T-Minus 4

6/9
Less than 4 days until we leave for Dar and I'm already completely packed! It's not as if I have better things to do with my time, since our meetings end before 3 each day and I am very efficient with my "homework". For those of you who stumbled upon this blog and have no idea what's going on, I am headed to Tanzania to dedicate 9 weeks of my summer towards (hopefully) improving the lives of local Tanzanians. I will be working along with 3 other students from Dartmouth Humanitarian Engineering to implement sustainable, clean-burning technologies that aim to reduce deforestation and Acute Respiratory Infection rates. I am concentrating on the briquetting project, which provides a cheap fuel source that can also be turned into a business. Essentially, briquetting is a neat technology that presses loose, unused biomass into a round briquette to be burned. Our project summer goal is to create a pilot project in a VICOBA (village community bank) in Arusha, Tanzania, with help from EARD-CI (Enterprise and Rural Development Community Initiative), an NGO established in the area. We will use these results to determine the feasibility of expanding our briquetting project elsewhere in Tanzania, since these VICOBAs are similar to, as the scientific community would say, controlled environments. DHE sent travelers to Arusha in the spring to scope out the area for the projects. After describing the technology, the VICOBAs became very excited to learn more about briquetting. To say the least, I'm very stoked about this project's potential.

Thanks to many hours and help from my father, our travel schedule doesn't look too terrible. 

June 13th- We take the Dartmouth Coach down to NYC and arrive by noon. Fight leaves from NYC to Istanbul, TR at 11:55pm.

June 14th- After a 3 hour layover, we leave Istanbul and arrive in Dar es Salaam at 2:45am on June 15th.

This looks bad, but it is nowhere near as horrific as some other flights. We'll be taking a taxi to a hotel once we arrive in Dar, and then getting on a bus for Arusha the next day. 16 hours of flying and 10 hours of bus rides later, we are expecting to arrive in Arusha on June 16th. What a great way to spend 3 days!

So in a nutshell, this is what I will be spending the majority of my summer doing. Of course, it is not all work. Our group plans on taking breaks and going on waterfall hikes and such to take advantage of the stunning Tanzania landscape. We also plan on taking a week-long break and heading to Zanzibar to relax on the beach and go snorkeling. I will definitely keep my camera charged to take pictures!

Right now I'm sitting in my room listening to a live band play at one of the fraternities, probably Psi U. Tomorrow's graduation and once the seniors leave, the campus will be eerily empty. It is already weird enough not having Rachel but to make things even better, I was assigned a new roommate for interim period. She works on C&R, an interim job that makes beds for families staying on campus during graduation. We don't talk much, but it could be worse! I'm just glad she doesn't snore.

I forgot to mention I have never been able to keep a journal, so we'll see if I am able to keep up with a blog all summer. Somehow I always find ways to surprise myself on stuff like this.