Termites like tomato soap?

 September, 2013

 

It's been just about an entire month in village.  This might sound un-incredible.  In theory I'm suppose to just be here for two years right?  I think that's what we all think before we join.  That we're just thrown in the middle of some village and left there for better or worse (like the movie "Volunteers" with Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson).  Maybe it was like that before and is more like that in larger countries with more difficult transport (not that it's not difficult here!).  But here in PCTG, there seems to be always something somewhere yanking you out of post.  Some training, illness, re-stocking of food staples, etc etc.  So when you can manage to stay and really just be there, it feels like a great accomplishment.  This stay didn't even involve a stroll to the market.  It was colored with some anemia complications, a second degree oil burn on my ring finger (very small), a visit with the local marabout or healer, harvesting beans and millet, and making headway on repairing a school garden pump.  Out of all that, I want to share my visit with the marabout most:

A fellow PCV had recently gone to see one themselves and I was also reading "God's Middle Finger, into the lawless heart of the Sierra Madre," by Richard Grant, and reading about how Grant got to spend a peyote session with a shaman or planned on it anyway.  At the same time, I've been struggling with health at site, mostly diet related, and just wanted the experience.  On top of it all, once you come into the single digit month countdown, especially at seven (now five as of this posting!), an alarm bell seems to go off ringing "you're here you're here, but time is ruining!  Enjoy, learn everything, take in at as much as you can, this is an amazing once-in-a-lifetime experience!"  So, I was inspired.  

 

One night, while sitting on the stick bed with my host mother and shelling beans in the glow of the twilight, I tried to ask where the nearest healer was and if I would be able to go and if that would be OK.  "You can go with me" was her reply.  "I'll take  you, tomorrow."  Tomorrow??  I don't know if I'm ready!  Our conversation was quiet.  I wanted to be gentle and reverent with my voice.  But it went up a bit at the idea of tomorrow.  I told her I was scared, never being able to remember how to say nervous.  She laughed at that and told me it would be good.  That he would look into my work and health here and tell me if it's OK. 

 

Tomorrow became the day after.  After an afternoon nap, sweating through my cotton shirt (I ended up taking it off and using it as a pillow as my pillow got spoiled during the rains), I dressed in a wrap skirt, donned on the sweaty shirt as it matched the blue wrap skirt nicely, and tied on a head wrap.  For my usual attire here, I was dressed up.  I was excited to wear something that had a matching color scheme.  It felt refreshing.  I fetched a quick bidong (25L oil container) of water in case our session ran late, and we set off down the road to the neighboring Fula village. 

We stopped off at my friend Isatahs to visit.  She ended up coming to the marabouts house with me.  I was surprised how at ease I actually was.  Ebrima had a good compassionate vibe about him.  My host mom explained my visit.  He was happy with it all and said it was good.  He held his shiny and beautiful prayer beads and began praying.  His prayer beads reminded me of Tiger's eye polished stones.  I tried to calm and open my own energy to be receptive to the experience.  He blew on the beads held in his fingers.  Then he handed them to me.  For me to hold them for a beat before he continued praying.  Eventually he began giving me my 'prescription.'  I heard something about a small white sheep and eating or food and that it would be good.  My host mom and Isatah repeated in simpler Wolof to me until I could reiterate back satisfactorily.  Before the comprehension, after he had spoken about how he heard, peace only, peace only, and the sheep, my mom told me to give her the money to give to him.  Just a little over a dollar was what I brought which she said was more than enough (fifty Dalasi). 

He had gone out and brought back cooking pot resin and began writing prayers on a worn shiny wooden plank in Arabic script.  There was a bowl of water sitting near the healer.  I had heard about babies drinking this prayer water when they are born.  So I was nervously mentally preparing myself for the same fate.  But for me, he said I was to add it to my bathing water and wash with it.  Phew!  He gave me two juju's also.  These are more Arabic prayers written on paper, folded and wrapped in cloth or leather, and worn on the body.  He gave me two.  One for doing well on exams, and one for ideas and dreams.  They actually seemed really relevant.  I dream a lot and often tell my host mother or family about them when I can.  My host mother told Ebrima as much which made for a nice bonding moment. 

I thanked him and Isatah.  Eventually we (my host mom and I) made our way back to our village.  It was cloudy, threatening on rain.  I was preparing to bathe after returning home.  Ebrima had poured the prayer water into a small bottle which I had brought back with me.  As I went to grab my soaps, I saw a new termite mound coming up from the ground under my sardine tin holding my Burt's Bees tomato complexion soap.  The termites where building on top of the soap!  Somehow, it just seemed to beautifully sum up my last month.  Especially right after the visit with the marabout.  And I couldn't help but ask out loud, laughing to myself at the same time, "termites like tomato soap..??"