Rain drops keep falling on my head

Recently, my roommate Sarah and I discovered that our local bar, The Brewhouse, has karaoke every Monday night. We've had a fantastic time. It's become our own sort of Cheers because everybody knows our name (and we're always glad we came).  I suppose that isn't so hard when you both have the same name, look kind of similar, always come in together and are the worst performers in the joint.  But still, we feel special.

I had been out of town last week, so Sarah and I were super excited to go sing out hearts out this week.  Since it was Labor Day and everyone knows you can't wear white after Labor Day, we put on every piece of white clothing that we own.

What you can't tell in this blurry photo is that I'm wearing fabulous white heels.

It was pouring down rain outside and we have no car, but we didn't let that stop us.  We bundled up in jackets (and pants for me) and splashed happily to our favorite bar, eager to show off our fabulous outfits.  When we got there, we were soaking wet because are jackets weren't actually water proof.  We also noticed a suspicious lack of cars in the parking lot.  Turns out, it was Labor Day, so the Brewhouse was closed.

So, we turned around and walked in the pouring rain back home. I suppose a lesson we might take away from this is to call ahead.  Or invest in rain gear.  Or both.  But the one thing I regret most about the whole evening was that not once did occur to me to sing "Singing in the Rain" and dance on a lamppost while I was walking past lampposts and singing in the rain.  I mean really, what is wrong with me?

What indeed.

How I decided to become a minister

I recently came to a decision.  I am going to go to seminary.  I am going to get my Masters of Divinity and I am going to be an ordained minister.  It is both a scary decision for me and an immense weight off my shoulders.

I have struggled with this decision for a number of years.  I’ve always felt a push to enter the ministry, and it is a push that I have always resented.  The best advice I ever got was from an Episcopalian priest.  He said, “Run.  Run as fast as you can.  If you can’t run fast enough, then you’re meant to be in ministry.

And so I ran.

I don’t think any of us who are faithful, who believe in loving their neighbor, who believe in social justice or who just believe in doing whatever we can to improve whatever small patch of world we can, none of us truly own our lives.  If we want to give to the world, we must give at least a part of our lives.  It takes time, money, passion and skills to make a difference.

For me, entering the ministry was – is - saying that I am giving my whole life over to making a difference.  It is saying that my life’s work is about giving back to the world. I don’t doubt that whatever direction my life may have taken, I would have been giving back, but I was worried about the outward burden becoming a member of the clergy would put on me.

I also resented that becoming a member of the clergy would be a public declaration that I believed in God.  And not only that, but that I was a member of a Christian tradition.

My faith was something of which I was never proud, occasionally ashamed, but which was always present. 

The fact that I was a spiritual person, a person of faith, was a source of resentment to me.  I remember going through one period of intense doubt when I was around twelve, but since then, I haven't doubted God, so much as I have resented my belief in God.

I had this idea that there was a great schism between what was intelligent and what was faithful.  The word "Christian" isn't a popular word among many in our society; it isn't a word which inspires good feelings.  It wasn't a label I wanted to claim for myself.  Smart people were atheists.

I read argument upon argument about the existence of God. And I found that the arguments against God's existence were much stronger and much more compelling.  But even through that, I found I still believed.  I still felt God's presence in my life.  It was something I couldn't deny, however much I wanted to.

Since then, I've accepted my faith in God, and have stopped resenting it.  I don't have all the answers, in fact I have very few, and my understanding of God and faith is constantly growing and evolving.  But letting go of the pointless frustration I felt has let me continue my journey with a sense of peace.

Of course, right in front of me were intelligent, dedicated people who had a strong, compelling faith in God.  Smart, deeply caring people who with their own quiet faith, set about doing God's work.

Like most journeys in life, I have not walked this path alone.  Many of those smart, faithful people have been with me on this journey.  I can't name every person who has journeyed with me, but I want to recognize a few.

 In Pennsylvania, the Wyomissing Church of the Brethren, has surrounded me with love and support through every rocky patch of the journey.  They have shown me love, compassion and fellowship in ways that I have sometimes doubted could still exist.

Here in Ohio, the Cincinnati Church of the Brethren has shown me the idea of church is growing and evolving.  This is a church that is doing things and I'm proud to be a part of it.

The pastor here, Ben Walters, has been an invaluable mentor by simply allowing me the space to doubt, complain and be frustrated.  And by nudging me until I was ready to accept the call on my own.

My roommate, Sarah Mayer, has been an incredible companion on this journey.  Struggling with questions big and small is easier when you have someone who is sitting next to you, asking the same questions.

And always, always present are my parents.  They have been with me for every high and low of my journey and every yes then no decision that I've made.  Most of amazing of all, they never once told me what to do.  My parents walked with me on my journey, from the first faltering steps to this moment now, but I can walk tall knowing that though I am surrounded by support, I am moving my own two feet.

I am truly blessed. I know that this decision is simply the beginning of another journey, but I look forward to seeing where the road takes me and who I meet along the way.

