Day 29

This was our last day with Robert for a bit as we are off on safari tomorrow. We were due to drive out to Bariadi to visit another ACTT agent, Faustine. I had had a bit of a disturbed night and didn’t feel 100% so decided to stay at the hotel so Pete went  with Shabani and Robert. So today’s blog is written by Pete 😀.

On my way back from breakfast Shabani was already outside the hotel, well before our scheduled departure. One of the tyres on the car had a slow leak and Robert had given Shabani cash to get a replacement. Unfortunately the garage in Bunda only had a “premium” tyre of the right size in stock so Shabani needed a bit more cash. With this in hand he departed and returned after half an hour and we set off a bit before 9am.

Almost immediately we were flagged down by a traffic policeman, after a quick exchange of greetings he got into the car, apparently he was just after a lift to the police station a mile down the road.

As the road left Bunda it descended and the countryside ahead opened up to a flat plain, this is the Western edge of the Serengeti plains.

Our route to Bariadi followed this boundary and took us past the Ndabaka gate to the National Park. 

On the opposite side of the road was the sign for the Little Okavango camp that we had stayed at for a few days last year. We had looked to book again this year but they too were suffering from the rising water levels in Lake Victoria and were shut to allow raised walkways to be installed between their buildings so that guests no longer needed to be issued with “wellies” to wade between the rooms.

After the town of Lamadi we turned off eastwards on the road to Bariadi. All along each side of this road were large fields of crops.

I noticed rice, corn, sweet potatoes, millet, pineapples, and sunflowers. Beyond these was open countryside so clearly there is plenty of scope to increase food production. This may be needed if the President’s appeal to the people to increase the population and make Tanzania an economic powerhouse is heeded. The number of pupils we see in the primary schools suggest that this is happening! I noticed both traditional and modern farm equipment in use.

As we neared Bariadi I saw a good use of the natural geology to provide billboard advertising, Tanzanian style.

Recycling is also done differently in Tanzania, this is plastic awaiting commercial collection.

Bariadi is the regional capital of the Simyu region, a recently created political area taking control of parts of adjoining larger regions. This has lead to a lot of government investment and there are wide tarmac roads even leading back into residential areas, something uncommon in many Tanzanian towns.

We picked Faustine up opposite a striking modern building, which to my surprise turned out to be the bus station!

Our first visit of the day was to Kidinda Primary School where Faustine had trained a dozen teachers, he had decided this school should be rewarded with the PC that we had made available to him. Robert spent some time explaining about ACTT and our involvement and encouraged them to apply for inclusion in our loan arrangements. 

The school has 3,000 pupils and 38 teachers so is very similar to those in Geita or Chato. The “kitchen” is very rudimentary however, these are the beans for school lunch being prepared.

Following this visit Robert wanted to look at a few hotels to find something suitable for a future stay, he is obviously planning on us having a commitment there in the future. We visited 3, one central to town in what passes for a tower block in Bariadi, the second was a more traditional African guest house and the third a new hotel / bar set up. Either the first or last would be fine for a stay, although the last was in a quieter location. We stopped there for a lunch of fried fish and bananas, the food was good.

Faustine then showed us a small shop unit he is going to rent and set up for training, with plans for a display for computer sales and for stationery. It was close to a busy junction and reasonably priced so it looks like he has made a good choice.

We then stopped off briefly at Faustine’s current “shop” where he has computer equipment for sale in a stationery shop owned by a colleague of Robert’s, Veronica. She has been happy to accommodate Faustine over the last year whilst he has been getting himself set up.

Our last visit of the day was to Sima “A” Primary School, which is very close to Faustine’s new unit. Here Faustine is currently running a training course for around 20 teachers. We paid a courtesy call to the headmaster, which ended up as a 15 minute conversation between him and Robert in Swahili, apparently he has some proactive ideas about involving the community and school leavers in computer training utilising Faustine’s facilities.

We then moved to a new classroom, one of three designated for special needs teaching, where the teachers were waiting for training. The class was under strength as apparently on Friday afternoons many have other commitments, and we were a lot later than Faustine’s usual starting time. All the teachers being trained are loaned laptops to use for the course, this is part of the support ACTT give their agents in return for a 50% share of the training fees.

Robert again spent some time explaining about ACTT and our involvement, and also asked me to say a few words, hopefully they found them encouraging and motivating.

We then set out on the return journey to Bunda, the roads were quiet and we arrived back around 5pm.

We met up with Hilary and after a brief chat about the trip over a drink in the bar we went back to our room and packed our bags for the start of our safari the next day. The maps below show the towns visited to see the ACTT agents and our overall journey so far.

The road distance covered totalled 310 kms (194 miles) for this leg of the trip, and 2090 kms (1306 miles) since we arrived in Tanzania.

We then got ready for dinner. When we went to meet Robert in reception our safari guide was there. His name is Alladini and he seemed very pleasant, we confirmed arrangements for the following morning with him.

Robert had taken some advice on good places to eat in Bunda and we headed to a local hotel called Kili Park. We were the only people eating in the restaurant, and the food again took around an hour and a half to prepare, but was nice when it came. Our entertainment in the meantime was a large lightning storm around the area accompanied by some very strong winds, but surprisingly very little in the way of rain.

We were back in our hotel before 10pm and settled straight down ready for a prompt start in the morning.