Culture shock

I went on a mini vacation to the capital city and went through some slight culture shock. I am so used to (though not completely comfortable with) always being stared at it was an odd experience to be in the city and be mostly just another person walking around. It was a little refreshing but unexpectedly I missed making eye contact with people. Out here people look at you, in the city its more like home where people don’t make eye contact. Below I recall all the ‘culture shock’ worthy notes…

Women wear pants in the city and aren’t looked at like they’re weird. That was nice because I like jeans. People were even weaing skinny jeans! Like really tight. Out here women rarely wear pants- its skirts or kitenge wraps. I guess it wasn’t that long ago that only prostitutes wore pants… at least out in the rural places like where I am. Thank goodness those days have past, but men still make comments about women who wear pants… I guess the thigh and butt are very sensuous here- even to see their outline. (But breasts are NOT and people breastfeed all the time and I’ve seen a few women wearing mesh see through shirts and its no big deal)

I also ate ice cream at this starbucks-ish place. Awesome.

There was a 24 h supermarket-NAKUMAT- more like a mini (and very expensive) walmart; it has a little bit of everything. There were books, bikes, treadmills, and groceries. Cereal was like 11 dollars for a small box. I am not having my wheaties that is for sure. But there were really cheap spices (probably directly imported from India) and I should have taken more advantage and bough a whole bunch… maybe when I go back to Kigali to go home. Out in Kibogora there is no grocery… there is the open air market and there are Dukas (shops) to buy Fanta/packaged goods etc. Nakumat was nice but its no Wegmans 🙂

The roads were paved, well… at least the majority of roads were paved. It felt luxurious to take a moto taxi, but it is more of an adventure here on the bumpy roads.

It only rained there once in the entire week! That was a nice change even though I really don’t mind the rain. Except that it can cause midslides and wash out bridges…

I went to a bar! There are bars out here in kibogora, but they are a bit sketchy. And usually not the endearing type of sketchy like dive bars at home, more seedy, But the bar I went to in Kigali was kinda funny… by day I’m sure it would look like a family resturaunt (except for the bar with uplights on bottles of liquor). The little tables had checkered table clothes and were arranged like everyone was having lunch. But there was a DJ blasting an odd mix of songs and strobe lights and laser lights putting stars and flowers on the walls. This was a Tuesday night I think. The best part was this middle aged man that kept getting up and shaking his booty half Shaquira/half traditional Rwandan dance style in the middle of the room. He was the only one dancing but he did not care.

The house I stayed at had 4 other young women staying there (also mizungus). One was a peace corps volunteer, two sisters (one was visiting the other who had just finished teaching for a year here) and the last was another volunteer. It was a little strange to have people around my age to chat with– there was some ‘girl talk’. Ha. They also gave me some great advice on what to see in the city/how to get places and we all went to that cafe to get ice cream together… pretty awesome.

This last one is not particular to the city but I just found out that it is considered rude to carry things like food/clothes without covering them… they should always be in a bag. I thought that was interesting and I think I have been offending people (unknowingly!) for months. Ooops.

More later on the city adventure….

All dressed up…

One of the doctors at the hospital, Ngoy, got married last weekend! Well the religious ceremony (what we think of as a wedding) was last Friday. The dowry ceremony preceded by a few weeks and the legal marriage ceremony was earlier in the week. All of this was in Bukavu, Congo and a bunch of people from the hospital were going to caravan it over to the border and go to the wedding. The border crossing is at the south end of Lake Kivu at the Rusizi River at the city of Kamembae. It’s about a 2 1/2 hour drive from Kibogora. Lisa, my American Dr. boss, had done the same trip for another doctors wedding last year so I thought I was all set.

I put on my most fancy outfit (the long maxi type dress I had made out of Kitenge), put together a little bag of the essentials, and went over to Dr. Bora’s house to show her my get up. After a few minutes of her and the kids saying how nice I looked she asked if I wanted to borrow some of her clothes instead! Sure… so we played dress up and I got pretty decked out- earings, necklace, bracelets and of course a floor length satiny get up in different shades of gold with flowers. And a built in shawl/wrap. So by this point I am really excited for this event (even though I didn’t really know what I looked like and didn’t have high hopes since i had no makeup and had been cutting my own hair). I would get to celebrate with most of the docs and see a congolese wedding and be taught how to dance…

