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A couple of days ago we decided to make a plan! Yesterday we had to change it! The plan was to go by bus to Dodoma and then take the train to Kigoma with a stop in Tabora in case it would take too many hours. Well; first of all it felt more like flying to Dodoma as the bus driver drove so fast that we were ready for take off any seconds and every speed bump (about 100) actually made us fly a couple of meters. Secondly we realised that the railway might be there, but it didn't seem to be extremely active... They even had gates on the track. We went to the Train station; a barn, to ask them just in case and found out that it would take appr. 24 hours to get to Kigoma at least! It was a high possibility that the train would break down and take another 12 hours before it would be fixed! The old Marika would have been pissed and would inform them that that's just insane, but the new Marika laughed and thought well TIA (this is Africa)! So instead of taking the 24+ hour train to Kigoma we changed our plans and decided to go the other way to Morogoro. Not by train as that would take 7+ h, but by bus (3,5h).
This isn't the first time we have troubles with the trains. In Mombasa we were supposed to take the train to Arusha, but when we asked the guy he said:
"The train is not active anymore."
"Since when?" I asked.
"Since 20 years ago"
"But why is it still on the map then?"
"The railway is still there", he replied as if that was the most obvious thing in the world.
Well well, it was ok to go by bus.
even if we had been on a bus for 9 hours to get from Arusha to Dodoma, we decided to go the next morning anyway. We stayed at the Christian Council guest house and belive it or not but we actually entered the church! for 5 min, but still. We arrived in Morogoro almost on schedule; just 2,5h late! New record! We almost didn't get a place to stay as as hotels for some reason denied us at the door. At first I thought that it was because we are mzungu's (white people) but then I realised that it was because we wanted a double room and didn't accept paying for 2 single rooms. They thought we were lesboes and that was just Not acceptable there! in the end we convinced one hotel that we were sisters by showing them our passports and they finally let us stay in a double room. Stupid conservative people!
But luckily we don't have to sleep on the streets tonight! We'll stay here 2 nights before we continue to the coast. We will try to avoid Dar-es-Salaam, but in order to get to Maffia island I think we have to take a ferry from there. Well, it can't be That aweful!
So please learn from this; don't take the train in Kenya or Tanzania and don't travel with someone of the same sex only! :)
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mamsen Du verkar kommit in i Afrikatempo, men hur går det för Sanna som hade det innan, är hon i rörelse alls, hi hi,