Took a break from writing for a while. Lack of focus and a bit of senior-itis as well. Our training is coming to an end and soon we will be volunteers. Currently I am on my first night in my assigned village of two years but more on that later. I want to take a few moments and point out a few interesting memories of the two weeks or so that have passed. Language and comprehension still alludes me and I spent the last week in training village doing my best but constantly being frustrated. Plus I felt like the only way to progress was to stop speaking English which is impossible with 3 other American trainees around who I constantly try to relate every waking moment to, in the hopes that they are having similar experiences and therefore I am not so unlucky, crazy or ridiculously stupid. Plus having our LCH 24/7 means even if I wanted to speak Pulaar all day I’m still way too tempted to turn and ask for help instead using my own fortitude or relying on my own resources, wit, courage, self reliance and/or “F-A-C-U L-T-I-E-S” as Salinger put it. But I am responsible for my own learning as M put it last night and therefore if I haven’t mastered the ancient oral language of the West African Fula tribe in 8 weeks then it’s my own damn fault. But maybe I’m being too hard on myself. So I digress. Everything else in village was pretty regular. Played UNO and guitar at night with my family. Studied all day. Went to A’s village to have lunch one day and learned Crazy 8’s which I hadn’t played in 20 some years and realized that Crazy 8’s is Uno. It’s the same game.
The Gambians have funny names however for the suits of a deck of cards (they also have issues organizing more than 7 or 8 cards in their hands (not in a bad way, just a funny way). Diamonds are not Diamonds, they are Biscuits. Spades are Black Hearts. Hearts are Love Signs and Clubs are something called Tankepeter, I don’t know how it’s spelled. Pronounced something like “thank you peter” or Take a picture or Hackapeter – the German meat. A boasted her Attaya brewing skills and I tried them out and for a toubab she’s pretty damn good. She came over to try a Fula lunch a few days later and brewed some Attaya as we worked on our last Technical Assignment. Our whole team was impressed. Our LCH seemed to take a liking to A as well, admiring the fact that she eats with her hands out of the food bowl and not with a spoon. I have been to a few other training villages for lunch and noticed that most trainees do not use their hands. M, A, and myself do and I pride us on that. Not to say that eating with a spoon is wrong but I have noticed the whole “when in Rome” thing being an apt part of integration, and where language or lack of fish-eating has failed me, at least I am still diligent in eating with my hands so as not to completely slip back into my American habits---of desiring convenience, cleanliness, or common sense. In the land of the blind, the man with one eye might be king, but I don’t think I’m here to be king. I’m here to be blind, more or less, just like everyone else. That, easily is the hardest part of integrating, not being turned off by sights sounds and smells based on what I compare them to in my previous life which was rich with meaning in one way, in that my cause or desire for film making or storytelling or whatever was very clear, or was, in years past.
But now, certain ideas and fictions I had in my head are getting clouded. I’m worried that they are dying. I hope all it is, is that they are taking a temporary break or hiatus. I need those fictions, and worry about the realities that are taking their place. We had Thanksgiving two days ago, Kennedy, the brains and poster boy behind this operation was shot 44 years ago this Thanksgiving. He was a president, like Washington, Lincoln and Roosevelt(s) that I had no personal relationship to. I was not alive when he or they were alive. Their words and actions affect me everyday however. The day after Thanksgiving we had a reception at the Kairaba Hotel for the 40th anniversary of Peace Corps in Gambia. 40 years of uninterrupted service. Two original volunteers from ’67 were there. All 100 some volunteers, currently serving, a slew of Gambians, the Gambian military band, and us, 24 trainees, who in a weird way were referred to specifically as trainees as if pointing out that we have not yet accomplished anything when we all think that we have, going though a major physical and emotional adjustment and all. In any case the event promised us a chance to meet famed President Jammeh but he didn’t show, to no one’s surprise. But what we got instead was a pretty decent speech from our CD about Kennedy, reminding me again that there was a reason that I am feeling on edge, being torn at the seams. That whole “ask not what” thing. It seemed to finally hit me like a ton of bricks. I always go back and forth about whether I should feel proud about what I’m doing. It’s very easy, even as a trainee to feel cynical and that a free ticket to Africa is just that. A two year form of escapism. Instead of making a movie or writing a book, I am watching a very long and involved travel show or drama inches away from my face, like if I were to sit half a foot away from the TV, wearing 30 specs, and tracing my fingers over Braille lettering, everything is real but nothing seems that way. It all seems like I’m being John Malkovich, or JD, or Momodon Bah, but I was never those people before. I was just familiar with them. When M, our CD spoke about watching JFK give that speech, I wondered if:
A)I would ever be alive to see a president as charismatic and outwardly true as that. (Clinton, yes, even Clinton wasn’t that man, and f*ck the Bushes). I want another JFK. I wondered also
B)If I were alive to hear that speech would I be motivated to join the Peace Corps in the sixties and/or
C)Would I make it past training. What we are doing now is not remarkable. Not in any stretch of the imagination.
