WHAT MATTERS MOST IN TANZANIA

 THE PHILOSOPHY OF MY HOME COUNTRY (TANZANIA)

Salutations dear reader,

It is 3:00 am East African time at the time I am writing this blog post. I was asleep until  I heard some people speaking outside, this made me feel uncomfortable and I couldn’t go back to sleep and BOOM! now I am writing this blog post.

Today dearest reader, I am writing about the philosophy of my home country, for those who do not know what my home country is, my home country is the East African nation of Tanzania and for some random reason maybe it’s just the lack of sleep, I felt like writing about the philosophy of this wonderful country but before I begin a DISCLAIMER, this blog post does not mean scrutinize the nation of Tanzania or any other country that might pop up in this blog post, I would also like to clarify that the “philosophy” I am going to talk about is what I find are the values the nation of Tanzania upholds the most, so this blog post is going to be very subjective as it’s just me rambling on and on about what I think my country cares about the most. I would also like to remind you dear reader that Tanzania is a nation of over 60 million people, the values and ethics that I think Tanzanians uphold the most might be flat-out wrong and might not be the values each individual Tanzanian upholds. With that out of the way, I can begin.

WHAT IS A TANZANIA?

Before I head into speaking about the “philosophy” of Tanzania, some background information on Tanzania. As I said in the beginning, Tanzania is a country found on the Eastern Coast of Africa. It covers an area of 945,087 square kilometres, that’s almost twice the size of metropolitan France which has an area of just 551,695 square kilometres and almost three times bigger than its old colonial master Germany whose size is a measly 357,588 square kilometres.

Tanzania also has a large population with a population of over 60 million people. It is also blessed with lots of resources, like lots of resources like big water bodies i.e the Indian Ocean, Lake Victoria( Africa’s biggest lake), Lake Tanganyika( The longest freshwater lake in the world), gemstones like ruby, sapphires, diamonds and garnet Tanzania even has it’s own gemstone only found and mined in Tanzania, Tanzanite, Tanzania is among the biggest gold producers in the world and Tanzania has lots of fuel mineral deposits like coal, natural gas and even uranium deposits.

After all that, here is where the economics start to step in. Tanzania has a large young workforce with a median age of 18 and has all these resources but the country like most sub-Saharan countries has a weak economy. Remember when I compared Germany to Tanzania, saying that Tanzania is 3 times bigger than Germany?  Well, Germany’s economy is 62 times bigger than Tanzania’s. Tanzania is also very poor with 25.7% of the population living under the poverty line. It is quite common for me to bring out these stats when I feel unpatriotic, so for those who know me personally, this is just another intense of me rambling about how disappointing my country is.

For some these stats might make them feel bad about Tanzania, for some it might even bring about thoughts on how countries with great potential like this are exploited and left in the dust but what do the Tanzanians think about these numbers, that’s what I want to talk about today.

The late President Magufuli once said, "We are poor as Tanzanians but it is better to be poor and happy than rich and sad”. This is not an exact quote but I remember him talking about something like this. This statement for me encapsulates Tanzania. 

We live in a world where most of our ideas, organization and systems come from European/western ideals. All the stats and numbers I stated above are all numbers and stats made by western countries, but this doesn’t mean they are the most accurate when it comes to describing for example the prosperity of a country. For example, when I stated Germany’s economy is a staggering 62 times bigger than Tanzania’s I used the metric of GDP to measure their two economies, GDP is just the value of all the goods a country produces in a certain period, the more you produce doesn’t mean the more prosperous your country right? Or does it? Most people take it as a fact that more GDP equals more prosperity but it doesn’t mean it’s true. Someone else can bring up another metric to measure a country’s prosperity like the World happiness report, another metric made by western countries. In the world happiness report, Finland is the world’s happiest country for four years running and Tanzania is the world’s 139th happiest country BUT, a big but indeed Finland, the world’s “happiest” nation has a suicide rate of 15.30 as of 2019 while Tanzania has a smaller suicide rate of 4.30, leaving other factors aside it sounds really odd that the world’s “happiest” country has a higher suicide rate than one of the “saddest” ones.

