Please don't cry.

I'm in Basse, but I only came for the day, thinking I could quickly get some banking and shopping and typing done and then return to site. I need to only stay for the day, because tomorrow is Monday.

I forgot banks are closed on Sundays.

And I've already spent a lot of time on the computer and the power went out (I'm on a laptop), and the power just went back on so maybe I will have time to write out some blog posts for future posting after all. I have a little less than one hour before I'm going for a chicken sandwich lunch and heading home. Let's see how fast I can type.

It's been about a month since I returned from site from Banjul but thankfully some muffins arrived for me in the mail, so the transition back wasn't too rough. Before I left for Banjul I was convinced my host family's dog was pregnant and that I'd soon have my pick from a litter of adorable puppies, but I returned and she's no fatter (if anything, she's a little skinnier). However, having already made up my mind that a puppy is exactly what I want, I now need to go searching around the village for one.

Oh! And today I saw pigs for the first time! A bunch of them were running down a side road in Basse. They really have the cutest snouts.

The cold season is drawing to a close and I've been informed multiple times that I'll need to buy a small bed for sleeping outside and not to worry because the mosquito net will catch any falling mangoes.


And that's all I have for random thoughts of the moment. Now I'll write up some more stories and click "Post Options" and click "Scheduled at" and type in some dates in the future.

Favorite words

One of the teachers at my school, after giving an impressive summary of Macbeth that led to a discussion of the English language, informed me that he likes looking through the dictionary. Some of the words he enjoys very much:

• lady-in-waiting
• lady-killer
• waterbed

"Hup! But they are very uncivilized!"

One day last November I observed a science lesson taught by one of the teachers. After the lesson, a group of boys went to look at one of the posters hanging on the back bulletin board. At first I didn't notice them or the poster, but when I hear, "Man. Woman. Woman," I turn around, curious.

It is a poster of famous scientists. Now I am even more curious, because posters of famous scientists don't generally include many women, unless it is a poster of famous women scientists. Sure enough...

Student, pointing to Isaac Newton: Woman.
Me: No, it's a man.
Student, pointing to Marie Curie: Woman?
Me: Yes.
Student, pointing to Stephen Hawking: ?
Me: Man.
Student points to Galileo and Darwin.
Me: Man, man.
Student looks skeptically at Darwin's bushy beard and Newton's long curly locks.
Student: Hup! But they are very uncivilized!

"Your brain went to America"

Sometimes Gambians translate things in a unique and interesting way. And sometimes I do. I probably should have translated "Hakil ma yahii Amerika" as "Your mind is on America," but a brain with a suitcase is so much more fun!

Repulsive!

I've now become quite good at telling the following story, both in English and in Pulaar, and it's made me quite popular around the village, so now I'll share it with you! I'm setting this to post on January 20, which is nearly a month and a half ago from when it actually happened, just for your information, and for those people who don't realize I haven't actually been in front of a computer every day for the past month. (it's possible to schedule a post to be published at a future date).

Here are the notes from my journal:

"03 Dec. 2010 As I write this I am listening to the little crunches of a mouse consuming a frog in the gap between my 2 trunks. I am revolted. Last night and this night I heard munching, but I thought it was coming from outside my door (although I wondered why it was so loud). Now, of course, I am wondering how a mouse and a frog managed to make their way into my house. The mouse, by the way, is absolutely disgusting. It is the most hideous mouse I've ever seen. It's got beady little eyes and a pointed nose and matted fur and it's so obsessed with gorging itself on the frog that it didn't even mind when I shone a light on it. Now I don't know what to do. At the moment I'm huddled atop my chair, and no longer will I laught at the portrayals of housewives spotting a mouse and promptly leaping atop a chair, screaming. Mice are neither cute nor adorable and it is a disturbed mind who thinks to purchase them from a pet shop for any purpose other than to feed to snakes. I'm toying w/ the idea of crushing it between the trunks, and then asking Amadou to clean up the mess. But first I've got to work up my courage, because if the mouse realizes what's up and comes dashing out, face and paws smeared with frog guts, I might just scream. Plan aborted. It has just stopped munching and is now squeaking. It has somehow been alerted to my plan, and I didn't even step out of my chair."

