The Marathon

On Monday, I ran my first half-marathon. It was generally a positive experience, and I finished in 2:10, not too bad for my first one. However, it was also one of the most ridiculous experiences of my life. We enlisted the help of a local runner in recruiting participants. He recruited about 200 international elite runners. There were no other runners besides these runners, David (another volunteer) and myself. So my time, that I was pretty happy with, was about 30 minutes after the next closest woman, and I think about 25 minutes after David. Everyone was waiting on me to start the awards ceremony, so I had mixed emotions of embarrassment and pride as I crossed the finish line. These feelings were soon enhanced. It turned out that several of the women who ran the race didn't finish. This meant that I finished 20th (and last) amongst women. However, prizes were given to the top 20 men and women finishers, so I won 5,000 Tanzanian shillings (about $4) and had to go up on stage to claim the prize. The runners were generally very kind and congratulated me on finishing the race, and my prize. Some of my office colleagues made fun of me for finishing last. Katherine and Natalia took pictures of the race, so when I receive them I will post them here as well. I'm sure everyone can appreciate the humor of me lined up next to several Tanzanian Olympians. There have been a lot of other activities around Karatu that deserve comment as well. I'll write about them tonight and post soon.