le 16 decembre

Today

I have...
- felt stupid for leaving some stuff behind, like extra toothbrushes, my track jackets. Our stuff will be moved for us and it seems a waste to have to buy stuff like toothbrushes again. Feeling self conscious abuot continuing to exist in a consumer culture...of one, amidst a culture that lacks a lot of things
- started a (new) "idea" notebook to help consolidate all the ideas I have jotted down
- essentially faciliated most of class today, since the syllabus calls for just conversation, review and our teacher was not really moving all that fast.
- realized I'm (finally) getting used to the cockroaches. Part of this is surely that I use the actual latrine less (don't ask why).
- had some hilarious convo's with the lady that sells cecena. I go to her pretty much every morning and she's cool although she loses points when she asks for stuff. Today, I started to say what I wanted to buy and she asked if I had or wanted a wife or a girlfriend. Her daughter or someone is like 14 or 16 or something and therefor the ripe age for marrying off. I replied that I was hungry and wanted food; first, eat food, second, look for girlfriend. Later in the day, she again asked if I wanted to marry her daughter, and I replied that I wanted to marry all the girls in the town. How many are there I asked? She said..oh jeez, maybe like over 500. That's good I said. Then I asked how many cows (for the dowry) I would need to marry her daughter. She said six. I said jam, I don't have any. I said I think I should start selling cecena to make some money. All in Zarma of course. Pretty funny stuff. As our language skills get better and better, joking around with people gets more and more fun.
- finally gotten to weed my gardens. Also moved around some tomato plants that were squished, so hopefully these make it. Several other CHA's commented that my gardening skills are not too bad considering growing stuff is not our field. Besides the fact that I figure food security is EXACTLY out field, I attribute my success to asking lots of people lots of questions, being mostly consistent with watering...and mostly lots of luck.  I have peanut plants, tomato plants, and watermelon plants growing in two (and a half I assumed from a friend who had nothing but weeds there) small plots.
- had a pretty good day. Full day, moved from one thing to the next, and I was able to accomplish just about everything I needed to without major impingments on these activities.
- shaved down to a Jman beard (had trimmed around lunchtime...took a pic of all the hair that came off) at dusk with the tiny mirror and a headlamp
- eaten sala and cecena for breakfast, cecena sandwich for morning snack, rice for lunch, egg sandwich and candy bar for afternoon snack, the usual corn meal and with sauce for dinner, with candy (thanks home!!) intersperced throughout the day. Again, I reiterate that at least in the town where the training site is, I'm eating very well!
- switched to a new toothbrush. This one actually lasted several weeks as I haven't dropped it or run it under dirty water. I also cleaned out the toothbrush holder.

I have not...
- been much LESS frustrated with today's cross cultural session. Group work, that is splitting us into groups to talk about a topic, does NOT work when we know nothing about the topic
- decided if we made major faux pas today by buying food in public and eating it by the road like we usually do. Today is another Muslim holiday where people fast and, at least during Ramadan, it's not cool to basically flaunt food in front of people who are fasting for obvious reasons. The shop guy told me he was hungry, but I didn't get it until this  evening, many hours after my mama explained baba was fasting and therefore would not each lunch.
- played soccer. Thought today we would get to play, but took the opportunity when I had some time to myself with friends to assist me in the garden to get that done
- had many nice thoughts about the extra excited call to prayer last night and this morning. Last night as I trid to go to sleep, I believe there was a chorus of men and children singing through the speakers. From our concession, I can here 2-3 mosques simultaneously. Since lang immersion, I have been without fail, awake for the 0530 call to prayer and have not easily fallen back to sleep.