But then I go ahead with the plan anyway, and afterwards write the following:

"Well the mouse didn't die, but it's definitely trapped so I feel safer walking around my house until I can fetch Amadou. It stinks over there, though. I should have done a more thorough sweeping job these past few days, because one of my socks is over by the trunks, looking disgusting and poop-covered. Also, on closer examination the critter is not a mouse, but a shrew-ish, vole-like thing. So maybe I'll revise my cruel opinion of mice, but probably not. God that thing is vile."

And later:

"The vile vole story has a less satisfactory ending that I'd hoped. After I ate some bananas and brushed my teeth I went outside. Only Neene was there. I told her about the situation and she said call Amadou. So Amadou comes to the door looking groggy and none too pleased and he comes to see the mouse (b/c that's what I call it in Pulaar) and he says "can I kill it?" and I say, "Umm, yes please" and he brings a spear and stabs it. But he doesn't wait for the thing to die or even stop moving before bringing it out from between the trunks. So the wounded mouse escapes & disappears. Amadou claims it went out the door, I claim otherwise because the door is closed, though possibly it pushed it open. But we move the bed (yay, I got to sweep under my bed) but it was not there. Amadou claims it ran up the wall into the roof to the outside. I don't know much about voles, maybe they can climb walls. But wherever it is, it will soon die, if it hasn't already, and when it does I hope it did escape to the outside and run far away so that it doesn't stink up my house more than it already has. The mess is mostly cleaned up, except for some small poops I'm noticing around the house and the frog's blood stains on the floor near my trunks. It is not even 7:30 am."

However, this story is possibly the best thing that could have happened to me, because it's given me something more interesting to converse about than, "What are you cooking?" and convinced most of my neighbors that I hear Pulaar now.

Rugi (another Rugi, who's an adult, not little Rugi), after hearing the story: There aren't mice in America?
Me: There are mice, but they don't eat frogs!
Hysterical laughter.

Sini: [I don't remember Sini's question, only my response. But she asked a question to which I replied...]
Me: The frog didn't have legs! The legs were inside the mouse's stomach! The legs were not there!
Hysterical laughter.

And one night, as I'm heading into my house for the night:
Neene: May Allah not bring a mouse into your house.
Me: What did you say?
Neene: Say, "Amen"
Me: Amen, amen.

Throughout the week, random people, most of whom I had not even originally told the story to, would say things like, "Hope there weren't any mice in the house!" or if they wanted to hear the story again, "What was in your house?" or "What was the mouse eating?"

A FROG!!!

Blech.

Busy, busy

I was telling Julia one day that it's difficult for me to recognize students outside of class and that I only know they're one of my students because they'll shout "Miss Jallow!" Then she pointed out that at least I can identify what class they're in by the other phrases they'll also shout out. So in case you ever find yourself in my village, here's how you, too, can identify them:

• "Busy, busy" will be said by the twelfth graders because one day while most of them were doing classwork and some of them were napping I told them I hoped they were being busy-busy and not lazy-lazy. They laughed hysterically.
• "Time wasted!" will be said by either of the grade nine classes because for a couple of weeks I attempted to keep track of all the class time they wasted by talking instead of listening. But the plan failed because students would rush up to the board with a piece of chalk and write random numbers like 20 or 100000 underneath where I had written "time wasted"
• "No minties!" will be said by the grade nine circle class because one day they tried to distract me from teaching maths (this is the same class that asked about who invented colors) by requesting that I buy them minties (candies). I replied that minties are expensive, I am poor, and there will be NO MINTIES.
• The eleventh graders and I have no inside-jokes :(

Tobaski, Part IV of IV

 To conclude:

