On the 14th through the 16th we were in Dar es Salaam. Flying in from Julius Nyeere airport. Dar es Salaam – like many African cities bursting with overpopulation, lack of opportunity, intense poverty, lack of electricity and clean drinking water for the majority of the people. One of the things that struck me however was how civilized driving was. After spending time in Algeria earlier this year, there wasn’t much horn beeping were aggressive driving. The other problem we saw in Arusha was the cops constantly engaged in shaking drivers down. It was kind of funny in a weird way. There was no radar or speed gun, the cop would say you were going to miles above the speed limit give me $12. Then they would give a printed receipt from a machine that look like a credit card reader. A very legitimate appearing receipt. But, the police are paid a pittance, and this low-level racketeering is endorsed. We could’ve stayed at the higher end part of town by the beach, but we thought we could take in the older museums and the monuments. However, the downtown is broken sidewalks, buildings that look worn and shabby, and the waterfront was strewn with trash. On this Sunday morning of the 16th we walked around the older part of Dar es Salaam. The previous night we had been at a vegetarian restaurant called Swastik. Though the swastika is an ancient Indian symbol it had been sadly hijacked by the Nazis. We met our dear friend Sarah who has worked with us for the past several years. She is on a fellowship here in Dar es Salaam. It was wonderful to get her local knowledge on this. It is exciting to seeing a young friend approaching life and her adventures internationally in the way we did some 40 years ago. During the daytime the city seems relatively safe, but it is dodgy at night. It is a simple equation. It’s just that there is so much poverty that even purse snatching or worse, is the alternative. Generally, we say hello and greet people in Swahili. It is part of our campaign always the matter where we are to master at least the basic 50 words. In some countries it is less and another countries a bit more. On a Sunday it was very peaceful. Very calm. Tanzania is divided roughly half-and-half between Muslims and Christians. So on this Sunday it was very pleasant to walk around the old part of the city. No charm nor anything truly memorable. We did walk by one Lutheran Church close to the waterfront. Oddly they had a German Lutheran mass. There is also a Catholic Cathedral St. Joseph’s. We did not go in since both were full. There is also a mosque a few blocks away that was closed. I am sure like all mosque it would be open to us if we wanted to pray.In the morning at about 430 I enjoyed the sound of the first prayer call. Dar Es Salaam much like most other third world cities is deeply divided. Though we are only here too brief over time, it is a familiar tale. This downtown area that has grown so shabby and worn, and then a few kilometers uptown is the beach area where the international community and the embassies are. It was like taking a rocket-ship to a different planet. We ate at Salt for an Sunday afternoon brunch. All the things that I can’t eat, pancakes and waffles, and it is like being at Bella’s dinner in New York. The only thing missing was the maple syrup. As a Vermonter, it is sacrilege to eat a pancake or waffle without maple syrup. Not just your ordinary maple syrup, but grade B syrup is best with that slightly smoky flavor. Though we are fairly lightweight travelers, generally we travel with some maple syrup and coffee. Delicious first world breakfast!  We so enjoyed the time with Sarah and hearing of her adventures in Tanzania. Her story of staying overnight in a Masai Mara home, while welcoming, made my delicate stomach cringe. It is not just the idea of drinking blood and cow’s milk together, but according to her story you pee wherever you want, and you defecate outside the gate. No one washes with soap. There is none. There is no such thing as filtered water. I am sure their got ecology is robust and bullets would bounce off of it. I bet you none of them suffer Crohn’s disease. It is all those invincible parasites. However, I will take a cup of yogurt to assuage my delicate digestion. I know there are travelers, who eats street food in Calcutta to Shanghai, and I am jealous of their intrepidness; however, my gut is made for slightly more refined fare. Sorry to be a woos! Sarah’s story of after the dinner, they would store it underneath the floor and the mice would come out and eat all the leftovers from the pots and pans. She was trying to sleep and kept hearing the sound of mice crawling across the pots. I am waiting for her to write down the story. That evening after we said goodbye to Sarah we went to this incredible first world shopping plaza on the waterfront, the Slipway. It was as if we had landed in Miami Beach or some first world waterfront Esplanade, but this Esplanade was filled with Tanzanians, Africans of all color, lots of East Asians, and a diversity of Mazungos (white people/ foreigners) We had dinner at a Thai restaurant on the waterfront and watching the sun going down across the harbor in Dar es Salaam. The sound of a disco in the background, children wheeling around on little bicycles, families strolling along the Promenade, and occasional women in a burqa, a few women in the multicolored scarves for a hijab. The conversations in the wind were of Swahili, English with accents of all kinds,