Reluctance

I am somewhat reluctant to write today as I am tired from frolicking in the winter wonderland that is January in Togo. I guess I should start from the beginning.

Yesterday was a good day. It started out like any other, rolling out of bed at the clanging of the breakfast bell. Breakfast, which has recently switched from corn soup to steamed yams (bigtime downgrade), was better than normal as the presence of bread at least gave me some reconciliation that my favorite meal of the day wasn’t going to leave a sour taste in my mouth that was oh so used to the sweets. I then did a quick bout of laundry taking advantage of the unusually timed running of the generator to play some music while I worked. Ok I didn’t just play it I practically blared it, as much as is possible from my computer. There weren’t too many people around at the time and I am not shy about using the nonconfrontational style here to my advantage.

After laundry I sat down in my room and stared at my desk before decided to play a few hands of solitaire and FreeCell (old school fashion with the cards as someone didn’t like my music and cut the power). I then received a knock on my door saying that we were having fufu for lunch and they needed help pounding the yams. I jumped at the opportunity to get some kind of physical activity in and dashed off. I saw the UNESCO group who barely blinked at the sight of some random white guy walking around. I pounded fufu for as long as my nolongerleatherskinned hands could take, turning down every offer to take over and becoming more defiant each time as I was the only one receiving the offers. The fact that it was the lazy and uneducated aspirant who was constantly asking me only aggravated me more to the point where I was ready to knock him in the jaw with the mashing baton if he came near me again and blame it on losing my grip. I finally succumbed to the fact that my hands were now raw with blisters and realizing that there was nothing there to prove and I wasn’t rowing that there was no point in completely shredding my hands over a bowl of pounded yams. I saw Blaise make his way over and tossed him the baton, spurning the ones who had been trying to cater to me. I don’t treat anyone differently based on their color and I command the same of anyone I interact with. Treat me with any sign of difference and you’ll get a swift kick in the ass before being afforded the opportunity of watching me doing what it is that you thought I couldn’t.

After Lunch I made my way back to my room where to my surprise the electricity was back on. I figured I had nothing better to do so I watched one of my legally backed up for personal use movies. If you’ve never heard of “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” snag it off of Netflix and start watching. At about the climax of the movie my phone started ringing. My dad called about 5 hours earlier than I expected, which I was hoping for as I had other plans made for the night. I had a great talk about anything and everything I could think of at the time. It was nice to not have to stop and explain my words, attempting different pronunciations in trying to hit upon the West African version of the same word. English is meant to be spoken fast I have determined, as are most languages. And I am thankful to not have started off a conversation with “thank you” (the first time I heard that one I was stopped dead in my tracks, skipped by it and probably came off as incredibly rude when talking to the armed guard in Accra, but seriously? Who starts a conversation with “thank you?”) which people are taught here along with the always present “hi, how are you, fine thanks,” monotony that has been etched into people’s minds, and (although it would be difficult to replicate for a phone call) “I am coming” as a form of saying “I will be right back.” If I have one pet peeve here it is that. In French you say “J’arrive” to say I will be arriving soon, I have arrived, or I am arriving – in context, “I will be right back”. But here they are taught to say “I am coming.” Christian says it all the time in Kara when we are sitting down and he has to run out of the room to go help someone. NO you are not coming, you are leaving, you will be coming back. The proper term is I will be right back.

Anywho the talk was good, but the credits cut out on us right at the end. Almost no sooner than I had clicked continue, I heard a knockin’ at my door. Who on earth could it be? I opened the door to find the man in red himself (minus the red, and the reindeer, and the snow, and rosy red cheeks, and the white beard, and the boots, and the whip, and the bells, and the sleigh, and the elves, and the bag, and the blue eyes)! Santa is black! And his sleigh is really a 2009 Sanya Motorcycle, black. But I was like no shit, this is actually happening. I saw 3 boxes in the ledge outside my door and was greeted by one of the monks, Nikolas, who is always happy to see me since he lives in Kara and we haven’t fallen into the mundane daily greeting routine. He took off as quick as he showed up always having things to do and as far as I could tell he made the special trip down from the north pole just for me. My initial reaction was, my god how did Natalie afford a box this big (as the other two and hers were expected to arrive around the same time). Turns out I am still waiting on that box, but Mom Mom you will be happy to know that someone upstairs has an eye on the USPS because that box somehow made it up from South Africa generally unscathed save the chocolate covered pretzels, which have been reduced to chocolate covered bags with pretzels inside in the African heat.

I had another reaction, but this was to the third person who found his way to be standing outside of my room when the boxes showed up (I think is was a right place, right time kinda deal). It was the lazy aspirant who still owes me money from a moto ride about a month back. He had huge eyes seeing me take the boxes (after bidding farewell to Nik) and said knowing that I prefer French (even though he speaks less than Colin) to his native version of English “On va partager?” I shot him a look that said like hell, gave him a cheerful “nope” and closed the door with my foot.

So yes today was a good day and I have been frolicking in my private winter wonderland for the past day and a half.