Counterpart Workshop Apprehensions

Tomorrow we leave for Counterpart Workshop in Mamou followed by site visit. Today was not a fabulous day for me and every little thing stressed me out, most of all packing for this ordeal.

I am apprehensive for several reasons. First, that my counterpart will even show up to the workshop. AgFo is different from other disciplines (especially SED) in that our counterpart is the local Chef Cantonnement du Forestier, which is a government appointed position and is the default counterpart for all AgFo volunteers in Guinea. I am supposed to be relying on this dude for everything, basically. He is supposed to get me to my site, provide food and a place to stay (if my house isn’t ready yet, more on this later), introduce me to the community and get me back on a bush taxi to send me back. And hopefully he speaks French because if it’s only Pular there will be problems.

Now to the house situation. No one has seen my house or even knows for sure that the town has officially decided on one. The only thing keeping me optimistic is that my APCD said my Sous-Prefet (local government official) is really enthusiastic and I should be able to rely on him for stuff once I get to my village.

Now the part about getting to my village. John, Ian and I will leave Mamou together with our counterparts and go to Kate’s site, where we will need to get out of the bush taxi and get in another one to go north to John’s site. At John’s site, we will have to get out again to find another taxi to take us further north (on the same road). Ousmane said that by the time we get to John’s site it will be late afternoon and the likelihood of us finding a taxi going north at that hour will not be easy, meaning we will probably have to stay the night at John’s and catch a taxi the next day.

To get back to Forecariah at the end, we will have to go to John’s site and spend the night again, then get a taxi to Kate’s site, where we will spend another night and then the NEXT day finally get a taxi to Forecariah. The only thing keeping me slightly sane about this is that Ian will be with me the whole time as his site is north of mine and the only time I might have to get a taxi and ride in it alone is on the way back on the my site to John’s site leg, which should actually be fairly short and painless. The really painful rides will always have at least Ian by my side which is at least comforting.

I think I am just very pessimistic about the whole thing. I just need to sleep on it. In the morning when I’m all packed and ready to go, I’m sure I will feel better. I really think it’s the whole figuring out what to take and then hauling it all around and being paranoid about the dude riding on the roof of the taxi stealing my stuff or having forgotten something key that I can’t get at my site (I only have market once a week and I don’t know what day it is). Hopefully it will all work out.

In other news, tonight was the last evening I will see my sister Fatim as she is leaving for university in Conakry while I am gone. So tonight I gave her her cadeau (gift), which is a shiny metal keychain I got in a swag bag from WE TV for I think the Independent Spirit Awards. She LOVED it. She squealed when she opened it and then showed it to everyone in the family. I think the family thought that they weren’t going to get gifts, only Fatim, but I am just waiting until I am fixing to leave to give the other gifts I brought (Hello Kitty hairties for Mamadaba, CSULB hat and Obama bracelet for Yari, Rubix cube-like thing for Mohammed and a can opener for mama – they open cans with knives here, though tomato paste and condensed milk are the only cans really - …hmmm I still need some cadeaus for Oumou and grandma!! A project for Mamou or Kindia…). I also gave the family my remaining pineapple from Maferinya and mama looked really surprised and pleased when I handed it to her as pineapples are relatively expensive and difficult to find here even though there is a huge pineapple plantation a half hour away.

Also Fatim told me a chicken has to be over a year old before it is big enough to eat and that once the chicks are big enough to live on their own they will eat the year and a half old mama…or all three of them (we have 3 mama chickens right now and 15 chicks, all of which Allah decided would be girls). In fact today I identified all of our chickens (3 other adult chickens besides the mama hens). I think the family might give me the chick I saved a few weeks ago when I leave. I keep calling her “ma petite poussin” and I think once Fatim asked me if I would take her with me to site. She still won’t be very big but if I feed her rice she should be fine. I dunno. I think that when I go out of site and need a neighbor to watch my animals they might just mange (eat) my chicken. But at least she’d have a good life until then? Or would her life be better if she could spend it with her siblings? Am I reading too much into the life of a chicken? Food for thought (but not for belly…I am a vegetarian after all).