Flux

I woke up in a perfectly still house for the first time all year. I was completely alone, and alone has been a foreign concept in Africa. In Alaska, Scott’s work took him on two-week dive trips, multi-day meetings in other towns, overnight stints on float-cabins. While I didn’t travel nearly as regularly, I had my own solo adventures – to Barrow, to a fishing boat, to an occasional news conference. Here in Tanzania, Scott and I worked at the same school. When we weren’t in class teaching, we sat at desks facing each other, separated by a wall. And when Scott was teaching, his voice carried throughout most of the school campus. We were always together.

And we were always surrounded. Besides the doting students who would say they missed you if they didn’t see you before morning tea, or their ability to constantly be in need of something – “Teacher, may I have some glue?” “Teacher, may I borrow a pencil?” “Teacher, may I have some paper?” “Teacher…” “Teacher…” “Teacher…” – Scott and I had no respite from company when we left the school. Our home was an often-bustling volunteer house that ranged anywhere between three to six occupants.

But yesterday, as Elizabeth and I parted ways going towards Monduli town from her boma, I finally said good-bye to the last student. I’ve had a series of goodbyes with them which started last Friday, the closing of school, and extended into Monday and Tuesday, work days for the students and tidying-up days for me. Friday started out hard with a morning cry in town before all the teachers drove to the school and a suppression of tears as the Land Rover approached the school. But the emotions seemed to subside as the events of the last day unfolded. Tuesday proved to be more difficult. I had to leave as most of the form one students continued to clean – I had to leave them, as opposed to Friday when the students left the school first. Small groups of students requested last photos with me; it was truly a last good-bye. I tried to leave without crying, but noticed one of my favorite students was inside the classroom, so I ran inside and said good-bye one more time. I saw Lais and felt compelled to hug him but didn’t want to appear like I was favoring him, so my eyes found his for a brief moment, I forced a weak smile, and I just had to leave. I would’ve crumbled if I didn’t.

So no more “Teacher…” “Teacher…” “Teacher…” – at least for now.

This past week, the volunteer house maintained a normal occupancy rate of four. Scott and four other teacher, as well as Scott’s cousin JJ and JJ’s two friends, left to climb Kilimanjaro on Sunday. Roommates Greg and Kelly were still around though and Jane moved in from the other volunteer house for her final days in Tanzania. But yesterday, Greg and Kelly went to Arusha to spend a couple days and Jane’s flight to Ireland was last night. So that left me – alone.

But alone is relative. I was alone in the house – Samson, our night guard, was only a few feet away outside.

So this morning, I didn’t wake up to voices or shuffling or the urge to begin a normal school day. I woke up to birds tweeting and chickens doodling and cows mooing in the distant – all the normal sounds of a Monduli morning. And the sun. As much as I wanted to stay in bed, I knew the sun was shining on another beautiful day, and there’s much to do. I need to make more progress on packing before I go into Arusha to meet Scott, JJ, and crew. We’re spending the night in Arusha since JJ and his friends fly out tomorrow. Then we’ll come back to Monduli Saturday for Scott to pack up and have yet another goodbye with friends and co-workers, and we’ll leave Tanzania Sunday afternoon.

I know I’m not quite processing the fact that we’re leaving – leaving the students, leaving Africa, leaving this completely different way of living. I’ve had time to think, but I just can’t seem to wrap my mind around it. Maybe nothing’s made sense since we left Wrangell one year and one day ago. Or maybe it’s all made sense. Last night, as I was sorting through things trying to figure out what to throw away and what to take, I happened upon a part of a notebook that Scott had used as a journal. The first entry was marked December 16, 2009, exactly one year prior. It described our final goodbye with friends, getting on the ferry, and watching Wrangell disappear in the darkness. There is a really great line that jumped out at me. It was when he wrote about sitting at the Stik with our dearest friends before we had to disperse to either the airport or the ferry terminal – “No one wanted to welcome the inevitable.”

Leaving Wrangell was a bigger deal because we had lived there for longer – Scott had spent seven years there and I had spent four. But all goodbyes are different. I don’t quite know what I’ll be feeling when we board that plane to fly away, when we’ve said goodbye to the last possible person we can say goodbye to, when it’s just Scott and I again. I don’t know what I’ll feel when we spend out first night in my mother’s house in New York and wake up to sounds of cars and doors slamming instead of birds singing and chickens doodling. I have no clue what it’ll feel like to know that our one year in Africa is over.