Hitting the big waves

October 24 2012

     Jumping the waves in the Atlantic Ocean today was very exciting! I watched with anticipation at the height of each new wave and waited for the crest. I was daring myself to catch the wave before it caught me.  I was trying not to get swept under. I missed one and salt permeated every pore in my face. What a cleansing that was! Great for the sinuses! Then Raymond joined me and we were like two kids, frolicking in the sand and surf! Fun in our fifties, in the Atlantic Ocean on the white beaches of The Gambia! Who would have thought that I/we would be having this life experience!

     The words “swept under” are clinging to me right now. In the past 10 weeks, I have often felt swept under by the demands of my new teaching job, mostly coping with an exceptionally difficult group of kids. Thinking about a few of these kids kept me awake at night. I worried what the next day would bring. I needed to stay calm, be proactive and mostly always be on my toes. I had to be energetic yet calm. Mostly I needed to be very grounded. I had to be steadfast, unwavering and determined. For me to be in that state, I needed rest.  I needed to arrive at school rested. It didn’t always happen.

     I felt swept under by all “the new”. We arrived August 11 and started working August 20, just 9 days after our arrival.  In retrospect, it was all too fast, not enough time to find myself in this new place. Not enough time to find everything you need in this place: food, gas, pots and pans etc. Not enough time to open a bank account and figure out the value of the Dalasi compared to the US dollar. At school, there were books missing, programs that had not been ordered and some challenging students right from day 1.  At home, some basic kitchen utensils were non-existent which meant that I had to figure out where to buy these items. Batteries were missing and light bulbs too. Normally I really enjoy shopping, but there were time constraints and money constraints which made it stressful to enjoy shopping for household materials. It took me 3 hours and many stores to find the correct light bulbs to fit into fixtures. What a great way to get to know a city…..on a light bulb mission!

     Then there were keys for every door in the house and out of the house as well…..at least 20 keys! These keys were not labeled which made getting out the door in the morning more stressful. Then to add to all “the new” that was overwhelming, while preparing dinner over the gas stove, we ran out of gas. Shortly after we ran out of electricity so we needed to buy coupons called cash power. Who do we call and how do we get this electricity going again? Whether you have cash power or not, the city electricity cuts off several times a day. This is normal for Africa, at least West Africa.  To help with the power outages, we have a generator in a shed beside our house. Not everyone has the luxury of owning a generator. Certainly not my neighbourly Gambian. We also have a security guard day and night that stays on alert and on call for us. When the electricity shuts off, our security guard runs to the shed, in complete darkness and starts the generator; this big furnace-like machine sounds like an old beaten up tractor. After our first two weeks here, we decided that when the electricity outages happen after midnight, we asked the guard to ignore the start up of the generator. We did this in consideration to our neighbours. The high level of noise coming from this generator can be very annoying. Knowing that no electricity during the night means total darkness, no whirling ceiling fan nor air conditioning, it was something to contend with. That would not be so bad in Vancouver. In The Gambia however where humidity levels reach 100% some days, breathing was an exercise in itself. It was horrible. Every night in October, I went to bed hoping and praying that we would have electricity through the night. My prayers were not always heard.

     Keeping hydrated has also been a challenge. Most of the time, wherever I am in the world, my habits of drinking 7-8 glasses of water a day are a no-brainer. It is just a habit I have. At first I was not always diligent about my water consumption. Hence, one day, my body was completely dehydrated and I stayed home sick in bed, unable to move, totally fatigued. I thought I had the flu. The humidity factor is really something that can creep up on you without warning. I did not know how important it is to stay VERY hydrated. In order to make sure that important minerals and electrolytes are replenished, I’ve also learned to have Gatorade on hand. We lose more than just water through perspiration… a lot more!

     Grieving Conakry and our little school with the big heart was also a huge factor in my adjustment here. Somehow I carried all the wonderful people from AISC into my heart. I was so sad the first weeks we were here and kept comparing this place to Guinee. Raymond had created a slide show and we would watch it together, remembering all the kids at school, our friends and all the places we had visited. Tears ran down my face every time I looked at it. I had no idea to what extent the people in Guinee had become so important to me. I had become very attached and missed them all so much. I had invested myself personally in many relationships. Now I was grieving.