We are coddled compared to those 40-30-20 maybe even 10 years ago. The world is getting hard, but we as people are getting easier. It is impossible for me to believe that I have made any great sacrifice in coming here but maybe if I keep thinking about Kennedy, maybe I’ll buy into some form of pride and not just float through this experience. Our volunteer leader, F, and our other volunteer facilitator, J, both seem put together, both probably younger that I but seem years more mature. I look at F and hear about what he has done and pity him for going back to the states because it is as if he has actually done something with his life these last two years, he has done something for his country, and going back, I fear the hum-drum will swallow him up.
Having been out of the loop for only 2 months, I find little desire to know what’s going on. The same thing happened when I moved to Berlin. Hurricane Katrina happened; brought America “together” and I thought I would have been envious for missing it. But I wasn’t. A form of self-centered-ness is a lack of homesickness I guess. The other trainees admire my ability to nap almost anywhere including a massively bumping ride down the south bank highway. Is it that I have an uncanny knack for relaxing or that most times I don’t care about the details or what’s going on in front of me and find better solace closing my eyes and escaping into whatever my brain tells me to think about? Or maybe I’m just a sucker for the sandman.
On Thanksgiving we flushed out of our training village and drove to Kombo to have dinner with every volunteer and admin at the Ambassador’s house which I on the beach with a pool, all the beer we could drink, all the food we could eat. It was great. The day went from walking away from my host family which, surprisingly I grew to really care about and which I could spend the two years with, when my second oldest host brother Amadon came back up to the road after everyone had seen us off and just stood there watching the bus that was about to take me out of his life. My heart truly broke and I had to get off the coaster to give him another hug and hope that I would see him again. The mood was high on the coaster as we picked up everyone else. I didn’t feel like being happy, but over the course of the day everyone’s energy exponentially grew and I couldn’t help getting swept up as well. At the ambassadors we drank and swam and I met some more volunteers and I almost forgot about my sleepy little training village. Times were good there. It only reminds me of how we are getting it easy. Or at least I am. Or was.
Today was another story. Today we begin our site visits. Three days to checkout our village, meet our new host families, and negotiate rent and food and laundry. I was first to be dropped off. B or L.J. as he was aptly named, American named that is, will come on the third day to help me with negotiating the money stuff. Today, until Monday I am all alone. I was dropped off and I met my family. I was told something different about them, or at least the picture in my head was all different. I knew very little since I am not taking over for anyone and since no one wanted to talk about the last guy here or why he early terminated a year ago. Whereas K, my old training village, was a sleepy little hamlet, my current village seems more like a forgotten outpost or inhabited ghostown. Something about it smells like the film “A Fistful of Dollars” or was it “for a few dollars more”. In any case, I am not Clint Eastwood. This is not Yojimbo, and my family is nice enough and no one is at war, or so I hope, and chances of something going awry are slim to none. But I am on edge just the same. There’s smoke in the air and I can’t tell which direction it is coming from.
My house has holes in the thatch roof and my backyard fence was in shambles, the replacement fence was pseudo put up and I am writing tonight on my bed/sack of hay. Obviously the amenities are few. Nothing will be quaint and cute as it was in training. College is over, life is what I make it. My main goal is to learn or understand what they are saying about me. Then find out what the town needs and by God keep busy. My new host brother who’s a little older than me came to greet me, as I was setting up my bed and doing little unpacking. Later I went to fetch water and he was sitting outside my door looking down in the mouth. He said: “a bazi sundu am do” I had him repeat it several times, I knew the words but couldn’t understand the meaning behind them “I took his house” he said. He had to bathe, where was he going to do that. Depressed and ego probably a little bruised he had to give up his house, he, his wife pregnant, and maybe another toddler probably had to move out so I could have a place to live. As much as the prospect of toubab living with the family can be, it must suck to be ousted, furniture, family and all to some other less exciting digs. I didn’t know what to say. Sorry. I was kind of going through my own thing. I didn’t know how sympathetic I should be about it. For the same reasons that I don’t give every person I see a hundred bucks, even though I really want to, I just can’t muster the strength to bend completely backwards. A part of me wants to help. Anyway, any how. But another part of me knows how much b.s. that is. No one can help anyway, anyhow. We just don’t care and are too concerned with ourselves, our lives and end up going to church only twice a year Easter and Christmas and telling ourselves we will make up for missed charity by feeding the homeless on Thanksgiving when no one helps 364 days of the year. I was losing light and needed to get to the pump so I could wash my water filter. I would have loved to explain the complexities of a J-curve and why him giving me his house would eventually lend to a great gain than his current loss but, I just didn’t have the words. And where does he get off!! Like I am not already overwhelmed?