On the third day of Tobaski I:

• Clean and write until the afternoon, when I go visit Sowe Kunda
• Sinni (maybe that's how you spell her name?) who is Adama, Cherno, and Salio's mom, has put on the asobi compelet and tells me to do the same, so I go home, change, and return
• I'm tired, but I stay around their compound because I really don't want to miss seeing all the women wearing the asobi, despite the poor fabric choice
• It's approaching the time of seven o'clock prayers and the women have started fetching water, etc so I'm sitting pretty much by myself
• Fatou passes by on her way to the tap and we have the following exchange:

Fatou: Binta, when you are tired you can go home
Me: When am I going over there?
Fatou: You're not, it's finished.

So...I bought gross fabric for nothing, but at least I seem to be the only one in village who recognizes its gross-ness.

Tobaski, Part III of IV

On the second day of Tobaski, I start the day by sealing up the gaps between my fence and the ground with large stones and the tops of tin cans because I spot a mouse in my backyard and don't want him to return. Also, at night a lot of frogs come through the gaps and I'm scared I'll step on one, or that one will jump into the pit latrine. Next I:

• Visit Julia and Pateh tags along and jumps on her bed for a bit
• Rugi comes and tells us to visit her mom, so we do and help her crack peanuts until she tells us we need to stop because our fingers are not used to it
• Pateh decides to help by sawing through the peanut shells with a dull knife
• Fatou tells me if she gives birth to a girl she is going to name it Binta, after me!
• I return to my own compound and don't do much except sit around and attempt to understand the conversation happening around me.
• Lunch! is super delicous and includes potatoes, cabbages, and eggplant
• I return to Sowe Kunda and ask Fatou Sowe (who is not Mamadou, Rugi and Pateh's mother. This Fatou is Ebrima and Buba's mother) when the ladies will wear asobi, because it's looking like almost-sunset. She replies I can go home and she will tell me when it is time
• I sit with Rugi for awhile and make clothes for my baby (a stick she picks up from the ground) out of an instruction booklet for an Africell SIM card (also picked up from the ground)
• Some kids come by and I ask were they sent to tell me it's time to wear the asobi and they reply "yes" in Pulaar and I repeat the question a few more times and ask if they understand, and they keep replying "yes," even though I was hoping they would provide more elaboration or at least say, "yes, put on the asobi" so I would know for sure they understood my question
• I wash and put on the compelet and Neene tells me I look so nice and Fatou Sowe asks where is my camera and I return and get my picture taken and then Pippi leads me to wear the party is happening
• Except...the party is not happening. No one is wearing asobi and I am politely informed that everyone will be wearing asobi tomorrow. So I rush home to change, but the lady (who I know because I've seen her at Tostan and we walked back together from the market once, but I forget her name) told me to stay. So I sit awkwardly for awhile and someone gives me some heated sweetened condensed milk and that makes things almost better because heatened sweetened condensed milk is really delicious.
• The lady, who has been bagging salt to sell at market while I have been sitting awkwardly, asks if I've eaten yet and when I tell her no she tells me to go home and eat and come back at twelve for the party. To which I reply, "if I'm not tired..."
• So I go home and eat dinner and roasted peanuts

Tobaski, Part II of IV

Continuing:

• After eating some lunch at Julia's compound I return to my own and eat some more lunch (coos with an oily sauce of onions and meat) that will also be dinner and the next day's breakfast.
• Julia returns home and I visit Sowe Kunda  (the name of the compound where I hang out a lot and play with the kids) to see if the ladies are wearing asobi yet
• They aren't, but the kids have started walking around asking for salibo. It seems like every country has some sort of holiday that requires kids to go around asking strangers for candy, and in The Gambia it's the days after Ramadan and during Tobaski. The boys and girls put on their nicest compelets and the girls also load their hair with sparkly clips, shove all their bracelets around their wrists, snap several necklaces around their necks, and pencil in their eyebrows with jet-black or purple pencil.
• Fatou (I forget who I've already introduced you too, so in case you don't know Fatou, she is my grown-up host sister and the mother to Mamadou, Rugi and Pateh) comes by and we go to the imam's compound where a bunch of women are gathering. I thought there might be tasty food, but there was only chewing gum, a broken cassette player, and a lot of angry shouting.
• We sit there for awhile, silently.
• Fatou asks if I'm tired.
• I say "a little," and we go home.

