Monogomy? You must be joking.

I yell goodnight to families sitting around a fire on a cool evening in December. As I reach my compound I find our landlord and his wife chatting by the fire. They look so cute and in love. A few months later, it’s now May. Our landlord’s wife had a baby in February but he has been gone working in the city for the past 2 months. I hear commotion outside and look out the window to see what’s going on. I see our landlord has returned. His wife is all dressed up and runs to greet him. Both times I smile to myself and think how great it is to see them so happy. But in the back of my mind I remember that this is his third wife and he has kids older than she is. He has just come back from spending 2 months with his second wife and their nine children. This is certainly not the only man with multiple wives. There are very few men who like the idea of having a friendship marriage with only one woman. I can’t imagine what it must be like to share your husband with another woman. I will be happy to wait for a man that I know loves only me.

No Germs in Africa

Sometimes I forget that I’m in a remote African village… and then I’m reminded by small but significant differences in culture and mindset. I will take the next few entries to attempt to share these stories with you in a way that you can relate with me.

Stepping out my door on my way to work I’m asked to sit down and join my neighbors for some breakfast. To be polite I pull up a stool around the communal bowl of rice pudding. One of the kids runs inside to get a spoon for me and as they return I can see there is evidence of last night’s dinner still on the spoon. They swish it around in a bowl of ‘clean’ water and hand it to me. Of course, in my head I’m thinking “That water hasn’t been filtered and without soap that spoon is still greasy.” But I take the spoon and dig in right beside the two year old who is squatting beside the bowl with no pants and no underwear. And that’s when I’m glad I get to eat with my hands (which have been washed with soap) for lunch.

Life is a giant sandbox for the kids and a giant litter box for both the children and animals here and any child under the age of three can get away with running around with no clothes on. As I walk back into my compound at lunch time all it takes is for one person to say my name and the kids come running from all directions wanting to be picked up and held. I don’t even think about it anymore with the little girls but I will not pick up the little boy if he doesn’t have clothes on, but I think he’s okay with that considering he still cries if he gets too close to the Tubob (white person).

My Sister's Company

MSC is going really well. We have been really busy with making products for the US. I've really been blessed by working with the women. They are all really excited to learn new skills and they are clearly very happy to have the opportunity to learn. I can't wait to see how they develop over the next couple of months.

Working on potholders

Here are a few examples of the products.

Everything comes in many different colors and designs.

Knot-bags

Pillow Cases

Free-form Earrings

Fabric Necklaces

Coconut Earrings

Wire Earrings

Potholders

Aprons

The past month in a nutshell

A second baby girl was born in my compound. This time we actually got to witness the naming ceremony and try to decipher what was happening. The Marabout (an intermediary of the spiritual world) shaves the babies head, and the elders sort of pass her around and formally decide on the name which is usually chosen by the father. Kola nuts and a pounded mixture of rice and sugar is passed out to everyone. And the rest of the day is a celebration.

Before Eric left we visited the biggest tree in West Africa which just happens to be in our backyard.

We also bought a solar oven that we have had fun experimenting with. (more to come on this in my newsletter)

A new Sister

Since Yankuba (Eric) is leaving we decided to get Asobes (matching outfits). Don’t be too weirded out. Eric’s doesn’t really match ours and it’s something they do for a special occasions. We went with some of our friends to pick out fabric and talk to the tailor. Lori and I got a custom made dress for the equivalent of $7, Eric’s was about $17. But like we told him, he bought a suit when we just bought a Sunday dress.
We have a new sister! Our landlords wife had her baby on Feb 18. She is a tiny little girl named Mariama. And our outfits were ready just in time for the naming ceremony.

Eric holding Mariama after the naming ceremony

This was a mis-shot but you can see the end result of the skin dye from the earlier post

Me and Mariama

Fun stuff

We decided to make doughnuts about a week too early for Fasnacht day. We didn’t have yeast but we made cake doughnuts instead. We a great 3 man assembly line going and they turned out really well. The first ones got a little too dark but then we discovered that putting a potato in the oil with the dough keeps them from getting too dark.

We also had an evening of “painting” our nails. There is a local tree here that they pound and make a powder with. They then mix that with sugar to make a paste. It is very similar to the Indian Henna that we are familiar with. So they spread the paste on your finger tips, palms and sometimes the bottoms of your feet, cover it with plastic bags. You leave it on over night and your skin is dyed in the morning. They think it is very beautiful and on their skin I think it is too. It makes a very nice, deep tone. We aren’t too impressed with the orange color that it dyes our skin but that eventually goes away and we’re left with nail color.

rolling & cutting

Frying


Dipping in glaze & Cin/sugar


The finished product


Yay, doughnuts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Applying the paste to my foot

My fingers covered with plastic

Lori's feet all finished ready for bed

Abuko

A lot has happened since the conference. I’ve been unable to update my blog with pictures so the stories have been piling up. I will split them into a few posts.

On Monday after the conference our team had a day out. We went to a wildlife reserve Abuko; where we walked through the bit of jungle that is still left in the area. It was really cool because you turn off the main road in the large city and you’re right in the middle of a jungle. Here in West Africa we don’t have the big, exciting animals that you typically think of when you think of Africa but it was exciting to see monkeys, antelope, crocodiles and lots of beautiful birds. They also had a few animals in cages that used to be found in the wild here; such as baboons, tortoises, a pelican, and hyenas. Let me just tell you, hyenas are much bigger and scarier than “The Lion King” makes them look. They are almost the same size as a lioness and some lions will actually back down from a hyena in a confrontation. Scary!

Our little guard at the MEHDA Gate

In the forest

A path made just for Denise

Tarzan or Eric

Crocodile (this guy was what we saw from behind that sign^)

Cute Monkey

Killer Ants (ok, maybe not killer but fierce)

Snarling Hyena