A corporate shill of Christian love

There is a children's song called "When you learn to follow Jesus, you will act a little strange."  It's a bit of a silly song, but I've only begun to realize how full of truth it is.

When I signed up for BVS, I knew that i could be sent anywhere to do most anything.  And I was down for that.  I wanted to do a year of service, and I understood that service takes many forms.  Or at least I thought I did.

Fast forward to my time in Ohio.  I work with kids, tutor adults, all pretty common, run of the mill good things to do.  I also paint, clean out fridges, preach and organize Easter Egg hunts.  Maybe not the first things you think of when you think of service, but I do work for a church.

This is me hanging with TWO six foot white rabbits. Jimmy Stewart, eat your heart out.

Recently, however, I have been spending a good deal of time encouraging people to shop at a local grocery store.  Not a small, local mom and pop store featuring organic produce.  But at Kroger, the largest grocery store chain in the United States.

 And it's not because we're boycotting another store or trying to make a point.  I want people to spend money, lots of money at this Kroger so that it makes money, lots of money.

The fact is, this grocery store - the Walnut Hills Kroger - hasn't turned a profit in over four years.  And any business that doesn't tun a profit is danger of closing.  If this business closes, it just might be the final nail in the coffin for Walnut Hills.

First, if Kroger leaves Walnut Hills, our neighborhood becomes a food desert, which in short means that there is no source of healthy food.  Many of us in this neighborhood do no have access to cars, so we walk to and from the grocery store.  The store closes means taking buses and cabs, annoying enough for a single person like me, but even more of a head ache to anyone with children.  All of this adds expenses onto already strained budgets.

Second, Kroger is the largest business in Walnut Hills.  If it closes down the store and leaves a big empty box, the challenge of revitalizing the neighborhood shoots through the roof.  Empty buildings aren't exactly welcome signs.

So, on the second and fourth Tuesday of every month, I help out the Walnut Hills Redevelopment Foundation (WHRF) with their Buy 25 Tuesdays. 

Which means I sit at this table for 4 hours, being friendly and polite.

What WHRF and Kroger management figure out was that it would take 200 new customers spending $50 a month to make the store profitable.  So we set out to do just that.  Every second and fourth Tuesday, we hold events from 4 pm to 8 pm, asking people to come spend around $25 and to tell us about their experiences.

Which means they tell me what products they couldn't find

The Walnut Hills Kroger management has been great.  Because we're bringing in a new customer base, they want to buy different things.  After every event, we tell them what the top three most requested items were, and they do their best to stock them for the next event.  So far, we've added organic fruits and vegetables, whole wheat pasta, whole bean coffee and local beers to the store's inventory.
 
I'm just a small cog in the machine, but I do get to interact with most of the shoppers who come out to support Buy 25 and our local store.  It's rewarding to see so many people who care about the neighborhood, about the community and about their neighbors.

I also get to do the date entry, which is largely boring, but means that I'm the first one to know the results of our efforts.  Since every event has been more successful than the last, that means I get to share good news.  At our last event we brought in almost $7,000 in business, two grand over our goal for each event.  I'm going to chalk that up in the win column.

Just in case you're not yet bored with tale of Buy 25, here's a video from the local news, with a silent cameo by your favorite blogger.

Will oats, peas, beans and barley grow?

There are two gardens at the community house.  A flower garden in the front and a raised bed vegetable garden on the side.  They'd both been running wild for a bit.  I was eager to dive in and start my contribution to the community house.  My housemates told me to go right ahead and give it shot because they are fabulous people who also happen to not be too big of fans of dirt. Luckily, I have no problem with dirt.

Fiercely not having a problem with dirt in The Gambia.

Proudly not having a problem with dirt in Turkey.

Determinedly not having a problem with dirt at BVS orientation

So I dove right in and started pulling weeds.  Or at least pulling what I could figure were weeds.  I attacked the vegetable garden first and then moved on to the front garden.  I recognized some things as straight up weeds and some as straight up supposed-to-be-there plants.  But there were a lot of in between plants.  Sarah and Sticks had wandered out to keep me company and I would confer together before deciding what needed to be pulled up.  It was rather pleasant.

Either I have just valiantly removed an evil weed or I've just destroyed someone's hard work.  If it's the former, Sticks and Sarah totally told me to do it!

 

 The most nerve wracking thing I did was to plant seeds in the vegetable garden. That, my friends, is faith. You plant these bitty seeds in the ground and just pray that something sprouts.  it was terrifying. While I was possibly committing plant murder, I was fretting about wasting seeds and failing the house garden.  But luckily, my housemates are marv.  Sticks told me that if one things grows, our garden is a success. And Sarah snapped pictures so I had proof that I tried.  (I'm not sure what Marc thinks. He probably hopes things grow if only so he doesn't have to hear me lament about them not growing).


I'll keep you all updated with our house gardens.  Hopefully something will grow.  Until then, here's proof that I'm working hard:

It's also proof that even elbow deep in dirt, my nails look fabulous!

