Harvard College Student Blog

When I dubbed last week (with my Zanzibar trip and a successful meeting with my principle investigator) as the best week ever, I might have spoke too soon. Alternatively, the best case scenario is that I’m having consecutive best weeks ever…let’s run with that.

The most epic week of my whole summer internship (thus far) and I didn’t even go to work once. Very analogous to those learning moments outside of the classroom – that is what the summer is for after all, right?

This summer, I’m serving as a research intern in clinical trials revolving around maternal health and nutrition. It’s my first time handling clinical trials and I’m definitely learning my fair share of the triumphs as well as the difficulties of protocol vs. practice. Did I mention I’m working in Africa? Yep, I’ve landed the dream “job” at age 21 by participating in the Global Health Institute’s international summer undergraduate research fellowship (iSURF) program.

Since iSURF is a fan of the buddy system and sends at least 2 students per destination abroad, I have a summer program partner, Leanna, and although we work on different projects and in different areas of the city, we try to align our African travel plans – because we too are fans of the buddy system. A bit of planning and flexibility allows students abroad to exploit their summer destinations. One of Leanna’s best friends and blockmates (a group of up to 8 friends that you tell the college you’re obsessed with during the spring semester of your freshman year to ensure that your group is placed together in the same upperclassman house for the remaining three years of undergrad) is pursuing research for her senior thesis in East Africa. They had roughly planned to hike Mt. Kilimanjaro, the highest peak in Africa, together this summer. When her plans fell through, Leanna was still determined to hike it and I was pretty much indifferently down for the ride. Let’s keep in mind that I’ve never been camping for more than one night and for whatever reason, the sound of 6 days didn’t alarm me.

A view of Kilimanjaro from our bus ride. We were entranced about how the peak just pops above the clouds!

Leanna spearheaded planning the entire Mt. Kilimanjaro hike. Many Harvard students volunteer with SIC, Support for International Change, and she had heard of a partnership between SIC and a hiking company. We rode SIC’s coattails for their student discounts and had semi-strategically/semi-luckily planned our 6 day hike up Mt. Kilimanjaro to begin one day before the federal government of Tanzania imposes a hefty, high-season tourist tax.

I would have done a lot to avoid the taxes – but it would have been worth it regardless! Just look at this view from the rainforest, near the base of the mountain!

Everything seemed to be going our way! We bought bus tickets for a 12 hour ride to the base of the mountain and although our tickets mistakenly noted the wrong day, we didn’t have a problem boarding! The bus seats reclined and the Bongo-flavor music was all very conducive to sleeping. When slumber wasn’t on our side, we were easily amused by the passing of the beautiful green scenery as well as what we suspected to be a baobab tree forest!

Wiped out from the long bus ride, we turned in early despite the Friday night ambiance.

Saturday began with a hefty breakfast along with an introduction to our head guide named Kombe who visited us at our hostel to help us with our rental gear as well as give us a brief overview of our imminent week of hiking. After an initial blood oxygen level and pulse check, we bid farewell, knowing that the next time we met, we would be starting our ascent of Mt. Kilimanjaro.

Leanna and I spent the rest of Saturday food-touring the small town of Arusha and met up with a friend we made through mutual friends at Zanzibar last week. Her name was Lauren and although she was based in Arusha, she had yet to explore an arts and crafts center called Cultural Heritage.

Cultural Heritage was a huge arts center that included the largest collection of Tanzanite gems. Our eyes sparkled just as much as the gems as we stared, but we quickly made our way to the large art gallery next door.

A view from inside the art gallery

The gallery was fantastic! From architecture to content, the building fitted with stained glass window and spiraled around an impressive showcase boasting the most prominent aspects of African culture, from tribes to animals. There were plaques and framed letters of US presidents George Bush and Bill Clinton visits; too bad Obama wasn’t planning on coming to the Cultural Heritage center during his POTUS visit!