End of Part II.

Tobaski, Part I of IV

I've divided my Tobaski stories into several parts so I can make it last longer.

First, you need to know that for Tobaski my host brother sewed me a compelet in the fabric he claimed all the neighboring women would also be wearing. I think I mentioned in an earlier post that it was hideous, but I don't think I described it.

The background is seafoam green and the battern on top is dark blue and yellow shapes that look sort of like horseshoe crabs or alien spacecrafts, except less cool. It's gross, and hopefully I'll upload photos later so you can agree. However, Amadou did an impressive sewing job, and while the earrings and shoes I bought to match don't exactly match (because seriously, nothing could match this fabric) they at least provide the eye with something more pleasing to look at.


So, now for the bulleted version of the morning of the first day of Tobaski:

• I wake up and proudly put on my Tobaski asobi that spent the last week and a half in my suitcase, untouched.
• Amadou informs me I cannot wear the asobi yet because none of the other women are wearing it. They will wear it this evening, maybe, or tomorrow. I am not to put it on until I see the others wearing it.
• I change into the peacock compelet from swearing-in, which looks better anyway
• I go over to Julia's house so that we can go together to the mosque, but the praying won't start for another hour so I spend the time watching one of her host sisters iron their compelets. The iron is actually made of iron, and you heat it by putting hot coals inside. It's awesome! Also, there's a rooster design on the handle.
• Meanwhile, another of Julia's host sister's is practicing her spelling by choosing words from an issue of Newsweek and testing whether I can tell her the word: "t-e-r-r-o-r-i-s-t" "w-a-r-m-o-n-g-e-r-i-n-g"
• Julia, her sisters, and I set off for the mosque. Lots of people are all sitting outside, the men all in the front, the women all towards the back. Julia and I find her host mom and we join her.
• The imam (I'm assuming) starts the talking and Julia's host mom tells us to start taking photos. I thought the people would be angry or secretely resentful that we were being a distraction during their religious ceremony, but instead the women were all waving us over so we would take their picture. We never walked in front of the men, so they probably didn't even know we were there. I'm not sure if they would have waved us over to take their pictures if they'd known...probably not.
• I returned home and took some pictures of my family looking all fancy in their new Tobaski outfits
• I watch Neene cook some coos as people from neighboring compounds bring over various bits of the rams they've slaughtered, because my family couldn't afford to buy a ram to slaughter. We got some stomach bits and intestine bits, a heart, a leg, and some unidentifiable stuff.
• I go over to Julia's house to help her cook, but discover that she has already finished, so instead I sit with her family and drink mango juice.

End of Part I

Turtle, turtle!

One day I walked over to my neighbors' compound and found the kids playing with a plastic, squeaky turtle toy. Unfortunately, there's not a paragraph's worth of story in a plastic turtle, even one that squeaks, so I'll resort to bullets.

Reasons why the day the kids played with the plastic, squeaky turtle is worth remembering:

• I learned the Pulaar word for turtle, which is something like "sow-ray," so in my mind I pictured this hilarious image of a sun that emitted rays of hot pink pigs
• At one point the turtle stops squeaking and Adama and Cherno tell me it is because the battery is finished. I tell them there are no batteries inside, but as I am not a squeaky-toy expert, I could not explain the real reason why it wasn't working, so I don't think they believed me.

Conversations with Rugi: Fetching water

Neene tells Rugi to wash the dishes, so Rugi tells me to help her fetch the water from the well.

