Bye, Bye Miss American Pie

Back in the States, Luke and I used to joke that I had “better get used to the vegetable curry,” meaning that vegetarians would probably have limited options at the restaurants here. As it turns out, we have four principle options, and vegetable curry isn’t one of them: rice, beans, cooked spinach and eggs.

So far my meals have looked something like this:

Breakfast (chai ya asubuhi): chai na maziwa (black tea with milk, and keep it coming!) na chapatti moja (one piece of fried tortilla-like bread) or a Spanish omelet.

Lunch (chakula cha mchana): bowl of rice with beans and/or boiled spinach or cooked cabbage.

Dinner (chakula cha jioni): more rice and beans and spinach, or a Spanish omelet.

At one restaurant/bar near the office, the vegetarian dish is something called “chips mayai,” a locally famous dish which consists of fried eggs laced with French fries. I walk on the opposite side of the street when passing that place.

On two very memorable occasions I have gone to a place called the “Gibbs Resort,” which offers a variety of vegetarian options, including margarita pizza, spring rolls, veggie burgers and, yes, vegetable curry. The fact that it will require walking (or running) up and down a very steep hill will help me burn off the excess calories I consume there.

Obviously there is a market where I can buy groceries and choose my own gastronomical adventure (for example, I can pack bananas and boiled peanuts to supplement my lunches), and obviously when I moved to Tanzania I knew I’d be leaving behind the foods and routines that constituted a Venti-sized portion of my diet. Learning to “live without,” and to do so without needing to blog about it, is one of the many things that I hope to gain from this experience. Because for most of the world, it probably doesn’t feel like living “without” anything at all.

It is hard not to live here and know just how lucky I am to have any food whatsoever, and while I may joke about it here, when my bowl of rice and beans is served at lunchtime, the predominant thought going through my head is this one: gratitude.