The poor man built his house out of mud...and the walls went washing away.

When people clean here it seems like one of the dirtiest things
ever. I jogged through the village this morning. All the women
were out sweeping in their dirt yards, throwing up dust all over the
place! This dust consists of the dried particles of everything they
let drain on to the ground...yikers. I almost choked a couple of
times. Then the men add to the haze with their little smoking
circles and the Arab cow herders by driving their cattle right
through town. What are they thinking? The children are burning
trash on the paths and so the mornings have this thick orange cloud
to welcome them in. It's actually kind of cozy...like a campfire
feeling every morning. The kids wear little parkas for the first
hours of the day and I even saw a little boy in a snow suit. Who
sent a snow suit to Africa? Confess now. :) They think it is
cold right now. Sure...it's a bit cool in the mornings...but it
takes two hours and we're back to the blazing heat.
The sky is big here. You know when you go to a very flat
place...maybe parts of Wyoming (Tara you remember this?) you see more
sky than you do land and so the sky FEELS bigger. It's blue I'm sure
but the sun is so bright that I can't ever gaze up long enough to
appreciate the blue. The rainy season was GREEN! And wet! The
first week I was here, we took a walk to the river, which, at that
time was like walking through mash potatoes or something. Everything
was soaked through and through. Nathaniel acquired worms on this
trip. Apparently you can get them right up through your feet
(especially when walking in wet lands). This is what has deterred
me a bit from running around barefoot. That and my father's scolding. :)
I tried to think of some comparison for the houses here. I thought
of a gingerbread house and how a really good one is made of only
edible materials. The huts here are a collage of ALL natural
things. The mud bricks (mud, water, sand, some vegetation and alot
of heat), the branches for trusses, the grass roof, the grass ties
around the trusses, and the dirt floor. You could smash this house
down and not leave a bit of garbage. Kind of neat. But when the
rainy season comes, houses are destroyed left and right. The mud
walls just disintegrate and there is alot of rebuilding done after
the rains stop.
One night, at like 10:00 p.m., I was in my hut, sitting in the dark,
just listening to the rains crash on my tin roof (yes I have a tin
roof...this has kept me quite dry.) It's a crazy sound. All of a
sudden a woman was yelling outside of my door. She was banging for
me to let her in. I was already totally out of my element in this
crazy storm and was afraid of what I'd find when I opened the
door. I cracked the door and as soon as I did the wall of rain hit
me. Remember, this was the first week. My french was really awful
and the rain was demanding that we shout over it's ruckus. I
couldn't understand anything she was saying but, as we stood under my
door frame, I could hear with my eyes that she was worried about her
baby...that he was sick...that she had no money...and she wanted me
to fix it. The mother was drunk and I was scared. Since I live
right next to the hospital, I told her rather shortly, to go over
there; that there were nurses there to help her. She only shook her
head and ran off in the rain, trying to stay under her umbrella.
There I stood. Not knowing if I had done the right thing. Being a
little disappointed at how I had reacted. The questions started
parking themselves in my head: How did she know where I lived? Was
the baby really sick? Why was she so panicked? Should I have at
least brought her in my hut, out of the rain? Maybe she really
didn't have any money and this was why she didn't go to the hospital.
I closed my door and ran my hands over my clothes. Soaked. I
pulled them off of me and as I did I realized that the walls of water
had been hitting my dirt hut, throwing mud all over me. I was soooo
dirty. But my mind couldn't stop running this weird situation
through my head and all I wanted to do was sleep. After I got my
muddy, wet clothes off, I just climbed into bed and put ear plugs
in. The morning brought clearer thinking for me. I washed up and
ate a cup of bruille. I don't know where the woman went. I wish my
reaction could have been a little more loving and less fear motivated.
I think we can kick ourselves for not acting this way, not doing
that just a little bit differently, not biting our tongue, not being
a better friend, sister, or teacher. But kicking ourselves just
leaves us all beat up. Instead of being resilient and rising up, we
just look like the beaten puppies of Chad (animal rights activists
have a lot of work to do here). We're mistake makers. We're
imprefect. We'll never be perfect until we get out of this
place. Bounce back. Attempt. Pray. Fail. Learn. Try again.
Everyone makes mistakes. Hopefully next time a woman comes banging
on my door in the middle of a fear-inducing storm I will react
better...I'm not sure when that will ever happen again. :) You never know.