Life in the Village...

... where each day was like all others' ~The Alchemist

Recently I found out one of my form 2 students got married and moved to a nearby village so won’t be coming to school any more. This happens pretty often here; rumor has it another one of my girls got married last term but she still comes to school. When I first arrived in my village, I had my students fill out an index card containing info about themselves to help me get to know them. During the example I gave, I wrote something about marital status single or married and joked that we didn’t need this one. In retrospect how foolish I was! Coming in as an outsider I was completely oblivious to the reality of many aspects of life here. Another illustration, during a PTA meeting last term I gave basic facts on HIV/AIDS to the parents using a UNICEF booklet. One of the prevention techniques is to be faithful to one uninfected partner which got lots of laughs from the audience since its typical here for men to have multiple wives. For example, the chief has five wives.

I commissioned a man in my village to make two wooden ‘lazy’ chairs for my house and he finished yesterday. Today some kids came to visit so I snapped photos of them (you can see the chairs in the background). I’d seen the boy Kweku around before but learned today that he can hear people but when he speaks it doesn’t make much sense. I let him listen to my iPod today and we danced together while the girls painted and jumped rope. Sometimes I enjoy when the kids come to visit me more than adults because with them I can just play but with older folks I struggle to make small talk.
Last week I had a bad day which happens here just like it does back in America. I feel like my teaching isn’t very effective, the students don’t respect, other teachers aren’t doing their jobs, etc. After going home, crying and watching TV shows on my laptop for a while I decided I needed to get out of the house and stop wallowing. So I asked to borrow a bicycle and setup for the Kunkwak dam, farther away than the dam I usually walk to (about a 40 minute bike ride roundtrip). It was great to get out, exercise, and see other sections of the village. I didn’t even think about the fact that I might finally spot a crocodile. Which is probably precisely why I did get to see it; funny how that works. It was just chilling, floating with only its head visible in the middle of the dam. I’ve wanted to see one in our local dam since first arriving and being told they reside there. People bathe, wash clothes/dishes, go fishing, and swim in these but the docile crocs don’t bother them. I also ran into a few students who live out there including the two boys who stay with my friend Chris so they can study at night. They were fishing so I spent time with them and met one of the boys Sunday’s younger brothers. They tried to give me the only fish they’d caught so far but I protested and told them next time when they had caught more I’d accept. So Sunday when I returned from my weekend away they gave me a smoked fish which turned out to be quite delicious. Sometimes I don’t enjoy the fish here but other times it’s pretty tasty.

I’ve had the past two days off from school because of the Independence Day holiday yesterday. Usually in the district capitals students do marching to celebrate but our school didn’t participate this year. I stayed home until around 5 in the evening to just relax. In the evenings this week I’ve been going to the site of my friend Chris’ house he’s building to see the progress of the roofing work and snap photos. On the way yesterday I stopped in our town center to buy some groundnuts and much to my delight women at one of the stores where they recently added on were working on pounding the floor while singing and dancing. I snapped some photos which they loved. I also took a video which I hope to post next month when I go south for a conference. I’ve been storing up lots of photos of village life so can’t wait to share those then!