Noor Farjo '20 – Page 2 – Studying abroad in Tanzania

September 20, 2018January 16, 2019

The big Karatu market

Mambo!

This week has been, learning more and more everyday in the classroom and the field! Today, we decided to take a break from our work and explore town to go to one of the biggest markets here! This market only takes place once every two months. The whole community comes together to sell fabric, clothes, food, and even livestock! Even though it was very crowded that day, we enjoyed experiencing a non touristy market in our own village.

On another day of this week, we were able to go stargazing and enjoy the natural beauty of Tanzania at night!

The Karatu market

Being basic as can be with the girls

Mousa here helped us with Swahili and finding these sugarcane!

Cutting down some sugarcane; they’re basically wooden ice cream

Stargazing + headlamps = : D

Baadaye!

September 16, 2018January 16, 2019

Lake Manyara National Park

Mambo everyone!

Today was one of the best days of my life! It was our first expedition of the semester in which we spent about 12 hours in a safari at Lake Manyara National Park! We were observing and trying to identify all the animals at the park, both in English and Swahili. Some of the wildlife we saw that day included, elephants, giraffes, zebras, hippos, wildebeest, impalas, different species of monkeys and gazelles and much more!

The main reason for our visit, other than seeing all this wildlife, was to conduct a research project on olive baboon’s activity patterns in the wild. My friends and I learned, identified, and recorded different behaviors of targeted baboon troops. After collecting their behavior, we wrote a research paper regarding this data. It was interesting to analyze our results and find out why baboons displayed movement and foraging as the two most frequent activities. Some of the reasoning behind these activities is their location, resource availability, season, distribution, and individual traits such as the sex, age, and hierarchical class of the troops observed.

Enjoy the pictures!

It’s our first time doing a safari

Olive baboon posing for the picture and eating palm tree nut

Mama and her baby on a mission to find food

Baboons right above our safari… a little scary but super cool!

Zebras and wildebeests running behind me

Pictures do not do zebras justice, their beauty is so detailed and hard to explain!

The zebra family showed up… the baby is so cute!

Spending 12 hours in the safari with these lovely people made my experience even better!

Hippos! Lazy as can be : )

Enjoying the beautiful views with these ladies at our mini break at the park

Vervet monkeys chilling by the trees

Grant’s gazelle

Our next expedition is at Tarangire National Park, cannot wait for more wildlife!

Baadaye!

September 10, 2018January 16, 2019

Sunday fun day: wax painting and wood carving

Mambo everyone!

This is my first weekend at the School of Field Studies Program at Tanzania and I am happy to say we get Sundays off to relax and explore some off-campus locations! Each week there is a list of activities and workshops to participate in that feature the touristy and not so touristy places in Tanzania.

This Sunday, I decided to have an artsy day since the art workshops here are so unique! In the morning, I attended a wax painting workshop at a local home. The people guiding us through wax painting techniques have been doing this type of art for the past 50 years and are therefore very experienced. The majority of their art work featured African culture and wildlife. This included people practicing daily activities, like going to the market, or dancing traditional dances. Some even represented certain rituals through different symbolic meanings.

In the evening, I went to a wood carving place! It was so interesting to learn, see, and be a part of the wood carving process. A particular technique is necessary to achieve a beautiful wooden work of art.

Fransha and Elaine are already skilled wax painters

Me trying to not mess up infront of Ali

Sarah and I working hard to get the waxing technique down

The whole crew drying their wax paintings at the fire pit

Professional painting of three women dancing

A beautiful painting of people heading home from the market

Just one of many wildlife paintings at that house

Working hard at the wood carving place

We were all successful in making our wooden animals with a little help by the professionals!

They used mango trees that were licensed to be cut down and carved to make these beautiful animals and other statues

Always excited to share more next time!

Baadaye!

September 5, 2018January 16, 2019

Field Lecture at Mto Wa Mbu

The majority of our lectures are inside the classroom but we have field lectures, exercises, projects, and safaris at least 2-3 times a week! This is the type of learning I enjoy and understand the most.

So today we went to Mto Wa Mbu, a city close to Rhotia (my home location) and had class out on the field. First we went to a location that used to be populated with many elephants but due to agriculture and human settlements, elephants are rarely seen there now. Our professors talked about some of the issues involving the human wildlife conflict by considering the wildlife, the local people and their culture, as well as, the politics behind these wildlife conservation and management efforts.