Cross posted at the Cincinnati BVS Community House Blog, which is updated each week by a different member of our house.

Broadway, baby

Note: I make references to specific songs and for the enjoyment of my readers, I've included links to those songs, if you'd like to take a listen.  But really, it doesn't matter.  You can totally ignore all those links.

I love show tunes.  I make no secret of it.  It's probably my number one conversation killer. Some friendly new person will say "So, what kind of music do you like?"  Then I'll tell them I love show tunes and they awkwardly trail off and desperately look for someone else to talk to or tell me that they like Rent.

But despite my inability to have a proper conversation about musical tastes with most other people, show tunes have always been there for me.  There is a song for every occasion.  Making small talk at the office after a hard day's work?  Bam.  "It's Been a Long Day."  Frustrated that your exotic plant won't sprout? Bam. "Grow for me."  Just want to celebrate your ridiculous amounts of hair? Bam. "Hair."

 I was dancing to "Cotton Eye Joe," but I was thinking about "Hair" the whole time.

And in their bountiful wonderfulness, show tunes came through for me when I realized I'd be spending the next year in Ohio.  Right into my head popped "Ohio," a beautiful lamenting song about how wonderful Ohio is and how maybe the singer should return home to Ohio.

Jane Lynch and Carol Burnett pretending to be mother and daughter and that they love Ohio.

Actually, all of that is lies.  Well, the song  "Ohio" mostly consists of "Why, oh, why-oh, did I ever leave Ohio?" but everything else was lie.  That was not the song I thought of.

I thought of "A Summer in Ohio" from The Last 5 Years.  If you want, take a listen to this sketchy and probably illegal video of the song.

It starts off encouragingly enough:

I could wander Paris after dark
Take a carriage ride through Central Park
But it wouldn't be as nice as a summer in Ohio
Where I'm sharing a room with a "former" stripper and her snake: Wayne

But it quickly turns into this:

I could shove an ice pick in my eye
I could eat some fish from last July
But it wouldn't be as awful as a summer in Ohio

Without cable, hot water, Vietnamese food, or you.

I may be lucky enough to have hot water, but I do have to pretend to be interested in baseball.

Truthfully, I love what little of Cincinnati I know so far.  Admittedly it's not that much, but I'm enjoying the process of getting to know it.  I've been to some good restaurants, checked out the art museum (which is having a special Monet exhibit. Can you say fate?), grabbed several loads of books from the library system and have become quite the connoisseur of our local Kroger (Kroghetto, if you will).  I even enjoyed driving a borrowed stick shift car up and down the many, many hills of Cincinnati (well, enjoyed it once the feeling returned to my fingers).

That doesn't mean every day has been a piece of peach pie.  I miss my poodle and the family I babysit for and my church family at Wyomissing Church of the Brethren, and my own family (sometimes).  And part of BVS and living a simple lifestyle is making sacrifices.  Again, I haven't been here that long and haven't had to make all that many sacrifices, but I know that there are things I'm not going to be able to go home for and be a part of.  Life at home will go on without me.

So whenever I feel myself getting too sad, I just start singing to myself "I'd rather be going slightly batty, in Walnut Hills, Cincinnati..."

 

Shredding for Jesus

We're about a week into Lent and many people are probably seriously beginning to regret giving up chocolate.

Not me.  I have never spent a second of my life regretting giving up chocolate.  Mostly because I have never been foolish enough to attempt to live without it.

I've never been apart of the tradition that gives things up for Lent.  I remember being about eight years old and asking my father why we didn't.  "Because we try to remember the teachings of Jesus everyday," he told me.  That did and still does make perfect sense to me.

So when one of my housemates asked what all of us were giving up for Lent, I was prepared to give my usual reply.  Then my other housemate chimed in that, in her family, instead of giving something up for Lent, they added something to their lives.

I liked the sound of that.  One of my friends has always used the Lenten season as a time for disciplined self-improvement and that seemed like a good idea to me, too.  So for Lent this year, I decided to add Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred to my life.

Jillian Michaels, looking shredded after presumably only 30 days.

So far, it's been pretty good.  I've done three workouts.  Jillian tells me I'm doing a great job and I'm not going to believe the results.  She has confidence that I can do it; I've just got to give it my all.  I'm pretty sure that I've made amazing progress and am just about an exact clone of Jillian.

Me, looking like an exact clone of Jillian after 3 days.

Yeah, I'm feeling good enough about this whole workout thing that I'm going to grab myself an extra piece of chocolate tonight.  And maybe a cupcake, too.  And that peanut butter ice cream...

The state of independence

"It's not community theater; it's better," Ben, the pastor from Cincinnati Church of the Brethren (and my supervisor) told me as he pointed to Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park. "Bob from church has an ushering gig there and sometimes he needs help.  It's a great way to see shows for free."

Free theater?  Sign me up please!  Well, someone in the universe was listening because two nights ago, my housemate got a call from Bob, who needed someone to fill in for him as an usher. Bingo! I was set.

