Peace Corps Post - February 8, 2004

February 8, 2004 - Sunday
11:35am
Gbereire

I am about to lose it with my host family. As I said to Laura and Ingrid, I just can't deal with Guinea today. The fishbowl and lack of privacy is really getting to me. It started a long time ago. People are just rude and sit around and stare at everything I do, including such fascinating activities as washing my hands, writing letters, or talking to another American. I can't believe the novelty hasn't worn off yet and at this point I feel like it never will. Then I think about how this village is supposed to be broken into Americans and how it's going to be 10x worse at site.

My father constantly knowing everything that goes on with me is also so ridiculous/annoying. Talk about a lack of privacy. I feel like every day he comes up to me and is like, "I saw you at _______ doing ________" and I never even had the first clue he was around. It's like friggin' big brother over here.

I don't think I've gone to the bathroom once in the almost one month I've been here without someone knowing. During the day at least five people stare at me the whole way to the latrine and the whole way back. Good GOD is it annoying. There will also inevitably be some disgusting-ass annoying little kid calling my annoying Susu name over and over for no reason. I am definitely not keeping "Fatim" when I go to site because it annoys the crap out of me already. I basically want to kick all of the kids in the head 95% of the time. They are always around and always annoying the crap out of me. UGH!

Not being able to be in my room for more than about half an hour uninterrupted is driving me slowly insane as well. I think I'm just going to stop answering them when they knock on the door from now on when I'm resting.

I almost killed my father this morning. This is my one day per week where I can sleep past 7 and at 7:45 my dad was knocking on my door and talking to me through it. It was SO obnoxious with absolutely no point and I was so pissed off especially since I didn't go to bed until 1 last night. I was visibly annoyed and trying to look sleepy and he was like, "Ok, after you go to the bathroom then you can have breakfast!" I wanted to scream at him, I was so annoyed. And now my lack of sleep is making me mad and crabby, so I am going to take a nap.

**Hahaha. Looking back on this entry makes me laugh, even though I know how genuine my anger was. The training villages were a strange little place, especially since the families were getting paid to host us. I really don't know how I survived three months of this, as I already seem at my breaking point less than a month in.**

Peace Corps Post - February 5, 2004

February 5, 2004
10:43pm
Gbereyire

That last entry was going nowhere. I should learn my lesson and not try and write during lunch breaks with other people around and too many distractions.

Today was a pretty good day overall. We have Makan now for a language teacher and he is a lot of fun. He is mad sketchy, but his classes are a lot of fun and I learn a lot of practical stuff, so it's nice to have language class go by fast. Passy was a very good teacher and was good for learning technical things, but it was so much more structured and school-like, so I'm enjoying the change of pace.

Most of our day was spent in Dubreka at the PC office which was fine with me. Escaping the fishbowl that is Gbereyire was fine with me. My father keeps telling me random places that he saw me and what he saw me doing and for how long and I never even know he was around. It is quite creepy/annoying because I constantly have to monitor my actions in case someone is watching me, which they most likely are, and will not fail to comment on! Ugh.

So yeah, just being able to mess around all day and not have to worry about being watched by the town was a nice relief. El Haaj [a Guinean man who worked for Peace Corps and had gone to university in New Hampshire] was also there today, which was quite a trip. He came up to me and said, "You forgot you have an Uncle here!" and I asked him where he had been and he laughed [When we were introduced to him, he asked if anyone was from New England. I was the only one who raised my hand and so he "adopted" me as a niece since he has a soft spot for New England]. A few minutes later he came over and gave me 1,000 Guinean Francs!! He said something like "Uncles give their nieces things" and when I tried to give it back he wouldn't let me and just said "you're in the right family." I was shocked but thought it was so sweet and so cute and it totally made my day. I can't remember the last time 50 cents made my day. :-) Just kidding, it's obviously about a lot more than that. I'm going to try and send some candy to Conakry for him on Valentine's Day. It's about the extent of what I can do for him here!

I got my water filter to work tonight (sort of) and then just sat around having really good talks with Ismael and Albert about the serpants [snakes], so that was surprisingly fun and bonding. Tomorrow is another day!

Peace Corps Post - February 4, 2004

February 4, 2004 - Wednesday
1:24pm - Homestay

Wow, my mail luck has continued. I got another letter from my mom today and one from Alissa with pictures from Thanksgiving in it. Man does Thanksgiving seem like a long time ago! Looking at the heavy sweater makes it feel like another world away. I guess it is. The letter from my mom was really great because she sounds content with my email and in good spirits about this all. I was glad to hear that my email made Barbara Denver feel better as well [her daughter, a childhood friend of mine, was about to head off to Peace Corps Jordan]. It's really hard for me to know I won't be able to talk on the phone with my family for a long time even when I do get the chance. This is by far the longest I've ever gone without talking to my family and I think that's going to be really hard for me. The letters really are like Christmas, but it's really hard to hear about everything going on at home and not miss it.

Janny's grandmother died and she just found out last night. That sort of brought it home for me and made me realize how much it would suck but how possible it is that I might get bad news while I'm here. That would be really hard, especially to make the decision whether or not to go home. At this point, though, I'm feeling good because I think that even if I did go home, I think I would come back.

Training is HARD and I really just can't wait until it's over, but I also know that then there will be a whole new set of problems. Luckily all of the current PCVs say that training is terrible and that if we make it through this, site is a piece of cake. I sure hope so! Because at this point, training is going fine, it's just so tiring and structured that I will be quite happy to be on my own and have some more independence. I'm definitely going to miss seeing everyone everyday though, and the camaraderie. I'm really nervous/excited/anxious to find out our sites at (I think) the end of this week and who I'm going to be near!! That will be very interesting.

So although getting those letters from home today made me miss home a little, I woke up this morning feeling somewhat amazed that some of the things I thought I'd never get used to are already seeming more normal. For instance: I am now able to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night AND with cockroaches in it! That's pretty huge. And I don't turn on the flashlight at every little noise thinking it might be a bug. I still think it might be a bug, but I just don't care as much.