Musoma
"Unfortunately we do not have the money"

Photo: Musoma main harbour. Left: a stranded broken tug (inhabited!) behind floating island (snakes!), then dhows, on hilltop: three! GSM masts. Scroll right to see Saa Moja. ATM? Bank?

071029 In an amusing operetta in Mwanza, my VISA card became useless and got even swallowed for shredding by Standard Chartered ATM, click here. How now to get money? I have a  Maestro-Cirrus card, but the existence of and ATM in Musoma where I can cash in using  Maestro-Cirrus is highly unlikely. Yesterday, on entering the Mara River Bay, getting internet coverage, I selected a Western Union office near my parents' house in the Netherlands from where they could send me money: the local post office. In this procedure, neither sender nor receiver has an account, sender simply pays at the post office desk, and receiver receives. This is the format

Sender Forename: Grietje
Sender Family Name: hamminga - van der Vegte
Sending office: Post Office Bussum, The Netherlands
Amount: TSh equivalent of � 700/=
Reference Number: 2438686958
Q: Name of mother/A: Grietje
Receiver Forename: Lambertus
Receiver Family name: hamminga
Receiving Office: Post Office Musoma
 

My mother sent 29-10-2007 about 11:00 Netherlands local time that is 13:00 East African Time.
I did this once from Uganda to Tanzania. That money arrived within one day.

071030 The next day, on 30-10-2007 11:30 EAT I went to Postoffice Musoma, filled the receive form and talked to Mr. Ng'andu (VERY fat). He said he was authorized to pay me but, "Unfortunately", he continued, "we do not have the money". He said he was waiting for money from Mwanza post office for some time but had not received anything yet. He suggested I would go to Mwanza.
I answered him that if my money was at Mwanza Post, it should come now to Musoma Post according to Western Union procedures.
Mr. Ng'andu agreed on this general principle but was not ready to give me any deadline for receiving the money.
So Musoma post office now had my receive form fully completed and signed, but I did not have my money. This obviously made me feel uncomfortable, since that includes reference number, secret answer and a copy of my signature.
Back on the boat, on Google I found the email address of Tanzania Postal Service Head Office, Dar es Salaam. I sent an email "Urgent: irregularity in Western Union transaction". On the Western Union web site I found the phone number of Mwanza Main Post Office, accused by Mr. Ng'amba of not giving him money. I was given to Mary, who called back after 10 (ten!) minutes: "go to Mr. Ng'amba right now and take your money". So, the money had been there all the time!
I went. I told cheerfully to Mr. Ng'amba that I heard good news. Mr. Ng'amba  clearly was nervous and not amused. Dar es Salaam had also called him!
While counting my money Dar es Salaam called me to hear how things were going. I thanked them for the quick response. I got the money 9% below the middle exchange rate (1 euro = 1680 TSh) while cost at sending side was 5.7%, but apart from some unwillingness of the last chimp down the line to part with my money things went smooth.
But not with me: I got so tired again that I would have thought I would have a heavy malaria had I not been treated the week before last with three quinine drips and artimeter. I go to a clinic where the lab find three strains of malaria and - not threadworm this time but - hookworm. Malaria? Then right after my hospital visit in Mwanza I must have been bitten by something between three mosquitoes carrying a malaria and one mosquito carrying three malarias or something has gone wrong in that hospital. Anyway, as in Mwanza, we leave the worms and attack the malarias first. After two days, returning for the worm treatment, the lab tests, on my request, my urine and finds a bacterial infection in the urine system. So the balance of three weeks: 4 malaria's, thread worm, possible typhoid, hook worm and bacterial infection of urine system. Everybody small and loving people is feasting on me here.

Photo: encore!

We are now worried about our GT Ben (see Surf Board, an index to the greetings pages. He normally sends three emails per day on average from his Turkish mountain village, is now silent for three weeks, this does not look well at all.

Ton reports by SMS Wednesday he still has our battery charger (I lent it during the ferry's engine-start up problems). I reply Ton Thursday by SMS that Philemon will come today to take it. Philemon leaves to Mwanza by bus. On arrival at Ton's place. Mary says Philemon can come for the charger the next morning. I call Ton who claims the charger stands on the ferry in the dock "next to his sandwich box". When I tell him he will see Philemon in half an hour to take it, he says "Let me do this, I will call Mary". Philemon calls me again to report the message has not changed: charger available next morning. Because I have never even seen Ton with a sandwich box I resign and let Philemon have another day with his family in Mwanza, waiting for the charger to reappear from wherever it is.

071102 Final tasks: changing the Western Union Tanzania Shillings for dollars, the serious currency in Africa.  And immigration visit for exit Tanzania. Money: there are two banks, both of which have daily changing buying and selling rates for dollars, but they do not want to sell.
Why do you write there "$ Selling 1168 TSh"?
That is procedure Sir, we do not sell.
I am referred to the shop of Ali So-and-so who sometimes sells excess dollars. Ali has no dollars.

Photo Left: Post Office (taken through Western Union signpost): "No money",
Photo Middle: Bank 1: "No dollars", Photo Right: Bank 2: "No dollars"

Immigration: the usual issue: hosts of bored idling officers, lots of curious questions about things that are not their business. But you are not supposed to annoy them by saying that. Instead, with a smile you feed the bloody bastards with quasi personal information and small talk, waiting for the key question. The main crime they always like to detect is not whether you killed people or so, but whether you do any business. When would it come? Yes finally it came, and...framed in a very shrewd way: "I see you are traveling with Tanzanians. What business do you do with them?
OOPS that was a hard one to escape! (but I managed).
In the end I got of course the familiar question to give them some money, after all, they had not asked me to come back tomorrow, and had not even let me wait.
I told them Tanzania was now a modern country without bribing clients and begging officers, because now we have Kikwete (the new president).
This caused a loud laughter all over the office resounding on the stone walls of the empty corridors, slapping knees and high fives everywhere. On this tone of laughter I shook hands and left the premises, thoroughly cleared with two-coloured stamps overwritten by signatures, of Tanzania.