You TREKKED?

This is a question I get asked on a daily basis. I am a constant source of amusement to the people living in the same area as me. They cannot understand that I like walking from My Squat to the main road where I catch public transport. It’s not far, if I’m walking quickly it only takes me 25 minutes. But even though they see me doing this at least twice a day, they still look just as horrified every time they see me. I went out quite a few evenings last week, and on Thursday my ‘trekking’ proved too much for one poor lady to comprehend. She saw me walk back to my compound after work, then 10 minutes later she saw me walking back past her again when I was leaving to go out:

“Bakara (white person), where you dey go, you trekking AGAIN?”
“Yes”
“But you just trekked?”
“Yes”
“If you dey go again, you trek 4 times today”
“Yes”
“Ah Bakara, no….”

At this point she started pushing her half eaten dinner towards me and tried to get me to eat it. She seemed to think I wouldn’t make it back up the hill otherwise. I don’t like to think about how they’re going to react when I start running again. I’ve avoided it until now, because I wanted to get used to the heat and the area I live in. Just walking attracts enough attention; running might be too much for them to cope with.

It’s been a busy couple of weeks, so I haven’t had much time to update my blog. But to summarise, some more highlights:

• Working on an orphans and vulnerable children project at work, which meant I have been able to spend several afternoons holding babies and playing children’s games. My ideal job.
• Finding another supermarket. The best thing about this supermarket is it’s clean, it has air conditioning, and most importantly, the stock doesn’t seem to be 20 years out of date. It’s the only supermarket I’ve been to here where I didn’t feel like I was disturbing some sort of museum exhibition when I took something off the shelves.
• Going to the two monkey sanctuaries in Calabar. I want a monkey. Although as these sanctuaries were populated with monkeys that had been rescued from being ‘pets’ (and I use the term lightly), I think that’s probably out of the question, and I might just need to stick to becoming their most regular visitor.
• Finding a real bakery. That sells real bread. With salt in it, not sugar. I might survive the year after all.
• Mango season arriving in Calabar. It’s quite impressive how many mangoes I can get through in one day.
• Finding a bar within walking distance of My Squat and another VSO’s house that serves cold beer at the cheapest price we’ve paid for beer since arriving in Calabar. We’ve found ourselves our local!
• Going to Freddy’s, a Lebanese restaurant (and the most expensive restaurant in Calabar) twice in one week. I can only afford the cheapest thing on the menu, the falafel wrap, but it still beats anything else I’ve eaten since being here.
• ‘Cooking’ my first meal since moving into My Squat. It was only beans on toast, but still, it’s progress. And it’s a step up from my staple daily diet of avocado, bread and tomato!

And some lowlights…

• The insect bites I got from the monkey sanctuary. I didn’t think it was possible for me to look any worse than I did already, what with the constant sweating, frizzy hair, lack of makeup and all the bites I already had from my bedbugs. I was wrong.
• The light switch breaking in my room. In the ‘on’ position. I can’t reach the lights to take out the bulbs. And in the days that followed this happening last week we had more electricity than in the whole time I’d been in Calabar (although having had none for 5 days now I feel bad for complaining about this!) “The electrician is coming” apparently, or so I’m told whenever I ask about his whereabouts. It’s already been nearly a week so he must be coming from a very long way away.
• The most irritating taxi driver in the world. I shouted out where I was going. He stopped, which is the cue for me to get in. I stupidly wasn’t paying attention, and when I looked up I realised nothing looked familiar. I asked where we were, and it turns out he wasn’t going where I wanted to go after all. So why did he stop and pick me up? Because he liked driving a Bakara in his car. Great. I was then further away from home than I had been in the first place. But being a kind person, he didn’t make me pay for the diversion.
• Going to one of the local primary schools to run a session on personal hygiene and seeing some of the classrooms. The ceilings were half caved in. It’s dangerous enough at the moment, but I can’t even think about what it’s going to be like when the rainy season starts.

And finally, The Sweat Index. I mark my journeys to work in the morning on the following scale:

1 – Lift with my Lovely Neighbour Number 1 in his lovely air-conditioned car. No sweat.
2 – Lift with my Lovely Neighbour Number 2 in his lovely car – but no air-conditioning. Slight sweat.
3 – No lifts, so start walking up the hill but then get offered a lift by someone who stops me on the way. Mid sweat.
4 – No lifts so walk up the hill and catch a public taxi. Muchos sweat.
5 – No lifts so walk up the hill and no public taxis going in my direction so have to get a public bus. Same cost as a shared taxi but a step up the Sweat Index as it’s much more cramped and crowded. Sweat galore.

4 days out of 5 I arrive at work with a rating of 4 or 5 on the Sweat Index. This wouldn’t be such an issue if my colleagues didn’t always look so immaculate and fresh faced, meaning I constantly feel like some sort of swamp monster.