Elle est malade
The sicknesses here are different from at home. While at home, I’m content to weather most any sickness on my own, I’ll rush downtown to the embassy nurse for any strange symptom. Diarrea could be cholera, a fever could be la pluie. “Malaria” could be very serious, and because of the more rainy than usual rainy season, very prevalent. I’ve rushed with Allison once to find that her bloody stool was beets from dinner the night before. I’ve been healthy so far, except for a sudden bout of puking and diarrea, so sudden, it caused me to pass out and to later pour over email descriptions of cholera. Today, Bronwyn’s home with a mysterious high fever. Yesterday we determined by blood test that it wasn’t malaria. We sit and wait with it to see which way it wants to go.

Bringing water from the well
I was full of questions on my first visit to an African village for our host, Arielle, the Peace Corps volunteer posted at Missira, a small seaside village near the Gambian border. Trying to grasp the basics of how the village managed I asked… “So, you get water from a…. well?” Next thing I knew, I was getting the full demonstration. Arielle’s Maman in the village, delighted that I had volunteered, provided me with une bassine, one of the smaller ones that the youngest girls use for learning how to carry water, and a colorful rag for cushioning my head for the return trip. We followed her with an entourage between huts, under lines of laundry, to the path behind the village compound, up a small hill, pressing through weeds and a forest of baobab trees to reach the well. She deftly dropped the yellow gallon seau down to the surface of the water, where it obediently fell to its side and quickly filled with water, then she jerked the long rope back up, hand over hand, soon filling her grande bassine with several or so of these gallons. “Your turn, toubab”, I imagined her to say in Mandinka. I was grateful for whatever I had done in life to prepare me for this task. It wasn’t so hard- only a few patient jerks of the rope encouraged the bucket to fill nicely. I managed to position my measly two gallons (less than one measly toilet flush back home) atop my head with Arielle’s help. I slowly proceeded like Princess Diana practicing good posture, watching the slow, easy gait of the “mother” in the lead, wondering if my ass looked “African” enough to be doing this properly. On the return, we were abruptly pushed off the narrow path from behind by a cow and two little boys chasing it home, later by some other miscellaneous livestock passing through. The water stayed aloft down the hill, but once inside the compound it insisted on gushing over the front lip as I took a step up into her hut area, then righted itself as I limboed under the clothes line to the finish. Not too bad, maybe I’d only lost a liter or so. I had saved enough face to still be welcome for dinner.

Telling stories around the fire
Electricity has come to this village, but not much of it. When we returned to the village near sunset, the village had gathered to break the day’s fast together. We sat on chairs that were offered to guests, watching the scene from midstream. Around us a pack of children squealed and ran. Some women prepared a fire for cooking, some nursed babies, some sat. The men mostly sat. It became clear that the real focus of attention was a small TV placed on a tabouret, its electric cord stretching to within a hut where a small fluorescent bulb burned bluish in the darkness. Save for these two things, the village became dark and cool as the sun retreated. Tout le monde gathered in the courtyard area for a viewing of “Married With Children” dubbed into French, only besser-ing the volume when the call to prayer issued from the tiny mosque nearby and men knelt on their prayer mats in front of the sit com.

La Pouponniere
Soeur Angel, a petite Senegalaise woman in a crisp nurse’s gown worthy of a children’s book set in London, led us to a sundrenched room at the far end of the nursery. She smiled broadly under her lunettes, gently and firmly motioning us to enter. After a moment, my eyes began to focus on the scene- babies, babies- everywhere. Watch your step. They were all under foot, like the profusion of frogs that appear here after a rain. Some napped, some drooled, some rolled, some noticed each other, some didn’t. Fourty some babies were being watched by four young women, who tended to the playgroup like pancakes on an enourmous griddle. This one needs flipping over, this one you can leave for a while, this one needs to be taken off, this one is getting dry on the edges. Always in repose, yet always doing the right thing at the right time, the women’s soft gaze never left their work. Like an amateur, I jumped in and fumbled with one baby who managed to catch my eye. What did she need? What did she recognize? What would she grow up to be? When was it time to leave her and “try” another one?
I learned that this “nursery” is for babies 0-9 months, whose mothers can’t keep them at that time, because they are too sick, too overwhelmed with work already, or have died in childbirth. After nine months, or before, the babies return to their families. Each month, the families visit with their babies and provide the orphanage with one month’s worth of food. The place seems clean and well organized, the babies healthy and content. Send crib bumpers or other interesting toys to hang from cribs, and small summer clothes if you wish to contribute.

Pigeon
I was hoping that when Bakary said he had a cadeau for Allison, a “pigeon”, that maybe the French word pigeon means something other than what we know it as. Actually, I was hoping that pigeon would mean something that wasn’t a bird at all, maybe some cute handmade toy or something. The next week he did show up with a small ominous carton, rectangular holes carved into each side. Yes, it was a pigeon, just like what we would call in New York a “flying rat”. Thoughts ranging from bird poop, to Tucker with a mouthful of feathers, to avian flu rushed through my head. How could Bronwyn have let this happen? She insisted that Bakary was “my” problem because he was “my” odd job man. Did she forget that “my” French is lousy? Bakary gently produced the pidgeon for our inspection. I managed to flap my wings and ask, “ Est ce qu’il peut…fly?” No, he showed me that the bird’s wing was inadequate- through device or accident, I couldn’t translate. At least we would be keeping a lame bird in a box. That was a shade better than boxing a bird in top form. In my most careful French I finished with “Nous… peuvons… avoir… le oiseau… pour… une semaine,… mais……… pas… pour… tous les jours”. He chatted away in response. Steely eyed, I turned to Bronwyn with, “He understood that it’s only for a week?” “Oh yeah,” she knocked off, not understanding the grave nature of the situation, “He understood”. Eager to gain some French from this experience, I consulted Larousse later, to find that the alternate meaning for the French word “pigeon” is… “sucker”.