So the drive out to the border was pretty uneventful. Long and bumpy road and a little warm in the car full of people but ok. The views were beautiful though and I hadn’t been out to the south at all so it was nice to see something new. Huge beautiful fields of tea- they are unbelievably green and cover so much area (its one of the country’s biggest exports). Then we come out of the hills and back to the lakeside and I see Bukavu in the distance. A city! I hadn’t seen a city since I left Kigali a few months ago, but it was still far away. So we drove through Kamembae the Rwandan city to the border crossing. All was going smoothly and my passport was stamped as ‘leaving the country’. Now the border crossing is interesting in and of itself. I’m told that the paperwork to take vehicles across is quite extensive so almost everyone does so by foot. There is this bridge wide enough only for one vehicle and is just slats of wood with iron railings. So we all start walking to Congo… cross the bridge then walk up this dirt road a few hundred yards to the official DRC entry. We stand in line and I am quickly plucked from the line by this man. He grabs my passport and starts flipping through.

“Where are  you going?” He asks in French. “To the marriage of my friend” I reply in broken French.

“Where is your visa?” He demands. “I need to buy a visa” (This sentence I know I said correctly in French)

“You cannot do that here”. Heart drops. Stomach jumps. This cannot be correct because Lisa just did this and bought her visa here!

So the man starts walking away from me into the building WITH MY PASSPORT. This is when I start to get worried, but perhaps this is how I buy my visa? I still have some hope. So he motions for me to follow (remember I am dressed to the 9s here in borrowed African golden floor length gown) He goes into a back office and starts writing down my passport info. I start to think that either I’m getting my Visa or getting arrested. Then Dr. Bora comes in and tried to bargain with the man as it becomes clear that I am not getting my visa. He keeps saying that it is not possible and is pretty mean about it. Bora tries to talk with him about options… but to no avail. He hands my passport to an armed gaurd and instructs her to excort me back to the Rwandan border office. Let me tell you about walks of shame. Dressed head to toe in this gown being escorted down this dirt road back to Rwanda. Man that was embarrassing. Not to mention how sad I was that I was going to miss the ceremony and the gaurd would not stop walking away towards the border with my passport even long enough for me to talk with my friends about what I was to do when I got back to Rwanda! Was the driver still there? I didn’t have his number. Was I just going to wait?

Anyways Bora caught up to me as I got “checked back in” to Rwanda. Then another car of people arrived from the hospital and I had to explain to everyone how I was rejected by the DRC. One of the docs was pretty sure he could ‘get me in’ so I reluctantly agreed to give it another go. I had come this far after all but my ego was a little worse for the wear already. He was confident and I let myself hope. Only this time to be turned away a bit more gruffly. At least this time only my friend walked back with me and not another gaurd.

So I technically was in Congo but the only record of it is whatever that mean man wrote my information in. I hope it wasn’t a no-border-crossing no-visa allowed list. And basically Congo wouldn’t even take me if I paid them (extra).

My plans had definitely changed but thank goodness the one driver was still around because he was going to be running errands all day waiting for a truck load of people that would be returning to Kibogora that night. So, all dressed up with no where to go but run errands around Kamembae. Not the ideal day but I tried to make the most of it. I felt really grumpy twice, I have to admit. Once when the driver assumed that I would take him out to lunch and then onthe drive back when he was endlessly having shouting conversations on the phone and with people in the truck. For the day as a whole though it was ok. We bought paint, picked up blood from another hospital, had lunch, picked up other supplies.

The highlight was probably that I actually ran into a friend!! I was waiting in the car in front of a store and people were all walking by (becausec we were parked on the side walk ) and I hear “KARI!!” I was like “???!?!!??!!!!” It was the deputy of discipline from one of the schools I’ve been working with! (like a vice principal) She said i looked ‘very smart’ in my outfit and should wear it to her wedding next weekend! I was planning on going to her wedding too but I am sad I missed Ngoy’s still!! Seeing Esperance and getting a hug admittedly made me feel better and like less of a moron.

To justify my mis step– I had tried to research the visa thing but the congo-official website had not been working and other websites and lisa said it was possible to buy entry visa at the border- so it was just unfortunate. BUT AT LEAST I TRIED! And the docs have been saying that since the Congolese elections are next week they are much more strict at the borders (hence the failed ‘smoothing things over’ attempts)

Anywho that’s my trip to Congo! The one picture above is the Rusizi River and the little bridge to Congo.

