The Odyssey

That’s what I’ve decided this is. Tonight when I was having my dinner, a light rain falling on my corrugated tin roof, I put on my iPod and flipped nonchalantly to The Killers, an album from my days as a film student at CSULB (Hot Fuss), and remembered suffering the mosh pit that is the floor at the front of the stage at a Killers concert in LA with my friend Jackie, saying “fuck it” after 3-4 songs, allowing ourselves to be pulled out by big burly security guards and stalking to the back of the floor (where it was empty) to dance like idiots where we were sure all the people in the seats in the general vicinity were staring at us either enviously or laughing in cameraderie and both agreed that this would be our last Killers concert unless they came out with an amazing new album.

This past week I was in Conakry, putting together a video for JET (our peer support network), that ended up being a slideshow with a bunch of different volunteers explaining the hardest part about leaving the US, how they felt when they got to Guinea, what got them through training (training is a bitch and nothing like being an actual volunteer), how they felt when PC dropped them off at their site and drove away, things they did to integrate into the community, their favorite thing about their site and their advice to new trainees.

My answers: The hardest part about leaving the US was knowing I was putting my career on hold and knowing I would never have access to refrigerated water or sour cream (FALSE…can have both of those things in Conakry with some effort). When I first got to Guinea I felt like I needed to throw up. And then I did. Repeatedly. Also miserably hot and yet despite it all, kind of peaceful and relieved. The hardest part about living with a host family during training was not knowing what they wanted me to do and not understanding what they were saying to me. The things that got me through training were egg sandwiches at the carrefour, spending evenings at Chey Vicky’s (a bar where you hang out with fellow trainees after dinner), and going to the Bureau (PC base of operations) when I needed to talk or have a little piece of America. Or cry. And mail day. If you don’t get anything it’s really disappointing, direct your friends to my epic mailing guidelines post (linked on Right). When Peace Corps dropped me off at my site and drove away for good, I felt ready. I was happy to be in my own house with my own rules, have all my stuff with me and not in a suitcase, clean the place up and make it what I wanted it to be. I did not have the infamous feeling of wanting to run after the car yelling, “I’m not ready yet!” about which I was almost a little surprised. One thing I did to integrate at my site when I first got here was to only buy one onion a day. Since I cook for myself (don’t really have a family, though the SP’s family would be the closest), I use an onion or two every day for my meals, as it is pretty much the only vegetable readily available (and has Vitamin C!). So I would only buy one a day so that every day I HAD to leave my house and go to the carrefour and buy an onion from my onion lady, who always saluer-ed and was happy to sell me an onion: people saw me and while I might not have been comfortable, I was starting to be part of the community. My favorite thing about my site is that my dog that I got the night before we left training lives here with me . Also that everyone wants to saluer (greet) me and that I live on the carrefour (intersection) so lots of people walk by my house so I can say hello. Also that the lady I buy rice and sauce from every morning (for me and my dog to share) always seems happy to see me. And my onion lady. And my friends Ousmane and Nene. And the Sous Prefet and Madame and his whole family. And that it is ridiclously gorgeous here. If I had any advice for new trainees it would be that training is nothing like being a volunteer, language will come, your host family is really happy to have you, everything will get easier/seem normal with time, you WILL communicate with the States regularly if you make the effort and those pink and white lollipops with the black and white cow-like wrappers are the answer.

Another thing I have recently come to peace with: this is a ridiculously beautiful country. I have found myself thinking that often. Yesterday I was sitting on a transport truck in the late afternoon, trying to make it back to my site by the exact day I said I would (a feat in Guinea) and I was just staring out the open top of the bed, looking at rolling mountains, cliffs, clouds and streaks of sunlight and thinking: what a ridiculously beautiful place I live in. If you are going to come visit Guinea I recommend June. It doesn’t rain constantly, but just enough to make it fucking beautiful here.

The other thing was that when I got home my friend Ousmane said that he and my chauffer friend Emcee had been waiting for me in Telimele that day, KNOWING I was coming back that day and had left merely minutes before I arrived, disappointed. Emcee had told every passenger that the front was reserved for me and both Ousmane and Emcee said “WHEN DID YOU GET THERE??? We were waiting for you!” But of course Ousmane was at the carrefour when I arrived and he came to the truck to take my backpack down for me, then carried it to my house and accompanied me to the Sous Prefet’s house where my dog was beside himself to see me and Madame said Yogi annoyed her “only a little” and insisted on me eating some “mafe hakko” (sauce made from manioc leaves), my third rice and sauce of the day (and it was an awful bush taxi ride, I will say only that), but really I was grateful because it was late and I didn’t want to make dinner but enjoyed half a Milky Way bar I got at a Leb store in Conakry once I got home before I went to bed. During the night it rained HARD and at 2am I had to let my stinky dog in my bed. Today I bathed him in herbal shampoo (send me doggie shampoo, people!) so he can sleep there all night if he wants (put on the new sheets I bought from Paul’s friend at his site in Haute, they are pink and green tie-dyed – c’est jolie!). I also had a dream about eating (no, ordering, I woke up before the eating part) a Chipotle burrito (I went through the whole line and everything, telling them what to put on it, though sour cream was expensive and there was no corn salsa – WTF). It was disappointing not to have dreamed eating it. Zach’s brother brought two Chipotle burritos with him when he came last week (both of which Zach ate) so I recommend doing that if you come visit me. It doesn’t need refrigerating. Apparently nothing does (learned this living in Guinea).

All in all, basically I am saying life is good here, I have figured almost everything out. It took six months. Now I need to start actually doing projects. Which is an exciting yet daunting idea. MORINGA AND ORGANIC FERTILIZER!!!! 

Hold on, Africa. You’re about to have a lot of trees planted in you! ;)