Saturday morning around 8 am I headed down the street to join in the festivities of celebrating a baby's baby naming. First stop, the dark room of the new mother and baby, where congratulations are given, we found out his name, and the obligatory scented oils must be rubbed on your hands and hair. This time we (the four of us who arrived around the same time) were also served breakfast.
After that, festivities translates into food preparation and lively conversation! I found myself a spot on a mat in the "middle-aged" group of women. They are probably only 5-10 years older than me, but are also probably all grandmothers. Also, they're not yet considered the "old women" of the town by any means. We prepped sweet potatoes, peeled garlic, washed lettuce, and all the while a near steady stream of chatter was going on around me as the women talked about recent happenings involving different ones in the community. Every once in a while conversation would be directed at me, but for the most part they were quite happy to let me just listen, and I did my best to follow along, often getting quite lost but enjoying it nonetheless.
Sunday, after a lively service with the southern believers in French, I stopped to visit my friend Say on my way home. I discovered her sick in bed with no energy and throwing up! Uh oh. I headed off to find her some medicine, and then came back and had the privilege of helping her out around the house until late afternoon. I was only a little scared when she said...Margit, you're going to have to make the okra sauce all by yourself, there's no way I can stay in the kitchen anymore. (She insisted on making food for her husband...no McD's to send him to for supper.)
Monday, Wednesday and Fridays you might sit with me on a mat at the clinic, weighing kids, doling out medicine for various illnesses, and chatting with their moms.
Today we took a bit of an off-road adventure. Scott and I were headed out to talk to a village about preparing for the mason to come and work at the well site. Scott's sister and three hired workers were heading out to their fields, "a little past" the village we were going to. So everyone hopped into the Land Cruiser and off we went. We reached the village with little mishap; the road was relatively visible in most places, and not too sandy.
As we left the village, we had to wander down to the wadi to locate Scott's sister who had taken off to find a man who could make her some "kokim" -- these are blades with wooden handles for cutting the millet. Here's a picture of the kokim maker who set up shop under a tree in the river bed.
The next part of our journey was far from what I would call "a little past" the village we had visited. We encountered every type of road imaginable, except of course paved road! Faint tire tracks in the grass, wadi crossings in deep sand requiring four wheel drive, no road, rocky bits, not to mention the traffic of people, motos, cows, goats and camels...and nearly an hour later we were driving through millet fields. Then we had to get out and walk through said millet, nearly as high as a camel's eye, and rife with all kinds of prickly plants that get caught in your skirts.
When we finally reached our destination, Scott and I were ready to turn around and head home, when the discussions about the laborers' wages began. Come to find out, agreement could not be had, and so EVERYONE piled back into the car for a ride back to town! At least we had been able to drop off some food for Scott's brother who was already hard and work and looking forward to some reinforcements. I guess he'll be waiting a little longer.
Now, can I talk anyone into planning their next relaxing vacation in G-town?
1 comment:
Count me in! :-)
Thanks so much for sharing some of what life in Guereda looks like. This is really helpful for me.
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