And lastly lastly to justify my grumpiness this is a picture of the moon rising behind a hill in Kamembae before we even left to return to Kibogora… it was a long day~ but at the end of the long day, despite some embarassment, fear, frustration, and almost tears being shed (oh did I leave out that I was so embarassed when I had to tell everyone I couldn’t get in I ALMOST but DIDN’t cry?) it was an interesting day and I think I got some good photos and got to see a little bit of Kamembae. The next time I go back there though I will be wearing a different outfit for sure.

shopping for paint

Life lately

I haven’t posted anything for awhile… as a slight follow up to my last post: I was not able to find a gorilla suit. I think wearing it would have been oddly freeing. People already stare at me (always) and it would be nice to have a reason other than there’s that pale girl walking by. I feel the staring would finally be quite justified if I was wearing a gorilla suit. But alas, no suit.

On another note there have been a bunch of new people here!

There was an optho team here for a little over a week doing mostly cataract surgeries. To be honest I think eyeballs are the scariest part of the body. They are balls of goo covered in a thin, seemingly poppable layer of mystery. I don’t like them very much at all and the idea of cutting into them makes me squeamish.

To be fair to all eyeballs I have a nice memory about them… there was this slowly intensifying rivallry going on in my senior bio class in high school and someone (i actually think it was the teacher) wrapped a cow eyeball in tin foil and put it in this girls purse. She walked around with it there all day. I’m pretty sure this was in response to the student stapling all of the teachers papers to his desk…. but back to the optho team…

I did muster up the courage to go watch some of the surgeries and they are pretty cool. The surgeon was saying how out of date the techniques are due to equipment limitations but that the old techniques at 1 month post op have the same results. That part is reassuring at least.

Just to summarize the procedure (and to justify my weak in the knees response) They start with a retro-orbital nerve block. A probably 2” needle is placed under the eye (like in the part that gets dark circles) and inserted until you feel the membrane BEHIND the eye pop! Then you know you’re in the right space. Another smaller injection is made above the eye. –I don’t like to imagine seeing that needle come towards my eye! but at least the nerve block stops the eye from seeing from here on out!

Then the eye is “softened” with a weight sitting on it. Then cleaning the area, mundane things. Then to the good stuff! They stabilize the eye with one stitch near the top of the eyeball and clear away the conjunctiva. Then an incision (in several steps) is made through the sclera (white part of the eye) into the chamber that holds the lens. Lots of fine manuevers later and the lens comes out (with the cataract inside it) and an artificial lens is put in. Like two days later the patient can see! (as a caveat to this summary I am no expert)

It was really interesting and I didn’t faint so it was a great success. It is such a neat little procedure but to see someone cutting up an eyeball that is still in someones face is unnerving to say the least. It is amazing what the team was able to do in their short time here. I think they did upwards of 70 surgeries and one patient was only 18 years old! The surgeon said to me  “this is why you should be an opthomologist!” The results were amazing so many people can now see when a few days ago they couldn’t or at least see much much better. The quality of life change for that person and their family must be drastic. It is the perfect kind of service that a small time can make a huge and long lasting impact.

Though my fear of eyeballs still makes optho not for me- I do think you can do great things with it. During the post op rounds the patients were singing and shouting for joy when their bandages were removed. It was great!

So, back to when I first met the optho team… we were going through the usual, ‘where are you from’ s and it turns out one of the nurses is also a UR alum! Of course I shouted ‘Meliora’ and gave her a hug. It was kinda funny. A picture was taken and she plans to write into the Alumni magazine about our chance meeting! And it gets better… the group gave me some of their leftover snacks! it really was like christmas! Did you know they make dark chocolate snickers bars? They do. I now have one that I am saving for a mentally rainy day.

There is also a German team here for a couple weeks- two GYN surgeons, an OR tech, and an anesthesiologist. They are all really nice- it’s too bad I never took German though. ‘Guten tag’ and ‘Danke’ are the sum of my skills. They speak English though.

I have been running around for the Sex Ed classes and going through records at a Health Center a bit away from here so I haven’t spent much time with them.

I was able to assist on a surgery yesterday. It’s that same paradox that you run into often in medicine… it was very interesting from a medical perspective but a poor prognosis for the patient. Unfortunately it was a case of metastatic cervical cancer in a woman who is only 42. A cancer that with proper screening is almost entirely preventable. THERE IS NO SCREENING HERE. It really is unfair. Even comparing this case to the US healthcare points out why everyone needs healthcare coverage. Though at home we have people trained to screen patients, we have the pathologists to look at specimens, etc. Everyone needs access to healthcare. Here it is the same problem just scaled up. I will have to write another blurb sometime about the health care system here at another time.

