Being Bipolar

2/9/11:

Crying into my pillow earlier today, I’m positive Nena could hear me, despite my back being to the door. The sounds of sniffling and stifled sobs are pretty universal.  My daily “freakout,” I like to call it.  I’m always okay for most of the day, but as soon as I let myself think too much, I’m not anymore. Today, like most days I assume I’ll have, is made up of highs and lows. Practicing my Bambara w/ my family after dinner & playing “Mun don?” or “What’s that?” is always fun. We laugh- or more accurately, they laugh at me, and I get by using my charades skills mostly. But I’m getting better. They think it’s funny when I make the noises that animals make to find out their names in Bambara. Lows: constantly being dirty, mosquito bites, flies everywhere, eating the same starchy foods every meal with only my right hand (no utensils), and missing home, mostly. As soon as I talk about my homesickness with someone, I feel better. Jasmin cried today, too. I feel like tears are going to be pretty common here, or at least among some of us. I still wonder, even if I do master the language and can manage to communicate well with the Malians, will I ever feel at home here? Happy here? Not be homesick? It’s daunting to think about 27 months and everyone keeps telling me not to, that you can’t look that far ahead, that one day at a time is all you can do. Damn my forward-thinking.

We bought cookies today at the butiki and I shared them with my whole family after dinner. I felt bad hoarding them. Am I Anne Frank or something? My host brother, Drisa, is super patient with me and is my Bambara teacher of sorts at my home/compound. Found out he’s thirty, though. Bummer. Black people age so well. Jealous. He’s also super cute.

I talked with Ashley about ET’ing, like I have a few times before with other people. My emotions are constantly changing here, so all I can say is- I’ll take it one day at a time. I am learning a lot about myself already and surprisingly: I’m less independent, less brave, less strong than I thought I was. I need people constantly, familiarity, to be social, not to be left alone for more than showering and sleeping…not yet atleast. My reactions to this whole situation seems to be different than most. Many people's frustrations seem to stem from inabilities to communicate. Language or not, I’m sad atleast part of every day. Who would have thought my biggest fear (besides rollercoasters and the dark, of course) would be what I’m trying to create here: change. 

2/11/11:

If I was Malian, I would totally date Drisa. He’s so patient with me and he’s adorable. My fam makes comments all the time about me liking him. It’s cute because he covers his face like he’s embarrassed. He probably is. I look like a hot mess 24/7 here. Nana told me tonight that I’m her friend. All I could say was “Awww” and “thank you.” She is absolutely beautiful. Not to quote an Usher song or anything, but she reminds me of a girl that I once knew…She also said she wanted to go to America with me and then I explained I’d be here for 2 years. Damn. There we go again. For some reason, days are pretty rough, but nights, I’m fine. I’m more than fine, actually. We always laugh and talk and joke around, mostly at my expense, but I totally don’t care. I understand a lot actually and surprisingly for how short of a time I’ve been here. Drisa breaking it down for me helps a ton and he seems to understand me somehow.

2/12/11:
Good day over all. Started out by doing laundry at the pump with a few of the girls from my village. The fam was super surprised I was going to actually hand wash my own clothes. I was like umm…I’m not an idiot. It was a little tricky, though. We ended up hitchhiking a ride in the back of a pickup truck to a neighboring village to hang out with some of the other volunteers there.  We ended up going to this bar (so fun) with couches and electricity and fans and tiled floors and a real toilet (I know!) It was so fun to see everyone. There were groups of people from 5 different villages there. We had drinks, danced a little, but mostly we talked about how much we needed this social interaction with Americans...in English. 

2/14/11:
And the best fam award goes to: mine. Tonight, Hannah, Ashley, and Jasmin all came over after dinner. First off, dinner was delish. They’re finally starting to realize what I do and don’t like. Although, that may not be a good idea since I’ve shown an interest in bread, potatoes, and rice. I’m gonna get so fat. Whatever, though. When in Africa, right? Malian drumming music is on the radio outside my door (loud) and the voices of my fam shouting over the steady, repetitive beat. Tonight, we finally all got up and danced and they all clapped to watch the white girl shake it. I’m starting to mind less and less that my ceiling is full of spiders and that there are cockroaches swarming in the nyugen where I go to the restroom. Happy Valentine’s Day, loves. Goodnight, Moon.

