Screaming Children, Thieving Monkeys, and Learning Swahili

Three weeks after our arrival in Tanzania we found ourselves on the road to Language School. Located in the town of Usa River, our home for the next three weeks was a Danish run hostel offering up training courses in everything from business to language. We arrived for our first session of Kiswahili training, pulling into the parking lot the evening before our first classes were scheduled to begin.

We were given a room in the back of the compound, a two-room affair big enough for two beds and a couple of suitcases. The school offered an early dinner for families, so we left for the dining hall almost immediately after dropping off our luggage. We found out at dinner that night that we were the only family, and would be for the remainder of our three weeks there. So we ate dinner alone in the dining room. The food was a buffet, but because we were the only ones present, the chef would only remove the lids of each item one by one as we passed through the line. This gave off the odd sense of a really tiny scale surprise party, as each new lid breaking free from its pot provided a new revelation of sights and smells. More often than not however, the sight of whatever was gurgling under that lid was a party I’d wished I hadn’t been invited to. Over the course of our time at language school, each of us would be sick at least once from something hiding in those bins. Regardless, his smiling expectant face dictated we heap generous portions of each bin’s offering onto our plate.

That evening Deanna and I lay in bed listening to the sounds of monkeys jumping up and down on our aluminum sheet roof. It was an all night affair.

In the morning we got ready and walked down the wooded corridor to the kids’ classes. For each day we had classes, the kids were also provided with separate activities in a neighboring building, a brightly painted room on the top of a little hill. When we dropped them off they screamed and cried. They didn’t want to stay, and they certainly didn’t want us to leave them.

Each day for the next three weeks this pattern would continue. Elliana, for her part, actually grew to like the little class and ceased complaining every time we dropped her off. But Ian, our youngest, continued to scream as if each day was the beginning of a fresh new session of torture. The only way the teachers eventually learned to pacify him was by providing him with heaping plates of bananas each time he arrived. He’d gnaw on them in consolation as we snuck off through the back door. Although eventually even this proved ineffective, as he soon learned the bananas were merely a distraction. He still ate them, only this time he did so with shifty eyes and increased vigilance, staring us down the entire time as if challenging us to make our move. But they persisted, and we’re even rewarded with a field trip one day. The teacher took them on a short jaunt down the road to the Tanzania National Artificial Insemination Center. The conversation that night at dinner was laced with details no small children should know.

Our class was a simplistic affair. Along with five other foreigners we sat around a small wooden table and a room full of flip charts. Along with us was a young girl studying abroad, a retired German fellow who was here to do business training, and an elderly Danish couple, both of whom were retired doctors. Our teacher was an approximately 115-year-old Tanzanian lady named Mama Louis, taken to the educational tactics of shame and embarrassment. I often feared my incorrect answers would lead to my direct instruction to go out in the woods and cut a switch. I say this without a bit of sarcasm, she made Deanna cry at least 3 times. One afternoon during a particular compelling discussion of Tanzanian vegetables Mama Louis asked if we knew what a pumpkin was. When we explained that they were common in the U.S. during the fall and were often used as decorations on the exterior of homes she stood slack jawed. The idea that Americans would just waste a piece of food like that was beyond her.

Each day at 10 we were allowed a momentary reprieve for chai, as the entire compound shut down for a cup of tea. Then it was back to classes until lunchtime. Then we would meet up with the kids for a few brief moments of sustenance before repeating the task of returning the kids to their own classes for the remainder of the afternoon.

One such afternoon we decided to try eating outside for the day. Because the school offered all types of classes some days the cafeteria would be packed with people coming in for a simple day class, making finding a table for 4 an impossibility. We grabbed some trays of food and retreated to a small portico just off the main building. I sat down with the kids and their food as Deanna ran back inside to get napkins and cutlery. At this point I started to notice the monkeys. They were leering at us from their perches around the roof of the building. Soon leering turned to cackling, their shrill shrieking announcing what we would later realize was a bit of a primitive war cry.

Finally, the biggest of the monkeys lept down from the corner of the lattice he had fastened himself too. He inched his way towards our table. Soon he was only 2 feet away from Elliana. In one swift movement he stood up on his hind legs, stretching almost 4 feet high. He hissed like a cat, a prolonged and eerily feline outburst. With one arm he swung in the direction of my head. I ducked as his arm shot past my face and ended on his intended destination, Elliana’s plate. He grabbed her roll before scurrying up and over a railing. I grabbed our trays and the kids and we nearly knocked over Deanna as she was coming out of the cafeteria with the silverware and we were rush in. “Come on I shouted, before they take our lives!” We did not eat outside again.

I learned later these were Vervet monkeys. This species, apart from humans, are the world’s most numerous primates. They are common throughout East Africa, highlighted by greyish coats and deep black faces. Even now, almost three years later, each time I catch sight of one of their bright blue scrotums skittering across a tree, a shiver of fear runs up my spine, and I hold tightly to my baked goods.

After 3 weeks at language school and no more monkey attacks things began to settle. Aside from Elliana being attacked by termites on the playground and a deftly avoided disaster of not allowing her to find our there was a lizard trapped in her mosquito net, the days just sort of floated by. I’m not sure we learned as much Swahili as we had intended, but by the end of it all we were crammed full of sentence structure, tenses, and minor vocabulary.

But as we arrived for our final days of classes I still hadn’t learned the one thing about the language I had hoped. I was not going to let that opportunity slip by. As class wound down on our final day we were given the opportunity to ask any final questions we might have. After several students expressed their thanks to our teacher and generally just fluttered away the afternoon, I raised my hand.

“Yes, bwana Scott,” Mama Louis called out.

“Mama Louis, we’ve learned a lot and for that we are thankful. But, I feel like we’ve missed some core curriculum. Please teach us the words we shouldn’t be using. How will I know if I make a mistake? I think we need to know Swahili swear words.”

She was taken back, but she chuckled a bit and responded, “How can you ask a sweet elderly woman to teach such filth? I certainly cannot.” “But,” she playfully added, “I’ll go get one of the young teachers, he’ll teach you.” She left the room and returned with a young male teacher, probably 30 years old.

“So you want to know the bad words? It’s come to this has it?” He asked. “Ok, I’d be glad to teach you. We will play a game. If you want to know the Swahili curse word, you must first tell me the English equivalent.” The room fell silent. Everyone giggled under his or her breath, but no one spoke. Finally, the tiny Dutch doctor raised her hand.

“Yes,” he called on her.

She looked up, half laughing and half hesitating. Her lips pursed and she blurted out, almost inquisitively, “----?” The F-bomb dropped and the room exploded.

Words that would make your mother rush for the bar of soap began flying around the room, then quickly written on the board alongside their Swahili equivalent. By the time we finished the room felt exhausted, and we had compiled a list so filthy I’m almost ashamed to look at it even now, as a copy sits dormant in my notebook. To supplement the material I also learned a new inappropriate Tanzanian handshake. By sliding a finger between the two hands during a greeting and wiggling it back and forth you can let the intended party know you wish to have sex with them. I have put this to use frequently with my wife since then. It has yet to work.

That’s how we ended language school. We picked up the kids from their class one last time, I showered enough to wash the swears from my body, and we packed the Land Cruiser again. The entire family felt a strong sense of accomplishment and relief as we pulled out of the parking lot and began the 3 hour drive back to our home in Babati. But, we all understood at that point, although no one dared say it at the time, that in one short month we had to return again for intermediate training. I sighed thinking it over in my mind, and muttered a new Swahili vocabulary word under my breath.