Kankan Farewells

 My last round of good-byes in Kankan started with PCV Michelle's going-away party. Ethan, her replacement, happened to be in town for his site visit, so it was really more of a Farewell-Michelle-and-Welcome-Ethan celebration, and, because Michelle's host family and work partners really love her, it was really good party. Three were chubby babies, ladies singing and dancing, plates of meat and bread and fried potatoes, and lots of amusing photos of how Michelle is very petite and Ethan is very tall.

There was also this little kid (one of Michelle's host brothers) who was really, really into arranging and re-arranging all the rented plastic chairs, and we thought it was great when he lined them all up in the courtyard, so we took photos and told him how cool he was. He was very pleased; it was adorable.

 

A few days after Michelle left Kankan, it was time for me to say my own good-byes. I gave my nicest buckets and little decorative coffee mugs to the lunch lady down the street who has always been kind to me, and gave most of my clothes and sheet and towels to the ladies next door who washed most of my laundry. I brought my stove and gas tank and things over to the Peace Corps house for one of the new Public Health Volunteers, and I gave most of the rest of my things to the guards at the Save the Children office. Finally, I bought tea, sugar and kola nuts for the office staff and the guards, as a little farewell gift.

On the day that I moved out of my rooms I put on my best complet outfit, made from indigo fabric given to me by my Senegalese host family, and posed for photos with pretty much everyone at the office. There were a couple guards who weren't in that day, and I realized too late that I don't have any pictures of them, which makes me sad - they were really great, always helped me out with whatever I was trying to find or fix or move.

Adama, Adama, and Fatoumata

Save the Children, Kankan, Guinea

Everyone repeatedly complimented my outfit and told me that I should dress like this all the time, and said they were happy to see me looking like "a real Guinean." On behalf of the office Fatoumata and Adama presented me with a bunch of fabric and wished me all the best, saying that they hoped that I would be blessed with safe travels, good health, much happiness, and a handsome husband. (Adama said that last part and then she giggled a lot.)

Fun fact about indigo: It turns your skin quite blue when you sweat. Like Smurf-blue, and you really have to scrub to get it off.

Once I'd said my office good-byes I went over to the neighbors' house, where my friend Halimatou lives. They've fed me, helped me find tailors, and always been happy to have me over to hang out, so they're the closest thing that I had to a host family in Kankan. They fed me rice with Guinean leaf sauce (not my favorite - look at all that orange palm oil! - but I appreciated the gesture) and we took a bunch of photos and they told me to call when I get to America and it was all very bittersweet.

Pular Ladies in Kankan

Halimatou said that they had a good-bye gift for me but that it wasn't ready, so she'd bring it by the Peace Corps house later. The gift turned out to be more fabric and a really cool orange dress that, miraculously, fits perfectly, and I will try to get some photos of that up soon. 

Meetings

Shortly after I arrived in West Africa, I was told by an older PCV to always bring a book, my cell phone, and plenty of credit to any meeting I attended, so that I'd have something to keep me busy. I remember being slightly put off - it seemed so disrespectful, I imagined that I'd want to be attentive throughout any meeting to which I was invited. But that was before I found out just how long it can take for a meeting to get started here, and also just how long it can last once it gets going.

Disclaimer: It is often worth it to go to meetings, and important things do happen at meetings, so it's good to pay attention. It can also be helpful to have something to do for the hour or three before things get started, and to have something on hand to help you stay pleasant during the more frustrating parts.