After this introduction on the history of the area and community occupying it, we had the opportunity to talk to some local people and an amazing guest speaker to represent that community. He discussed the human wildlife conflict in more detail and specifically focused on the management efforts. He told us that a big issue the local people used to face as human settlements increased in areas populated by wildlife was loss of livestock, crops, and destruction of homes in some occasion. Also, the increase of human settlement caused blockage of many corridors used for animal migration. The co-living of humans and wildlife, encouraged the spread of more issues.

Wildlife efforts provided protected areas for animals with national parks. Additionally, they designated a no man’s land to act as a buffer for animals and people for them to commonly use. This land is government property in which people can use for agriculture at their own risk as animals may trespass this area freely. It is illegal to kill wildlife in this area or their living place unless, these animals threaten the livestock and the well being of the people. Even though, conflict is reduced and it is rare that animals cause issues for the people, it continues to be an issue.Thus, wildlife conservationist have been trying to reduce some human wildlife conflict by providing a more affordable fencing technique to keep elephants out of the people’s land. These techniques include, chili and beehive fencing; these are some things that elephants are afraid of and would therefore be discouraged from entering such a space.

My classroom : )

My classmates and I paying attention to our guest speaker

So many little kids saying hi to us and joining us on our walks!

It was very interesting to learn about how much these people know and how much work is needed to manage human wildlife conflicts

I am learning so much here, can’t wait for the next field experience at Lake Manyara National Park!

Baadaye!

August 30, 2018September 21, 2018

Orientation Week

This is week one at Moyo Hill Camp and just like freshman year at Holy Cross, we had a couple of days of orientation to acclimate to the new environment. During those days, we became more familiar with our surrounding community and area. I was also able to finally meet the people that I will be spending the next three months with! We played a lot of ice breakers and name games to get to know each other a little more before classes start.

We all landed safe and sound in Tanzania!

Hannah welcoming you all to our campus

Rega and Carla posing at the top of our campus gazebo

My new home: Chui

-‘Chui’ means leopard in Swahili and all of our dorms are named after African animals!

Bonfire night!

Getting ready to play soccer with the locals

Just a 20 min hike from our campus to see these beautiful views

Still cannot believe I’m here…

See you later, or as they say in Swahili, Baadaye!

August 24, 2018September 21, 2018

Off to Africa!

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog, or as they say in Swahili, Karibu!
I’m Noor Farjo, a junior biology major from West Springfield, MA. I’m so excited to share my journey of studying abroad in Tanzania with all of you; always feel free to comment and ask questions!

I’ve been looking forward to my semester abroad since I first attended Holy Cross! I can’t wait to start a journey full of adventures and unique learning experiences. This semester is going to be a time to expand my knowledge on African culture and wildlife, as well as meet people from different schools with different backgrounds than my own.

It’s been a long build up from applying to finally going to Tanzania and attending the School of Field Studies (SFS) program they offer. I applied for this program at the end of my fall semester sophomore year. The application process to study abroad was not difficult, however, I needed to decide my destination and how suitable the available courses would be for me and my major. So, I began my search! Even though I’m very happy and confident with my decision to study in Tanzania, I was not initially even looking into this program. This is mainly because I was not that familiar with it since it’s not the most popular program on campus, not surprisingly said. But, after discussing my options with the study abroad office, I became more familiar with all the amazing available opportunities that Holy Cross had partnerships with. After meeting with them, I felt much more prepared to make a decision that was most appropriate for me. I was open to go anywhere that was unique and would push me out of my comfort zone; SFS in Tanzania seemed like the perfect match for me! I would have never imagined that studying wildlife in Tanzania was ever possible and I am so happy to have found this opportunity before it was too late!

Leading up to my trip to Tanzania, I’ve had a busy summer in which I was a part of many new opportunities that came about through HC and it’s contacts. I started off my summer with the HC Paris Maymester program; I studied the art and history of one of the most iconic cities in the world. This month long summer program allowed me to explore the beauty of Paris as well as the French culture and most importantly food. After this amazing program, I worked, studied, and conducted research at Shoals Marine Laboratory at Appledore island for the remainder of my summer. Now, I’m ready for this next adventure to begin, I’ll keep you posted!

Here are some pictures from my summer experiences!

PARIS