While roaming the town, we stumbled upon a library and nervously/curiously entered. To our surprise and shock, the library was absolutely crowded both on the basement and ground floor … on a beautiful Saturday afternoon!

Obligatory creeper pictures to highlight some studious Tanzanians!

As the adventurous young adults Leanna and I strive to be, we also called Saturday an early night in an attempt to relish our last night in a bed under a roof for the upcoming week. There were no regrets about our decisions Sunday morning when we were picked up by our hiking company and started making the short drive to the starting gate of the Machame route where we’d be spending the next 6 days.

Get it?! … X for X-treme! 🙂
At the starting gate – after registration and right before beginning!

At the entrance, we met our entourage – or as we endearingly nicknamed our crew: mantourage – which consisted of 2 guides, a chef, a waiter, a toilet-master, and 6 porters. 11 men to take care of 2 girls for 6 days. Yeah, the numbers seemed about right.

In too deep to turn back now…

Leanna has camping experience and she was able to call our adventure the most luxurious camping she’s ever done. I, on the other hand, during this camping trip, gathered very high standards for what camping should be like; the disclaimer here being that our 6 day Mt. Kilimanjaro hike was enough camping for my lifetime. (I’ll probably avoid camping again at all costs, but make sure everybody knows about that one time I hiked to Africa’s rooftop in 6 days.) We were essentially waited on hand and foot: everyone in our mantourage (except for our guides) would race up and down the mountain much faster in order to have our campsite set up upon arrival. Leanna and I were woken up daily to a hot beverage delivered to our sleeping bags and there was even “warm water for washing” in buckets right outside our sleeping tent twice a day. There was no doubt we ate better on Mt. Kilimanjaro than in lower elevations when we were responsible for feeding ourselves.

Feeling like CHAMPS after Day 1 of hiking through the rainforest.

Throughout our 6 day route, we made our way up to the nearly 6000 meter peak, Uhuru Point. The most pleasant surprise was reaching the summit on July 4^th. I think it’s fair that students always get a burst of patriotism when abroad. Leanna and I may not have had an American flag to boast on Africa’s rooftop, but when we weren’t desperately trying to breathe oxygen into our lungs, we were radiating American vibes as best we could. Most of the hikers we ran into were American and reaching the summit not only felt like an escape from Africa, but also an escape from the real world.

…or maybe I was just feeling like there was some out-of-body experience happening because I was majorly oxygen deprived. I’m talking about a blood oxygen level hovering around 60%. This is when studying neurobiology serves as a disadvantage because I start listing all the neurons and organs that have most likely already suffocated to their demise. I wasn’t really aware of (or maybe I was denying) the severity of the situation. All I knew was that I was beyond super sleepy (on the verge of losing consciousness?) and very nauseous. I could n o t come to terms with not reaching the summit, especially after enduring so much dirt everywhere for so many days. I thankfully reached the top of the mountain with the hand-holding of my guide and raced down quickly after to chase some oxygen. Okay, so maybe Harvard kids are a little intense, but at least we’re not just intense about academics…?

Stella Point – not quite the summit, but an hour away – I wish someone had warned me about all this trickery!! Hey Tanzania, let’s not put congratulatory signs at non-summit points. Thanks.

Finally at Uhuru Point – Africa’s rooftop. Severely oxygen deprived & nauseous. Worth it? ABSOLUTELY.

It’s insane how many ecosystems you pass while hiking 6000 meters! We went through rainforests, deserts, heathers and moors! Mid-way through Day 2 of hiking, we were already above the clouds.

We’re breathing in a cloud!!!!!

The views of fluffy beds of clouds beneath us were priceless. Clouds would often roll right through our hiking trails and provide a movie set-like backdrop; I’d have to cue Leanna here to mention all the Lord of the Rings/Game of Thrones references I didn’t understand…

The entire week of hiking was not as physically rigorous as I thought it would entail – except for summit day of course. On summit day, you start hiking at midnight, trying to reach the peak around sunrise. This means you get very little sleep and it’s FREEZING. The wind was mercilessly whipping my face regardless of the direction I was facing.