Rugi [struggling to draw up the bucket]: Binta, help me!
[I start drawing up the water]
Rugi: Binta, stop! I can do it!
[Rugi takes over and manages to pull the bucket up almost all the way]
Rugi: Come on, Binta! Help me grab it!
[I pull out the bucket from the well and start emptying it into another bucket]
Rugi: Binta, stop! Hold the fabric. [we stretched a piece of fabric over the top of the bucket to strain out the bugs, etc]
[I hold the fabric]

Then repeat four more times until the second bucket overflows and Rugi decides we have enough water for doing dishes.

"He is my husband."

When I first showed my photo albums to my training village host family, I wanted to practice the new family words I'd learned that day. And when I first showed them to my permanent host family, back when I first arrived at site in September, it was because I was tired of sitting silently and awkwardly, so I thought sharing photos would be something to do. But I still couldn't say much more than "this is my sister, this is my brother."

However, sometime around Tobaski I brought out the photos again to show to one of the girls from the village (her name is Isatou, but she is Pippi in my mind, and I will refer to her as such) because we were sitting awkwardly and silently while waiting for the henna we applied on her feet to dry. And this time I could say lots of stuff! I could explain that we were dressed like zombies because we were dancing (okay, so I couldn't explain zombies...) and that I was soaking wet because my friends had thrown me into a pond, but I think she was too fascinated by the photos to actually listen to much of what I was saying.

I'm particularly fond of the following conversational snippet:

Me: This was me when I was a child.
Pippi: How old were you?
Me: Ten years old.
Pippi: I'm ten years old!
[Pippi points to a picture of my step-brother Taylor]
Pippi: That boy is handsome. He is my husband.

However, a few photos later she changes her mind and decides my brother Oliver (who's nearly twice her age) is her husband. Then, impressively, she identifies him in several subsequent photos.

So, Oliver, if you want a wife...

Thank you, Mr. Boys' Toilet

I had originally planned to write this post long, long ago (October) but forgot about it. Really the most hilarious part of this post will be the title, which was the closing line of a skit the Peer Health Educators performed one day during morning assembly.

And that's all there is to the post.

I also wanted to write a post titled: "Are you capturing what they are saying?" but in my journal I wrote down nothing more than that quote, so I remember nothing more about the context of it than that some old guy asked me that one day while some nearby people were conversing in Pulaar. I cannot even remember whether or not I had captured what they had been saying.

What is a negative number?

I was revising the distributive property with the eleventh graders one day last term (remember, I wrote this post in the past) which they seemed to be understanding very well, as long as all of the numbers and variables were positive. If, however, they needed to add -3x + 5x, they would unanimously reply that the answer was -8x.

So I took an unplanned detour into negative numbers...

Everyone agreed that I could show them two pieces of chalk but I could not show them negative two pieces of chalk; negative numbers are something that cannot be seen.

Me: So what is a negative number? Can anyone give an example of something that's negative?
Saikou: Bravery. Bravery cannot be seen.
Therese: And love.
Me: Ummm...

The Elephant and the Cock

After much nagging, we were privelaged to hear the introduction to the story of the elephant and the cock. He cannot reveal anymore, however, because he is still afraid of piracy, and also the story includes a song in Pulaar that he cannot translate.

So here is the beginning: "The elephant and the cock wanted to have a contest to see who could eat more."

The Animal Beauty Contest

One of the teachers at my school has been spending some of his weekends collecting traditional Fula stories from the nearby villages. He refused to tell us the story of the Elephant and the Cock because he is afraid of piracy (he is hoping to publish the stories at a later time). Possibly he would be mad if he knew I was about to share one of the stories with you, but if he ever publishes the book, I'll make it up to him by convincing you all to buy it.

Here is the story of the animal beauty contest, in its entirety:

So the animals decided to hold a beauty contest, and they all came. The wolves, the guinea fowl...even the rats. And they all made themselves look so nice and they put on make-ups. The warthog was walking to the beauty contest when he met the rabbit. And the rabbit said, "You have made your hairs look so nice and glossy, but your face...this beauty contest is not for your type." So the warthog turned around and went home. The End.

