Friday, May 6, 2011

In the past month...

Being an hour and a half away from the internet was a bit of an impediment to my blogging so now that I'm home I decided to share a few stories from the past month. If you're interested in having your ear talked off and hearing every single detail of my life while I was there just give me a call. Otherwise here are some things that happened...

March 29

For spring break the sisters decided we would do a community outing to a village called Marealo which is along the Niger river. They didn't know exactly where it was so to get there we first went to San to ask directions at a church there. Then one of the priests called someone he knew who sent his son on bike to an intersection where we were supposed to find him and he would then lead us there. So we drove around until we saw a kid on a bike at an intersection who looked like he was waiting for someone and followed him. The area was super desert-y with hardly any trees. Not the mango tree covered paradise that is Touba. Then all of a sudden in the distance there was a forest of eucalyptus trees. Really bizarre/pretty. So once we arrived we got out all our picnic supplies and headed down to find a nice spot on the river.

We walked over to a tree and were going to set up shop under there, but no we couldnt because that was the sacred tree where they do sacrifices. If I had been alone I would have had no idea, but the sisters saw some basket thing under it and they knew. Sadly we had not brought along a chicken to sacrifice. We found another tree and ate our lunch. Then later we decided to go swimming. Cattle upstream and a crowd of children washing their clothes? Yeah I'll take a dip. I love a combination pool/bathroom/washing machine. Sr Adriana said 'the water is so clean!' and I laughed until I realized she was dead serious. 'Clean' as in the water was not stagnant. The water did feel amazing and afterwards my feet were the cleanest they had been for a weeks. Don't hate- it's hard to stay clean with all the dust. The kids who were there doing laundry swam over to us and we talked to them for a bit. They were cold. It was at least 100 degrees. So our community outing was a great success and believe it or not I did not get sick after swimming in that 'clean' water.

It is the beginning of mango season and since the sisters have 5 mango trees on the property I eat at least 10 a day. Theyre not huge so I'm not exaggerating. Unfortunately at the beginning I had to take a few days off because I got a rash around my mouth that then spread to my neck/chest. I ended up having to take medicine and Jacques gave me a shot. If you know what I mean. Just kidding mom! Luckily that cleared up and I was able to continue eating a nasty number of mangoes.

More stories to come as I go through my journal and reminisce about eating dog meat and other things that happened...



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