Quite some time ago I was in a minor traffic accident. The incident happened during PST in Morogoro and until now I have refrained from publicly sharing the details to save family and friends from excessive worry. I share with you now what happened because the story illustrates several important and interesting aspects of Tanzanian culture. Before I continue, however, let me preface by saying that my wounds have healed, I am nearly fully recovered, and I have no lasting damage besides a killer scar, i.e. my African Tattoo. So here begins the tale of my accident, or to translate from the Kiswahili, my meeting with fate.
Only two weeks into homestay and already feeling delightfully overwhelmed from several full days of learning Kiswahili followed by a bombardement of vocabulary at home with my non-English speaking mama and dada, most of us trainees were ready for a break. Half of us spent the day hiking in the Uluguru Mountains, enjoying the outdoors and the beauty of the scenery so close to our Tanzanian homestays. After the day’s hike and a short break for fresh juice in town with a couple friends, I boarded a daladala, the local public transportation, and was on my way home. The daladala arrived at the corner near Sumaye, my training school, and I jumped onto the path off the road, opting to meander the paths between the maduka and the homes rather than walking in the road. I’ve always been cautious and a bit nervous walking in the street on account of all the crazy drivers that seem to zoom past without regard for what (or whom) they are sharing the road with, and on this particular day I made a conscious decision to walk elsewhere, though upon reaching the Sumaye grounds a row of shrubs prevented me from walking along the paths any further. So I jumped over the ditch and onto the road, making sure to walk near the edge and facing traffic so I could easily jump out of the way should any crazy daladala drivers swerve in my direction.
On the roads in Tanzania there is a pecking order of traffic. Semis, lorrys, and trucks carrying petrol are king and the hierarchy continues with buses, vans, cars, pikipikis (motorcycles), and ends with pedestrians. The road in my homestay village is barely wide enough to fit two vehicles and the smaller yields to the bigger; likewise, pedestrians are expected to jump out of the path of an oncoming vehicle if necessary. In Tanzania road accidents are far too common and far too horrendous. In my travels ’round Tanzania thus far I’ve seen cars compressed to nothing, blood covering the seats, blood spattered on the road, windows shattered, far too many disturbing sights to make me want to take too many unnecessary bus rides. Pikipiki accidents happen to be quite common in Morogoro.
So I walked on the road, albeit not without hesitation, and strangely a bit more on this particular day than most others. And I saw an oncoming pikipiki and I thought it looked a bit too much like he was driving straight for me and in fact he was. I had nowhere to jump except in the ditch but before I could he was gone, he drove right on by and came just inches away from hitting me. His arm may have even brushed mine and I was so freaked out my heart stopped for a second and I stopped walking. And I decided to get off the road as soon as I got past the rest of the shrubs, I could jump to safety across from the baobab tree. I walked a few more steps searching for the spot and suddenly…WHAM — I felt an impact and realized I had fallen to the ground. I was propelled forward, rolling in the dirt, and there was nothing I could do. I had just been hit by a pikipiki. “Mwalimu amegongwa! Mwalimu amegongwa!” people screamed. “The teacher has been hit!” I regained my senses, realized I had a huge gash on my right leg but could still move my toes, and started thinking to myself what the hell I was going to do about this. Suddenly I was surrounded by people I did not recognize, screaming things at me in a language I did not understand, and all I knew was that my dada, my homestay big sister, would be able to figure everything out. “Leta Mwasi!” I screamed. “Leta Mwasi!” was about all I could muster in my present state and just a few weeks into my Kiswahili lessons. I could still move my toes, I am in Morogoro, Peace Corps is here, I kept thinking. An administrator from my school called Roger heard the screams of the crowd and come to help. Upon seeing him a wave of relief washed over me and I instantly felt a thousand times calmer, he knows who I am, he know my LCF (my Peace Corps language facilitator), he can help get me to a hospital… I can still move my toes. I saw a girl of 14 to whom I’ve been giving casual English lessons and I breathed another sigh of relief. I saw a mob of people surrounding me and looked around for another mob chasing after the driver of the pikipiki but saw nothing except for a dumped bike on the ground. I can still move my toes.
I looked for the driver half expecting to see another mob headed his way, a group of angry bystanders seeking justice which wouldn’t otherwise come from the police. Here people often take matters into their own hands. It doesn’t happen every time but it’s certainly not unheard of for a criminal, a thief, or someone who inflicts harm to another to be subject to a mob beating, a thief being called out in a crowd and then beaten to death by strangers. The driver didn’t hit me on purpose and I hoped I wouldn’t see an angry mob, and to my comfort and the driver’s good fortune there was nothing of the sort.