That being said, here are some things that I would include if I were making up a game of Guinean Meeting Bingo:

• Things starts at least two hours later than scheduled 
• A host country national complains loudly about how nothing ever starts on time 
• A host country national complains that the punctual people aren't giving others enough time to talk
• At least six cell phones go off 
• At least two people answer calls and have a conversation about how they are in a meeting
• Someone hands out plastic folders containing gridded notepads and blue ballpoint pens
• There are at least three fake fruit and/or fake flower bouquets in the room
• It is approximately 95°F/35°C in the room but it feels so much hotter
• The guy in front of you falls asleep in his chair
• A local official shows up, accompanied by an armed soldier, to declare the meeting officially started
• Lunch is served at 3:30 PM or later
• Someone hands out cans of tepid orange Fanta
• Someone asks if you are married 
• The power goes out and it takes at least 20 minutes to get it sorted out
• A long period of time is spent reading text from PowerPoint slides
• A supposed professional says something wildly inaccurate, i.e. "Fistula is a women's problem caused by HIV."
• Someone says "We are running very late so I will be brief..." and then talks for nine minutes
• Someone says "We have already thanked everyone many times..." and then thanks them all again

Oh, meetings. I can't say I'll miss them, but I will miss commiserating about them and trading never-ending-meeting stories with friends and co-workers, at least a little bit. 

Celebration!

The Peace Corps Volunteers of Kankan are big on celebrating holidays, especially American holidays, and few things are as quintessentially American as Thanksgiving. Except for maybe Thanksgivukkah. 

We improvised a menorah on the second night of Hannukah and then celebrated with latkes, an improvised menorah, and an entertaining re-telling of the miracle of the oil. The evening's festivities included an inflatable turkey and plenty of palm wine (which turned out to be far too vinegary for anyone's taste) but we waited until Saturday for our big Thanksgiving-style dinner 

All the shopping and cooking went well because Carolina handled all the planning, and because there happen to be a lot of good cooks in Kankan. I was in charge of frying onion rings, which was a sweaty job made much more pleasant by bringing the gas burner outside. Since we were inside the walls of the Peace Corps office compound we were all free to wear running shorts and above-the-knee skirts, which also helped with the heat. Deb helped serve the onion rings, which, despite being non-traditional, were a big hit. 

All in all it was a really pleasant day, everyone helping out and having fun - very Thanksgiving-ish. The menorah and turkey decorations were set up right next to the spiderwebs and ghosts left over from Halloween, and then we added some sparkly Christmas decorations that had arrived early to the ones that were still on the shelf from last year, and the whole place started to look like a party were the theme was just Holidays. Thanksgiving dinner turned out amazingly well - roasted chickens, mac n' cheese, garlic mashed potatoes and gravy, cranberry sauce and stuffing, salad and cornbread, pumpkin pie and brownies... the only disappointing part was how we all got so full so fast - Thanksgiving fare is so much more dense, so much more filling than rice and sauce! We did the best we could, and by the end of the night most everything perishable had been eaten, which is good because we don't have much in the way of refrigeration and it'd be sad to see it go to waste. 

So, Happy Belated Thanksgiving, everyone! Also, here are a couple photos from last month, while we were in Conakry. On the left, Lane was re-heating some polenta that had been gifted to us by the Country Director, and we got creative with it. Sarah J. and I are on the right, enjoying a lovely sunset on the beach immediately behind the Conakry office. Good times. 

Note: Despite the photographic evidence, I don't actually wear that blue-and-white t-shirt every single day. I do happen to be wearing it right now, but I'm going to change before I head out to the market later.

Photos courtesy of Sarah J. and Lane G.

The Librarian

I really enjoy my Kindle, but it’s still nice to have access to a collection of paper books like the one that lines the walls of the main room and entryway of the Peace Corps office. Until recently these books were dusty and jumbled and were arranged in what appears to have once been alphabetical order, either by author or title. It was hard to tell.