Cut to Friday night.  I'm walking at what would be dusk if the snowy rain would let up, cutting through the park to go to a theater where I've never been before to usher, even though I'm not entirely sure what that entails or where I'm supposed to go or to whom I'm supposed to report.

And I start to feel a little smug.  A little proud of myself.  I'm an independant woman.  I'm going after the things I want.  Look out, world!  I'm strong, I'm confident and I'm on my way up and I'm doing it all by myself!

Except I'm not. At all.  I wouldn't be in Cincinnati without the support of BVS.  I wouldn't be in BVS if it weren't for the support of my family.  I wouldn't be able to usher without the help of Bob from church.  Hell, I wouldn't even be properly outfitted without loans from my housemates and the pastor's wife, Kristin.

Maybe though, that's part of being independent.  While it was true that a number of people had helped make my trek to the theater possible, no one was holding my hand.  I had chosen to do it myself and I was taking the steps to get my self there (pun definetely intended).  I think independent doesn't mean being alone, it means being able to take on life on your own.

So here's a big thank you to everyone who supports me and enables me to be the independent woman I am.  I couldn't have been this awesome without you.

Oh, hi, Ohio!

Orientation is a super busy place and our Internet connection disappeared for awhile, which is why there have been almost no new posts.  But that is no longer an issue because I now live in Cincinnati!

I'm working for the Cincinnati Church of the Brethren doing a whole manner of things.  I live in a beautiful house (and I really, really mean that) with three great housemates: Sarah, Sara and Marc.  Sarah hails from Minnesota, Sara is from Virginia and Marc is from orientation (and before that Germany).

All of those things - the house, the job, the roommates - deserve their own entry.  And they'll get it.  But for now, I want to show you the two most surprisingly useful things that I packed.  Both of these were gifts and both were things I was going to leave behind.

First, Pink Poodle Pillow:

Pink Poodle Pillow was a Christmas gift from my sister, so I would get less homesick for Sachi, our parents' real live poodle who became my shadow and source of sanity.  Sachi is adorable.  Poodle Pillow is ugly as all get out.  Poodle Pillow is, however, a great source of comfort, reminding me of both my sister and my favorite real-life poodle.  Besides being the perfect huggable size, Poodle Pillow is pink and lends instant personality to my bed.

But the most amazing thing about Poodle Pillow, is that Poodle Pillow is a pillow.  See?

 

Poodle Pillow was my only pillow for all of orientation.  Poodle Pillow is a great car pillow, lumbar support, neck support and floor pillow. Part of living simply is finding muliple uses for the stuff you have.  Poodle Pillow does this perfectly.


And probably the most useful thing I brought was this bag from my Aunt Sue:

This is a Blue Q overnighter.  It's made of recycled materials and is super durable and sturdy. It folds down flat and be folded up even more to fit inside my purse.  I've used it as a weekend bag, a bathroom tote, a suitcase reinforcer, a grocery bag, a laundry tote and a decorative room brightener.  I don't think I've ever adored a bag more than this one.


Once or twice I've had to go somewhere carrying both Poodle Pillow and my Blue Q bag.  For the most part I've tried to avoid thinking about how much this makes me look like a 9 year old going to a sleep over.


 But hey, if stuff's useful, it's useful!

The Purple Crayon

Orientation is filled with many different types of people.  I am, as any one who has ever interacted with me knows, a text book extrovert.  I want people all the time and lots of people.  When we were little and my sister was mad at me, she used to pretend she couldn't see or hear me.  It drove me bonkers.  After about ten seconds of this treatment, I gave in to whatever her demands were.

One of the volunteers here, Bryan, is a textbook introvert.  He's perfectly content on his own, he thinks things through before he speaks and doesn't feel the need to fill silences with conversation.

It seems to me that Bryan walks away from our interactions knowing exactly how I feel (and I think that's how most people walk away from me).  Meanwhile, I still can't figure out if Bryan finds me amusing or irritating or some combination of both.

Today, in one of our sessions, we were paired off with a partner and given one crayon and one piece of paper.  We were told that both partners were to hold on to the crayon and -without talking - draw a house.

Bryan was my partner and we had a purple crayon.  We both placed our hands on the crayon and paused, for just a moment, with it poised on our paper, waiting to see how things would go.  It was just a short moment in time, maybe three seconds at most, but it was an oddly intimate experience.  Two hands, two vastly different personalities and upbringings and faith journeys and one crayon and one task.

After that moment, Bryan realized I wasn't going to take the lead (I have zero artistic ability and he has lots) and he began drawing.  And let me tell you, it was so strange to just be taken along for the journey.  Bryan drew with slow, careful strokes, often going over the same lines, whereas I would have done fast, careless strokes, too eager and impatient to worry about quality.

Bryan also took care to draw the house so that it was right side up for me (and upside down for him), which took me somewhat aback.  Didn't it make more sense to make the drawing of the house easier for the person drawing?  That would be the most efficient way, after all.

