And then there was no light

15 Apr 12

Tonight there is no moon to be found but the red glow and brilliant bright shine from Mars and Venus respectively, keeping the night sky in good company.  We eat outside by the light of our electric torches powered by cheap batteries that might last a few months.  The food is cold, I’m pretty sure it’s left over from lunch.  I get my own bowl here and a spoon, and the kind company of my new Gambian family.  It’s a new training village which was prior to Gambia, referred to as CBT in Senegal.  After crossing the Gambian border, we’ve tried to let go of the Senegal PC lingo that doesn’t apply here.  Unlike Senegal, all of us trainees are in proximity to each other in three neighboring villages called training villages or TV.  The bike’s we are given enable us to see each other and the ocean, as we wish, given the free time which is only really given to us on Sundays. 

I wasn’t nearly as anxious to come here as I was for the first CBT in Senegal.  But those feelings of angst and uncertainty of being plunged into a drastically foreign world, again, reached the surface as we neared our villages.  Again I’m amazed at how much a person can grow or at least learn to accept after just getting through one night. 

It’s not as bad as it might sound and maybe worse than that.  To each individual is their own experience and what they make of it.  I’m thankful I’ve had similar experiences travelling in other parts of the developing world to lessen the shock of what would otherwise be many surprises. 

I have a lovely two room set up with my own private pit latrine out back.  One lesson learned today, was no matter how bad you have to go, don’t go running outside barefoot, your feet will burn!  I get a lovely pink mosquito net that my mom wanted to wash.  But I nicked it back so that I could have it the first night so that I wouldn’t be too paranoid of rat piss leaking through the calcium (“Calcuim”) carbonate sacks that line the tin roof ceiling.  I like to imagine that cacophony in the late evening and early morning is attributed to  cute lovely birds that nest there, or maybe even curious lizards; but when the nibbling and gnawing starts, it’s hard to picture anything else but giant rabid foaming-at-the-mouth rats.  I’m sure they’re much cuter than that but hope I never get the opportunity to disprove my vision. 

But I have to admit, Rachel Carson would have been disappointed in me earlier today.  Thinking originally that I wouldn’t get the net that first evening, my LCF instructed me to spray my room with insecticide hours before I needed to sleep there.  Knowing Rachel Carson was somewhere sending a frown my way, I sprayed the interior of my room anyway, as well as window screens trying to justify it with sorry excuses that just boil down to me being a bit of a baby when it comes to creepy crawlies.  I later tried to dust the window screens with my gifted twig broom from PC when a spider/crab looking thing jumped out at me.  Thankfully my foolish running around trying to brush it off occurred in my “back yard” where no one could see.   It’s true that behavior change is hard.  I know better, but sprayed anyway.  From here on out, unless there’s a serious problem, I hope to rely on the lemongrass oil and other tinctures alone and leave the nasty who-knows-what causing chemicals alone (if anyone wants to send drier sheets I hear they dissuade the rats!).

But tonight, there is no insect spray and the fears are at a minimum.  There is just a the creaking of the window covers, the occasional strong draft, and the Jamaican or island-ish sounding music, when not lost in the wind, there to keep me company in this dusty donkey town (as the donkey brays in the not so distant distance).