby the person was gone. When I inquired the woman at reception told me it was "a green, very green man". Now I was left to wonder. Was it a very environmentally aware person, a sick person or maybe an alien ? After almost one hour of waiting and walking up and down the lobby I came to a conclusion. It was an alien :-)

However, in the early evening hours the alien materialized again and I also met the other group members. We were 5 in total: 2 Brits and 2 Irish guys and me. We were going to have a 23 person crew. Oops ...