Our guides called this “Kilimanjaro Cocaine.” Let’s just say this definitely pushed me up the mountain.

I countered this by taking gulps of straight up glucose provided by my guides. Yet, This isn’t to say the the 6 day adventure wasn’t exhausting, but I’m confident that most people could handle the level of hiking difficulty! In my opinion, Mt. Kilimanjaro is less of a physical battle and more of a biological battle. You struggle with things out of your control – the two main things being the cold and the altitude. With four pairs of pants on, Leanna and I were equipped to fight the cold (although our painfully freezing fingers and toes wailed in disagreement – I was just happy I could still feel pain rather than having my extremities go numb!!). However, I struggled a ton on summit day with altitude sickness and experienced my first oxygen mask…an overload of scary excitement! University Health Services, UHS, and abroad programs partner up before students go abroad to ensure students have all their necessary vaccinations as well as appropriate medications (i.e. altitude/diarrhea pills). With their medical support, we were prepared as well as we could be for the hike but mountain conditions are so unpredictable!

I still think my most physically challenging quest was hiking the Colca Canyon in Peru last summer after my Summer Internship Program (SIP) with the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS), but summit day of Mt. Kilimanjaro was by far my most biologically challenging adventure. Is it ironic that I have Harvard to thank for an overwhelming majority of my blissful challenges whether that be academic, social, physical, and biological? College has definitely been a transformative and fulfilling experience if I’ve ever had one.

Overall, the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro was a super scary experience as it was happening and I’m lucky to say that I have no regrets. Reaching Africa’s rooftop was an experience unlike any other and I’m confident that this is a true statement I can continue to make throughout my life. It was my very first time doing anything of this kind – camping?? extreme mountain hiking?? Crazy.

You may have noticed that this blog sort of jumps all over the place. This can be explained by 1) my tendency to ramble, 2) all of my EMOTIONS – I’m so proud and happy for myself, for conquering something I didn’t even know was on my bucket list; but I’m also still debating whether or not it was stupid of me for doing something that brought me so close to kicking the bucket, and/or 3) the overload of events over the course of a single week that I’m still trying to process – I hiked ~19,500 feet, WHAT?!

Matters didn’t even really slow down off the mountain! We had scheduled one more day in the small town of Moshi which lies at the base of the mountain before returning to our internships. Plans were looking pretty grim as it seemed as if Leanna’s throat infection evolved into bronchitis during our hike. After consulting with a physician at the closest public hospital, Leanna chose to spend the day indoors. However, I met some New Zealand travelers in our hostel and ventured out with them to the nearby waterfalls and other attractions.

At the Moshi waterfalls with some New Zealand friends I picked up along the way

A week of pure nature without any responsibilities or distractions – amazing. I highly recommend it. But I have to admit it was really nice returning to civilization and being able to communicate with my family and friends regularly. And if we’re on the confession train here, I also hated returning to flooded inboxes and the guilt-driven impulse to reply immediately. Technology is such a double edged sword/catch 22. I have some really hefty travel plans for after my internship ends so we’ll have to wait and see how technology serves me then. Just 2 more weeks until my internship is over, but this in no way reflects that the summer is almost over!

Students tend to feel the stress of summer planning during the spring semester. To be fair, our month-long J-term (January break/winter break) has recharged and prepared us to tackle the extra load of stress; especially since final exams are now before – rather than after – the break.

I had one goal for this summer: go abroad. (My sub-goal was to secure a warm location that was conducive to tanning.) My aspiration isn’t unique and when there’s such a high demand to experience life abroad, Harvard tries to supply. There is a ton of support for students’ foreign aspirations such as the OIP (Office of International Programs) or its sister, the OIE (Office of International Education). From studying and interning abroad, if the variety of Harvard programs doesn’t fit your appetite, it’s not uncommon to apply to other universities’ programs. All the opportunities can be a little overwhelming and a little more difficult to navigate – but this is more of a good problem to have.

