Errands in Arusha

This term, I don't have classes on Thursday, so that's generally the day that I go with Beth and Michela, and whoever else needs to go, to Arusha to run errands and go grocery shopping.  Today, we had a few unusual errands, so here are some pictures of our day. 

First, we needed to go out to the Kahindi Mechanic Shop, where one of the Shorts' cars is being worked on, to check on the progress.  The road out to the mechanic passes by a small quarry where rock is dug up and turned into gravel.  The gravel is made the old-fashioned way--there is no big grinder, just some people sitting around with hammers beating the rocks into smaller and smaller chunks to earn a pittance for the gravel they produce.  

After finishing at the mechanic, we headed downtown to buy vegetables at the big central market.  While we were down there, I stopped by a roadside stand to have more library keys and an extra set of keys for my house made. 

Next, we we to the home of Ali Shariff, and Indian expat who runs a hair salon out of his home.  Well, half the week he works out of a space he has at Sable Square, a shopping center in an area with a lot of expats, and half the time he works out of his home salon.  While there are salons (well, 'saloons', someone got the words mixed up decades ago and it stuck) everywhere, he's the only one we've found who caters to non-African hair. 

He's quite a character.  He loves animals; he has a couple of cats and a whole pack of small fluffy lapdogs running around the place.  Around back, there're several cages with all sorts of exotic birds.  He also has a set of concrete zebra statues in his front yard.  Emmy liked the baby one, but was rather scared of the adult-sized one.

We ended the day at the TFA Plaza, where our favorite large grocery store, Shoppers, is.  While there, we stopped by Rachel's Fabric Shop.  She has an amazing selection of kitenge fabrics, especially batiks.  We also used to have clothes made there, but the seamstress we liked went on maternity leave and none of us are impressed with the work of the new seamstress.  It's fun to look around there, but I'm always tempted to buy more fabric than I really need.  Today, I looked through some of the ready-made dresses they had, and I found one I really liked.  I probably wouldn't have picked this color scheme if I was starting from scratch, but it's different from anything I already have and will match well with a jacket and a scarf that I already have.  So, I have a new dress.  :)