Thanksgiving!

I had written down in my notebook that I would write a post about Thanksgiving, but I can't remember what I was going to write about. I didn't eat a lot of tasty delicious food, but I did talk to lots of relatives, who all told me how awful I sounded (my sore throat is better now, by the way).


Also, in the evening I had the following amusing conversation with my host family, in a combination of English and Pulaar:

Amadou: Neene is happy because you always eat the food she gives you. Even if it is not sweet, you will eat it.
Me: It's true, even in America I will always eat all foods.
Neene: But you won't eat a cat.
Me: Ah! No, I won't eat a cat.
Neene: Also, you won't eat a dog.
Me: No, I won't eat a dog!
Neene: Me too, I will not eat a cat, I will not eat a dog.
Me: Good...But when I went to China, I ate a frog.
Neene, Amadou, and Bubacarr: A FROG?!
Me: Yes.
Neene: But you did not know it was a frog?
Me: No, I knew.
Amadou: You knew?
Me: Yes, and it was sweet.
Bubacarr: Sweet?
Me: The frog was with a sauce and the sauce was sweet. I did not eat the frog only.
[Sellu, my host dad, joins us. He sits down on the hammock]
Neene: Did you hear? When Binta went to China, she ate a frog!

This post will become even more amusing in the context of another story you will read about later...

What I find most interesting about this converesation is that all the other "bizarre" foods I was so proud of eating in Hong Kong would not have elicited this sort of excitement. If I had mentioned fish head casserole, they would wonder wonder why I mentioned it; obviously the head will be eaten along with the rest of the fish. Ditto for pig brain omelet. Most Gambians wouldn't eat a pig brain omelet, but the pig, not the brains, would be the problem. For Tobaski Julia's family cooked sheep's brain soup...

British English?

At least, I think the problem is with me not understanding British English. It might be a problem with me not understanding English, period. I've gotten used to some differences, like "zed" and "full stop," but I can't for the life of me figure out what "whizzing" means. One afternoon Cherno, one of the boys in an adjacent compound, asked me if I was whizzing. I thought the miscommunication was happening on his end, because the only other English I've ever heard him say is "chicken." However, a few days later I was flipping through the grade 12 textbook (Comprehensive Mathematics for Senior Secondary Schools) and came upon the following passage in the chapter on probability:


"Can you whiz with your mouth and blow your nose at the same time? Throw a die to score a three and a four at the same throw with the die (single dice)...From these little experiments, it will be discovered that each of those events cannot happen at the same time. When you are whizzing with your mouth, it is impossible to blow your nose. The performance of the whizzing will prevent that of blowing the nose."

D.I.Y. Make your shoe like new!

Materials: Plastic flip-flop with a detached strap, sewing needle, thick thread, hot coals


Step 1: Place the end of the strap in the hot coals for a little bit.

Step 2: Thread the sewing needle and knot the end of the thread.

Step 3: Use the sewing needle to poke a hole in the strap and also in the sole of the flip flop in the place where the strap has detached from.

Step 4: Bring the needle and thread through the holes a few more times so the strap and the sole are securely fastened together.

Step 5: Break the excess thread off with your teeth.

Step 6: Try on your shoe--it's just like new!


There is also a method of repairing plastic shoes that are not flip flops that involves melting on bits from other, presumably beyond repair, plastic shoes. I have only witnessed the final result, however, so I cannot provide the steps for you to do this type of repair by yourself. Sorry.

Test messages!

Messages written on the test papers of my students:

"Every day looking good is my hobby"

"In the name of Allah the most merciful the most gracious!!!"

"Rooney boy"

"Cherno Jallow or Chey Boy"

"Good luck may Allah be with me for us for every"

"Forward ever Backward never!!"