Last summer, I participated in the Summer Internship Program (SIP) through the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS) in Lima, Peru where Harvard runs several summer programs. I had some friends who were based also in Lima, but were participating in the international summer undergraduate research fellowship (iSURF) program through the Global Health Institute. I filed the latter program’s name in the back of my mind when I learned that acceptance into the program came with automatic funding! The iSURF program supports 8-10 week projects all over the globe (with the SURF program supporting domestic projects).

With my endeavors to achieve a secondary (more commonly known as minors at other universities) in Global Health and Health Policy, I researched projects pertaining to nutrition and was ultimately placed in Tanzania for the summer to jump on board with clinical trials examining maternal health and nutrition in the context of malaria. Abroad? Check. Tanning potential? Very high. My summer internship offer was a once in a lifetime opportunity to pursue many “firsts”: venturing out to the African continent and acquiring experience in clinical research. If this isn’t the American dream, it’s definitely the premed dream coming into fruition.

In the midst of summer planning stress, it’s important to remember that with a little planning, we can make it something special. –> This was a cheesy-cute introduction of a current summer email thread among fellow summer interns in Tanzania. I like to think we’re a very eclectic group that’s not very representative of a normal population sample. Although a handful of us are still in our undergrad, most of my friends are 1) in grad school (studying something along the lines of international development), 2) have volunteered in the Peace Corps, and 3) have DC origins. We all came together in quirky ways – from a Harvard in Africa summer contact list to random chance encounters. Our “how we met” stories all seem very shady on both the surface and deeper levels, but the more important thing is that we’re sticking together while we’re grasping Tanzanian culture.

Our process of cultural immersion would most definitely be incomplete without a trip to Zanzibar.

The domestic airport is full of baby aircrafts!

Unashamedly pretending to board my private jet to Zanzibar.

Incredible views for the short plane trip!

Before arriving to Tanzania, I was ordered to go to Zanzibar by every single person I knew who has stepped foot in this wonderful country. The opportune weekend finally presented itself so my iSURF program partner and I extended the weekend from Friday to Monday. We spent four fabulous days and three glorious nights in Zanzibar with each night on a different part of the dream-like island.

Stone Town, Zanzibar – no worries with a view like this!

Kendwa Rocks, Zanzibar – not too shabby, eh?

My Zanzibar trip was phenomenal. The pictures don’t do the paradise island justice, but it’s much better than what I could describe with words! It’s dangerously easy to fall in love with the island and its crystal clear ocean. For the first time ever, I pet a tortoise, ate lunch in the company of a peacock and his mistresses, and went snorkeling. When I returned home, I promptly declared Zanzibar as my honeymoon trip.

Prison Island with, like, a 156 year old tortoise!!!!

My home for the summer is in Tanzania where my research is based. I’ll never turn down the opportunity to travel, but I do prefer to travel to one place for an extended period of time so that it feels more of a home rather than a layover; this is just about the only way to discover the nooks and crannies – the real character – of any location.

Studying/working abroad is what I call a staycation: not exactly a vacation, but definitely not real life either because hard hitting responsibilities can be as transient as Zanzibar beaches. My Zanzibar trip was a pure vacation. I was sad when my weekend in paradise came to an end, until I realized I was only leaving one beach vacation and returning to a staycation – I’m no doubt the luckiest girl in the world!

In an attempt to get more comfortable in my summer home, I discovered a group of expats in the area who meet weekly to dine in a new restaurant.

Hibachi style – a Japanese tradition with a Tanzanian twang

The week that I had joined this expat group of foodies, it was their 100^th dinner and there was even a celebratory cake! It was both extremely intriguing and exciting to meet such a diverse group of people who had also made Tanzania their home from anywhere between a handful of weeks and up to 13 years! It’s always a refreshing experience to mingle with people who have gone through similar transition phases, Swahili learning curves, and culture shocks.