Even though it was a nonverbal activity, I couldn't quite keep from offering my own opinion, clucking my tongue when Bryan drew the door to the left and I wanted it centered and insisting that we draw grass.  After the house was drawn, I couldn't resist adding a bit of my own flair, so I took lead of the crayon and drew a stick figure.  And there was our house.  Solidly built, with a bit of humanity thrown in at the end.

After session, I asked Bryan if I could write about it in my blog.  He said yes, but as usual, I wasn't sure how he really felt.  However, when I got back from break, this is what I found, so maybe it really was alright.

Operation Knock-Knock

On Saturday, we had a workday.  We'd had one before and I'd spent most of the day stocking shelves in a low-income grocery store.  It had been a good experience and I was looking forward to our assignments for the day.
 
Except, there weren't any.  They loaded us up in the vans, handed us garbage bags and a set of directions to get back to base and told us to go do service.  Then they dropped us off in various neighborhoods in the town of Apopka.

In the neighborhood where my group was dropped off, no one spoke English except for the kids.  Luckily, I had some Spanish under my belt.  So wandered around and asked various people if they needed any help with yard work or washing their cars or whatever.  No one had any work for us and most said thank you with very confused looks on their faces.

When we got back to camp, I used my Spanish-English dictionary to figure out what I had said.  Turns out it went a little something like this:

"Hello, sir.  Do ya speak English? My Spanish is bad. I speak tiny.  We are in a voluntary program. No bosses says 'look, to do to work. For nothing money.' Do you have to work for we?"

Eventually, we wandered into an English speaking neighborhood of senior citizens.  No one there wanted any help either.  Finally, we met a man named Mr. Young who offered to let us rake his leaves.  We finished up our work and were eating lunch when the head of the home-owner's association came and told us we had to leave.  Mr. Young came out and argued with her and we got permission to rake two more yards.

We wandered out of that community and started heading to base, picking up litter along the way.  We found an abandoned shopping cart and used they as a sort of rolling dumpster.  One inquisitive little boy we met was fascinated by our cart.  He kept running around finding garbage for us to put in it.  So we would have even more garbage in our cart, he even unwrapped an old half eaten burrito and stuck it bean side down into my hand, separate from the wrapper.  Joy.

Eventually we made it back to base.  A little sun burnt, extraordinarily dirty and pretty well worn out, but full of good stories.

Orienting myself to be a volunteer

Hello everyone!

Orientation is at a small Church of the Brethren camp near Orlando, Florida.  We stay indoors in bunks and we have electricity and hot water (yay!) and somewhat scarce internet access.

One of the unique things about Brethren Volunteer Service as opposed to other service programs is that we don't determine our project until orientation.  Much of our free time here is spent going through project files, talking to the BVS staff and trying to figure out where we want to spend the next year of our life, and what kind of work we want to be doing.  I won't talk about my project hopes here because I'm somewhat superstitious and don't want to jinx it - and because I'm still sorting through my own stack of projects.

Another unique thing about BVS orientation is our food groups.  The 13 of us volunteers here are spilt into four groups.  We are each responsible for planning, shopping for and cooking several meals in a week.  The challenge of this is our budget.  We are giving a dollar per person per meal.  So, if there are sixteen of us who need to eat dinner, we are given sixteen dollars to buy the things we need for dinner.  It's a challenge, but it's definitely doable and we have been eating quite well.  Although, my sweet tooth misses desserts (oranges and apples are not quite as satisfying in the same way as cookies and cupcakes).

It's fabulously warm here.  Yesterday I was in a t-shirt and jeans and wishing for a pair of shorts.  Today is cloudy and windy, so it's a bit chillier, but I'm still outside right now without being bundled up.  Earlier this week, I tried my hand at kayaking in the camp's small lake and found I really enjoyed it.  The lake provides a peaceful backdrop and the trees are all hung with Spanish moss, so the overall atmosphere of Camp Ithiel is relaxed.  There's a highway very near the camp, but suburban girl that I am, I find the sound of flowing traffic soothing.

This is it

Today is my last day at my parents house.  I've been crashing here since I graduated from Juniata in May.  I've kept myself busy picking up various "sitting" jobs (kids, babies, dogs, the elderly, houses) and various church activities including a week-long trip to Tennessee to rebuild houses.

A lot of parts of living at home with my parents really stank.  It felt like some sort of weird time warp, especially since I was driving the same car, sleeping in the same bed and working the same jobs I worked in high school.  None of my friends lived very close, so life could get pretty lonely.  A lot of days, my only company was my dog, Sachi, until I picked up the kids from school.  And while children are better conversational partners than anxiety ridden poodles, it was a very different life from the people-packed life I lived at Junaita, where I would sometimes go to the bathroom just to get a moment to myself.