I further have a strange taste now in my mouth at about this spot. There was a bit of mystery and controversy surrounding it that I can’t get into now, which only adds to my desire to write tonight for a few hours, hoping to figure out where I am and how I am going to deal with it. Arriving in F Kunda two months ago made me ask what the heck I was doing with my life. Then I loved it and didn’t want to leave. This town could have a similar effect. I’ve been here 8 hours or so and had a great dinner and slow evening of bad Pulaar translation with my host parents. But as I arrived and Peace Corps and the last trace of U.
S. connection left my sight I again asked. “What the heck am I doing now? I’ve done it again like it or not. Sink or swim if I’m lucky, maybe both.
Like most journals that have come before this one I preface for the multi-numerous time…
“O snail,
climb Mt. Fuji
but slowly! Slowly!”
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Jounal Entry 11.13.07
28 years and one month and one day. A funny thing happened on the way to the pump today. Strike that, it was to school, to class. This afternoon as I walked around my house, I saw the tin door to my window shut and thought “hey, I’m right here, it’s easier to prop open from the outside, might as well.” So with nalgene and Pulaar dictionary in hand, I open my window, the top of the door (or shutter) scrapes the bottom lip of the thatch roof as always and then something hit my face. I at first thought nothing of it. I’m used to birds and lizards living in my roof. Often I will find bird poop on my desk; termite mounds jetting out of my walls. I sweep twice daily to make sure frogs aren’t hiding behind my bags, trunk and/or bike but still wondering why, since technically they are guests in my house. Why they are not eating their fair share of mosquitoes, spiders, earwigs, beetles and various other creepy crawlers common indoors this Halloween season. But this afternoon, what hit me in the face was not my everyday piece of crumbled termite debris or bird/lizard shit, but instead judging by the intense stinging section on my lower lip and then a subsequent just as fast as the first time sting on the bridge of my nose, I determine these were angry Africanized wasps, not bees but wasps, just like the ones in my backyard some weeks earlier. This time they chose to live outside my bedroom window, a shotty thin screen separating me sleeping and them buzzing. In shock I got out of there and walked in a daze to my LCH’s house wondering if the sharp pain in my nose and lip were visible to all the passersby. Happy end of course, I’m not allergic to bee or wasp stings African or any other and redness aside, no swelling. As I look in my hand mirror I can’t tell the difference between the stings and my previous and fast growing zits. So all’s well that ends without swelling and an Epi-pen shot. I just did some re-con and sure enough there is a small hive. I’ll need to kill or displace. But tomorrow there is a 6 inch gecko eating bugs on my back screen door, my garden is half successful, half non-existent, and I am tired and still need to fetch bath water for tonight and sweep and do whatever else. That doesn’t compare to the chores my family and neighbors do to prepare each meal and give me the best portions and all I did today was get stung in the face and not have the foresight to take a picture of it. I have about a week left in my training village before I go to Kombo (the capital area) to have Thanksgiving, swear in, buy all my stuff for my permanent site and celebrate the 40th anniversary with the President and all the president’s men.
