I cut my hair.

This morning started off just like a normal Saturday here in Tanzania, but as the day progressed, I managed to take part in a few new and unusual events…

Rehema and I slept in until about 9:45 since we were up until almost 2 the night before for a youth-group type praise and worship. I got dressed, drank some sweet tea, and ate a few chapattis (not like Indian ones—these ones are mostly eggs and not whole wheat flour). Then, Rehema announced that we were going out—she would take me to a good salon that could cut my hair.

So when we got to the salon, my hopes were high—there were pictures of wazungus on the walls with flowing, stylish hair. I told the receptionist that I wanted a hair cut. All the workers kind of glanced at each other, then one of the men got up and told me to come with him. I sat in the barber chair, had an apron placed on me, then watched the hair dresser take my hair out of its braid. I showed him where I wanted it cut, just at my shoulders. Now usually the next step is to wash the customer’s hair or at least wet it… but nope—he just went right at it. Chop. Chop. Except he must have thought that when I said shoulder’s I actually meant earlobe! He obviously had never touched mzungu hair before because he kind of awkwardly grabbed it, and randomly chopped it here and there (and the scissors he was using didn’t look like a hair scissors, it looked more like a little kids safety scissors!) I couldn’t really do anything once he started, but once he was like ok? I kind of examined and tried to direct him how to cut it to make it look a little less awful… So yeah, now my hair is ridiculously short. (I tried to post a pict but Internet is too slow today...)

My hair way really long—when I looked on the floor after it was all chopped off, it looked like a little fur-ball animal. It was very sad to see it lying there very dead and gone. At least the good news is that thankfully hair always grows back. I just wish it were like one of those dolls whose hair you could cut and then magically pull it right back out…

Despite the tragedy at the hair salon, the rest of the day ended up to be a lot of fun. Next, Rehema took me to the beach! We went to this hotel/resort that was very nice. Just to get in, we had to pay 6000 Tsh. We took part in the hotel’s amazing lunch buffet and both ate until we literally could eat no more. There was even dessert—cake and chocolate mousse! This was very exciting as I have not had any dessert-ish things since I’ve been here. And I got to eat something that wasn’t just rice, beans, and meat! It was definitely a treat.

We spent the rest of the afternoon resting our full belly’s on the beach and beside the hotel’s pool. We kind of came unplanned, but next time we are going to bring out swimming gear—I promised Rehema I would give her swimming lessons since she doesn’t know how. It was nice to have an extravagant afternoon, and to learn that the beach is less than 5 miles away from where I’m staying!

After we got home I went jogging, which has become a habit of mine to do in the evenings once it cools down a bit. The route I’ve been doing climbs up a couple hills, and when I get to the top I can look back to the East at the Indian Ocean. It’s quite nice, and I always have something or someone interesting meet me. Sometimes I meet herds of goats (my favorite), many times I can hear children laughing at me and yelling mzungu as I go by, sometimes people like to imitate me and start running with me (I just give them a thumbs up), a few times I’ve stopped to have conversations (even with Masai) and one time I even helped save a stranded chick that was running away into the road! I have really been enjoying running here. And I need to keep running up hills if I am going to climb Kili in Dec with my family!!