Bijli Ati Jati hey

The topic of conversation around here these days is not about sports or weather, but the electricity.  In the last few days, the electricity comes and goes (the meaning of the title) constantly.  Sometimes it is 20 minutes on, 20 minutes off for hours.  I am learning to not keep things (like a computer) plugged in b/c the power surges can harm things even with a transformer.  I am learning to buy in smaller amounts b/c food is going bad in the refrigerator.  I am learning to sleep with sweat dripping down.  

To be honest, I don't know how to explain the bureaucratic problems that is causing this.  But I do know that the newspaper said this morning that on top of this, they are now going to raise the price of electricity.  There could be some very angry people . . . 

Birthday Post

 I tried to switch the time back to U.S. time so I could actually post this entry on my birthday.  But no such success.  I have already had a full night's sleep and the day has moved on to the 10th here.  

My birthday was a low key day here.  We heard the medical team missed a flight which gave us 16 or so extra hours to prepare for their coming. In the afternoon we met up with our friends Dave and Jenny at the local Naval Park (with so much money going to the military they really keep up their parks:)  ).  Of all things, Jenny has the same birthday.  The menu included a bucket of Kentucky Fried (hey, options are limited here), homemade salsa (my choice potluck item this month) and a really nice cake from a bakery (Dave's find).

I came home and had a quick chat with my family back in MO.  I gave my twin brother a call, but he didn't pick up.  I had heard he was out playing African drums for his (our) birthday.  Probably couldn't hear the ringer over the beats.

A few thoughts on hospitality

I think that I have mentioned a few times about the hospitality here.  This part of the world is known for its welcoming of guests.  Imagine walking down the street (a bit more true in villages than in big cities) and being urged by locals to come inside their home for a cup of tea and biscuits (i.e. cookies for us from the U.S.).  For extraverts, its a lot of fun;  we are always meeting new people and getting to be with people in their homes.  

Our problem is knowing what to do with those awkward final moments when we are ready to leave.  Although they invited us in, how long do they want us to stay?  How do we say that we need to move on without offending?  We all struggle with this wherever we are, but with hospitality being such a HUGE value here, the pressure not to offend someone by leaving too early or too late seems all the more stressful.  Somehow you have to send signals that they have successfully been a great host.  We try our best, but anticipate future understanding that will show us we should have done some things differently.

I struggle with one piece of the hospitality.  To show you that they are offering you a clean cup, they will set a cup in front of you dripping with water.  Thats not a big deal unless you are aware of results of testing done on that water.  Acceptable drinking water has less than 500  of some measurement of microbes.  In this area testing has shown the levels over 30,000.  We are trying to work on that problem.  Anyway, just one droplet in your system doesn't sit well for a few days.  I just experienced that this week.  We try to discreetly wipe the cups, but it isn't always possible. Most times you say a short prayer before you take a sip.

Medical Team coming

This week we jumped right back in.  In 3 days a medical team comes to do 7 medical clinics in a slum area of our city.  This is our 2nd time around doing this as a medical team came last September.  We have high hopes that the 2nd time around will go much smoother.  We already have the medications set up at our first location and have discussed the flow of the clinic.  The biggest anticipated stress is thinking about crowd control.  When something free is being offered in desperate days as these, people can get quite pushy.  Our goal is to serve as many people as possible, but also give our medical professionals the space and peace to do a quality job.  

I am excited

• to see people from home
• to use my newly acquired language
• to meet new local ladies (with hope that I will see some again)
• to survey the people in anticipation of future, long term medical work
• to gather more anthropological insights for medical care.

Back Home

We arrived back today after 3 months away at language school.  It feels great to be home!   We both have been able to try out our new language skills in the neighborhood.  Its encouraging to see progress after so much hard work.  Will post more soon . . . busy re-settling in.

Teas

Tea is a very important part of this culture. When you meet someone, often the first request from them is to have tea. There are also different types of tea in different parts. In the south we mostly drink milky tea (black tea with milk and sugar), in the east we drink green tea (with sugar), and in the north on our vacation we drank tumuro tea (I heard it is made with thyme). In northeast apparently the tea is pink, but I haven't had that yet.

On vacation we were always wanting the native experience. A local widow invited us in for tea. She asked how we wanted it fixed. Joe promptly said, "just like the locals". She poured us some tumuro tea into a large cup (looked like a bowl). Took a couple of sips- delicious. After this though she proceeded to put in salt. I took a couple sips and thought, "I can handle this. I like salt." But then she put fresh butter. And then broke up pieces of fresh bread. Two large bowls of salty, fatty tea with bread chunks sat in front of us. The first couple of sips/bites were okay, but then it became quite obnoxious to our taste buds. About 50% down, when our host wasn't looking, we began pleading with the other to finish each other's tea. We gulped down another 25%, but then had to call it quits. Our host seemed to understand.

The next tea time we were more careful in our request of how we wanted it fixed.

Public Shame

The other day we were walking in the bazaar when we began to hear a lot of noise and people all looking in the same direction. The commotion was coming quicker and we couldn't figure out what was going on. We finally pushed ourselves to the edge of the road and saw a group of policemen coming with a large group of people behind them. The people the police were escorting looked like they had been rounded up like a herd of cattle. As a group (about 20 people) they were lassoed together in a rope and all walking together. In the front were men who all had blank ink smired on their faces and clothes. They also had their hands tied together with rope. In the back of the herd were women. It was another one of those instances where we had absolutely no idea what was going on. We asked the ever helpful, "Kya hua?" (what happened) to a few people. We were able to piece together that it was group that was caught drinking alcohol in a hotel as well as some potential prostitution activities. They were being publicly shamed by being paraded through the busiest part of town.