Mission Accomplished

A week or so after I first arrived in Moshi, I heard about a Kenyan woman who offered hour-long pedicures for 5000 Tanzanian Shillings, about $4. Upon hearing this glorious, if somewhat surreal news, my roomate Laura and I immediately decided to have a pedicure party, less to enjoy polished toes, but more to bask in the glow of the elusive. We would have someone paint our toes while we watched girly movies and ate cookies.

This provided me with a wonderful challenge. I would somehow, within the bounds of Tanzania, locate a copy of Steel Magnolias--the first movie I ever watched on VHS home video (with my Mom, sister Holly, and Aunt Emma in the old house on Cole Lane). Having little else to occupy my free time, a little scavanger hunt was just the thing to stave off complete and engulfing homesickness. I knew that there was someway to locate a copy, even here.

I looked around with the usual suspects, the pirated DVD dealers. I'm against pirated DVDs on general principle, but was willing to overlook my opposition for the good of the cause... but to no avail. You can find 20 movies on one disc, but they apparently never include 1980s film starring Dolly Parton. I later turned to my favorite cab driver ("Hapana, pole sana, dada")and then to the local 'guy who can get anything'--including the power turned back on during an 'outage'. No. After traveling to Arusha and still coming up empty handed, I didn't think my dream would come true.

Ah, but dreams do come true when you happen to mention said dreams to wonderful friends like my own Mr. Salazar! It's kind of like cheating, but since I didn't ask for it, it still counts and I still get points. It arrived just in time for Laura's going away on Sunday.