     I reread everything I just wrote and it seems so petty, so unimportant. These are just new things that I needed to adjust to in this new place called The Gambia. When one has to adjust to living and working in a new country, so many “new things” happen every day and all day long. One never gets a rest. When many “new things” are thrown at you simultaneously, it can become overwhelming.  Living overseas has taught me that it takes time to get settled in, both physically and emotionally. Many studies have found that there are milestones in cultural adaptation: the first 3 weeks, then 6 weeks, then 3 months and then 6 months. I guess I am in between some of these milestones right now.

     Alas, I lived through it all and now the weather is cooling slightly, enough to say that we are noticing the altering weather. The tourists are arriving and we see the locals scurrying about selling their wares, hoping to get the best price from the bright-eyed visitor.  The taxi drivers too have overtaken the streets. The rainy season is almost over and The Gambia will soon be overpopulated with European visitors.  Dutch, British, German and Spanish visitors are all common visitors to The Smiling Coast and between now and next April, they will be sunbathing en masse and increasing the economy of our area. Great….this country needs the help, with 40% unemployment. Having all these visitors creates a momentum, a positive energy and provides many jobs for the local people.

     So have I hit a big wave?  I have, in the sense of hitting the jackpot. Life is pretty nice here. I am very grateful to be working in a cohesive and harmonious little school with devoted and professional colleagues. I am also grateful to be living in a resort area, with beautiful beaches and great restaurants. I am happy to have access to all the amenities that I need. I have a reliable car that I can drive too.  The Gambia is a tropical paradise. Now, about those 20 keys.... where are the car keys?

My Life in Pictures: 7 weeks in The Gambia

Sun-dried clothing smells so nice!

Giant hibiscus flowers growing around our house....beautiful!

Rainy season at its' worse....on my street...at
 7am just as we are leaving for school.

The maintenance staff of our school, all looking too serious!

Madeleine the teacher with some of the kids eating lunch.

Weekend adventures to buy fresh fish....cannot get better than this!

My friends take me out to the port.

No caption needed here!

Sundays at Seaside Resort Pool....what a life!

Friendly goats everywhere....they eat all the garbage
on the streets, when they are not resting under
the mango tree.

I have survived September...yeah! For all the teachers out there, you know that this means a sigh of relief. Today I post My Life in Banjul. Here are little clips of my home, school and region in my new country The Gambia.

Somone's breaking in!

September 1 2012

Week two of our new African adventure and the humidity is killing me! I thought Conakry was humid…this beats it! The Gambia with its proximity to the beach is absolutely breath taking the ocean is splendid with huge waves and golden sand. Every time we go for walks on the beach, I remind myself that this is one of the important deciding factors we accepted to come to teach at BAES in the Gambia. The natural beauty of this place is stunning: there are exotic birds everywhere and butterflies of all kinds. Nevertheless, in all its natural beauty, it is humid and hot beyond belief….how humid is it? In my classroom, when I slip on my eyeglasses, they fog up, the posters I put on the wall fall off and the calendar pages curl up. It is extremely humid. I will live through it and apparently this weather will end in October sometime. Bring on October!

Lost in the corn field on the school campus.
.....that's right we have an actual corn field on the school grounds!

My new surroundings are beautiful but I am having difficulty sleeping. I worry about my new Math program that I have to teach, worry about the 9 year old rambunctious boys and at night I hear noises. I worry that I still have hot flashes that keep me awake at night and that I have not slept 8 uninterrupted hours since July. The noises at night keep me awake…like… the old donkey in the empty lot beside our home that brays loudly and the ugly buzzards that walk on the roof and the small exotic birds that crash in our bedroom windows in the early hours of the morning. Then there are the creaking noises…you know those noises that make you think that someone is breaking into your house…those noises that are unfamiliar and have no regular pattern to them…those noises.  I am laying awake thinking someone is breaking into our house. Nothing makes sense at 4 in the morning and the noises seem amplified. Someone is breaking into our house….now I am sure of it!