But life at home wasn't all bad.  I've made deep connections to some of the families I worked for and am leaving them with a very heavy feeling (shout out to you, Meg and Abby and Jack).  I also got to know many of the people in my life on a new level, on an adult level.  That sounds really lame, but when you grow up in a church (or any kind of community), every adult is kind of a surrogate parent, dispensing advice, being proud of you, telling you to stop running around.  But coming home from college, I no longer had the "kid" label on me.  It's really cool to be respected as an equal and to be able to work and serve and laugh as friends.  I've really treasured my time as an adult in the church congregation I grew up in, and I've also enjoyed being able to have more meaningful conversations with the other grown ups in my life.  There's still a great deal of difference between a 23 year old and a 53 year old, but college graduation has served as sort of rite of passage that lets me feel like I belong to that grown-up world.  Even through things as little as calling adults by their first name.

But just to prove I'm not too grown up, I'm only halfway packed and am still running around like a mad woman trying to find the things I swore I saw just a minute ago.

A semester in Africa By the Numbers

5 months in Africa (just about)
3 the number of African countries I've been to
4 hour time difference
0 hot showers
2 times I've watched television
7 easily visible scars I've acquired
638 of times I've been asked for my phone number
4 times I've given out my number
1 hours commute to class each day (one way)
1 pair of shoes stolen
26 dalasis to a dollar
8 hours of electricity per average twenty-four hour period
4 papers written this semester that were longer than two pages
100 degrees Fahrenheit on an average day
3 liters of water needed a day, minimum
0 stomach viruses
1 nasty cold
1 (2?) ear infections
0 trips to Sheetz, McDonalds, etc.
2 more sleeps in The Gambia
1 more sleep in Senegal
1 sleepless night in the sky
2 people picking me up at the airport

I HATE MOSQUITOES

STOP SUCKING MY BLOOD INSIDE THE HOUSE!!!

Is that too much to ask?

Run, Toubab, Run!

I went for a run today. I was bored with my usual route along Stadium Highway and sick of breathing in exhaust fumes, so I decided to try a new loop one of the other girls had shown me. This loop ran past a women's collective garden. It was much greener and much prettier.

As I huffing my along my way, I jogged past a group of little boys. "Give me dalasi!" called out one of the boys. "No money!" I said and kept on puffing along. A little farther along there was another group of boys. One of the boys approached me as he opened his mouth I cut him off. "You give me dalasi?" He gaped at me confused. I jogged a few more steps and another boy approached me. "Any minties?" I said. (Minties are what Gambian children call candy). "Any minties?" I repeat, hand outstretched. A few of the boys were very confused, but most of them laughed.

As I continued along my route, I noticed I had a shadow. The boy who had asked me for dalasis was running along behind me. When he saw me looking, he grinned. I grinned back and picked up the pace so that he wouldn't think I was a wimp. We got to the end of the road and I stopped. "Now we go back," I said to the boy, pointing back to the way we came. I started jogging again and he fell in behind me.

We got back to where his buddies were and they shrieked with laughter to see the two of us running together. I waved at them and kept running. Three more boys fell in behind me. With my bright green tank top I imagine looked like a scruffy and confused pied piper.

A woman working in one of the gardens seemed to have the same impression. She called something to me in a local language. I have no idea which language she was speaking, let alone what she said,but I imagine it was something along the lines of "Why are you kidnapping children?" Having nothing else to say I said what I always said in that situation.
"Asalamalakum," the standard Arabic greeting. I smile at her trying my best not to look like a kidnapper.
"Malakum salam," she replies, smiling back. "Suemolay?" Ah, she's Mandinka.
"Eebeejay," I answer back, thrilled to know the proper response. The boys are thrilled, too.
"Etonday?"
"Sarah!" Once again I am thrilled to know what she is asking. The boys laugh at my enthusiastic answer to a mundane question. "Etonday?" I ask the woman, grinning.
"Mariama," she answers laughing. At this point, I've exhausted my entire knowledge of the Mandinka language). I thank her ("Abaraka!") and wave good bye. She laughs again and waves back. The boys wave, too.

We keep jogging for another few minutes. We stop when we reach Stadium Highway. "I have to go home now," I tell the boys. "Did you have a good run?" They reply yes in way which could mean "Yes, the run was fun" or "Yes, I understand you are speaking English." Using a combination of Mandinka, English and hand gestures I find out their names. "Thank you for running with me," I say before crossing the street. When I look back, the boys are racing and shouting back up the road to their playmates.

All in all, I'd say it was a good run.

"Potty" Break

Last weekend we took another trip up-country. A few hours into our journey, we pulled off at a gas station to use the bathroom. Gas station bathrooms are never a treat, but gas station bathrooms in a developing country achieve a class of their own.

The gas station manager walked us over to a shed, more a shack really. He opened the door on the left revealing a squat toilet and the overpowering stench of stale human waste. He then opened the right side door revealing a four walls and a wet floor that smelled slightly better. He explained that this side was "For urinate! For urinate!"

I decided to take whichever room (stall?) became available first. It turned out to be the "for urinate!" side. I took a deep breathe of the refreshing exhaust scented air outside and stepped in. The door didn't close all the way by itself, so one of the other girls held it shut for me.

