A Lot Can Happen in a Year

 Post by Lara

7^th June 2013

The first picture we snapped of Freetown

One year ago we arrived in Freetown, after nearly 3 days of traveling.  Harrowed by the journey and intimidated by the shock of finding ourselves in one of the poorest countries on Earth, we spent the first day or so wondering what we had gotten ourselves into.  Little by little we adjusted to Salone, until at some point we realized that we’re at home here, in our own way.  To mark this occasion and give a bit of an idea of the ups and downs we’ve had along the way, I’ve put together some tidbits from my personal journal over the course of the last year.

Lara and Mama Gilo

Dennis helping pull the ferry across the Jong River

• 10^th June, 2012 – I wrote about my thoughts on what makes a “developing” country. In just a few days I noticed that just about every car I saw had at least one dent, and many were in quite bad shape—but they were washed all the time. In our hostel room, the water heater and air conditioner did not work (but they were there!)  Electricity in many places only ran at night
• 29^th June, 2012 – My first trip to a Salone supermarket.  I spent $11.98 (Le 48,000) on goodies like jam, cookies, Nutella, Laughing Cow cheese, and an ice cream bar.  At this point I was starting to feel more comfortable with our host family and less intimidated by the environment.  We found out around this time that one of our fellow trainees was going home, which I think made all of us wonder if we would last the full 2 years in Peace Corps.
• 2^nd July 2012 – Kevin got sick for the first time—it was some kind of stomach bug. I got it soon afterward. As if it wasn’t bad enough being sick in a foreign country, our host family was really worried about us and kept hounding us to take medicine and call the doctor, which added to the stress of it all.  We were both better within a day or two.
• 7^th July 2012 – We held a 4^th of July celebration at the training site today, with a whole lot of good food made by both the Americans and the Sierra Leoneans. It was a really nice day where we got to meet a lot of volunteers who came a year before us, who shared some of their own experiences with us from this country. 
• 16^th July 2012 – We visited our site for the first time. It was a great visit but just a small taste of what traveling to and from on African roads would be like.  It ended up being even worse in August and September when the rains had washed out several parts of the road.  We were pretty excited about moving to site after this visit.
• 24^th July 2012 – Kevin and I talked about how uncanny my memory is with names of medicines in our medical kit and he said I am already like halfway to being a doctor. I’m sure my dad would love to hear that!
• 1^st August 2012 – News from home was pretty tough to hear today—my grandma was in ICU after surgery and my Aunt Tracy was most likely not going to pull through after they found a brain tumor.  The helplessness of losing a loved one paired with 4000 miles of distance between us was very hard to handle.
• 9^th August 2012 – I wrote about my many names—I have my own name, my “teacher” name, my Mende name, etc.  I pretty much answer to anything now.
• 21 August 2012 – Moved to site, started cooking and cleaning and doing chores for ourselves, and found out we’re not the only Americans in town when Dennis showed up at our door one night. It’s been SO AWESOME having him around as we adjusted to life in Salone. (Check out his blog at www.realafrica.blogspot.com) 
• 25^th August 2012 – I had mastered the Mende greeting, and 3 or 4 stock phrases. Pretty exciting!
• 28^th August 2012 – We went out to the local bar with our friend Dennis and saw…2 other white guys! After spending some 20 minutes trying to eavesdrop and figure out who they were and what they had come for, we finally introduced ourselves and found they were from the Midwest. We had a good time chatting with them for a while.
• 7^th September 2012 – After 3 weeks at our site, we were starting to get tired of being watched all the time, dealing with new people, adjusting to Mende being the dominant language, and getting our footing in our new house.  On the plus side, we had our own house so we were able to make whatever food we wanted, which was a great stress reliever.
• 13^th September 2012 – I listed off the items bought at market day: okra, “plums,” chicken, lobster, shrimp, limes, pumpkin, coconut, beans, and bread. A pretty typical market day.

• 30^th September 2012 – Went to church in our community and had the announcer point us out as the “two white people among us”. He then asked us to stand so everyone could see the two white people and clap for us.  It was awkward. 
• 9^th October 2012 – I wrote a journal entry about the Mende phrase “Kaye Ngewo Ma” (“Thanks be to God”).  This is the only acceptable way to respond to any form of “how are you?” or “how is work?” etc., even when things are not going well.  It’s weird.
• 13^th October 2012 – I made a list of small things that make us happy. These include:
• Laughing Cow cheese (the only “cheese” for 50 miles)
• Projects like painting our house and starting a garden
• Cooking
• Being called “uncle” and “auntie” by local kids
• Being able to text people back in the states
• Being told we’re appreciated
• 29^th October 2012 – I had my hair “planted” for the first time.  I wasn’t a big fan of the style they put it in, but it was nice to have it out of my face.
• 13^th November 2012 – I started a list of things we don’t like eating in the states. We’ve realized that there are very few things on that list that we wouldn’t want to eat now.  Some examples: anchovies, sourdough bread, black & green jelly beans, German potato salad, artificial grape flavor, and those black and orange Halloween taffies.
• 16^th November 2012 – With our colleague, Mike, visiting our house, we decided to make Thanksgiving dinner. It was great—complete with a freshly-slaughtered chicken and pumpkin pie for dessert! 

