a month in tanzania

welcome to introspection ft. harsehaj! ⭐️ i’m harsehaj, a 19 y/o always up to something in social good x tech.

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onto today’s topic: a month in tanzania 🇹🇿

i’m so blessed to live in such perpetual excitement. 

each day of the 27 i spent in tanzania was a new adventure with memories made and even more laughter shared. no matter how exhausted i was or how much i missed my mom’s cooking, i felt so buzzed from excitement and the promise of something new awaiting me by the end of the day. 

tanzania showed me the highest peaks (in more ways than one), my first authentic safari, and beaches with the bluest water i’ve ever seen. quite a top-tier spot for my very first real travel experience. as i write this while on my flight back home, the hours seem to be taking forever to pass by yet this month was over in a flash. we literally climbed that mountain 2 weeks ago … it feels like it has been ages. ⛰️

we started off our trip putting one foot in front of the other with the mantra of “pole pole” repeating in our minds. it seems like this mantra also translated to influence my temperament. the same way we trudged forward slowly, but steadily, i found that my patience also thickened and i mellowed out through this experience. i took my time to appreciate the world around me, and conversations where i would have previously gotten frustrated, i wasn’t even irritated in the slightest. this specific part of my character has been something i’ve been meaning to improve upon, and kilimanjaro bumped up the progress bar by a significant chunk. 

i started each morning off with a steaming cup of black tea clasped in my hands and checking to see if my hiking boots were as soaked as my sleeping bag was. this routine repeated for 7 days as my fatigue increased. high altitude sickness nicked quite a few of us, but we still summited, nausea and all. racing down the mountain on our last day was nothing short of glorious as i took out my camera and flipped through all of the photos from the last couple days.

we often huddled around uploading photos in our shared album, and air dropping them when the wifi failed us — a very frequent occurrence. our group was equipped with more cameras than people and taking photos of each other ended up becoming such a lovely part of our trip. 📸 flicking each other up, capturing memories to be eternal, and scrutinizing instagram post orders, there was a shared appreciation for content and photography in this group and i absolutely loved it. 

these photoshoot sessions were honestly also a highlight for me while celebrating my birthday. at some point, i completely forgot that my birthday was coming up but my friends took great care in making sure that i would never forget my 19th birthday, and how magical it was. earlier in the month, i had resolved to myself that my 19th would be a birthday that i’d have to just let pass by and wait to celebrate once i was reunited with my family back home. instead, i felt so special and loved by my friends around me as they positioned the day to revolve around what i wanted to do. the people pleaser in me found this terrifying. “i don’t want to ruin a day of everyone’s trip by making them do what i want,” was at the forefront of my mind the night before. celebrating myself felt pressuring, but that quickly washed away when i could feel the sincerity practically radiating from everyone. 

our camaraderie carried us through a lot. horrendously bumpy car rides rebranded as “african massages,” an 18-hour bus ride from arusha to dar es salaam (with only one stop), endless haggling and a stream of “cheap price for you my friend,” our jeep getting stuck in a muddy ditch, harassment in zanzibar, a lot of throwing up, and tons more. before this trip, we were all mostly strangers to one another. yes, some of us met during our scholarship weekend last year, but i certainly didn’t know anyone that well. perhaps this camaraderie was built through the trauma bonding on the mountain. perhaps it was the games of black 3s that we played any time a table was spotted. perhaps it was the writing food cravings in our notes app and devouring supermarket pizza together. 🍕

whatever it was, i’m so grateful for each and every member of our group. all of our personalities are so distinct, yet we just fit so well together.

i first saw uredo when i was waiting to join board our dc → addis ababa connecting flight to eventually reach kilimanjaro together. i was immediately drawn to her grounding energy and impressed by her photography. in a class 2 years above mine, i’m so glad my path crossed with uredo’s and will continue to weave their ways together. katarina, affectionately known as kiki, was next and through this trip she showed me what the embodiment of strength is. i’m grateful for kiki’s wonder-filled smile that i was fortunately able to capture on my camera many times. of course, philip followed after kiki — the younger of the sparling twins. ;) i appreciated witnessing philip grow into himself as the days went by, the frequency of his dad jokes increasing and selfless nature leaving me inspired. it was our group of 4 that spent the first night together and hit up george’s tavern for food (yikes). all 3 of them were complete strangers to me — i had never met any of them before. yet, that didn’t even register at the time because everything felt so natural. i’m only realizing now as i’m writing this post LOL. 

a few others trickled in by the next morning. kendall, whom i already had the pleasure of meeting at the explore fellowship, joined our morning chat on the front porch and let out his contagious laugh. although kendall was only with us for the hike, his laugh and wit left a lasting impression on me and there’s nobody else i’d choose to speed-hike with while blasting music. i ended most nights of this trip rooming with anjali. i appreciate her for our unspoken morning rituals and endless collection of riveting stories. i admire her storytelling and i hope to instil that in myself as well. on a similar note, i was impressed by randy’s ability to make a friend out of absolutely anyone. i’m grateful for his unwavering optimism and the deeper conversations we shared over this trip. ⭐️

i give a lot of credit to gaby for how frequently our group laughed. i’m so grateful for her ability to make someone laugh, and our long bus ride together (watching very questionable movies and eyeing some very questionable french women). prince turned out to be a local celebrity in tanzania with locals beckoning their “rafiki” at every turn. i admire his authenticity while balancing both deep introspection, and sassy humour. i noticed ali had such an amazing sense of self, and i’m grateful for her confident nature that makes everyone around her comfortable. also s/o to ali for being dripped out every day. 

last, but certainly not least, i’m grateful for sachi. she truly made this trip possible by taking the load of most of the planning as well as looping kiki and philip into the trip. i loved her calming presence and deeply appreciated her patience with all of us.

finally, i’m grateful for morehead-cain for bringing us all together and funding this life-changing experience. 

it feels so unreal that i just did that, and it probably will continue to feel unreal for a while. at the start of 2023, i wrote “achieve a 4.00 gpa in college” as one of my larger goals.

now? i started 2024 on top of the highest mountain in africa — i scored a 4.00 in utter joy which i think is a pretty good trade-off. 😋

daily opportunity + resource drops 🔍️