Journal Post 11/3

FIRST BIRTHDAY IN THE GAMBIA! First of three birthdays. I stayed up listening to music until it was 12 AM when the day officially changed and fell asleep. It was actually a bit cold and I had to wrap myself in my bed sheet...exciting stuff. Note to self that I will need to break out the nifty pillow blanket that I received from Res Life if this cool draft keeps up. I'm very proud of Res Life for equipping me with this useful tool. Anyways, the morning was really cool and borderline crisp.cold by the time I woke up and it was beautiful. I ate the boiled peanuts my family gave me last night with a couple of spoonfuls of congee WITHOUT the sugar, sweet success.

I went off to Ida's early to rewrite notes. Unfortunately, my iTouch charger broke today. I was okay with it though since tourist season is here and packages come easily aaand I was expecting phone calls from the States later in the day. Besides, the lack of music will help me concentrate on studying/reading the gazillion books Peace Corps provided. I made a wish list of what I needed and it's kind of funny...

Cleaning Chlorox wipes/chlorox spray
Small plastic containers (bigger than tupperware)
Tupperware
Big bottle of Purell
Dottle soap
Spoon/fork case
Waka Lamp or a crank flashlight (I THOUGHT I packed it... luckily I have a Waka Lamp that solar charges which I put in a zip lock bag so when the kids reach for it, I can sleep easy at night)
D Batteries x2938479283
PJ capris
Breakfast bars x29384723
Dried fruit
White board + markers + eraser
ITOUCH CHARGER
Protein powder
SteriPen Freedom

But... I'll probably only have 5% of my list until March/April when I can leave The Gambia after my 3 month challenge after swear in for my first real life grown up vacation haha.

Anyways, a bit more studying later, Tombo (a girl from Sierra Leone who helped the Peace Corps with our PACA training a couple of days ago) comes by and chats with me a little. She's very shy and reserved but knows a lot of English. She came from Sierra Leone to stay with her mom and get away from the country. I keep on telling her every day that I see her that she must go back to school because she has so much potential. I gave her some of my papers tucked away in my PC binder to read. She's great at pronouncing and reading and just needs to know the definition to words but that all comes with time. A bit later, my two site mates came along and sang happy birthday to me! They gifted me with food and cards. I was so happy - definitely didn't expect such a sweet gesture! I then gave Tombo other materials to read and there was one awkward moment where she read my salary for Peace Corps and I quickly turned the page and told her to focus on something else. It's not much by American standards but I bet it's a LOT for Gambian standards. Out of no where, Tombo turns to me and tells me she made a song for me. I took out my iTouch - thank god I had SOME batteries left - and recorded it. It was so unreal. All of my site mates stopped to listen and we all loved it. I felt so touched and I will play it back for myself years to come and remember the exact morning, what I was doing, where I was, who I was with, and everything that took place. I know that I will always remember.

We tried studying but our minds were so scattered and I tried my best recopying notes. There was just random things distracting us - hunger, the fact that there was a death in the extended family in one of our sites, I wanted to make sure Tombo read some of the more difficult words easier and that I could define them for her, and there was this white baby doll owned by this one boy who was the biggest Distractor of all. First of all, the idea that there's this white plastic baby doll in Gambia with big blue eyes, peach skin, and bleached blonde hair is hilarious. Second of all, it's a sad looking naked doll with its face jarred from marker and its eyelashes falling off. BUT THIRD OF ALL, the best part about this thing is that it had strings of black hair being braided into its head and the kids renamed him Toubab baby (foreigner baby). I had to take a picture which will hopefully be posted later. A little later,  Tombo is done with reading and I asked if she wants to sit away from the sun since it was slowly creeping in on us. She shook her head and said no because she was going to head out, but before she leaves, she turns to me, looks me straight in the eye, and says "I like you because you have have regard for others." I totally wasn't prepared to for that and so I thanked her and asked if I would see her tomorrow. She said she was moving to a place where she could go to school, a placed called Sekunda which has a LOT of schools. I was super excited that she was finally going, the biggest step was relocation, but I wanted to give her something to express my gratitude in meeting her. She said she will try to see me.

Unfortunately, I'm suppose to be going to Soma for internet and a homework assignment so I don't know if I will see her (since I'm meeting my site mates at 8:30 AM). SOOO I wrote her a nice message on a note card and drew Hello Kitty holding a book tonight and set my alarm clock for 6 AM so that hopefully I can catch her in the morning before leaving. I really do hope I'll see her, though.

I had lunch with my site mates and we and raised hell at Ida's since she wasn't there. We did everything we weren't suppose to do - knees were out, asses were shown, ate with spoons, laid everywhere, damn we were wreckless. We had fun talking about anything and everything and I received nice birthday texts/calls. One of our Peace Corps Resident Assistants (I like to call them... they're really my PCVL/Peace Corps Volunteer Leaders) called and said he'd be visiting us shortly so we finally found the will to leave Ida's house. On the way, Arroy, the Alkaloo's daughter, waved me down and we stopped in her compound. She brought us into her house and we saw her beautiful drapes and dishes and really shiny wedding gifts. She had this huge cabinet full of shiny things, everything was really well kept, her bed area was very colorful and the mattress was huge. I really liked the place. She was generously hospitable to us and it was at her house that my first call from the US came through! My site mates and I only stayed for a bit before leaving and was quickly surrounded by school children saying hi, hi, hi. All these kids from my compound came rushing at me and then the kids from the school were dismissed and came rushing at us, and then the Peace Corps vehicle came and all hell broke loose. I felt like a celebrity at a movie premiere. My PCVL/RA Daniel emerged and I introduced him, Alicia, and Elizabeth to my family. DANIEL IS SO POPULAR. Absolutely everyone's host family loves him... what a charmer.  He then checked out the garden and bussed the ladies back home. It was quite convenient that at that very minute my second call from the US came! I started gushing about how Gambia was thus far since I couldn't really hear that well on the other end. It didn't seem that long but it was 20 minutes and when I started recalling everything the waterworks came. I just started crying because it has only been a mere 3 weeks but so much happened. It's a bit overwhelming when I really think about it because never in a million years would I expect how my life is unfolding.

A bit later, a friend of Arroy's came by and she dropped off a pot of oiled up spaghetti with a couple of potato slices. The gesture was endearing and saved my LIFE because my family only cooked coos and peanut sauce/oil tonight which I had none of. I went outside for brief homework checks and assigning out more math problems. They gave me a bowl of boiled peanuts, hell yeah. I called it an early night though because I was exhausted. I do think, however, that I heard one of my 16 year old sisters talking crap about me/toubabing me and so I'll have to confront her tomorrow with my limited Serehule and get my RA face on. Helllll to the no is she getting away with that after I helped her with math and we had a naming ceremony where the Alkaloo specifically instructed everyone not to toubab us. Especially the adults. Hell no.