I spent all last week at Tendebah and sent my last journal entries and photo card home with A.O. who early terminated after 5 weeks. I wish him good luck and hope he seizes a better opportunity in the states than what the Gambia had in store for him. Tendebah was nicer this time around. I had only one bout with stomach illness on Friday where, no joke, I lost 5 lbs in one day but it wasn’t so bad. I got to sleep most of the day away and that was what really counted. The next day we did the marathon march where as 24 PCT’s and 3 guides walked 20 some kilometers though sharp, itchy 7 foot tall grass and sopping ankle high mud. We couldn’t complain about the weather though, it has cooled down substantially and I feel like I’m back in LA except today which is hot and humid and very Africa. I can’t help but sweat as I write and watch this lizard outside my door. I know it is raining in Portland and snowing in New York and 72 and sunny in California. All of which I am not shy to say sounds wonderful. I can’t help but constantly feel humbled here as I sweat and have an awful day with language as I did today. I watch the locals and my mind wanders. I don’t feel so on task as I used to. No one does. Our thoughts are drifting away from our training villages and onto our permanent sites, or at least, to the feeling of permanentness of our decisions. Not in a bad way, just in a readjusting way. We are constantly learning and comprehending, struggling, adjusting, thinking, reading, writing, studying, preparing, but not settling in. That comes in the next three months when we go to site and are challenge don’t get to leave for 90 days or at least no overnight stays or guests, so as to better integrate. That’s scary I think, in the way that we have no idea what to expect but are asked to expect everything. How will we stack up? Your guess is as good as mine, but I am up for the challenge. I long for the days where this language does not bog me down. This could be the hardest thing I do, ever, and/or the easiest, depending on how I handle myself. Probably with a smile and a stupid look on my face. Let them laugh; God knows I would if I were they.
Quick note, getting back to the marathon march at the last few kilometers we trekked though rice patties and at two points we had to stop, take off our packs and move up and slip down into the neck high, thick muddy swamp water flooding the surrounding rice fields. Uneasy going in I was also uneasy going out. We had to stagger out from bank to bank passing backpacks over our heads to the other side. Not a one fell in the water despite clumsy hands and sinking feet. Some folks were comfortable in the water, the kind of folks who cool off in Florida, I imagine, by jumping into stagnant everglade swamps. They swam and kicked around and dunked their heads underwater, but they are f*cking nuts and I, being used to water with heavy amounts of chorine, decided to get in and out as quickly as possible without my hands or head going beneath the water line. I was successful even though at some point as my foot was mashed in the mud and I was passing backpacks over my head, something long and heavy and hard (and no it was not a polish last name) slithered over my foot and stopped and rested there, occasionally wiggling as if it were trying to burrow into the muddy bank adjacent to me. You know how I know it wasn’t falling mud and my imagination (like some of you may think as I tend to overact) because it slithered and wiggled and weighed at least 5lbs as it sat on my foot. A dense 5 lbs, not like the hollow 5lbs I lost the day before.
This thing was real, whether it was a snake or catfish, the guide (Gambian) to my right, who was sure-footed on the bank was quick to pull me out of the water as my face went a little white and I nonchalantly said that a snake or large fish was making sweet love to the top of my foot. And if the local guide pulls you out of the water--- you get out of the water! The only problem was that I had to get right back in, to cross the rice and not step back onto the snake, catfish or Loch Ness monster and not get swamp water all up in my grill was no easy task. But I did it. That night A and I traded full body massages and I slept like a baby. The next day we went out for a boat ride down the muddy tributaries of the river Gambia. We saw a plethora of beautiful white cranes and birds and crabs with one giant claw and mangrove trees and even one crocodile that slipped beneath the water a few meters in front of our boat. I caught only tail end of the croc submerging itself but I’m sure it won’t be the last wild croc I’ll see. I have too many juicy, tasty appendages and after the Marathon march, I plan on making a long career out of opaque river and swamp exploration. But until then, the night calls. I have only a week more to enjoy my host families company. Plus so much more Pulaar to learn. I scored intermediate low on our second test, hoping for an intermediate mid, but it didn’t happen. We need that IM to score our 4rd test to swear in. I was hoping to get it early and after today I see why. My comprehension is too poor. It also takes me too long to form sentences, statements and questions, basically I am retarded and cannot break through this wall. I will slowly slowly, seeda, seeda.
Jounal Entry 10.4.07
The flight, which could have been an adventure, was just normal. No extended layovers or turbulence or crazy flight attendants. Except for once when they briskly trotted down the aisle spraying something foggy into the vents above our heads. It turned out to be mosquito repellent, so mosquitoes wouldn’t fly into the plane and lay their malaria eggs.
Arriving in Banjul….green and red as far as the eye can see. I had never imagine Africa much differently, but here it was in front of me. The heat wasn’t too bad getting off the plane, neither was the rush to get into the country. No customs for Peace Corps. Should have smuggled something in.
I had spoken a bit more to J on the plane and in the Brussels Airport, we were now friends and when they crammed us and our stuff, all 24 Peace Corps Trainees into an Africa safari wagon we all as a group got to see The Gambia (more or less) for the first time. Then they dropped us at GPI (Gambia Pastoral Institute) a Christian mission/hotel/compound/learning center and told us our roommates for the next 11 days or so. J and I were roommates and he was very pleased with that. So was I. I felt like I could bond or at least b.s. with him about the girls, booze, blab, blah, blah and we did and then some. Dinner, bed, sleep, pack, move rooms, unpack, bed, sleep, first morning we wake up to the most obnoxious bird in the world. If I ever hear it again I’m going to shoot it in the face.