AND I ALMOST FORGOT TO WRITE THAT I WAS ATTACKED BY A LIZARD! I was outside last night trying to use the hospital internet without walking all the way there (there is wireless that works on and off… yes, I know I’m not really roughing it…) Anyways I was outside in the dark on this porch. I have become accustomed to the moths, the little lizards, the little ants, big ants, mystery insects surrounding me at all times. I like them better than roaches which I haven’t seen since staying in the capital. So I was minding my own business typing away when something substantial dropped onto my shoulder. I jumped up and a few steps away. What do i find behind me but a lizard and above me is another still on the roof. I don’t know if they were fighting, playing or loving up above me but somehow it ended with one on my shoulder. Not cool lizard. At least it didn’t bite me after it landed. There was a bit of nervous laughter after the fall but luckily no one (other than the creatures mentioned above) to witness the event.

Scissors and Gorillas

 

You know those cardinal rules you learn in childhood…? Don’t run with scissors, don’t eat and then go swimming, don’t cut your own hair… I never learned those and just cut my own hair. My trash bin now looks like someone shaved a small rodent and hopefully my head doesn’t look like a bald rodent but it’s a real possibility given that I still haven’t seen the back of my head.

 

On another note- Sheila just told me a story about a dude who was living here a few years ago… Around Halloween he found a gorilla suit somewhere and ran around scaring the ba-jeezes out of people. 1. He is my hero 2. I am now on the search for this gorilla suit (cross your fingers I really hope its still around 3. If I find the aforementioned suit I will be sure to document it so don’t worry– wish me luck!

And in response to advice from my gramma not to swim here anymore… I already promised to teach my friend how to swim! So now I have to- oops

Swimming in Schisto

 

So, in my first post I mentioned schistosomiasis. It is this little parasite that lives in snails then pops out as these little worm swimmers that find people in the water, pierce their skin, wriggle into the blood stream and either hone in on the liver or bladder (depending on the species) to then find a mate there and breed. Don’t worry this isn’t going to be a parasitology lecture (I’ll save that for Coyle)…but that’s a fun little summary.

Anyways, I have been having this ongoing argument with Daniel, the nurse that is working on the maternal health and sex ed projects; Daniel insists that people don’t get schistosomiasis here. I looked on the CDC website and there is low-moderate risk.

Who to believe?

 

I was leaning towards the CDC because I’m a stubborn American but then to top it all off Sheila, the Brit that has been running the Mission housing for almost 30 years, told me that almost every ‘mizungu’ that goes swimming in the lake ends up testing positive for schisto! yikes

 

Yet somehow I still found myself toying with the idea of going swimming. I’m here for so long. It gets so

warm. The water looks so nice. I haven’t

 

even seen a snail anywhere and so on…

 

Still on the fence thinking about it all until we took a little day trip up north a little ways on the lake. It was even more beautiful there (and I still didn’t see any snails). I can’t use the excuse that everyone was doing it because no one else was, but I jumped in and swam out towards the middle (farther from the invisible snails?) It was glorious. The water was clear, peaceful. As I swam towards the island in the distance there was music coming from a little church on the hill. Sun was shining. Paradise.

My grand plan is to either swim alot and therefore make it worth the risk or not to swim anymore and hope I didn’t get the funk this time. I think I’m leaning towards swimming alot. It was so nice! The water was great and it was just so beautiful and peaceful.

Well it was peaceful until these two guys rowed by on a fishing boat and I we had a little talk out there in the lake. Awkard to be all alone and then all of a sudden some people intrude on your private reverie. Then they asked me a question I didn’t understand (expected because my Kinyrwanda is minimal) Sheila eventually shouted from the shore that they were asking me to go with them. Ha. No, thank you was my reply… though I would like to take a boat ride… next time I guess.

And finally sorry Mom– I think there will be a next time swimming. Her reaction to this story was something to the effect of “KARI! Do you want your body to be a petre dish!?” Not particularly, but I’ll swim and treat the consequences later (praziquantel)
😀

Food food food

This weekend has been amazing. Went to the market on
Saturday morning; with the hustle and bustle and so many people it is always an
experience. I love the parade of people.  The crowd slowly increases  as you get closer and closer to the market
town. Kids are carrying chickens by the feet (still living but possibly not long
til the table); one woman was carrying a small goat, also yet alive, slung over
both her shoulders, strange yet impressive; then of course there are scores of
people  defying gravity with logs,
baskets, pots even backpacks balancing on their heads.. (I try to balance my
impulse to take pictures of everything with a dash of tact/an effort not to
turn people’s everyday life into a photoshoot so no pictures of the goat to
post).

