“There is no hurry in Africa”. This was my favorite phrase to hear from locals in Tanzania.
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“Tanzania? Really?!”. That is the reaction I got from most people when I expressed how much I fell in love with Tanzania. And how, if I could spend a couple of months a year there, I would be thrilled.
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“But isn’t it poor? And dangerous?”
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I didn’t feel especially in danger anywhere on my trip. Exercising general caution, yes. Especially dangerous? No. Poverty? Many people struggle, but most people somehow seem to make ends meet.
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Beyond that, I try to convey to friends, and always seem to fall short, how breathtakingly expansive and beautiful the landscapes are. How almost everyone I met there is warm, and funny, and friendly, and quick with a joke and a smile. How the sunset lights the horizon on fire, then brings with it a cool breeze that rustles through the dry savannah. How people seem quite content and grateful most of the time and try to make the best of all situations. How people talk of helping their families and communities as much as they can, of supporting each other. How 120 different ethnic groups and tribes manage to not only co-exist quite peacefully here, but intermarry and integrate nicely as well.
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This does something to the atmosphere. I felt calm and happy here. Even while climbing up a mountain in rain and freezing temperatures. And everything I usually worry about seemed distant and far away.
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Why exactly? Can’t explain. Hakuna matata.
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