And a bottle of wine we opened with a shoe

• 17^th November 2012 – Election Day! We stayed home the whole day, feeling like it was good to avoid all the people milling around in town.  Later we would find that Ernest Bai Koroma, the current president, was re-elected—but not before rumors flew that his challenger won. 
• 22 November 2012 – After I decided sometime in August or so that the pixie cut is not for me (not enough variety), this was the day I noticed I could put my hair in a ponytail, with the aid of 7 bobby pins. Progress!
• 26^th November 2012 – I was splitting my students into groups by having them count off, when one student decided I was doing it all wrong and tried to intervene. I got a little mad about this, and said to him, “I have a degree in mathematics. Do not tell me how to count to 7!”
• 29^th November 2012 – I announced to my classes that no calculators would be allowed on their next exams. They whined about it for a while, until I pointed out that I was not allowed a calculator when I learned this material, and also I was 10.  My students are all between the ages of 16 and 25.
• 6^th December 2012 – A fellow teacher turned to me at school and told me that I was to judge a debate that the students were having later that week. “I am?” I asked. “Yes,” he replied. “Were you going to ask me if I wanted to do it?” “No.” “Oh…ok…well are there any guidelines you’re going to give me?” “No.” “Um…ok.”  [that debate got postponed and has yet to happen, actually].
• 1^st January 2013 – A swarm of bees moved into the tree by our house while I was sitting under it.  It happened very quickly but was terrifying for a few minutes.
• 12^th January 2013 – Kevin showed our small neighbor boy how to wash his hands after doing his business.  We also had a student come by and ask us to pay his tuition. After we said yes, he came to the house a few days later with a bag full of locally-grown rice and a live chicken for us. 
• 8^th February 2013 – Our nearest neighbor volunteer left Sierra Leone to return to California.  We were very sad to see her go, and even more so because she had a few really rough weeks before she decided to leave. 






• 9^th April 2013 – Two Sierra Leonean ex-pats who now live in the states had become acquainted with me recently, and this turned out to be great news. One of them sent us a package with goodies from the states and school supplies for our students. The other one, a doctor who was in Salone building a school, came by the house to introduce himself and gave me a bottle of ice cold water before he left.  Everyone I’ve ever met who left here and moved abroad is incredibly generous, especially to us Peace Corps volunteers. We’re very grateful for that.
• 12^th April 2013 – I made a very entertaining list of things we’ve disagreed with our neighbor about. These include things like whether dogs need to eat meat (he said no) and whether water with a little more iron than normal levels is potable (he said it’s not). 
•  7^th May 2013 – I was having a bad day, so I wrote it down, along with some good things that were going on.  I was dealing with my students on strike, so no school for 2 weeks.  I had mango rashes [it’s like poison ivy] on my hands, wrist, chest, neck, face, and back. I also had 2 canker sores. The night before I was stung by a disoriented bee right on the temple while I was showering, and it itched and hurt like crazy. On the plus side, a random person bought me a Sprite while I was walking in town, one of my favorite shopkeepers gave me a handful of candy, and our town was assigned a new Deputy Director of Education from Freetown and he was off to a great start trying to get things in order at the various schools. 
• 14^th May 2013 – I made a list of #FirstWorldCitizensThirdWorldProblems (even though I don’t have a Twitter account and kind of hate hashtags). This included things like:
• We need to stop being so nice to everyone else’s dogs before we find ourselves in charge of a whole pack
• Gotta eat this banana before the mold does!
• We name our male chickens after food so it’s not so bad when we kill and eat them.
• It’s hard to take a church service seriously when there’s a LED-lit copy of Da Vinci’s Last Supper flashing behind the preacher.



A few of the dogs we've attracted

•   8^th June 2013 – Last night we had a very American dinner with 3 other Americans (Anne, Krystin, and Dennis).  They brought mozzarella cheese from Bo and we made vegetarian lasagna and drank a bottle of wine. Delicious! It was a nice way to mark 1 year in the country.

Who knows what another year will bring?  Maybe it’ll find us speaking impeccable Mende and teaching every scheduled school day, with reliable daily internet access and maybe a supermarket opening in our town with things like real cheese and potato chips…or maybe we’ll at least make some progress in those directions.  Either way I’m sure we’ll let you know how it goes!