Current mood:	nostalgic
Current music:	So Far Away - Dire Straits

12 years later
Today is the 12th anniversary of my arrival in Beindou, the village in southeastern Guinea where I served for two years as a Peace Corps volunteer. It's hard to believe that this was a full decade ago.

Like every October 4, which conveniently doubles as my brother's birthday, I'm struck with a bout of reminiscence. I remember my first day in Beindou like it was yesterday.

I arrived in the late morning in a bush taxi filled with all my crap. After bringing my stuff inside, I was taken on a tour of the tiny village. The tour would've taken mabye 3 minutes uninterrupted but it ended up taking about 3 hours. I was invited into nearly every house and hut in the village where I was expected to consume, rice, peanuts, fruit, palm wine and kola nuts, which are a traditional gift given to visitors or at ceremonies. I was expected to consume those at every hut, lest I offend the host.

That first evening, I nearly leaped out of my skin as a tire iron banged against a metal wheel. This was located about 10 feet from my bedroom window. I learned later that it was the signal to call people to choir practice at the next door religious dwelling.

Then there was the incident of the goat that was like something out of a Richard Scarry storybook.

Below is the journal entry recounting my first three days in Beindou.

It's really interesting to re-read this 12 years later. Interesting because when I finally departed from Beindou two years later, I left with much different impressions than when I arrived.

When I arrived, I was bit overwhelmed by everything. I was the first westerner ever to live in the village. I was tired and agitated. I'd spent some two weeks in the big city near my village waiting for my house to be finished. I was also disappointed, and frankly somewhat bitter, to have been assigned to a middle school in a small village when the only thing I'd requested was to be in a high school in a bigger town. I'd spent most of the first two days greeting everyone, trying to get my horribly uncomfortable bed fixed and figuring out how I was going to spend two years in this place. As a result of all this, I was probably hyper-critical of everything.

A few of the things mentioned below, I'm embarassed to have written. But hindsight is easy to have. I understand why I felt the way I did back them. I'm glad I turned out to be wrong.

Near the end of this entry, I ask "My early judgement is that I don't think I'll hate it here but will it ever be home?"

My final judgement is yes, Beindou did become home.



6 October 1995

Well, it's near the end of day 3 here. The first day wasn't too good. I met about 1 million people, didn't remember too many names, saw my French abandon me and had most of those million people act like they expected me to learn all of the Kissi language in two weeks.

I've already had the DPE [local education boss] ask me if I were going to marry a Kissi woman and had a neighbor woman act a little strange when paying a visit, which in itself is a bit unusual.

I made the mistake of revealing my real age. Hope that doesn't cause any problems.

I've rushed out of bed, frantically throwing on clothes only to find out that it was a GOAT who knocked on my door.

So far, I've been given 9 mandarins, 10 oranges, a cucumber [the size of a watermelon] and 2 liters of palm wine, which tastes like alcohol-laced lemonade (well, a little).

The first day really sucked, as I said, but I kept telling myself "Remember Senegal" [where I did my training] and, just like Senegal, things haven't been so bad since. I think it was more the deluge of it all.

The doors are all built for someone 5'6".

Trash-throwing out the windows is actually no big deal. The goats, sheep, chickens and dogs eat it.

It's weird in that they won't let me get my own water, even though the pump isn't 100 feet away.

Anyways, I suppose this would be really great for someone who actually wanted to be in a small village.

As I write, I'm watching 2 virtually horn-less rams butting heads; ah, such is life in Africa.

Ok, this 'learn Kissi' thing is really starting to bug me.

Oh, and as for that water thing, it also goes for sweeping.

I'm hoping to expose myself to the village as much as possible in the first few weeks so they can get this damn celebrity thing out of their systems as soon as possible.

In four weeks of practice school [part of training], I was never close to booting someone out of class but on the first day of real school, I kicked someone out about 20 minutes into the first class. Go figure!

It's really boring here. There's nothing to do. I usually retire publically (ie: shut the door and stay inside) at around 8:30 and listen to the radio until 9:30 or 10:00. The only other things to do are: a) sit outside, starring at each other, saying 'çava bien?' every few minutes or b) go to the "bar" and drink either palm wine (which is, at best, tolerable) or warm Skols (I ain't fond of cold Skols) and say 'çava bien?' every few minutes. Yawn.

[*-Skol is a local embalming fluid that is labelled as beer]

The phrase tally after 4 days is as follows:

'Il ne comprend pas' [he doesn't understand] is way out in front with 23 times. I feel like saying 'Peut-être mais je comprends quand vous m'insultez' [maybe but I understand when you insult me].

'Il faut apprendre le Kissi' [you must learn Kissi, the local language] is in 2nd with 14 sayings. Half the time, they say this minutes after I've already said, 'Je vais apprendre le Kissi' [I will learn Kissi]

I have plenty of friends, it seems, since 'N'importe quel problème, parlez avec MOI' [No matter what problem you have, talk to ME] is in 3rd with 9. And the ever-so-revealing 'C'est pas comme chez vous' [It's not like where you come from] brings up the rear with 7. Duh!

Also, Jill, Jen and others [two older volunteers who lived near me] have commented on how wonderful and quaint the village is and how they'd love to live here. I feel like saying, 'Ok wanna trade.'

Just as I suspected in Kissidougou [the big city near my village], I really wish I'd had a little language training in Kissi, like the NRMs and Santé [ecology and health volunteers]. Maybe it's of little consequence to teachers in bigger cities (never an issue when I was staying in Kissidougou) but it's been a big problem here. I'm to the point where I know the greetings but for anything more than that, I'm lost and, especially the old women, look annoyed or pissed at me. It seems that I came in with them having far more expectations of me than I expected them to have.

Will I be happy here? I dunno. I think it's really too early to tell. My early judgement is that I don't think I'll hate it here but will it ever be home?

Before I forget, what annoyed me most was rather than being friendly or whatever when I first arrived, a lot of people could only bring themselves to lecture me on why I should learn Kissi. $&(*#*$&*#

On verra [we shall see]