The days at GPI were full of classes, one block after another, slowly introducing us to the LCH’s, (language and culture helpers), natives who will be our number one contact at the training village. At meal times we eat in the hot, humid dining hall which at night reminds me of those movies about evangelicals in the south having town hall meetings on hot summer afternoons, with the cooling fans spinning but not cooling anyone down. Schedules are: 7a.m. breakfast, then classes, then lunch at 1ish, more classes, then dinner at 8:30 and for the first couple of days a lecture after that. People were dropping like flies, sleeping through the awkward PowerPoint presentations. All was pretty much perfect for the first few days.
Saturday was A’s birthday so we all went to a bar that night to try Jul-brew. S, our PC Volunteer/babysitter and I and others bought some booze as well. 70 Dalasi for a local bottle of vodka, gin, whiskey, etc. where at a bar a Jul-brew is 45 dalsi. The booze was for pre-funking and it was the cheapest imaginable but whatever.
The bar and the beer and the company, more PCV’s were all right. We were supposed to mingle but I stayed mostly with who I knew. The few volunteers I spoke to were rather boring, as was I, I’m sure, not really who I expected as PCVs but neither am I. I supposed. M was right, a lot of “bores” and “white guilt”.
Back to GPI, we formed a dance party in the gazebo but everyone was a little bummed about dancing. Only M and A and myself and a few others did, and what music to play. It was A’s birthday, but whatever.
The next day we went to the beach, the water was amazing, shallow for miles and warm. We tried body surfing, only T really got going. Went to the reptile farm, all was good. I held a snake, I sweat like a pig. I got dehydrated but felt great going to bed. Even stopped to watch a bit of Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Woke up shivering some time in the morning/night. I couldn’t believe I could get so cold in Africa. After what felt like an hour, huddled in my sheet, I turned the ceiling fan down –- still cold. I pulled out my sleeping bag, still freezing. I couldn’t breath very well either. I didn’t want to admit it, but I had the chills. My roommate finally took pity on me and woke up and got me to stand up, though I was out of breath and walk around. I went downstairs and it was a cool, nice night. Lightning went off in the distance, I was feeling better walking around trying to remember the lyrics to “Changing of the Guards” and “On Traveling”. I could feel like either shit or vomit was going to come next. J already has some minor diarrhea. I was hoping for the best. That’s all I knew.
I got the chills again and went into the empty vacant room with my sleeping bag. The storm began, it was amazing. Hard, hard rain. Loud thunder or no thunder. Bright, sharp lighting. I couldn’t help but draw the natural conclusion that this was not a coincidence. I started this storm. My body at least or the way I was that was a part of it. I tried to wake up J but he didn’t get it, so I left him alone again. I slept until the next morning. Still freezing and dizzy I got up to go to the nurse, Barbara, for immunizations. Everyone saw I had it bad and they all took pity. My shits were starting to burn and give me less warning of their onset. I lost more and more energy. I didn’t eat or drink so I could break the fever. Barbara checked me out and immediately put me to bed. I had to give her a stool sample, that was gross, but at least I aimed well, then I conked out. T joined me later, he had been experiencing the same thing for all of Sunday. Barbara said something about my temp being 104, later I saw it was 104.8, at some point it was over 105. Bad ass dysentery was the name of the game. She gave us some antibiotics and had us sleep off the fevers, more people were coming down with diarrhea. Barbara wasn’t happy. We tried to come up with what it was.
My theory was the fish because my stool smelled exactly like the fish market town we went to. This was the third time in my life I have had this in one form or another. We called it food poisoning in the states. I beat it there but no such case here. I needed the sick bay, I needed to sleep and have people take pity on me I guess. This all being said, the bug is gone and I feel tons better and 13 lbs lighter. Weighing myself I started at 192 and am now 179, I hope I can lose a little more and lighten this load.
