. . . . and smell the roses

it rained!

D and I went to Kara last week to run errands.  And to spent a night in A/C (my self-prescribed treatment for heat rash).  It stormed that night.  Wonderful.

Until the next afternoon when we were getting a car back to Kabou and it stormed again just as we were leaving. Legit storming. Of course the car did not have functioning windshield wipers.  The driver hung his head out the window.  D had a mild panic attack.  Before that, I could never figure out how so many head on collisions apparently happen here.

We made it through the storm just fine, then, about 10k outside of Kabou, the driver's side brake pads fell off and went bouncing down the road.  So it goes.

I got tired of sleeping in a stew of my own sweat and body heat so i drug my lit picot outside last night to sleep on.  its much better than sleeping on a mat, which is what I did before.  I laid under 100 thousand stars and read "Wizard of EarthSea" by LeGuin. It was a transcendental experience.

Since its (mostly) dry season, I can take the back way to Kouka.  It is amazing how much 2 good rains can do for the countryside.  All of the trees look greener.  The bushes are filling out.  Weeds are growing along the road.

I was biking in the middle of nowhere this morning and kept thinking that I smelled lilacs.  So I walked a little ways into the bush to see what it was.  I'm terrified of snakes in the bush, but this lilac smell that kept drifting over the road was bugging me. I found 3 different flowers within like 20 feet of each other.  Something I've never seen before.

Kodjo had a hernia operation in Bassar last week.  It cost him 60 mille, 30 of which I gave him.  but he's had a hernia since i've been here, so i figured he needed the operation more than i needed the money.  We stopped in to visit him on our way back to Bina.  He was on a gurney in this shack behind the surgery building with like 5 other patients and various family members.  He proudly showed off the evidence of his operation, along with other things that I didnt really want to see.  The fact that he can have successful surgery here without all of the other stuff (like sterile sheets and A/C) that we seem to require in the states is interesting to me.

Last week I helped Petite make bricks.  He tore down the two round buildings in my compound to make room for a 3 room building so there is room to store his corn and for the kids to sleep.  Ntifoni and I got out to the brick site first.  It is basically a hole by the pump.  they dig up subsoil, wet it down, and make bricks out of the mud.  We each made 40 bricks.  he got done first but my mold was bigger.  I was starving when I was finished.  but, since it was marche day, a guy came by selling stewed dog off of the back of his bike, so I ate a bunch of that.  then drank tchakpa that my host mom made.  then slept the rest of the day.