Then Adrienne, who along with me got roped into serving in the Kankan House Committee, decided that we should sort them out into categories and make a Suggested Reading shelf, so we got to work. Over the next few days whoever happened to be around pitched in, stacking volumes into genres including:

·         Exciting Books: Thrillers, Mysteries & Crime

·         Books about Africa and/or Peace Corps

·         Classics: Because When Else Will You Ever Have Time to Read Them

·         Books That Were Marketed to Women

·         Romance, Vampires, & Vampire Romance

·         Books with Magic and/or Dragons

·         Books with Time Travel and/or Space Ships

·         Assorted Non-Fiction

·         Books that Are Supposed to be Funny

·         Terrible Books that Aren’t Worth Your Time

·         Self-Help

·         Card Games, Crossword Puzzles and Knitting

·         Books that Aren’t in English

·         Poems and Plays

·         Professional-Type Books and Reference

·         Jesus and Other Religions

 Once we finished clearing off the shelves and getting the genre piles in rough order, we weeded out the books that were mouse-eaten or missing big chunks, and we got rid of a lot of the dust. We've been putting them back on shelves, grouping them by author, but not really worrying about alphabetical order. It’s been interesting to see what we have, and what we don’t have. We have a bunch of copies of the The Secret Life of Bees, The Lovely Bones, and Seabiscuit. There are several copies of Bridget Jones’ Diary, all of Harry Potter plus Tales of Beetle the Bard, and several copies of Angela’s Ashes. There are two copies of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, which I have always meant to read, and three copies of The Thorn Birds, which rang a vague bell of recognition. There are a few copies of Into Thin Air, most of the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency books, and a few Cutting for Stone, which I liked so much, even though the ending didn't sit all that well with me. (Too symmetrical, I think.)

Unsurprisingly, Tom Clancy occupies the most shelf space, followed by Michael Crichton, Sue Grafton, Patricia Cornwell, John Grisham, Scott Turow, Clive Cussler, in no particular order. Isabelle Allende and Dean Koontz all take up a good deal of space, as does Danielle Steele, who irks me because her back covers are all just big pancake-makeup-ed headshots with the caption EVERYONE READS DANIELLE STEELE, which just isn't true. If it said A LOT OF PEOPLE READ DANIELLE STEELE I would like her more. I read one (I’ll read just about anything) and it wasn't the worst, but it felt flat and bland and slightly preachy. (One might go so far as to call it milquetoast...) Also in one picture she has giant diamond earrings and a polo shirt with a popped collar, which I don’t understand.

There are some good romance writers - I like Jennifer Crusie, Maria Gabaldi, and most of LaVyrle Spencer. The bad romances tend to be really, appallingly, unfinishably bad, but they also tend to have the most entertaining covers –some are just embossed with flowers and wedding rings, but there’s a set of cheap, slim volumes adorned with soft-focus photos of Hot Cops, brawny men in kilts, and shirtless firefighters from the 80s, and Sarah T. and I decided to give Chris N. a legacy by inscribing his name on the inside cover of all the most ridiculously titled romances, in the hopes that years from now he’ll be remembered by PCVs we'll never meet as zealous reader of trashy, trashy romance stories. (These particular books are not substantial enough to be termed novels.) 

There are nine copies of Hough’s Official Rules of Card games and no decks of cards anywhere in the house. There’s also a game book called Solitaire and Other Games of Patience, which I find delightful because that is just the saddest title ever.

I was pleased to find a nice selection of David Sedaris, Carl Hiassan, Barbara Kingsolver, a couple Sarah Vowell books, some Michael Chabon, some Saul Bellow, one Douglas Coupland, and an Ursula LeGuin book that I’m looking forward to reading.

I came across no copies of Infinite Jest, nothing at all by David Foster Wallace. Nothing by Mary Roach, no Hunter S. Thompson, no Mark Twain, no Salman Rushdie. There’s also no Twilight and no Fifty Shades of Grey but there’s some debate as to whether that is because people are hoarding them, downloading them discreetly onto Kindles, or simply not reading them.

Most of the Jesus books are flowery and look exactly like they were sent by someone’s fretful mother, which they probably were. There’s one New Testament, one Book of Mormon, and one Cliff’s Notes for the New Testament.

So. I’m not sure what all this says about the PCVs of Kankan past and present, or if it says anything at all, but it's been fun to sort through.