So, yesterday was a pretty wild day. I woke up pretty sore because of my new workout, and from digging up some dirt the day before. I had also woken up a little bit late at 8:40. I jumped out of bed and started pulling water from the well so that I could water the garden I had started. Right now there are a few tomatoes scattered here and there, a banana tree, some marigolds, a papaya, an intensive moringa bed with about 50 moringas, and some mint. I didn’t have time to shower, and I went straight to my new pulaar teacher’s house. When I get there I learn that Shades lives there too. (Shades is this weird guy, that pam and I keep seeing. Whenever one of us sees him he always asks where the other one is.) So of course he asks me where pam is and I try and explain to him that I have no idea where she is. I tell him (again) that we have different jobs, and live in different houses and that I never know where she is. He seems content with the answer and goes off into the city, I can only assume to the school he works at. I
My pulaar teacher seems like a nice guy, really close to one of the school gardens I supervise. He also teaches Unicef workers pulaar. The only problem with him is that he doesn’t speak any English. But anyways, I go there and sit down and take out my books and start going through some stuff, when this one crazy guy comes into the compound. Apparently he cannot speak or hear. I decide to watch the conversation unfold between my pulaar teacher and the deaf mute. For it being a conversation of just gestures, it goes on for a very long time. I can only assume that the deaf mute is asking for money, and my pulaar teacher keeps pointing up to the sky and making praying motions probably something about if you pray to allah good things will happen. We eventually get to study, and it was a bit difficult, mostly because he can’t speak English. Luckily I do have a French English dictionary, which is quite helpful.
I then went to the agriculture office and listened to podcasts and read about gardening and then I went home for lunch. After lunch I went to the hotel for a coke, and to check my e-mail. After a few hours I came home and I went about my business in the garden. I watered stuff, and started to make a trellis. Then I decided to sit back and hangout for a bit. My host mom decided that she needed to sell ice at the market, and she left me alone with my sisters. Lately however my sisters have been a bit rambunctious, and extremely obnoxious. I sat in a corner of the compound with my guitar and started to play. Well after about 10 minutes (without any adults besides me in my terrible pulaar) about 20 kids were in the compound all going crazy, screaming, and fighting, and trying to touch the guitar. I picked up a stick to threaten them, but they just saw it as amusing. Eventually one of the older ones were able to get most of the kids out of the compound. So then its me, my guitar, and like 7 kids. Suddenly the weirdest thing happened. One of the kids (Abdulay, he also suffers from some kind of mental illness) hits the ground head first maybe 2 inches from a rock, and begins to seizure. This scares the crap out of all the kids and they run. So then it’s me a seizing kid, and my guitar. At first I wasn’t sure what was going on, after all the kid isn’t all quite there already. Then I realized that he was having a seizure and moved things away from him and tried to protect his head. The child pissed himself mid seizure. Then suddenly he stopped seizing he sat up, realized he pissed himself looked around and bolted out the door. Maybe 30 seconds later all of the kids were back causing all sorts of trouble like crazy African children do. Finally after another 2 minutes my host mom comes back. She must have stopped and talked to the ladies down the street cause when she came into the compound she gave those kids a verbal beating like you wouldn’t believe. I am not quite sure what was said because she spoke so fast, but I can imagine.
The rest of the day was pretty good. My sisters are just out of control.
-Mike
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