I dressed the wound with the kangha I had been using to cover my shoulders and Roger let me use his phone, “make any calls you need,” he said. I called the Peace Corps Duty Officer and Roger sent for a daladala to take me to the hospital. He and a friend of my dada lifted me into the daladala, us sitting in the front row and about eight people in back, people that weren’t there to help but just there because they were on their way somewhere. I had to get the hospital and they still had to get into town, just on a slight detour now. We arrived at the Morogoro Regional Hospital and Roger checked me in, paid the fees, let me make a few more calls, and I saw Peace Corps staff arrive with the headmaster of my school. I knew everything was going to be fine but I couldn’t help shed a few tears; I was, after all, in a brand new country where I couldn’t speak much of the language and though I knew the people around me and knew I would be fine I wanted to be at home with my American family, my American friends, and I wanted my Peace Corps friends there with me. Roger saw my tears and told me not to cry. I saw a tall, thin Maasai, dressed in red and purple robe in the waiting area and I diverted my thoughts to him, trying to distract myself from the situation I found myself in. What would this man do if he were in my shoes?
In Tanzania nobody cries at a time like this. Pikipiki accidents happen all the time and many are fatal. A wound like mine isn’t serious, people are afflicted with things much, much worse, and to cry in this situation is seen as childish, weak, immature. Children die during infancy, people die from AIDS, from malaria, from malnutrion, from all kinds of sicknesses and funerals are far too common. A gash in a leg is little more than a papercut here. Though I knew it wasn’t something to shed tears over here, I couldn’t help but a few.
Peace Corps wanted me to relocate from the government hospital to a private one on the outskirts of town and a driver came to take me, Roger, my dada and her friend, and four or five Peace Corps staff there. While we waited for the nurses to prepare things for cleaning and stitching my wound, one of the Peace Corps staff stood by my side, talking to me and making jokes. She asked about the kangha around the wound. She told me a real African woman would never leave home without at least one kangha in her bag. “You are a real African woman,” she said with a smile, and we laughed.
In Tanzania what is one person’s problem is everyone’s problem. People in my community instantly came to help. The headmistress of my school accompanied me to the hospital. And Roger was there with me the whole time, someone whom I didn’t know too well but who offered his phone, paid the hospital bill out of his own pocket (later to be reimbursed by Peace Corps), and supported me throughout. Several Peace Corps staff, LCFs and other training staff, were there to help. The entire waiting room of the hospital was overtaken by people there to make sure I was being taken care of. And when I was on crutches nearly every person I spoke to, or even just said habari? to, gave me a heartfelt pole sana, because my injury is somehow their problem, too, they sympathize and understand.
Before I was stitched a fellow PCT arrived to my comfort and aid at the hospital. I am forever grateful she came to help. Peace Corps staff had been super helpful but it was so good to have Vero there by my side, someone with whom I had developed a friendship with and who I knew I could trust and who would make me laugh. I received 11 sutures to stitch a cut on my leg about four inches long, I don’t even know how deep, and three on the top of my left foot. I have pictures of before and after. I was lucky to have come out like I did. No broken bones, no concussion. A mob of strangers to help, and people to do everything they could to make sure I was alright. A network of Peace Corps staff to stand by my side, and a good friend to help me. Not to mention my REI thermos which was in my lumbar pack, softening the blow from the handlebars to my spine. That was a lifesaver.
There is a baobab tree near the place I was hit. Near this baobab tree lives a man who became infamous in Bigwa, my homestay village, about one week after my incident. For reasons we may never understand this man was said to have castrated himself then proceeded to chop the remains in half and throw them into the same street, in nearly the same spot I was hit. People in Bigwa were saying the tree is cursed, there is witchcraft there, and the tree should be removed. That two incidents occurred in the same spot is no coincidence to them. It is God’s will, or perhaps the will of something else.
My pikipiki incident was what my LCF would call a “teachable moment;” I learned a lot about the culture of Tanzania and also some new vocabulary: kushonwa, to be stitched, nyuzi, stitches, and kupata ajali, to have an accident. Later as I was writing some of this new vocabulary down I looked up ajali and realized it also meant fate, that there is no distinction from getting into an accident and meeting one’s fate. Tanzanians are fatalists: if a student passes an exam it is God’s will, if you get hit by a pikipiki it’s because it was meant to be. Every day they wake up safe because God willed it for them. Everything is attributed to some other force, something metaphysical, be it God or witchery of some kind. And who knows, maybe that has something to do with why I was thinking about getting hit at the exact moment it happened, why I fell to the ground thinking “well isn’t this ironic,” relatively unphased by the accident, and as a result my body was a bit more relaxed and a bit more resilient, and I came out just fine.
And if you’ve got the stomach for it I’ve got a great photo of my leg splayed open with some insides coming out.
Danielle in Tanzania 