Speaking of shocks (warning: worst segue ever), my trip to Zanzibar was quite unexpected; but sometimes the best parts of traveling stem from flexibility. My iSURF program partner and I were initially planning on leaving the city to spend a week hiking to Africa’s rooftop – we wanted to hike Mt. Kilimanjaro, otherwise known as the highest peak on the African continent. Our plans were struck down due to calendar conflicts: Professor Wafaie, the Principle Investigator of my project (and an overall champ of every department ever), was traveling from Boston to Tanzania. All the postdocs I work with on a daily basis urged me to reschedule my Mt. Kilimanjaro climb which I did very willingly because I was excited to see the man in action!

I’m very content with the way things worked out. Professor Wafaie and I exchanged a few emails before last spring semester ended in an attempt to meet and acquaint each other before I started on his research project. However, the semester ended quicker than we anticipated and we settled for meeting in Tanzania. I finally got to meet him in a meeting which I anticipated to kind of just sit in on and observe. The highlight of the work-week was definitely when I contributed to the meeting – I felt like it was one of those moments that would have made Sheryl Sandberg proud.

This meeting was filled with all the head honchos of the medical school and our big team of researchers. You could sense the higher tensions all day in preparation for this meeting. I had been assigned to work on some blood samples for the day and I reported some numbers and statistics to my postdocs before the meeting. However, my overloaded postdocs were scrambling to locate the scratch piece of paper where they scribbled my numbers on so I spoke up and announced the numbers out loud, to which Professor Wafaie responded by thanking me personally! … !!

Best week ever.

The biggest chunk of my summer will be spent in Tanzania where I’m lending a helping hand in some clinical trials pertaining to maternal health and nutrition. I lucked out with this sweet summer internship with the help of Harvard’s Global Health Institute and their international summer undergraduate research fellowship (iSURF) program. The program catalyzed my access to busy professors, accomplished postdocs, as well as generous funding for an 8-10 week abroad adventure! It has provided me with all the ingredients and now it’s solely in my hands to make sure I concoct a scrumptious final product!

I’ve been studying up on malaria and how it relates to (deficiencies in) iron and vitamin A, but I think it’s safe to say I’ve learned much more about Tanzanian culture. I was told that people here spoke English; I was told a lie. In an attempt to start crawling over both the cultural and communication barriers, I’m trying to pick up useful phrases in Swahili.

Learning numbers is always a fundamental component to speaking any language – the practical reason being I can now bargain down prices! Yet counting has began to be a scary activity…! This fear stems from my senior year of college creeping closer. I can’t believe – and hate admitting – that three years of my young adult life have ended! I also can’t fathom that I’m approaching my third year of blogging! So many rightful exclamation points!

I still remember the very first blog post I ever wrote. I’m not sure if it’s the first blog that went live, but part of the application for becoming a student blogger involved writing two sample blog posts. I was completing the application at the beginning of my sophomore year and I was fresh out of my first collegiate summer which I spent at home. I wrote about my summer and the seemingly endless doubts and insecurities about spending the entire summer at home.

Generally, Harvard students are intense about utilizing their summers to propel and supplement their studies. I’m one of the biggest advocates for this year-around productivity as evidenced by my avid and enthusiastic participation in science camps during my high school summers. This summer mindset seems to culture the association that summers are only productive if spent anywhere but home. Thus, during an entire summer at home, it becomes very easy to feel like I was wasting time, wasting opportunities and wasting  resources. Every Facebook update from my college friends flashed adventurous world travels. Now, I am the obnoxious one who is not-so-subtly boasting my worldly travels via Facebook. But it’s important to remember my roots; it’s important to note that all my motivations for pursuing opportunities abroad stemmed from my summer at home when I realized how small I was which sparked one of the biggest urges to grow bigger by traveling wider. At that point, flying coast to coast between home and school seemed like the longest flight ever; yet now, the frequency of international flights is at least equivalent to the number of domestic flights I take! I feel beyond fortunate that my interest in healthcare and development easily affords me opportunities to work abroad – not to mention Harvard’s resources and support which makes the logistics of it all even easier.

