Shopping in Dodoma

Written on May 1,2008

Happy May Day (also Ascension Day),

Yes, in Tanzania they celebrate May Day. It is a holdover from the socialist era of the 1960s. Anyway, I wanted to share my experience yesterday shopping for a water heater. Ever since I learned they existed and were relatively affordable, I have longed for a water heater for my shower. Finally, I have decided now is the time to do it. I have used the advice of another missionary and am working with a “fundi” (expert/craftsman/technician) who also teaches at a local technical or trade school. Yohana, the fundi, teaches electrical students and earns only 60,000 TSh (about $45 a month) so he has to find outside work to support his family. I am also using a plumbing teacher from the same school to help with that part of the job.

So, yesterday Yohana, the plumbing fundi, and a student from their school arrived at my place at 1:30 and we hoped to use the college’s one working car to do our shopping. However, the principal needed the car to go to a meeting, but he did offer to give us a ride into town. So we left around 2:45, when it was convenient for the principal, and got dropped off in town. So we went from store to store tying to find the different parts that were needed. It took trips to many different stores to find the right parts. Things were complicated by the fact that the plumbing in my house was very old and not standard so most of the plumbing in the bathroom had to be replaced. The hardest part to find was the right size water heater. We found some that were far to large and eventually we found the right one. It was an interesting experience because a lot of the places we went to are not frequented by westerners so I got quite a few interesting looks. We walked all over town — it was quite an interesting experience. Eventually, we left town via a taxi with several pipes and some wire cover tied to the side of the taxi.

A long, but productive afternoon. I hope all is well with y’all.

This entry was posted on May 2, 2008 at 10:35 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.