14.05.08

i guess a blog isn't interesting unless someone writes on it...
...here's my attempt.
i have a plane ticket home for the 13th of june which is earlier than i wanted...and planned on of course. there are days when i cannot wait to stop standing out toubab-style. but there are also other days where i panic when i think about coming back to the US and what it is going to be like to shop for food at the...'super'market? and i sometimes get anxiety thinking about the fact that i probably won't be able to find bouye (baobab fruit) to suck on when i am hungry between meals. the other night i was realizing that there is so much to learn...i was talking to two travellers from england and scotland who asked me what i was studying at the university and when i said african literature one of them asked if i'd read A---- someone i've never heard of and i laughed and said "i don't really know that much about anything" and the more i think about it, the more i realize i don't. there are people who haven't even been to elementary school here who know more about practical life things than i will ever figure out and i am supposed to be graduating from college in a year? i think travelling is a good way to learn but i can't help but smirk when the new kids (toubabs) on campus think they've got something figured out...i still don't think i know anything about anything here. this continent has more secrets than people can ever imagine...i have a friend who lives in a village and some of the girls from the program went to visit and on their way back they were waiting by the side of the road for a taxi when mansour's dad (my senegalese pal from campus) came up and asked if he should call a taxi...they said sure and he then threw three stones in the road, after 45 minutes of waiting without a single car going by, an empty taxi showed up. i don't know if it is a coincidence but weird things happen like that all the time here. one of my best friends i made here, paco, just left for italy without really telling anyone...he just called last thursday and told us he was in italy for 5 years. i guess it is superstition that if you talk about leaving/travelling you won't ever go. it is hard to see his other friends suffer...it is like he just got promised a life and they are still stuck here living off less than $2/day. but then again it is always hard to see grown men cry.
...on a less spiritual note...
i think my roommate has forgotten about me. she uses everything i own and sleeps on my bed when she invites her friends to stay in our room. i don't think we've had a conversation in about 2 weeks. i was mad at her before because her husband came on a monday night (i was then sexiled) and stayed until saturday morning. FIVE nights. i felt homeless. finally one afternoon she left me naked in the shower while her husband's cousin was visiting in the room and that is when i was really pushed over the edge...i don't know him, or his cousin. they could be rapists and i wouldn't know. since then i don't know if we're friends anymore or just clenching our teeth until i leave...it sure doesn't seem like she gives two flying fucks about me. i am sad about it but i can't compromise myself anymore. it is like living in a maternity ward. my roommate with her big belly and the girl next door with her baby and baby-sitter (who is also married and has a daughter of her own in Thiès) our two rooms are cut off from the rest of the floor by the bathroom. i was in natalie's room the other night and i was just realizing that not all senegalese people are as maternal and authoritative as chez moi in the maternity ward. it is alot more fun not being married. or pregnant for that matter. i don't even feel comfortable in my own room. maybe she'll pop kid sooner than planned and go home. well, meeting with baydallaye...ba ci kanam.