Every single person I meet stresses the importance of traveling now, when I’m “still young.” It may seem like I’m short on money now, but apparently I’ll be more pressed for time in the future. I’ve willingly taken their advice to dedicate my endeavors to exploring the world. Traveling can be hard, especially when you’re striving to strike the perfect balance between cheap and safety. Good thing there are endless excitements in Africa that constantly distract me 🙂

There is so much stimuli when you’re in a new country that it can be sometimes hard to remember that my first and foremost priority is my clinical research internship. Since I work at the Harvard Decision Science Lab as a research assistant during the semester, my clinical research summer internship is not my first time interacting with human participants. However, the studies we run at the interdisciplinary lab back in Cambridge usually are a one time gig rather than a series of repeated visits which is characteristic of clinical studies. I’m really getting a kick out of being involved in clinical research because I split my time in a research office, a wet lab, and the hospital environment – it’s the trifecta!

It took a few weeks for me to visit the hospital sites involved in the clinical trials, but it was well worth the wait! I loved meeting the enthusiastic nurses working with the trials as well as observing their relationships with the pregnant women. The study aims for monthly visits which have really fostered a trusting relationship between medical staff and patient – something I not only admire, but also yearn for myself!!

There are records on records at the sites! Space for all the information is often a problem.

An unexpected but nonetheless interesting aspect of my summer internship is the healthcare consulting component. The postdocs are very receptive to my thoughts and opinions about protocol and efficiency! I’ve made edits to their standard operating procedure and am in the process of renovating their database. It’s all very exciting because I feel like I’m an important member of their research team. I’m contributing to the project – which is something I couldn’t say last summer when I was shadowing at a private clinic in Peru.

A pharmacy near the research office distributes the supplements to the sites.

As previously mentioned, Harvard students are super determined to construct productive summers. Once j-term (January break/winter break) ends (and perhaps even during the break!), students jump start every spring semester with tons of summer applications. But don’t worry about us – the rough winter weather and of course the academic rigors concomitant to each spring semester also make students very mindful of burning out. In my personal efforts of refreshing myself, I joined some recently graduated Harvard College alum in their fun weekend plans!

The iSURF program always sends at least 2 students per location abroad. However, my program partner, Leanna, was sent ~500 km away to work at one of her sites. She’s working on a study revolving around maternal health and HIV, a study which has more distant sites than my own cases. Leanna was told she’ll be gone for at least 3 days and perhaps up to 2 weeks. I wasn’t surprised by the grand ambiguity because the concept of time seems abstract in just about every country; rather, I was more saddened by how long I’d be alone! Thank heavens there’s a Harvard in Africa contact spreadsheet that I was able to utilize as a preventative measure to my loneliness.

A Harvard College class of 2011 member, Sam, who has been in Tanzania for just a little short of a year, was introduced to me by the executive director of the Harvard Decision Science Lab where I’m a research assistant during the term time. Luckily for me, Sam and Alena are great hosts and they have shown me around one of the main markets in the city’s center. We got along well during our market times, mealtimes, and movie times. One of their friends was house sitting for a weekend and decided to host a dinner party. Plans were made to attend the dinner party in preparation for the city’s Full Moon Beach party. When I first arrived at my internship, a Dartmouth intern was ending her time in Tanzania and basically transitioned me into the internship. Not only did she show me the ropes around the job, but she also emphasized that there was a Full Moon Beach party once a month that I was not to miss – she even made it sound like it was in my job description to attend!

The dinner party and the Full Moon Beach party far exceeded my expectations! It was definitely one of my nights in Africa I’ll remember forever. We collectively cooked a delicious meal from all the random ingredients we had contributed. I don’t ever cook because I never need to – being on the full meal plan at school (like most students) and coming home to parents who dearly miss me, I always have the easy option of eating already prepared food! Creatively cooking was a lot of fun, as was snooping around the house we were house sitting for, which came with 4 pet ducks. The dance party afterwards was also really fun with great music, lights, and atmosphere. I was a bit nervous because all my company would be older than me by at least 3 years, but age never posed any obstacles of disconnect! It was a super fun, super memorable night/morning – everything in Tanzania happens really late (we ate dinner around 10 pm!)!