All I am trying to say is that most of our ways of thinking, metrics etc are based on Western ideas and they aren’t all correct or accurate at measuring everything. I believe most Tanzanians know this consciously or unconsciously, most Tanzanians disregard these stats and figures. Back to the statement said by President Magufuli, Magufuli seems to disregard the poor label given to Tanzania and actually values something else, what does he value? I really don’t know but I know it’s different for everyone. Despite, most Tanzanians living in poverty most of them are actually very happy and seem to be ok with the status quo, they seem to be ok with the poverty. Tanzanians are known for being easygoing. It’s like the whole nation has an unlimited supply of “chill pills”. 

So back to today’s blog post's main point: What is Tanzania’s philosophy? I think Tanzanians are hedonists to an extent. Tanzanians will do what makes them feel good and nothing more, they seem to live in the moment. Most Tanzanians live in poverty and I believe for most Tanzanians what matters most is now the current moment. How do I feel now? This might be the question most Tanzanians ask themselves the most.

“What’s the point of being an “advanced economy”? So we can get recognition by the wazungu and a couple of big Macs, No thank you I’d rather stay with the ugali I eat every day” For me, this might be an answer from an average when you ask them about growing our economy, most will talk about how they enjoy the status quo, most will talk about NOW. This makes most Tanzanians really fun people to be around (most of the time).

Categorising Tanzanians as mostly hedonistic doesn’t mean all Tanzanians adhere to the ideas of hedonism, I am a Tanzanian and I adhere to the train of thought of absurdism, existentialism and to an extent nihilism, I don’t mean Tanzania is just a hedonist spitting machine NO! Tanzanians can adhere to any train of thought they like. When I say Tanzanians mostly care about what’s happening now, it doesn’t mean Tanzanians don’t care about the future and aren’t trying to solve the problems the country is currently facing or the problems that might happen in the immediate future. The Tanzanian Government spends millions of dollars trying to reduce poverty in the country and it is actually working, poverty in Tanzania is actually in decline. The government also spends lots of money trying to solve other problems like unemployment, disease etc.

When I say Tanzania is a hedonist I mean Tanzania to an extent doesn’t care about the labels it is given by others rather cares about what matters to itself, Tanzania cares about what is happening now most of the time. This is my point of view, I haven’t surveyed all the 60 million Tanzanians to come up with this conclusion, I just made it from personal experience in my home country. My views are up to debate and I am open to a debate in the comment section of this blog. Again, remember I am most likely wrong about this so DO NOT TAKE WHAT I HAVE WRITTEN AS FACT.

CONCLUSION

What are your thoughts on today’s blog post? Do you actually think Tanzania is a hedonist from how I described the country? What do you think is your nation's philosophy? You can tell me all of this in the comment section.

This blog post has been an interesting one to write, trying to make a conclusion about the country I have lived in all my life as if it’s a person. I remember a comment from the Geography now Youtube channel saying that “Tanzania is the chill uncle we all have” that comment compared Tanzania to those uncles who might just give you weed because they can and honestly I kind of agree with this, I have always thought of my country as a Dionysus, the ancient greek god of wine. So it has been a real pleasure writing this blog post.

It’s been a while since I have posted on this blog, almost two months. I have been occupied with school and I don’t get the rushes of creativity I used to get at the beginning of this blog but I have written some things in my other blogs like my short story blog, storiespage05.blogspot.com, you can check that blog out to see what I have been up to (not much really).

I would like to thank every reader who has been able to pass through the long and monotonous blog post and reach this point, it is appreciated and if you like this blog please tell someone you think will like this blog too.

It is now 5:25 am East African Time at the time of concluding this blog post, I guess I’ll head to sleep. Again thank you for reading this blog post.

**It is now 5:53 am East African Time at the time I am actually posting this blog post, I guess the idea of sleep is out the window now. I just hope we don’t get a power cut BTW Tanzania has a power problem, so electricity is being rationed**