2/22/11:
Driving back to Tubaniso (the training site,) you would have thought we were either 1. arriving at our highschool reunion 2. checking in at the W or 3. returning home from war. We were SO excited to have internet, electricity (to charge our phones/ipods), and even the outdoor showers here. Mostly, we were ready to see eachother after a 12-day absence. They pampered us our first night back with Mexican food and you would have thought it was cheesecake the way I devoured it all. Skyping is among my many frustrations and challenging enough trying to compete with 62 other people for internet connection that is unreliable at best. God knows I can't handle technology...so please, be patient with my connectivity or lack thereof. I miss you all. I'm still alive, so that says something. Wednesday, we go back for 12 more days.  My host family said they were going to spend these 3 days crying. But then again, I probably misunderstood.  

Goodnight Moon

The title's for you, Jamie. I write that at the end of every journal entry I write in and I tell myself that you hear it, too.

Today we found out where we would be staying for homestays and what language we would be learning. Like most of us here, I'll be learning/speaking/dreaming in Bambara, which is what I expected, so I'm somewhat relieved. We've only had a few lessons so far, but atleast I can say hello and count to 10. Survival, right? We leave tomorrow morning and are going to be welcomed in our village by our host families. There's about 8 of us each going to each village and the villages are spread out about 5-10k apart. Should be interesting. Hopefully there's some cute Malian babies who want to play with my hair. We'll be there for the rest of training, only separated by the few days we come back here to training camp every 12 days or so.

Cultural festival yesterday gave us a chance to buy some sweet panyas (long wrap skirts) and the guys got outfits as well; pretty sure they'll never go back to wearing regular pants after wearing drawstring cloth ones for 2 years. They look super comfy. Pictures coming soon.

Each day is an emotional rollercoaster, but emails help (Thanks Mo, Mom, & Neely), as do YouTube videos of Pauly D's antics. Atleast there are a few people here who watch crap television like I do and we can bond over that. Excited for tomorrow. I'll be back in 12 days.

Goodnight moon.

Call out your names & I'll tell you what hut you're in.

Stepping off the plane, all 64 of us were surprised to see the removable stairs that led directly onto the runway. From airplane to pavement. The heat at 10pm was surprising, but 2 days later, it's cool and there's a breeze. Sleeping under a mosquito net and using the bathroom by squatting in a hole in the ground in a cement outhouse-like structure is interesting, to say the least, but it's refreshing. Like camping, but much more permanent. Our week here at Tubaniso -the training center is apparently luxurious compared to what we'll experience at homestays and later at our own sites: we have running water (though cold) in our outdoor showers, and electricity in the dining hall (though it goes out on occasion), which is where the internet is. Also, our water is purified for us and our food is prepared by staff. It's a lot like summer camp. We have iteneraries and daily sessions- immunizations after lunch, breaks in between language courses, etc. In a few days, we'll receive our cell phones (yay!) and have been told that texting the US is as cheap as twenty to thirty cents a text and receiving calls and texts for us is free. Pretty excited about that.
Our group of huts is the married people compound. 3 married couples are here and then theres our hut of 3 single gals. Everyone is bright eyed and curious, wondering what language we'll be assigned and to what region. Since I ranked "novice low"-the lowest French level possible, I will most likely be speaking Bambara, since it's spoken in the majority of the country, making travel for me easier. The pros at French will be taught a minority language and will have French to fall back on when travelling.
I'm still excited and no, I haven't freaked out  yet, but apparently that kicks in later, once we're alone in our village for the first time. Like many others, I prefer to be somewhat close to another volunteer and would LOVE if another volunteer was in my same village, though that's not common. There are more than a handful that want to be in isolation. I can't imagine.
So far, I'm journaling at night and pretty busy during the day, enjoying the company of everyone in our training group, who is made up of some pretty interesting, but surprisingly normal people. We're from all over, something I was excited for. Something annoying (a word of advice for new parents): every list and nametag has me as Patricia, so no one gets my name right. Everyone gets confused and wonders who Lauren is. Thanks Kim & Jeff.