We have a guard at our house, inside the protected walls of our 2 floor house. 24 hours, a young guy sits in this tiny cabin with no door, listening to his radio. I think what a boring job! But that is his job…security position for the director and his wife. These guys are very polite, never ask for anything…quite the opposite…they tell us that we should ask them for any help that we need, whether it is to move boxes, wash the car or trim the bushes in our tiny yard…that is the nature of their job. It takes some getting used to having 24 hour surveillance. These same guys are the security guards at school, working  on a rotating basis from home to school. These guys have families and a monthly salary of  $150.

Yesterday I found out that they were huddled together in a corner of the school grounds having a discussion to figure out when they would eat. They had not been paid since June and they were trying to figure out this dilemma. I was appalled, trying to wrap my brains around this notion of having no food. It is such a basic need for human beings that it blows me away when I find out that the people I see and greet every morning since my arrival are debating whether they will find something to eat. It does not make any sense, it does not make any sense.

So in my state of sleeplessness, during those moments of tossing and turning, the idea of these 10 maintenance people not eating kept me awake.  The idea of not having anything to eat would not let go of me. How could they be quietly talking about what they would eat next? Could I help them I wondered. I can’t feed 10 people. How stupid of me. Why would I want to make food for these 10 nice people that are struggling at the moment? What else could I make to feed 10 people? I wish I could make a meat dish because as they are going about their day, cutting down fallen branches, sweeping the walkways, washing the classrooms, they are sweating just as I am. They don’t worry about a Math program they have to teach or the misbehaving boys that will arrive at my classroom door. They worry about eating or whether they will be able to feed their families soon. Pay day will be at the end of the week, and meanwhile they are not eating. It does not make any sense, it does not make any sense.

So at 4:30 in the morning, I decide to pass to action still debating whether my idea of making food is silly or not, to get out of bed and prepare something to eat for the maintenance people. I decide to make soup, the best soup that I can possibly make with all the fresh vegetables that I have in my fridge. Tears roll down my face as I chop up the onions. Tears of hurt and compassion and of lack of justice for all people, but onion tears too, just plain old onion tears. I let the soup simmer while I write this blog. I reflect back on the obsession that woke me up earlier, the obsession that someone was breaking into my house. Now I know what was breaking in, it was not someone trying to do me harm but someone giving me an important message. Someone was breaking into my heart to coach me to think outside of myself. Someone was breaking into my heart to remind me to pass to action no matter what the old silly voices of ego were saying. Someone was breaking into my heart to ……….make soup and help a few people today.

No Words

Perhaps it is the humidity that has reached its peak or perhaps it is the sun mixed with the humidity that has somehow affected my brain but right now I cannot find the words to write this blog.  Finding the words that can best describe my emotions at this time is challenging. So much has happened in the last 2 years, so much of my life has been touched, so much of me has been transformed, but I cannot find the words. Where do I begin?

I begin with this sense of wordlessness. What seems to surface right now is a sense of disbelief that this Conakry experience is coming to an end. There is a piece of me that will stay here and will always stay here. It feels like a tearing inside of me, a tugging at my heartstrings that is so strong that I seem to be in denial of my imminent departure. I do not want to say goodbye. I still say: “next year OUR little school will have more kids, and OUR little school will need to move to a new place because it is growing.” It is OUR little school but after Friday, it will not be my school any more. It will be a memory. That is what is difficult for me right now. I am in disbelief that my time at AISC is coming to an end. I am putting the brakes on, trying to make time come to a halt. Yet, every day brings me closer to the reality of the END coming soon. I do not want to feel my feelings right now. There is too much sadness. I have become attached to so many people of our community that I can’t bare to say good-bye.

In his famous book, THE LITTLE PRINCE, the author Antoine de St-Exupery develops the story of a young boy, the Little Prince, who arrives on earth from a small planet. The Little Prince comes to earth to have an earthly experience, to meet people and to gain knowledge. He meets many people on earth and he learns about relationships. He meets a fox and the fox explains how to become friends. Then inevitably they must say good-bye and the Little Prince is upset.  He does not understand that he has become attached and now he is feeling an emotion that is new to him: sadness. It hurts and he does not understand why.  Why make friends if you must lose them? The fox explains that when he will see the wind blowing in the wheat fields it will remind him of the Little Prince’s blonde hair and their friendship.