So Willy was nice enough to come to the market with me, it’s
maybe like 4 or 5 kilometers away. I go more for the experience than to buy
anything and so mostly people think I’m weird to want to walk all the way there
just to buy some avocados. But really they are like 12 cents each and I’ve been
making my own guacamole fresh with ingredients from the garden and all I lack
are avocados and cilantro. Avocados are so cheap that I might start turning
green from eating so many… cilantro is another story as I have yet to find
anyone who knows what it is. Eh, my fresh guac is so good (on toast) that I don’t
need it (I tell myself). The market trip was great and I took Willy to lunch as
a thank you but I just wanted a coke to cool off (got my first sunburn… oops)

Then on my walk back to my house I ran into Alex, a Congolese
doctor from the hospital, and he invited me over for lunch. Good thing I only
had a coke at lunch with Willy because a regular Congolese meal is a veritable
feast. AND YOU GET TO EAT WITH YOUR HANDS! Deliciousness ensued. There was
chicken cooked in this thin red spiced sauce, roasted chicken, a green leafy vegetable
dish with onions and tomatoes, French fries, red beans, and finally these
Kassava/cornmeal lumps that look like mashed potatoes but are the consistency
of playdough that you make into bite sized scoopers to eat everything else with.
That was the first course. Then came bananas, pineapple, and avocados. It was
amazing but by the end I just wanted to put on sweatpants and sleep.

It was a great meal and Alex even had a friend visiting from
Congo but since my French is still in its infancy and I think I know 5 words of
Swahili … so it was not the most fluid conversation as his friend doesn’t speak
English. There was more eating than talking anyways so it wasn’t a problem.

Then in the evening I went with this peace corps volunteer
to have dinner at his host mother’s house. Of course I couldn’t be rude and eat
like a bird,  that would be just wrong.
So I again feasted and  now feel like I
should fast for about a week. There was rice, beans, this stewed cabbage and
carrots dish, plantain like bananas cooked in red sauce, spaghetti, French
fries, and roasted goat meat. I love how French fries are part of the meals
here and they make them nice and salty…mmmm. Russel, the peace corps volunteer
has been here for just shy of two years and he leaves in 2 weeks, so this was a
little bit of a goodbye dinner for him. One of the local pastors and his wife
came and at the end of the dinner they all sang him a goodbye song. I guess it
translates to “we hope to see you again but if we don’t we’ll find you in
heaven”. Of course I know the song has a nice heartfelt meaning but I couldn’t
help thinking the song was a little funny… because when they sing it it sounds
happy but they’re alluding to all of their deaths. Maybe I’m just reaching for
some morbid humor, or maybe I was just feeling giggly after feasting all day.
Anyways it was such a nice dinner and they all were very welcoming into their
home.

So I’ve been trying to upload photos from the feasts for about an hour but
no such luck… perhaps another day but the one above is a meal from a small restaraunt in town. Goat brochette (I tried to explain what a shishkabob was….) and roasted bananas

Inanansi–Pineapple in my backyard

I love pineapple. The garden is amazing– rows of pinapple, cabbages, carrots all growing at my house!

 

 

and a picture of the big market at Kirambo. I walked by there on a Sunday (the market is on Saturdays only) and it was nearly abandoned. There was one child running through the square rolling a tire rim with a stick. It was so strange as I have only seen Kirambo on busy busy market days!

Sex Ed Adventures

When I think about these classes I endured during my school days I can’t help but flash back to that ‘miracle of life’ video that tortured us all in 6th grade or so. It seemed like no small miracle at the time that the woman did not tear in two and that we watching or covering our eyes also survived the ordeal. Somehow I now find myself not only trying to start similar classes, classes that horrified me at the time, but also strangely thinking that in a short time I will be applying to OB GYN residency.

Anyways, we have two great nurses that are teaching the classes as I unfortunately have yet to master French or Kinyarwanda. But I am playing at administrator/coordinator/trouble shooter and lastly question answerer. Yesterday had some choice questions… the best of which I will recap.

One young man looking very serious waited until after class to approach me with some questions. The first question was quite confusing and somehow about Vitamin B 12 deficiency. (Not relevant to the class at all but his Chemistry teacher had said that for reasons he didn’t know women with Vit B12 deficiency were thin and fat women had loads of B 12) What is your questioin child? Bla bla bla I explained that is was not B 12 causing the women to be fat- if you eat well or too much you probably won’t have a vitamin deficiency and if you can’t eat very much for a very long time which it takes to deplete you B12 you get very thin.