Journal Entry 9.30.07
It’s been a while, haven’t had a lot of time. In Africa now, I don’t want to sound lame, but I can’t believe so much has happened. Last day of training was fine. We played a cool game where half the room was in a culture that have a set of rules, men speak to men, women to women. We could only answer yes or no questions but it would depend if their question was asked with a smile, then the answer is yes, if frown, then no, even if they asked the same question. Twice the answers could change depending on their smile. I had the fortitude to be made a native, so I only had to sit there and say yes or no. The other team were the anthropologists and they had to figure out our rules. That night I paced up and felt pretty confident about it. We went out to the White Dog. My bartender was not there. We, about 6 of us got nice and buzzed. I woke up still drunk and got ready to leave Philly. Shots, (inoculations), loaded whatever I could that was small and heavy and not a weapon or liquid into my guitar. When we got to the sky cap area, we weighed our bags. My Costco duffle bag weighed 51 lbs so I threw out expendable toothpaste and shampoo. My Jansport Mozembique was 42lbs—12 over the limit. L was there and she shoved about 10lbs into her second bag that was underweight. It was an ordeal. My guitar weighed 30.5lbs!!! I was nervous that security would not let it though or make me unpack it to check the pills I stashed in there, or the flight attendants wouldn’t stow it in their closet. In the end I made it through fine but I found out as soon as I had checked the bags and walked away from the terminal, with the group, ready to go through security, that the 80lb weight limit was b.s…the airline took 100lbs (despite what Peace Corps kept insisting). There was no reason to put so much stress on (or in) my guitar or shoulder stash (which weight some 25lbs). I was miffed, to say the least.
Journal Entry 9.25.07
What happened next was a little strange. Strange in the way of unexpected. The blonde-haired bartender and I started talking about the Gambia and her experience there visiting her sister. We share good eye contact and soon the two other guys she’s with seem to fade away. She says something about art and how that’s her service to the world. Giving the world art. Bit turn off. Why would someone say that? She, as it turns out is deaf in her left ear, as we switch spots so we can talk more and I’d be on her better side. The subject of dancing come up and we started dancing salsa to some Marc Anthony song. It was awkward but fun. For the last song, of the night she played “Mr. Bojangles” by Dylan and I was on cloud nine. I started talking about how rare that cover is and the guy with her that looked like Stanley Tucci was impressed by my Dylan skills. He gave me his website and said if any of the Gambians had CD players he’d totally send over a bunch of his CD’s. Ok guy, we’ll see what happens with that. The blonde gave me her contact info as well, walked me up the street. We parted ways after a kiss or two. “A farewell kiss” she said. This morning I woke up fully wanting to hear “Mr. Bojanles” but the copy I got from Liz didn’t work. It’s glitched, same with “Bob Dylan” which glitched on the plane. Not happy to know my Dylan is scratched for two years. That is going to suck. Had to pack tonight then maybe some more White Dog.
Journal Entry 9.24.07
Hier Kommt das begginnen: Philadelphia, PA
Yesterday doesn’t really count since it was mostly on a plane and I was asleep. But today counts. 24 or so hours ago I arrived and met T, my roommate or hotelmate, Sheraton University City hotel mate. But what’s stranger than that, which isn’t so strange, is that while getting the ground transportation at Philly airport a woman had the same hotel request.
“Peace Corps?” I asked.
“Yeah”, she said.
Long story, short, we shared a crowded van to the hotel and she was from Portland and I was from Portland—small world.
“I recognized you” she said, “you were asleep the whole time. I noticed you with that red pillow.”
I brought my mom’s red mochi pillow, it doesn’t condense well so I have to attach it with a shitty carabiner and so it rubs up against everything... dirty—airport floors, dirty airplane seats, dirty Philadelphia sidewalks. In any case, I thought it was weird, 3 out of the twenty-four volunteers are from Oregon, 2 from Seattle. The Northwest kicks ass!
My roommate (or hotelmate) A, the other Portlander, and I went to the White Dog Café which was recommended by the lady sitting next to me on the Liberty van that took us from the airport. The porter at the hotel said Peace Corps people always pack too much. “we have to” A said. The White Dog is a great bar. Well maybe not great. It could be cheaper, but the music is handpicked and the atmosphere is as well. What’s most impressive is the street on which it lives. Sansom, although A and I thought naturally that it was Samson. But T bet us the opposite and of course we were wrong. But as we licked our wounds I take comfort in hearing every local Philadelphian say “Samson Street”. So there. T is a geographer so I guess he reads street signs. F*ck geographers. But Sansom Street is quaint and beautiful. It looks like it got lost and is trying to find Greenwich Village again, a thin row and a tight one-way street lined on one side by brownstones. They’ve re-done on the ground floors to become cafes, bars, restaurants. The White Dog, is the only place in Philly that’s served me a beer. They feature local beers only so as to stay local. It’s a cute idea that the rest of the world should adopt. When we walked in, they were playing Ella. When I came back in to use the bathroom, Pointer. I’m a pointer, and we were sitting outside, the music was none other than Bob Dylan, good omen. “and like a fool I mixed then, and they mangled up my mind and people just kept getting uglier, and I lost all sense of time.” I non-soberly sang long. The White Dog’s good enough that I’m back here again writing this.