I am like the Little Prince. I do not understand the sadness and the grief that invades me right now as my departure date approaches. I have become attached to my school community, my little neighborhood of Camayenne and this place called Guinee. I have a tailor who is my friend, a bread maker who I call by name and the fruit vendors who have shared their personal stories with me. I will leave colleagues and friends from school but I will also leave people whose lives have touched me, people who have increased my compassion to another height and people whose understanding of the third world reality has opened my eyes and my heart. This week, as I walked by the young people at the corner street, these same young people that I have greeted over the last 2 years, one of them called me  “la reine de Camayenne”. I laughed it off as I walked by but I was touched by these words. No one has ever called me a queen before! I’ve learned to expect the unexpected in Guinee, but these words took me by surprise and I was flattered by the kind teasing.

I can’t begin to explain the depth and breadth of my Guinean experience. Living and working in Guinee has been the most challenging life experience that I have ever lived. I thought that living in Saudi Arabia during the terrorist years had been difficult but that overseas experience pales in comparison to what I have experienced here in Guinee.

So many times during these last 2 years, I had to dig deep inside of me to find strength to understand the culture, the people and the Guinean reality. So many times, I had to dig deep inside of me to find hope in this city of hopelessness and oppression. So many times, I battled with the guilt and the deep hurt that tormented me when people with no legs or deformed faces begged for money and food. So many times I felt angry at the color of my skin and angry at my wealth. I often wanted to be black myself, to be able to melt into the every day and not be seen as different and rich. I did not want to face the emotions that were stirring up inside of me. What can I do with all this poverty around me? “I cannot help every one”, this scream welled up inside of me so often!

For all these reasons and more, perhaps this is why it is difficult to say good-bye. Perhaps the words I can’t find today need to be borrowed from The Little Prince:   “I remembered the fox….one runs the risk of crying a bit if one allows oneself to be tamed.”

Mangoes, mangoes, mangoes!!!

If I could write a poem about mangoes, I would describe these beautiful, colorful fruits as little golden treasures. 

If I could write a poem about mangoes, I would mention how juicy and sweet they taste when I bite into them. 

If I could write a poem about mangoes, I would explain how the eyes light up when they see these gifts of fruit dropping from the trees. 

If I could write a poem about mangoes I would say they make a very tasty  fruit crisp, just like their friends the apple. 

If I could write a poem about mangoes…….it would be just as mouth watering as this picture. 

I guess I just wrote a poem about mangoes!

Impatience and Gratitude...Earth Day, April 22 2012

It has been a month since I last wrote and I am not sure why I haven’t written. I have been very busy with evaluating students’ work and writing report cards for the last 2 weeks. Sometimes blog writing feels like school work for me and at other times I just have writer's block, nothing seems to come to mind about what I could write about. However, there are many things to write about as living in Conakry never ceases to amaze me just by its uniqueness. The inspiration and the will to write were absent but now I am back.

I have found the last month difficult to endure as my thoughts were often gone to Banjul where I dream of a better African life. At least that is what I think. At the moment, I get very frustrated with what doesn’t work. At home in our apartment there seems to always be something in need of repair: the sink leaks, the door creaks and the light bulbs are burned out. Petty things really. At school, my patience with the basic needs has run out. We arrived at school one day this week and the generator was not working. Apparently we had run out of petrol, so there was no electricity and no air conditioning. No electricity also means no Internet, no photocopying machine and no running water in the washroom because the generator makes the water pump work. Then we find out that there was no drinking water left, AT ALL on our small campus. The 3 huge water bottles that are provided by the local Coyah distributors were all out of water. How can anyone be out of water? It boggles my mind. Some of our early bird students, who arrive at 7am before we arrive, came running to me as I was stepping out of the car. “Mme Mulaire, there is no more water. Can you get us some water?” …to which I queried had they asked our school secretary. No more water from the usual company that the school buys from.

