Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Things my kids said Today:

While looking at a photo of my house in winter:
Mariama: 'Does your father go and clean all of that snow off the roof?'
Me: 'No. When the sun comes out it melts it and the snow falls off.'
Mariama: 'Kono nange alaa toon.' trans- But the sun is not there.
Me: disbelief 'What?'
Mariama: laughs and returns to looking at photos.
Apparently there is no sun in America. It's still unlear as to why so many people want to go to such a dreary place.

Bobo explaining to another kid a photo we had looked at together earlier:
"This is Adama when she was a kid. She's playing in the snow. You can eat the snow. But if a dog pees there you don't eat that snow."
I wonder what other sage advice I'm passing on to the Gambian youth.

James is 3 and really likes to tell me things about his mother then ask me things about mine. For example "My mom owns this bucket. Does your mom have a bucket?" or "My mom wears a bra. Does your mom wear a bra?"
This morning: me: 'good morning James.'
James: 'morning'
me: 'how are you this morning?'
James: 'good'
me: 'everything's ok?'
James: 'yup.' 'my mom slept only a little. Did your mom sleep only a little?'
I'm not sure James i'll give her a call and ask. Susanna, his mom, looked like maybe she hadn't slept at all.

Last week James was asking if I owned everything in my house. I mean EVERYTHING.
'Do you own this book?'
'Yes James'
'Do you own this table?'
'Yes James'
'Do you own this bed?'
'Yes James'
'Do you own these plants?'
'Yes James'
I finally got tired of saying 'eeyi' and instead said 'Nope'.
'Does your mom own this?'
'haha yes James.'
So mom if anyone asks, you own the clothes line and clothes pins in my backyard in Fatoto. Consider it an early birthday present!

Fun Fact: The 10 yr old in my host family can recognize Gaddafi in a Newsweek (I had to look at the caption) but still needs help reading "If you Give a Mouse a Cookie."

My Life in National Geographic

Tonight as i pulled water from the well I was struck with a blow from pulchritude herself:
It was one of those moments of beauty that you hope can just last and last and so you stop moving except to widen your senses in the attempt to capture it all. When it passes you realize you'd stopped breathing so as not to disrupt the very air holding this beauty. But even if you could hold your breath forever, time keeps going, so it pushes you forward and out of the moment. Yet in that small eternity I will forever keep the Gambia.
I stand with the wet tattered rope in one hand and the empty bottom of the leaky bag in the other. My bucket and watering can are full, it's time to carry them inside, finish watering, and bathe. My gaze moves from the glistening water, across the sand of the compound, to the cement slab all the kids use to bathe, so their feet don't get dirty while they wash. Ousman is there, splashing water from the orange Africell bucket on his wiry 10 yrs old frame. At 10 he has enough energy to fill an elephant and make it gambol like a lamb. Energy reigned in to a scrawny yet fit kid.
The opposite edge of this scene: covered by the heavy drooping branches of a mango tree. Its progeny growing large and juicy and weighing on the limbs. Limbs that break under the pressure of a lavish bounty.
Bordering our compound is the stick fence draped with green, blue, purple, pink fabric. Bright clothes drying in the hot sun.
But the sun is setting now and the hot white of midday gradually gives way to a warm golden. Tonight a few hazy patches of cloud bounce color back on the sunset. A blissful pink. The color cotton candy strives for but only nature has mastered. This perfect pink layered over a early evening blue.
Just beyond our fence the golden pink catches on the thatch roof of the neighbors round mud-brick hut. Picture perfect lighting on a classic scene.
"Adama" time pushes me out. Breathe.
"Adama" Sama calls me again from my backyard.
"Nam" I bend, lift my buckets and the moment is gone. But not lost; remembered, noted, and not lost.