PS and my new number

Okay, so I just scrolled down and realized Bissikrima is on the map that I uploaded in one of my first posts – how exciting! Now you can see just exactly where I’ll be staying in Guinea

Just wanted to say again that my phone number is 65655605. My old number is no longer with me, and you’ll likely reach one of my non-English-speaking host sisters in Forecariah if you try dialing it. If you can, please send me your mailing address so I can use my spare time to communicate with you the old fashioned way.

And lastly, more exciting news, when I first met all the current volunteers in my region, Haute Guinea, I was thrilled to learn one of them was from Minnesota (man, do I love the Minnesotans). Upon further discussion, we realized we went to the same high school with him graduating the year I entered so our paths never crossed. Another volunteer was from Joliet, IL and is an NIU alum (like my parents). What a small world!

Sworn In

So here I am… a vrai (real) Peace Corps Volunteer! But I’m getting way ahead of myself. For the past two and a half months I’ve been living with my Guinean mother, Hija Mamdi Toure. She’s a 60+ year old (I think – nobody here celebrates birthdays or even knows how old they are) woman who was SO good to me. I lived in a very nice compound with a few girls my age who I called my “sisters”. I was surrounded by friendly people and all kinds of interesting activities. They all helped me with washing my clothes by hand (which they say I stink at doing…so good luck to me now that I don’t have them to help me), cooked for me (mainly eggs scrambled in an absurd amount of oil, french fries, and bread cooked over a chimney type little thing), helped me get my water (which is hilarious to watch, let me tell you), and many other things.

What have I been doing besides living with my family? Well, we spent 8AM-5PM in training, five days each week. The vast majority of the classes were language (French and recently I began learning Malinke) and learning how to teach. For three weeks at the end of August/beginning of September we did practice school, which is where the Peace Corps invited real Guinean children to come sit in on our classes with prizes for the best students at the end. This was eye-opening as the Guinean school system is very different from ours in the US. The class sizes are much larger, the students don’t have access to resources (basic things, like say, a compass, protractor, or even the textbook), and you have to deal with things like people passing by the classroom and stopping to stare at the fote (white person) teaching. During our training, we also learned about diseases like malaria (which one of us has already gotten), which snakes to be aware of (in my mind, all of them), and how to treat our water.

Oh the water. Yes, so I’ve been taking bucket baths now for two and a half months. I have grown to really love them despite the mini tadpoles, dead spiders,and gravel in my water and the film I find on top of it on a regular basis. I’ve likened it to swimming in a river or lake, and now that stuff doesn’t bother me. The water really is a problem here though. Two of my sisters had amoebas/parasites during the time I was in training, and that was not very fun. They threw up all the time and were pretty miserable. Bottled water is expensive, so they mostly drink the well water (the pump water is supposed to be cleaner, but unfortunately the pump is far away).

On my birthday (August 1 of course) we found out our sites. The volunteer trainers drew a huge map of Guinea on the floor of the classroom and our associate director gave a little history of each site before announcing the trainee who was headed there and placing them at their site on the map. What a cool way to do it! So, for the next two years I will be living in a village called Bissikrima, which is on the border of Upper and Middle Guinea. In the middle of August we got to go visit our sites to see where we’ll living, what we’d need, meet our village, etc. Bissikrima sits between some mountains on a main road (the one most used between the capital, Conakry, and the regional capital, Kankan. I am thrilled to say I will spend the next two years living in a hut. A two bedroom hut, actually! It’s pretty large inside, and I have a lovely “bathroom” off of my bedroom (I always wanted my own bathroom!) that is surrounded by a fence to give me some privacy. My bathroom consists of a large tree, some plants, and a pit latrine. It’s like a mini-rain forest, and when I took a bucket bath out there in the rain during site visit, it was complete and utter bliss. I think I may also use this as my laundry room. We’ll see. In any case, I am thrilled to be going back so soon!

And back I will go on Tuesday. Tomorrow Ben (my closest neighbor who also happens to be a UM alum), Hunter, our driver, our installer, and I will all leave to go to Farnah, near Hunter’s site. We’ll spend time greeting everyone (literally – not a single person in the village will be left out) on Monday before we install (move in) Hunter. Then the four of us will head to Dabloa (23K from my site) leaving Hunter at his site. We’ll spend Tueday morning greeting all of the people (mayors, police, etc) in my prefecture and village before installing me that same day. Wow! We were originally supposed to go to Kankan where we could shop for more stuff for our huts at the beginning of the week and then get installed at the end of the week. Late Thursday we found out that this wasn’t the case, so I’ve spent today running around Conakry like a mad woman trying to buy everything I need (and paying way too much in the process). Patience and flexibility… I’m getting a lot better at both!

Other highlights of training having included buying a chicken for my mother (that actually turned out to be a deranged rooster who woke me up at 4:30AM daily, although the sun doesn’t rise until 6:30, for the last month of training), killing a chicken (not at all difficult after the rooster incident), sharing my room with a mouse (cockroaches really don’t bother me much anymore), coming home one afternoon to find a cow in my compound (what?! turns out he was for a sacrifice), and I found out all kinds of new science, for example my pregnant sister told me her baby would likey be white since she had spent so much time with me, nevermind the fact that both parents are black. In other exciting news, I forgot to mention I have electricity in my hut. It sound silly to say that, mais c’est vrai! It’ll only be on (supposedly) every other day (for 24 hours), but at our training site the electricity schedule was never accurate. The way I found out the electricity was on was when I heard children (and some adults) yelling and cheering for minutes on end. Just because the electricity came on doesn’t mean it will stay that way – we often get a five minute teaser and are left in the dark the rest of the night, but the dark isn’t so bad with the amazing night sky here.

After two and a half months here, we’ve found the little things to be a lot more exciting. A conversation between Conor and myself on the bus back to Conakry after finishing training:

A: Ohmygosh pizza tomorrowwww! And ice cream! Wow! I can’t wait!

C: Yah, and I think I’m going to try the chinese food! This is going to be so good. And tonight I’m going to watch a movie!

A: Ohmygosh YES! AND DRINK DIET COKE!

C: AND COFFEE!

A: AND TAKE A SHOWER!

C: AND SLEEP IN AC!

Tiffany: You realize how ridiculous this conversation would sound to someone in the states.

It’s funny but having good food here can just send my mood soaring. Lisa, my friend from Iowa, got a care package with oreos, which we devoured and then walked around in a euphoric state for the rest of the day.  Fortunately bad food does not have the opposite effect because I’d have a lot of miserable days if that were the case.

To quickly finish up, I should be online more often at site, since Dabola (which is only 23K from me) apparently has internet. Hopefully I’ll be able to update my blog more often, but who knows. I will also have cell phone service in my village, although I had to switch my number to 65655605. To call, dial 011 224 65655605 ANYTIME!

For now that’s about all. I’ll update ASAP, hopefully Tuesday. Thinking of you all and hoping you’re enjoying some lovely Fall weather.

I’m Alive!!!!!

Hello everyone!

I dont have much time to write (and I also didn’t realize I would be lucky enough to use the internet), but I want to say that I’m still here in Guinea and doing extremely well. Right now I am in the Fouta region aka middle Guinea for a workshop with our principals. After this we will return to the training site for four days then head to Conakry where we will be officially sworn in at the embassy. When I get to Conakry on the 25th, I will immediately update you. I have plenty of amusing stories that I can’t wait to share. I am thinking of and missing you all.