It was dark in the shed, but still light enough to see. I looked around and tried to figure out the best way of doing things. There didn't seem to be any particular place "for urinate!" Rather, the whole place was wet and smelly. I picked a spot a decent distance away from the extra gross looking and smelling walls.

Being a woman and therefore not particularly talented at peeing standing up, I decided the best course of action was to just removed my shorts. It was a tricky process, keeping my balance without touching the wall and attempting to keep the grossness of the floor (and now the bottom of my shoes) away from my shorts. But I eventually did manage.

So, now that I was pants-less in a damp, dark shed in rural Africa, there wasn't much else to do but squat down and take care of business. While doing just that, I noticed that there was a sort of drain after all. There was a ground level hole in the wall that divided the "for urinate!" side from the squat toilet side. That meant all of the urine from my side of the shed emptied into the other side. Meaning that right now one of my girlfriends was peeing as the trickle of my pee sought its way to her drain. I pushed that thought out of my head after a brief moment of gratitude that I had ended up in the "for urinate!" side.

Having taken care of business, I was a little stumped about what to do with the toilet tissue. There was no trash can, certainly nowhere to flush it and I didn't exactly relish the idea of putting it my pocket to dispose of later. In the end, I just threw it on the floor. I did another complicated dance to put my shorts back on the least disgusting way possible and bid farewell to the "for urinate!" shed.

Once back out in the dazzling sunlight, I realized that despite my best efforts and wishful thinking, I had not entirely managed to avoid peeing on my own feet. No one else had either, so we passed around a pack of Wet Ones and agreed that this had been "an experience." Then we got back on the bush taxi and continued on our way.

The Lake House

There's a lake outside our house. Okay, not a lake but a really big puddle. One of the water pipes sprung a leak. The pipes here are made of rubber, so that's not so uncommon. For about two weeks now, water has been gurgling up forming an ever growing puddle in the dirt road. The mosquitoes probably love it. It gives them a great place to lay eggs and wash down the blood they stole from me.

Because the water flow hasn't stopped, the government isn't going to fix the pipe. Which means that the pipe won't get fixed until we can't shower. Since the Gambian government isn't renowned for its quickness and efficiency, I'm crossing my fingers that the water keeps flowing.

In the mean time, we have a mini lake outside our house. It makes going anywhere a bit tricky, but a conveniently placed tire gives you enough to bounce over a narrower part of the puddle. I wanted to buy a gold fish for the puddle and train it to do tricks, but everyone told me it would probably die from all the pollution (supposedly there was a dead rat floating in it. I didn't see it and refuse to believe it exists because that is too icky).

Probably the oddest part of all of this is how normal I find it. If the pipe still works, why should the government fix it? The water's not really in our way, we can jump over it, after all. And in a way, does add a kind of afternoon-at-the-park feel to the compound. Well, maybe an afternoon-at-the-desert-park-located-right-next-to-a-huge-garbage-pile-where-sheep-love-eat-even-though-it-is-perpetually-on-fire.

I think tomorrow I'll make a fleet of paper boats and reenact the British defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588.

Shower me with cleanliness

I really do not want to shower right now. I need to - desperately - as there is no way I can go to bed this dusty. But I'm having so much trouble convincing myself to face the shower.

To begin with, I'm dreading the cold water. Cold showers feel amazing in the middle of the day or when you've just come home from the bush taxi and you're over-heated and sweaty and just gross. They don't feel so good after the sun's gone down. I try as often as I can to shower when the cold water is a pro, but sometimes it's just not possible.

Tonight is one of those nights. I may be able to convince myself that the cold water isn't such a dreadful thing (you do adjust after the initial shock, after all), but I'm also very tired and not looking forward to shower aerobics.

The shower head is a sort of wand which is attached to a hose. The hose is about four inches to short for me to stand under. Or at least, it used to be. Our shower head broke and now we're left with the hose. So, washing my hair and anywhere above my shoulders requires a bit of work.

Showering is also very frustrating because it's very difficult (if not impossible) to get entirely clean. It's dusty and sandy here and the dusty sand seems to cling on to you, no matter how hard you scrub. It's very disconcerting and a little depressing as your scrubbing clean-looking feet to see that the soap suds gliding toward the drain are decidedly brown in color.

The good news is that the water pressure is always much better at night and I don't have to worry about not having enough pressure to rinse the shampoo out of my hair. The power has stayed on tonight so I won't have to shower by candle or flashlight. And the two girls who share my shower have already showered, so I'm free to shower whenever I can finally convince myself to stop putting it off.

All in all, I'm pretty lucky with my showering situation. The water pressure is so bad at my Swedish friend's house that some days there simply isn't enough to shower at all (on those days, he showers over here). And I only have to share my shower with two other girls as opposed to a whole floor (or a whole compound, which I suppose is the Gambian equivalent).

