American Overload

I'm now in Conakry after a couple weeks of American overload. First there was Lifeskills for G11 Business and Ag-Fo people. Then it was Teacher's Conference and Lifeskills for the Health people. Plus I had 3 friends stay with me one weekend. We drank some boxed wine, went to the "nightclub" (my, how my standards have changed) and had a generally good time.

My night classes are still going well and are much more fulfulling than my actual teaching. I had almost 50 girls show up for my first girls' review session - a lot of them weren't even from my classes but wanted to review anyway. I had to tell them they can't come back, cause I already have enough problems teaching to the different levels in my classes and just can't have a bunch of beginners in my class - they are too distracting and can't participate, so they were getting chatty in the back of the room. But the girls were noticeably more confident - and at one point a girl was trying to change a verb tense on the board and some girls started snickering at her and she turned around and gave them a lecture in French about how they were there to learn without the distraction of the rude boys and how the girls should show each other respect. That might not sound earth-shattering to you, but that kind of thinking just doesn't really happen here. I was amazed and touched - and am definitely going to keep up the girls' only review sessions.

Yesterday I arrived at school to find out that a teacher at a neighboring high school died and classes were canceled. I was scheduled to come to Conakry today, but went ahead and packed my things and got in a bush taxi.

Bush Taxis:

Contents of trunk: 2 chickens, my backpack, some bags of rice

Contents of back seat: me, old, old woman, girl starting University, man trying to hit on the girl

Contents of front seat: chauffeur, 2 giant men.

For those of you who have known me since high school, do you remember the '89 Oldsmobile I used to drive? It has about 200k on it and barely functioned. It was sent to Car Heaven many years ago. Now imagine that it was actually sent to Guinea, where chickens, people, furniture and a zillion other things were regularly piled on top of it and inside of it. 10 years passes. I now live in Guinea and go to the gare, only to see my old car, battered and beaten. And it's the best option of the cars available at the gare. It's ridiculous. The ride was surprisingly quick and comfortable, with no real moments of thinking we were going to go off the edge of a cliff.

Once again I was reminded about how helpful Guineans are. I got to Conakry and was trying to flag a taxi to take me to the market closest to the PC compound. There were a bunch of people all waiting to go to the same market (it involves standing almost in the traffic and signaling with a downward peace sign) and a man was asking about what I was doing in town. I explained that I taught English at a high school in Mamou and he made a big production of letting me take the next car. People here can be so nice and really are appreciative of what we do. Then I got to the compound and was going to surprise Camilo (his school is on strike so he came to Conakry yesterday and I didn't tell him that I was on the way a day early). I saw another volunteer and asked her where Cam was. She didn't know, but kindly suggested that I 1. look in a mirror and 2. take a shower. I was covered in dirt and actually had a a streak of mud running down my face. Lord. I took a shower before finding him, which made it a good surprise instead of a gross one!

We are off to eat cheeseburgers and go to the office supply store. I'll try and think of interesting things to update with later and will also try to load some pictures of my house and family in Mamou.