The Past Week

With school not in session because of the Christmas holidays I’ve sort of been at a loss as to what to do with myself in village. A lot of the people have left to visit family in other parts of the country. My days were mostly spent taking walks with Simba, playing soccer with the boys, and reading. A few days ago I had been in my house reading when I hear a commotion in my courtyard. Every year after they have finished the harvest, the corn sits and dries until it is time to take it off the cob. Usually this is done by laying all the dried corn on the floor and having guys come over and hit it with sticks. This year at Gabriel’s house they had a machine that does it for you. However, this still requires quite a bit of man power. I was in my house reading one day when I came out and it seemed like all the village was in my courtyard. I came out to see what was up and Gabriel said that it was time to do the corn. I pull up a chair and watched them get started. About 10 minutes or so into the process I saw my friend working hard with everyone else. I thought to myself “she’s literally like 8 months pregnant! She should not be working like this!” I really wanted to take pictures of the whole process, but then it just seemed like instead of just watching I should be doing. So I went over and began to help them. My friend was very concerned that I was getting corn dust in my hair but I told her that I didn’t mind. Then, my ma Madeline comes out with a wrap for my hair and even ties it on for me. Then she tells me that I am ready to go. It was hard work, my job was to take the corn cobs and pile them up to get it out of the way from the pieces of corn. I never realized how rough it would be. When I was working my fingers kept getting all cut up. It was so much fun. My whole family was working together, my whole village actually was working together. They all laughed with me and had a great time when I was putting buckets on my head to carry them out so that the old women and my pregnant friend wouldn’t have to. It was a great time. By the end of the afternoon I was dog tired. My fingers were bleeding, my hair was a mess, and my arms and back felt like they were on fire, but I wouldn’t have chaged that for the world. I think its moments like that where my village sees me not as a stranger, but as part of their community.

Christmas was spent in my village. I felt like this was the best choice for me. I wanted to do something that wasn’t going to make me miss home terribly. It turned out to be a great decision. On Christmas Eve I made shrimp chips, popcorn and gateaux with Gabriel’s daughter. Then at night Mattieu said that it was time to go to church and dance. I headed over to the church and was literally the only person over the age of 16! Then my neighbor showed up with her kids. The children of my village were all playing music and dancing. Everyone was so happy it was impossible for me to be sad. We stayed at the church so late that I actually fell asleep sitting up in church. My friends all told me that it was ok for me to go home to bed so Nathaniel walked me home. I woke up randomly at 3:30 a.m. Christmas morning and could hear everyone still playing music and dancing. It must have been a real wild night for my village. The next morning we all just kind of hung around in the morning. I watched a goat be slaughtered. That was intense because when goats make noise it sounds like a child is crying, so you can only imagine what it was like while it was dying. Then the whole family/village went off to church. I carried Kristian in her new pink Christmas dress to church. There was so much music and dancing during church. Even my Yaba got up there are danced while the music was playing. The joy that everyone had is something that I could never really describe and hope that I never forget. After church we went home to eat! People came in and out all day visiting and eating with Gabriel’s family. It was fun. I gave everyone their gifts and they are really loved them. Kristian has yet to put her stuffed dog down. She likes the wear it on her back like a baby. Unfortunately, the kids popped the soccer ball the morning after Christmas, but whatever. All in all Christmas was pretty good. I got to talk to my parents, and got tons of messages from my friends. Even one from Nate in South Korea and Mark!

I biked the 15km over to Lindsay’s village last Thursday, just because I was bored. I took Simba with me. I strapped my straw basket to my bike and put Simba in it. He did jump out one time, but then I put him back in and he was fine. Gabriel and well, pretty much everyone who saw me biking thought that it was so hilarious having a puppy in a basket. I thought it worked out pretty well. When I got to Lindsay’s I visited with her sweet neighbor. It was nice that she was so happy to see me. We hung out for a bit at her house and then went and had Café Au Lait at a little kiosk by her house. After coffee we went to visit Mufasa(that’s the nickname we gave to the Chef of her village). We had a nice time chatting with him and then we went off to greet more people around town. The Inspector of Boura had given Lindsay a chicken for Christmas so we went into town to try and find someone who would kill and cook it for us. It took forever but man was the chicken good. We shared it with Lindsay’s neighbor and Simba got to eat all the bones. Everyone was happy I think. Then we just sat around talking until the evening when I had to leave to bike back before it got dark. When I got back I played with the kids in my village and went to pump water so by the end of the day I was super exhausted. Now I’ve just been hanging out in Leo to celebrate the New Year with my friends.