Today I woke up and denied my roommate company to the Rocky stairs and went it alone to downtown. I took the 36th? Station thinking it was a real subway but it wasn’t. It was a trolley, a trolley underground. Strange. I got off at City Hall, which was gorgeous at least from the outside. I then walked down Market to the Delaware River. I was surprised that the sister city to Philly was Camden, a town I have only heard disdain for. But seeing it from across the river on a sunny clear, eighty some degree-day, Camden didn’t seem so bad. How lucky for me to see the brighter side of shitty horrible places, when of course I am far away and safe and naïve.
I didn’t go inside anywhere historical because, frankly once I got there, I wasn’t interested. I walked then, grabbed the real subway back to 34th no 40th avenue and walked back to the hotel. But before I got there, I went inside an Indian place, got the buffet, and did all my PC paperwork.
Orientation was all right. I had to busy myself with doodling and the lead facilitator I think, wasn’t so hot about that. I caught her eye a few times. They gave us a debit card with $180 on it and asked us to pull it out at once and we were happy to hear that. Reimbursement and per diem. So I’m back at the White Dog. Last night I caught the eye of the bartender a few times, right now she’s a few seats down between two d-bags trying to make important conversations. I’m glad to know that Portland isn’t the only town where people b.s. about their home made bikes and being an artist and how important and interesting it all is. But in the end there is always uncomfortable silence because who F-ing cares about bikes and self-righteousness. But who am I to judge, I’m alone at a bar. But I’m glad cynicism isn’t just for Portland and Seattle, the whole world can enjoy it.
...and just when I thought things couldn’t get stranger, the bartender from yesterday mentions Gambia and how her sister served there for the Peace Corps five years earlier. We talked for a while and she wrote down the village where her sister lived. If I make it there I’ll have to mention her name and see what happens. Amy from orientation doesn’t know I’m here, she’s on my left. This bartender is on my right, they both speak of the Gambia. The omens are strong. Maybe I’m meant to go there after all. Too bad for Tanzania.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Journal Entry 11.4.07
I just got scolded. I guess I haven’t been in much of an academic mood lately and my Pulaar is slipping. The trip to Janjanbureh hurt me more than it helped. I had an evaluation yesterday with my LCH and I couldn’t form even the simplest of phrases. There’s a wall I was ready to hit and I just hit it. Tonight my host father came up to me and said that I was having an exam. A pop quiz so to speak. Two days ago we learned body parts in class. I don’t know if he knew that or not but sure enough he tested me on all the body parts that I did not know or at least forgot. He joked with me but I was disappointed for the last two days I have been disappointed with my language skills both comprehension and in speaking sentences that sound better than a caveman. “me want this, me come water garden, me good good, mosquitoes bad”.
We have our second language test on Wednesday or maybe Tuesday. I got Novice High last time ahead of the curve. I have to excel again. My goal of course is Intermediate Mid, but Intermediate Low is more of a reality. I cannot get Novice High again. I must progress. My host father made me get a pen and paper and write down all the body parts he told me. I promised tomorrow that I would have a make up exam and know it all. I realize my worst fear when studying by myself. I procrastinate too much. I am way behind on my agfo reading. I don’t know coppicing from cutting or grafting. I’m working on my garden and in the process of making manure tea. ok clumps of cow and goat shit in a bidong and add water, shake and leave in the sun for a week until it gets ripe and then pour onto seedlings for extra fertilization or (jambunge). I have another bidong soaking up neem leaves and branches. Neem is a tree here that the locals use the branches for toothbrushes, the sap and leaves can be used as a pesticide that essentially is what I am making. Right now though, I am slacking. I need constant check ups and pop quizzes like tonight to keep me in line.
