Tonight I will take my last doxycycline pill. Tomorrow will be the first day since September 17ish 2010 that I haven't taken one. Its kind of weird. Hopefully all the malaria has been booted out of my system.
Another milestone-- this blog, dear readers, passed 10,000 page views last week sometime. Thanks to you all for taking the time to peruse my sometimes lucid ramblings about my life in Togo, and beyond.
Monday I caved and bought a new iPhone 5 from the Apple store near D's house. I got a kit for it the other day, so, once again, I am connected. Its funny, getting a phone here feels like when we got phones for the first time in Togo. Then it was like "oh my god i am connected to people again." Here it is like "oh my god I can talk to other RPVCs (and the student loan place) again."
Anyway, since I have read about 50 such comparisons in the past 3 weeks (the galaxy 4? ugh) I decided to compare my iPhone with my Nokia that was in my pocket when I flew out of Lome.
~Screen: iPhone- color, touchscreen, 4 inches. Nokia- sort of color, not touchscreen, maybe 1/2 inch. Advantage- iPhone
~Memory: iPhone- 16 gigabytes. Nokia- some? Advantage- iPhone
~Camera: iPhone- yes. Nokia- no. Advantage- tie (due to apathy. except when my little sister took a pic of herself screaming and made it my background this afternoon. now my iPhone looks possessed. so slight iPhone advantage)
~Battery life: iPhone- 7 hours. Nokia- 7 days. Advantage- Nokia
~Apps: iPhone- thousands once you figure out how to install them. Nokia- none, except solitare. Which saved my sanity. Advantage- Nokia
~Texting: iPhone- gorgeous touchscreen and cool clicky noise. Nokia- t9. I miss t9 so much! (it completes the word for you. I could write a book using t9 with one thumb riding on a moto). Advantage- Nokia
~Phonebook: iPhone- all contacts are blah blah blah it took me half an hour. Nokia- its in French. Advantage- tie
~Flashlight: iPhone- download app, push buttons= awkward Nokia-2 clicks= flashlight that is just the right size to put in your mouth, or tuck under your jaw when you're trying to take a piss at 3 am or make dinner or look for snakes/bugs/mice/scorpions/your glasses/malaria meds. Advantage- Nokia
~Size: iPhone- feels like I have a have an armored thigh when its in my pocket. Nokia- feels comforting. Advantage- Nokia
~Facebook/email: iPhone- yes. Nokia- no. Advantage- I can't decide
~overall winner: Nokia
~In summary, I feel less naked when I go outside now with a phone in my pocket. Ok, the flashlight was the deal breaker. I could not fully accept my iPhone as a useful part of my life until I figured out how to make it a flashlight. I felt naked without one. I feel weird with email and Facebook at my fingertips all day. Plus, my sister had to show me how to use my iPhone. What the hell is iMessage? or Facetime? My Nokia was just so little and useful. So it goes.
I've developed this problem here in the US. I get carsick easily. I NEVER got carsick in Togo. Even crammed in a van with 20 other people or stuck in the back of a crowded bus. But here, ugh. I think it has to do with the lack of airflow or something. Stuffiness gets to me now. I am not used to it. When I took the Megabus from Detroit to Chicago I had to buy dramamine cause I felt like crap. Then I spent the rest of the trip drooling on my self.
It has been so cold here. Seriously. Anything below 70 sends me looking for a hoodie
My cats have gotten reacquainted with me again. One comes and sleeps with me when I go to bed. The other one sleeps with me in the morning.
An elderly gentleman called me up the other day, said he saw the article about me in the local paper a couple weeks ago, and asked if he could buy me lunch. I said sure, cause I never turn down free food, and so we met up today. He was a PVC in Ghana- 1962-64. He was a teacher in Kumasi. He was sort of surprised when I was like "oh yeah, I was just there." But it was neat talking to him. He had a hard time wrapping his mind around cell phones. Peace Corps has really changed in the last 50 years. RPVCs have this weird mentality, or mindset, that Ive had a hard time figuring it out. Like the little bit of the world in which she happens to find herself at that precise moment is sitting in the palm of her hand for her to marvel at or ignore.
My sister and I really connected this afternoon over spider stories from 2 continents. I think that my Night of the Camel Spiders won though.
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