I’ve now been here for four months. I’m a third of the way through my placement, and it’s almost a year to the day that I went to the VSO assessment day in London. And I want someone to press the pause button, as despite the hair loss, constant sweating, daily irritations and living in an almost permanent state of confusion, I’m loving life here, and if the next 8 months go by as quickly as the last 4 then I’m going to be home before I know it.
But my current state of happiness (or euphoria, according to the VSO emotional map) may not last. Because apparently the next stage is likely to be shock and denial. Or guilt, depending on whether you follow the map clockwise or anti-clockwise. And so it seems I should enjoy the euphoria whilst I have the chance.
But I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I can beat the VSO emotional map and keep the depression, shock and denial at bay. I’ve found myself enjoying being here more and more as time has gone on. Whilst I know I was meant to find the start of my placement exciting, part of me just found it overwhelming. It was frustrating not being able to understand anyone, no one being able to understand me, not knowing how to get anywhere, not knowing how much to pay for things, and basically not being able to do anything on my own. I think part of the reason I am now enjoying being here so much is because I feel settled and it has started to feel like home (or home for now, anyway!). I like the fact that I can find my way around, I can understand a lot more pidgin than my colleagues realise (I am keeping this very quiet as I have a feeling it may work to my advantage!), I no longer get charged crazy prices for everything I buy, and I’ve got into a routine. Well, a routine of sorts anyway. It goes something like this:
6.30am: wake up to the sound of whatever strange thing my weird neighbours are doing. Or at least, get up. Chances are I’ve been awake since the crack of dawn, as everyone that lives in my compound seems to be nocturnal.
7.15am - 7.30am: hover by my window like a crazy person waiting to see if I can pounce on one of my three neighbours who have cars and frequently find themselves with the joy of driving me to work.
7.30am: Give up on the stalking and accept that if I don’t start walking up the hill I’ll be late. Walk up the hill from the End of the Earth sweating endlessly, and trying to say hello to everyone who walks past whilst also concentrating on not getting run over or falling into the open sewers that line both sides of the road.
8.00am/8.15am: Get to work and make sure I sign the staff register before the Red Line of Doom is drawn at 8.30am (once this line has been drawn there is no going back. You are officially late).
8.15am - 8.30am: Sit very still in the hope of stopping the sweating that has taken over following the walk up my hill/sharing of a seat in the taxi with 3 people more than you would think possible.
11.30am – 12.00pm: Admit defeat and accept that given I’ve already drunk my body weight in water I cannot put off going to the toilet any longer. I avoid this for as long as possible for several reasons. Firstly, the toilet never has any toilet paper in it, meaning I have to take the one that I keep in my bag with me, which means walking through the entire office carrying a toilet roll, which amuses my colleagues endlessly. Secondly, the floor of the toilet at work is always covered in about 2 inches of water. I have blocked the possible reasons for this from my mind, but I still find it difficult to ignore the sensation of water squishing between my toes whenever I walk in there. Thirdly, there is no running water in the bathroom, and so to flush the toilet I need to fill the bucket from the barrel of water we keep in there, which inevitably leads to water splashing back up from the toilet and onto my feet, exacerbating the problem referred to in my second reason for avoiding the toilet above.
12.30pm: Go outside and blink crazily like a newborn hamster for about 20 seconds whilst my eyes adjust to the light (my office is very, very dark). Go and see the lady who sits behind our office and try and decide what to have for my ‘lunch’ (I like to use the word ‘decide’ as it implies I have a choice. Whereas really, this just involves a combination of ground nuts, crackers, water, and maybe a sprite if I really want to push the boat out).
Work has been crazy busy the past few weeks, as there have been a lot of funding proposals to work on recently with very short deadlines. I went to one of the local orphanages the other day. And as I knew it would, it broke my heart. There was a two-day-old baby that had been abandoned, and I just wanted to pick her up and take her home (don’t worry Mother, I didn’t. But I’m not making any promises that I won’t go back).
4.30pm – 5.00pm: Finish work and start the journey back to the End of the Earth. Buy some combination of the only ingredients I can get from my road: bread, tomatoes, onions, avocadoes, oranges and pineapple.
Then there are two options depending on what day of the week it is:
A: 6.00pm: If it’s a Wednesday or Thursday I usually meet Jenny at a bar we go to on the main road at the top of my hill. Or my favourite yam bar where not only do I get beer, but fried yam as well.
B: 6.00pm: If I’m not meeting Jenny, get home and have a shower to try and address the fact that I am once again sweating endlessly after walking back down my hill.
6.30pm: Try and motivate myself to make something edible for dinner before it gets completely dark and I can no longer see what I am doing, but fail miserably and end up either doing some washing, checking emails, or reading.
7.00pm: ‘Cook’ some sort of meal involving the ingredients I bought on the way home, which generally involves just chopping up tomatoes and avocadoes and eating them with bread, unless I can motivate myself to make something more adventurous like an omelette or pasta. However the chances of that are slim, given the fact that using my gas stove in my already over heated kitchen when I cannot see what I am doing does nothing but irritate me and means I then have to have my third shower of the day.
7.30pm: Mop my kitchen floor, as any use of my sink involves the floor flooding within seconds as there is no U-bend in the sink (or so I’m told, all I know is that when I turn the tap on I get very wet feet).
7.45pm: Do some washing and then leave it to dry in my room and then have to mop again because I am absolutely unable to wring it out enough to stop the water from dripping onto my floor.
8.30pm: Spray Raid obsessively until I find it difficult to breathe, but this is definitely preferable to waking up in the middle of the night, putting my foot down on the floor, and stepping on a cockroach (this has happened more times than I care to remember. I have no idea how they always end up in just the place I want to put my feet when I get out of bed).
8.35pm: Once I’ve stopped coughing I start watching something on my laptop. Generally House, given I have all 6 series (Miss Bell, you’re my hero).
9.00pm: Try to ignore the fact that I can’t actually hear a thing from my laptop, as a result of the 20 industrial size generators that are running outside my bedroom.
9.15pm: Decide that lip reading really isn’t one of my strengths, and so give up and read instead. Generally by torchlight.
10.30pm: Start to think about going to bed. Or, going to sleep, given I’ve been ‘in bed’ since getting home as it’s the only surface to sit on in My Squat.
10.45pm: Cocoon myself in my mosquito net. Since Ratty came into my life this now involves using every book I own to weigh the net down from the inside (my bed is just one big lump of foam and so there’s nothing to tuck the mosquito net into, and leaving it hanging down the sides of the bed is not an option as I just lie there imagining all the cockroaches and rats that could climb up inside the net and crawl over me whilst I’m asleep. Yes, I’m just that paranoid and delusional).
11.00pm: Bury my head underneath my pillows and try to think about something apart from the sound of the generators/car alarm/howling puppies/shouting neighbours.
11.30pm: Pass out.
2.00am: Wake up and try to pretend I don’t need the toilet, as the effort involved in moving the books from my mosquito net, locating my torch, and praying there aren’t any half dead cockroaches for me to stand on just doesn’t seem worth it.
4.00am: Wake up again and admit defeat and get up to go to the toilet. 6 nights out of 7 the water will be off and so I’ll need to fill a bucket to flush the toilet whilst also trying to keep my eyes half closed in the hope that I won’t wake up entirely and be unable to go back to sleep.
And that’s my routine. The only real difference with weekends is I’m out later at night, sleep a bit more (well, actually that’s not always the case as the noise levels don’t decrease at the weekend, but I’m just more stubborn and lie there refusing to get up), clean more, and do more washing.
So, here’s to hoping I can maintain the ‘euphoria’ for the next 8 months.
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