My main priority over the last two days has been lei making. A trainee here is from Hawaii and today she had a birthday. The other week I asked her if she had ever had a birthday where she didn’t get a lei and she said no, her African birthday would be her first. Well somewhere inside I heard my mother 6,000 miles away saying that I shouldn’t let that happen so I asked the trainees in my village and the neighboring one if anyone wanted to bike to “M”s village for her birthday. I had four takers so yesterday I got all my chores done and at sunset I set off into the fields to find wildflowers. I asked the locals what the small yellow ones were. They called them Senegal something, no worries, I picked a bunch and then took them back and outside under the stars by candlelight with my travel sewing kit, I strung a bunch of little yellow flowers into a long white string with the help of my little host brothers and sisters, cutting flowers off of the stems piercing the needle through stringing them up. I liked the one I made for “M” so much that I started making another one for my host mother. I wanted my host brother to give it to her but everyone went to bed, so I stayed up and finished it. I heard my host mother still kicking around so I called her and gave her the second lei and she didn’t understand that I was giving it to her. She thought I gave it to her so she could try it on, but I said: “no its for you. I made it for you” in my best Pulaar. Then I turned my flashlight on to show her what she looked like with it on and to my surprise she was topless, National Geographic style. I guess it wasn’t that much of a surprise, she’s always topless, she has a baby after all, and this is Africa no one wears shirts I’ve seen more shirts on men then I have on women. But it was the fact that I was giving her this lei, I was expecting this nice bonding moment and it was at the same time it was yet another reminder that hey, I’m in Africa! When I give my host mother a floral necklace and put it on her, and turn a light on so everyone can see, chances are she won’t be wearing a shirt. The lei will only further accentuate her motherly breasts and her absence to the thought that anything could be possibly wrong with going topless because after all there isn’t anything wrong with going topless. I encourage more American females to follow in my host mother’s footsteps. I hoped “M” would at least, this morning when I gave her her lei but I wasn’t so lucky.
She did love it even though it wilted pretty bad. I tried to “refrigerate” it by sticking it in a Ziploc bag and placed it in my reserve bucket of drinking water which stays a bit cooler than room temp but I wasn’t so lucky The African heat got to it pretty fast, it shrunk to about 2/3 its size by the end of the day.
Getting to “M”s village takes about an hour so we had to leave at 7ish this morning. The ride was gorgeous! The sun rising over the baobab trees and the dew lifting off the rice fields. Awe inspiring a nice cool breeze. We waited till about 4pm to head back so the afternoon sun would cool a bit and we got lucky the ride back was even better. I’m glad out of all the miscellaneous crap I brought that I included my biking spandex padded shorts and cycling jersey. Sure I looked like a fool, but it felt great, sweat wicking off of me, the wind grazing my ample aerodynamic frame. I’m not used to mountain bikes and that’s exactly what we have. The roads look like downtown Bagdad potholes the size of VW bugs. The Gelegeles and trucks cannot exceed 20mph for fear of breaking an axel. So biking and driving have relatively equal distance times. If it takes me an hour by car, expect the same by bike. I’ll try to get pictures but just image an impassable road on the states, that’s the best stretch here on the South bank highway. The North bank is much nicer, but that’s because they vote for the current president. South bank could give half a shit apparently. They just drive on the side of the road in the ditches. It’s often better than what’s “paved”. Used to road bikes, I thought mountain bikes would take some getting used to but it was a lot of fun actually. I figure the main road is like a giant obstacle course and the back roads are so sandy it’s like riding on ice sometimes, jack-knifing and tipping over. I figure people drive for miles and pay lots of dough to ride in trails like this. Here I get a free trek mountain bike and an adventure every time I ride down the street to get a bar of soap.
On somewhat of a sad note one of our original 24 trainees is considering terminating his service. It’s a guy here in my training village. He confided in me the other day even though everyone saw it coming, he saw it coming too. We talk a lot about that, how he’s been overwhelmed on this journey and maybe it’s not the right time for him. He pretty much made it public the other day so I think it’s going to happen, we’ll see. Whatever does happen, whatever choice he makes I just hope it’s for the right reasons. Leaving or staying whatever makes him fitter, happier and more productive. It’s gotten all of us to think about our time here and how we feel about early termination or not leaving and why would do either. Riding home today I had a burst of endorphins and the road kept its integrity for a stretch and a nice cool breeze came and I really felt great. I felt the same emotion that I felt when I would ride home at night from watching a movie at the Laurelhurst on a cool summer night, dry, going “no hands”. It was one of these moments when I felt like this was my new home. I AM GETTING ADJUSTED. It’s strange to move somewhere and not get those feelings. But it takes time. Slowly, slowly. As much as Portland was my home so can this be. I’m not forcing it. I’m just letting it happen. Plus, the other day my youngest host brother was in my backyard helping me and saw my toilet paper and asked “what’s this?” I cracked up. I have two years to either teach people about toilet paper or forget about it completely myself. We shall see.
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