So this young man is apparently preocupied by fears of fat women, who for the most part don’t even exist here. His follow up question:

“Why do women get fat after they get married?”

The entire time this student has a very serious and concerned look on his face… I have no idea where these questions are coming from. The days lesson was on simple reproductive anatomy. I replied to the strange child that women start to have babies after they get married and in order to be healthy they must gain weight.

Still not sure if this student was trying to impress me with his astute observations or with his English… I’m yet confused.

I’ve also been passed two notes now confessing undying love. Glad people still pass notes- I thought it was a dying art.
Its not all kittens and rainbows though… one of the students stole my pen. Two students borrowed and didn’t return them but this was different! This one student either pickpocketed me or the pen fell out and she took it and left with it.
I took it back though- its a sharpie… I love those. Good thing you aren’t too sneaky and I saw you with it. Girl please. I’m not letting you take my pen.

A couple more photos…

 

 

I loved this bicycle! There are kids playing futbol in the background and the big building is a tea warehouse for all the tea growers in the area.

 

 

This picture is from my first trip here. Desire, Lisa and I took a hike back into the hills behind Tyazo (the village about a mile down the road from the hospital)

A daunting question… dun dun dun

I was at one of the boarding schools the other day (where we’re trying to start some reproductive health classes for the students) and I was asked a seemingly simple question… “How are New York City and Kibogora similar?” As this teacher was asking the question I was running through how they were different in my head but similar—that wasn’t the question I was expecting. I stalled for an answer. I am sitting in the teachers’ lounge of this boarding school thinking… UMMMMM come up with something! Come up with something!!

So my response was “We both have mosquitos,” absolute brilliancy ebbing from my mouth I continued, “We have mosquitoes In New York City too”. It was weak but I was caught off guard and an entire lounge full of teachers was awaiting my response. NYC is a crazy place, full of people from all over the world, all walks of life living in close proximity. Then the city itself sprawls out across a hug are with distinct neighborhoods and styles: hipsters here, Spanish Haarlem there, midtown, the Bronx (or trying to get a taxi back to the Bronx late and telling cabbie after cabbie that you’re going to report them for refusing your fare—that’s discrimination. and a shout out to nic, bon and steph). I’m not saying it’s all glorious, definitely not. But I’m sitting in this teacher’s lounge with someone washing their hands from a spicketed bucket perched on a stool and the window in front of me offers a view of Lake Kivu one the Africa’s great lakes and in the distance in Congo… so I have to say I was at a loss for similarities.

In generalities of course I think people are pretty much the same everywhere. Driven by basic human characteristics common to most everyone. But how could I articulate that? I had trouble typing it out let alone conveying across language barriers…

Now, having had more time to think it over, there are many similarities. Kids are kids. When I go walking, regardless of how tattered clothed, they do seem generally happy, the sounds of their playful laughter is heartwarming just as it is at home. Moreover, teenagers are teenagers. Ooo man. If you could see some of the stare downs I have gotten from a female student here or there- I thought one was literally trying to kill me with her eyes. And of course teenage boys… gosh one day a male student professed his love for me- wanted me to stay in Rwanda forever, another told me he loved me, many have asked for my phone number. I think it’s partly them being goofy and showing off their English and partly fun to make inappropriate comments.

And very often the first question of“what is your name” almost inevitably the next question is “Are you single?”. One time though it was “Are you married or alone?” I hesitantly answered “Alone” feeling a twinge of self pity that I quickly laughed away. I think the hesitancy was the realization that my response of ‘alone’ very much accurately describes much of my experience here. It is very strange to be set apart, and feel very much alone at times, merely by my appearance. It is more than that of course, cultural, language etc but yesterday I went walking and before I even came into this village a child playing on the side of the road still about 50 yards off or so stood up, pointed, and yelled “MIZUNGU!” (white person). Its pretty cute really but sometimes I’d like to be a fly on the wall instead of this walking flourescent blinking sign.

 To not end the entry on a downer though… I love bargains and at the little market this weekend I bough 4 avocados, 5 tomatoes and 1 pineapple for like 80 or 90 cents. Awesome.

Oh yeah and I saw a wild jungle rat on my walk this weekend! Wildlife! (if that had happened before the ‘similarities’ question I could have added that we both have rats too)