Even so, I'd give a lot to be able to have a hot standing up shower with real body wash and not the bubble bath I accidentally bought because the bottle was in Arabic and I couldn't understand it. Ah, well, imagine how much I'll appreciate my first shower back in America.

For tonight, I'll just savor the feeling of cleanliness. Until tomorrow when it's time to hit the (dusty) road.

The Companion's Burden

Rudyard Kipling's "The White Man's Burden" is a beautifully written poem urging the United States to take over the Philippines, to assume their duty and bring the Philippines into the modern world. Although a racist poem, Kipling elegantly instills feelings of pride and honor about taking up a noble yet unrewarding task.

It's a poem used in history and politics classes to illustrate the mood and view of Europeans about colonization, which is essentially that the non-European peoples were not civilized and were incapable of existing in a modern world and it was Europe's moral obligation to help them along. We discussed it in our human rights class at the University of The Gambia.

"The White Man's Burden" was written in a different time for a very specific situation, but it has not lost its relevance even today. Today we speak in more politically correct terms, eschewing terms like "first world" and "third world" for the less egocentric "developed nations" and "developing nations." And we no longer assume that the reason for a country's developing or developed status is the color of its people's skin. But read through the poem again, replacing "White Man" with "Westerner," and the poem could speak for any number of aid efforts.

The IMF and the World Bank, various human rights groups, aid efforts like Live8 and an innumerable amount of NGO's, all \ are attempts by the West to develop Africa, to save it, to help its people progress enough to fully and fairly participate in today's modern globalized economy and world system. These efforts are sincere and earnest. We must help them not for our own gain, but because it is the right thing to do. However, sincere and earnest the efforts may be, there is still a sense that we, the West, must help poor Africa because they cannot help themselves.

Without a doubt, there are things that the West can offer Africa. But any help or assistance, be it in the form of monetary aid, equipment, training, human rights work or whatever, needs to be offered not from a benevolent giver, not from a wise mentor, not from a self-sacrificing teacher, but from an equal to an equal.

This is not an easy thing to do. It's easy to assume the role of the wise mentor, imparting wisdom and gently guiding Africa toward civil peace and economic prosperity. It's also easy to take on the role of admiring sycophant, extolling the virtues of communal living and extended-family based society.

What is difficult to do is to strike a balance. There are values the West can offer to Africa and there are values Africa can offer to the West. The trick is to appreciate and criticize each other's cultures as colleagues, rather than inferiors and superiors.

I can and should criticize the subordinate status of women in African society, and my Gambian peers can and should criticize the harsh individualism of American society which allows so many people to fall through the cracks. The value of any cross-cultural experience is being to view your own culture with new eyes, cherishing its strengths and working to improve its flaws.

I'll end this post with a slightly edited stanza of Kipling's poem. Viewed in the context of equality, it strikes an even more poignant note.

Take up the companion's burden--
Have done with childish days--
The lightly proferred laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years
Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!

Tower of Babel

I've had a love affair with English since before I could talk. I love finding just the right word to describe something. I love that you can change the pattern and cadence of a sentence to convey different mood and feelings. I love that the rhythm and taste of words can be beautiful and their meaning wondrous.

However, I have found English to be a jealous lover and there seems to be no room in my heart or my head for any other language. I tried repeatedly to cram Spanish in and accomplished very little. I did manage to have some minor success with American Sign Language, but other than that nothing seems to stick.

In The Gambia, everyone is multilingual. The official language is English, but most people speak at a minimum two tribal languages and usually more. There was an add in the paper for a mobile phone salesgirl. Among other requirements, the applicants had to be fluent in English and at least two local languages.

The majority of people in The Gambia are Mandinka but many speak Wolof as well. Wolof is the more prevalent language in Senegal one of The Gambia's major trading partners, so it has become the language of commerce. Fula and Jola are also common languages in the greater Banjul area.

As part of our study abroad program, we've being taking Wolof lessons. From my trip I took to The Gambia this past summer, I have a few (that is to say three) Mandinka greetings under my belt.

It's incredible how powerful even these rudimentary bits of language can be. The children are especially tickled. When they shout "Toubab! Toubab!" after us and we respond in Wolof or Mandinka, it's almost as if a dog had begun talking to them. Some of the older kids will laugh at our accents and some of the very little ones stare almost frightened at us.

Shop keepers, taxi drivers and passersby are so excited to hear a toubab speaking a local language. It's like Christmas has come early. I feel like a thief a few minutes later when they find out that beyond inquiring after the health of their family and thanking them, I can't say or understand much else.

I've had varying responses to my bumbling attempts at Wolof. An old Muslim man lectured me that if I was going to live in another country, I should already know the language. A friendly taxi driver taught me how to say "I have a husband." A security guard drinking attaya (green tea) told me I should be learning Mandinka instead.

I would love to be able to fully grasp even just one local language. It's frustrating to realize that even the little bit that I do learn is pretty much useless outside of Senegambia. Guess that means I'll just have to come back someday...