Wednesday 7 January 2009

a cat, a disease, and 130 girls...

So i woke up one morning with a scrape on my forehead. I thought it was weird because i didnt remember falling or hidding my head on anything the night before, but oh well. it took a long time to heal and when it scabbed over, it was kind of yellow and crusty. Then a few days later i had another one on my chin and a day after that i had a big one on my cheek. they were all crusting over with this yellow junk, like something you'd find oozing out of your eye after getting pink eye. gross. so i called the med unit and Paula told me i had impetigo. she told me the name of an antibiotic, so i rode my bike over the the hospital and bought 40 pills for the equivilent of about a buck fifty. The gross sores went away after a few days and i look normal again. well, as normal as i've ever looked.

Also, there are now two of us living in my house. i got a little kitty. he is so cute: mostly white with a brown patch on his head and back, and he has three black stripes at the end of his tail. i named him Milo, and i informed him that it is his duty to catch any and all mice that come into the house, also, if he feels like eating a spider or cricket along the way, i wont mind at all.

And here is a story from yesterday morning. So my homologue has been MIA for the last couple of weeks. so i went to his house and told him i was bored and needed something to do, could i go do something with him. he said that he was going into Sokodé tomorrow and he will not be back for a week. he said that he had meetings to attend with the NGO that he works for, PLAN. i asked if i could go to one of his meetings and he said that i wouldnt be interested and that it would be just a bunch of other NGOs talking about boring stuff.

So i decided, fine, i need something to do this week, i cant just sit around and do nothing. so the next morning i went to a school and asked to meet the director (think principal). I chatted with a math teacher for a bit and he told me that the director wasnt in, that i should come back tomorrow morning.

so, yesterday morning, i returned to the school and introduced myself to the director. i told him that i work for the Peace Corps and i told him about the GEE program. he must have had stuff to do, because he directed me to talk to the woman standing next to him. she is the french teacher at the school. so i had the same conversation with her: name, Peace Corps, GEE, etc. She asked me if i wanted to talk to the girls, i said "sure" not fully understanding the question. so she told me to sit in this chair, and that she would be back. i waited in the room for about 10 or 15 minutes while the director and a few of the teachers had what looked like a daily meeting, going over paperwork and stuff. after a bit, the french teacher came back in and said "follow me". so i followed her across campus into another room empty, aside from 30 desks (i counted, 5 rows back, 6 columns across). i didnt really know what was about to happen, but all of a sudden a bunch of girls started coming through the door.

They filed in and started sitting three to a desk, and after the desks filled (5 rows, 6 columns, 3 girls each...90), they started lining up against the back wall (i counted 2, 4, 6... 40-- that's 130, every girl in the school). after everyone was in the room, the teacher turned to me and said "ok, what do you have to tell them?" oh, geeze, i thought, i started to panic. but then i collected myself and started to introduce myself. i said my name, that i worked with the Peace Corps and i started to tell them about the GEE program. When i finished my little soliloquy, i was somewhat proud of myself. yeah, that's right, i just said all of that in French. i had just enough time to reflect before the room erupted in laughter.

i looked at the French teacher, somewhat confused. She had a "dont worry about it" expression on her face and turned to the class and started to say exactly what i had just said. it took me until about half way through listening to my own impromptu speach before i figured it out. The french teacher was translating from an American trying to speak bad African French, to an African speaking good African French. after she finished the class was much more receptive and she turned to me and asked if i had anyting else to say. I told them that if they had any problems, or if they wanted to start a club or activity, to come talk to me. i live over in the Medina section of town, just ask where the Anasara (white guy) lives, and someone will show you to my house. they liked that little joke, and this time they were laughing with me instead of at me.

So the teacher dismissed them all back to their respective classrooms, and walked with me back to the director. This is actually when i found out she taught french, and i promptly apologized for slaughtering the language. When we got back, we met with the director, and i told him if he wanted me to help out with anything at the school, just let me know. i left them with a phone number and a hand shake, and rode my bike home pretty proud of myself.


on a completely different note, because i've had very little to do, i have been reading a lot. i'm about 150 pages into Obama's "Dreams from my father" and so far i think that im well on my way to becoming the president of the United States of America. let's see, i will be 35 in 2020 and i think that's an election year. i guess i should start campaigning as soon as i get back :-)