Back in the Village

written Sunday, 27 May 2007

 

 

Yesterday I got up at 5:00, packed up my stuff, and biked the 75 km from Tamba to my village.  It only took about 4 1/2 hours, with a 45 minute break halfway down to visit another volunteer and eat a bean sandwich for breakfast.   I was pretty proud of myself for biking the whole way, although my back was really hurting the rest of the day.

 

I am feeling a lot less stressed about living in the village after my little break in Tamba; it helps that I am managing to get a little more time to myself during the day.

 

As other volunteers had warned me to expect, one person did ask me yesterday if I had brought her a present from Tamba, which I thought was pretty tasteless and self-centered given the reason I went into town.   So I just said "no, I didn't", and when she asked why, I said "because my grandfather died".  Luckily, she is the only person here who seems to be interested in me only as a potential source of presents; the other villagers were all very nice and gave me their condolences and asked about my family, although some of them did repeat that death is a part of life and we should accept it and not be sad.   But I knew they were trying to be nice and helpful, so I didn't really mind this time.

 

Last night it was windy and cooler, so I thought it might rain and brought my bed inside.  But it didn't rain after all, so now I am disappointed that I slept in my sweltering hut for nothing instead of the nice cool outside.