The Food Market Continued

I have reached Tanga this afternoon and met the people I will be working with and went to the TAYODEA office. I will blog more about this later but I want to finish the blog about the market...

So we saw all sorts of raw vegetables and fruits that were very good looking and the method of displaying them was so interesting as well. Some were kept in crates, some were just laid out on cardboard, some were in huge burlap sacks and others were still hanging off the bicycles they rode in on. There were people sleeping next to their produce which was hard to understand but when I asked later the policy in Tanzania on theft is quite severe and no one would dare think of stealing something from the market which is what I was told. But the noise and the smell alone was so pervasive that I would think sleep would be hard to catch in the market! There were rows and rows of all different colors and shapes of beans, peas, potatoes, yams, and other vegetables and each vendor had similar produce but priced differently. We reached the end of the fruits and vegetables and turned left and that's when the smell of decay hit me pretty hard.
There were chickens and hens stuffed into small cages and people were sleeping next to them as well. The smell of the feces- both human and animal- consumed me and I thought I was going to be sick but I knew there was no room for me to vomit or I'd be spoiling someone's source of income...and as I looked down, there was a large puddle and trail of blood coming from an overflowing drain stuffed with feathers. Simon said that if we stuck around long enough we would be able to see the slaughter. We promptly left.
It was quite an interesting experience. Even though I felt sick to my stomach- it was quite the learning experience and has made me realize not to take food for granted!
Later that afternoon we met a guy from Tanga in Dar es Salaam and he took us to a book vendor to see if there were any good Swahili books. We started walking and I noticed some bubbling coming from underground spurting some water up in a steady stream and I asked him if it was an underground water source. He informed me that the chicken slaughter was one street over and all the feathers get crammed into the drain and clog it and then it backs up the sewage which compunds the exisiting plumbing problems... It seems to me that most of the basic issues here are compunded by the lack of knowledge of the consequences of one's actions- much like in the U.S. and this commonality is striking to me!