So let’s get organized and get some water. What frustrates me about the African way of doing things is that they wait when they have run out completely before more stock is bought. How can we operate an International School when we don’t have the basics of electricity and water? How can we provide a good international education when the basic needs are not met? Me with my “jump to the pump” attitude gets frustrated with these unmet basic needs. I really gave the director a piece of my mind, to which he got impatient with my impatience (see blog: http//raymondlemoine-afrika@blogspot.com). 

Luckily we love each other and support each other through the messy days of our everyday living here.

Also the mosquitoes have come back with a vengeance this past week. When I open the door to the library, the staffroom and then my classroom, I have to spray with insecticide as the mosquitoes seem to be sleeping behind bookcases and under chairs. Mosquitoes are the meanies here and in all of Africa as one never knows if they carry malaria. All the expats are more paranoid about mosquitoes then the local people. So insecticide spraying has become the norm in order to battle the beastly mosquitoes.

One very positive event this week was the arrival of a new school car….wow! A brand new white Nissan car that is so smooth, we don’t hear the sound of the motor…and the radio works very well so we can listen to the news coming from France and there is excellent air conditioning! It was a beautiful ride home on Thursday afternoon and the world seemed better gazing through the closed windows. It felt like luxury…heck it is luxury! And then this is when I realized that this brand new car brought me to feel uncomfortable, weird and a little ashamed. My African brothers do not have this luxury while I do. I got all choked up speaking to Issa at school about this luxury. He, in his African wisdom, said that the school needs to have such comforts if we are to attract people like Raymond and I to come and work here in Conakry. His words comforted me and then I felt grateful for this gift of a new car. It will make the last 8 weeks much more tolerable as the temperatures rise to the mid 40’s. Yeah new car!

First Day of Spring : March 21st, 2012

While the rest of the world battles snow storms, rain storms and violent winds, I am basking in the sun, the wind soft and warm on my face. The beach in Banjul has become my best friend for the past 4 days. I am in awe of the strength of the gigantic waves and the infinity of the Atlantic Ocean.

Delightful to be in Banjul, The Gambia. Pampered by nature, flowers heaven scent…a feast for the eyes and all my senses. Banjul is lovely, refreshing, invigorating, life-giving. Endless rows of bushes of tropical flowers send waves of delicate perfume smell on our daily walks…I only recognize jasmine, that delicate white flower that smells so sweet. It is so much fun to discover a new place with an invigorating surrounding. We can actually take walks here and not stumble on garbage, rusted razor blades and jagged metal pieces jutting out unexpectedly. And I have not smelled burning garbage, raw sewage and rotten fish!! Wonderful!

Everything Conakry is NOT, Banjul is. I needed to take a distance from Conakry from daily life in a dysfunctional country and I needed a holiday from school. I needed to rejuvenate my soul….and this is exactly what I am doing. Finding your way in a wild new world, Martha Beck’s new book is inspiring me and feeding my mind and opening my soul. How perfect to be reading her innovative ideas about this wild new world that she explains revolves around Oneness (which is an identity or harmony with someone or something) and Wordlessness (a state of quiet where one shuts off all words).

I have been absorbing all the beauty around me…some moments have been like ecstasy for me….the beauty of nature in this new surrounding has erupted all my creativity. I am creating in my mind all kinds of ideas for projects….possibilities of new tools to help persons, mostly little persons. Cascades of bougainvillias are trailing over white cement walls, reminding me of color-infused rhododendrons of Vancouver. First day of spring today and my spirit soars with optimism. Beauty and creativity go hand in hand. I needed to be submerged in a beautiful surrounding and this lodge, beach and city offer that…..and I am so grateful. I am blessed with this amazing, restful holiday!

Banjul carries endless possibilities of a wild new world for both of us…..Raymond as Director of BAES, (Banjul American Embassy School) a small international school and me as counselor, teacher and/or mental health practitioner. The future will tell. For now, ideas are brewing. I will discover newness about myself and about Banjul, I am sure.

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all…..thanks Helen Keller, you were so right and still are!