In New York: (concrete) jungle where dreams are made of!

Ok so everything about that title is true except for the concrete part. True story, I am living in New York! Ok, ok it’s New York Village in Bo in Sierra Leone, but I’ve always wanted to see New York! Except this New York doesn’t have electricity or running water or paved roads…so it’s just a little different!

So I figure the easiest way to catch you guys up is to just give you a day in the life here in New York: I wake up, go outside and brush my teeth and pull water out of the well if they haven’t already. Then it’s off to take my bucket bath which is an interesting task that I’ve come to love! It’s the only time during the day when I’m not covered in a gross layer of sweat aaaand it’s just so relaxing! Ok so after that I eat breakfast, which is usually eggs with onion and pepper and boiled plantains, then it’s off to training! The walk to the training site is about half an hour and you pretty much have to say hello to everyone along the way. That’s partly because greetings are a big part of the culture here and partly because everyone is staring at you and yelling “pumui pumui” (white person) so you may as well just say hello.

At training we have teaching sessions (and we start teaching our first students in a little over a week!), cross cultural sessions, medical and security sessions, and of course Krio (language) sessions. The days are packed full of information and real tiring, especially because everybody is tired just from trying to adjust to the climate and food. After class usually a big group of volunteers goes to the bar across the street (called Graceland) to chill and “shoot the shit” as everybody calls it. That is hands down my favorite part of the day, just decompressing with the other volunteers about how we are all adjusting and how classes are going or just talking about life here compared to in the States. We have a great group of people and I’ve luckily had no trouble making some close friends real quickly.

Then after that its back home for dinner (in Krio: A de go na house for eat) which is usually rice and some sauce with meat in it and occasionally (whenever I ask for it) some fruits or vegetables, then bath number 2 of the day (that’s right I have better hygiene in Africa than I did in the States!), then depending on the night it might be out to a bar/club called After Work that has awesome live music and dancing, or off to “Obama’s” bar to watch the World Cup games…yes there are many things here called Obama and this particular place has paintings of R. Kelly, Akon, and Bob Marley on it too!

Other things we’ve done: met the President and Vice President of Sierra Leone in a ceremony at State House, had a reception at the US Embassy, played soccer in the national stadium, watched soccer in the national stadium, got adopted by our host family, got given Mende names (mine is Konya, which literally means a woman fighter and is usually given to girls born during wartimes…it is a strong Mende name and people have responded well to it), and sooo many other things I can’t even tell it all!

Things are going pretty well in general. Of course some days are more challenging or tiring but overall things are going well. Life is busy with learning and preparing and all the madness that goes along with training. I hope all is well with everybody and I miss you guys. Wi go talk bak (We will talk later)!!!