A handful of hours of sleep later, I hesitatingly woke up to my alarm. I had plans to meet another group of friends for the Tanzania vs. Ivory Coast soccer game, a FIFA World Cup qualifying match! My main link to this other group was through a Harvard College 2008 alumna who is interning with the US Embassy in Tanzania which provides housing for their interns so most of them were roommates if not also current graduate school classmates. It was my first professional soccer game and I was stoaked beyond belief! In all honesty, I was half stoaked, half scared; the same Dartmouth intern who had raved about the monthly Full Moon Beach party had also told me that she and 2 of her friends were mugged by thieves with knives outside the stadium. The sensible half of me told me to avoid the stadium at all costs, but the stubborn side of me reasoned that if I was with a big group of friends, everything would be okay.

Quickly did I learn that the stadium was synonymous to chaos. My friends and I had done everything we could think of to make the soccer game a nothing but pleasant experience – we got in a taxi to the stadium 3 hours before the game started and we splurged an extra $4 for VIP seats. There were, however, many more factors out of our control! First of all, they oversell tickets to the game so everyone is both eager and aggressive to enter the stadium. There appeared to be a huge bus that was selling tickets so people were crowding that bus and were even trying to climb up on the tires to crawl in the windows. The driver wanted to avoid everyone breaking into the bus so he sped down the road without any concern for the hundreds of people standing in the street. Additionally, there are multiple gates to the stadium that people swarm and shove their way inside. My friends and I stood in line for a while, but eventually gave in to join the mobs so that we’d be able to enter too. Pickpocketing is always a heightened concern in crowded areas. Some people tried to pickpocket some of my friends even when their hands were resting in their pockets! Someone did manage to pickpocket some cash out of my friend’s pocket, but this friend is fluent in Swahili so when he verbally confronted the thief, some mob justice ensued and random people in the crowd started beating the thief until the police broke it up. Needless to say, all heart beats were rapid.

Pulses remained high even after we managed to group-push our way through the initial gate. After a quick moment of relishing in our front gate triumph, we heard the crowd roar from cheers of happiness which sparked us to race towards the second, inner gate as to not miss any more of the action. At the second gate, people just wanted to push through in an unorganized manner, but the police were very adamant about mandating a single file entry and they were willing to use force. During my first attempt to pass, the man in front of me got hit a few times by a policeman’s stick so I instinctively turned around. My friend held my hand for the second attempt, but our link broke in the crowd and I was almost pushed into an officer. I was extremely fearful of getting beaten so when I almost stumbled into an officer, I threw my hands up in a surrender position. The police officer could probably see all the fear in my face even if he was blind; he smiled at me and it broke all the tension. We had a great moment. After this second entry, everything was smooth sailing! It was crazy to see how everyone’s barbaric behavior instantaneously disappeared when they could see the soccer field! Everyone was super nice inside the stadium and some strangers even helped me get a seat with a good view!

My friends and I were pretty shaken up from experiencing such a high concentration of seemingly near death moments. We decided to treat ourselves to some fabulous Chinese food – we did have another full week of work ahead of us!

I think I’ve told my soccer game story about a dozen times, adding more and more drama to each subsequent version. My stadium experience may seem horrifying and overly risky, but as I mentioned in my last post, the iSURF program grants participants pretty much complete freedom to make and handle our own decisions.  The soccer game was only a cool experience because all of my friends and I managed to leave unscathed. We’d be happy to have Lady Luck as a member of our friendship circle anytime!

PS – Sorry for the lack of pictures! I want to keep a clean, non-mugged tracked record so I often leave the camera at home.