I am in Africa still

Well hello there, I think today’s blog is going to start off with a nice little description of a day out here in Bissau.

First thing I do in a day (after I wake up of course) is get a shower. Showering in the morning is an important thing to take care of, we are supposed to shower 3 times a day or so when it is warm and if I do not get that morning shower in, it is a hard mark to hit.

After the shower I go shopping. It does not take long because the only thing on the list is bread. Once my loaf of bread is purchased for 150 cfa from one of the kids in the market, (like 40 cents or something not expensive for fresh bread) eat it, and it is delicious.

Now, here it is a toss up between Kiriol study (their language out here) OR reading books for school. Both insanely fun, so I am good to go. Sometimes for breaks I get to go outside and practice talking (in a different language of course… I don’t practice English).

At around noon (usually a bit after noon actually) I get to eat lunch. This is a feast of a meal. In fact, more often then not, dinner (which is at about 9pm) is usually composed of lunch left overs. Because it is such a long time between meals everyone eats as much as possible.

The only thing one can do after an eat fest like lunch is nap. So we have a bit of a siesta. There is nothing like a solid afternoon nap. Nothing really exciting happens until about 7pm. Then, at least at the base, the generator gets turned on and I get power. This is prime time to use the computer (my laptop battery life has dwindled down to about 12 minutes) and doing things that involve using light. Power gets turned off at 10 and sometime before 2 all go to bed.

If I am in Ingore, it is pretty much the same story except there is a lot more hanging out with local youngsters and a lot less power using. Hopefully when I get my own place (in like 2 days) I can use the solar panels for the computer. Also, Ingore has many nights of church events and when that is not going on I get Kiriol classes! Hurray.

So, there you have it. A couple people asked what “a day in the life” for Steve was like in Guinea-Bissau so this pretty much sums it up for now. I think I start teaching now in November so then of course my daily schedule will change a bit but who cares, that is for a future blog.

K, for those who want to read on I will give a nice little description of the area. The roads here are sub par. If one is lucky enough to find themselves on a paved road they will soon find a plethora of potholes to navigate around. At times traffic will come to a near stand still. This means that slightly ahead there is a giant mess of holes on the road that force vehicles to shift down and roll over at the lowest speed they can manage.

To make matters more confusing there are no streetlights, stop signs or rules of any sort. Pedestrians are found in high quantities as well because of a lack of funds for purchasing a vehicle. Needless to say, driving here has a bit of a learning curve. But with the help of a decent horn and a passenger to point dangerous things out, I should be fine.

A neat surprise here is the amount of pigs, goats and chickens. Thy are every where. They just roam around the city, not doing much. Just being animals I suppose. Guess its one of those things that happens when there are not many fridges or freezers for meat. I like to pretend sometimes that they are just walking afternoon meals. Unfortunately they create a pungent aroma which, when combined with the smells of the extra garbage out here can catch you by surprise. While walking things will smell fine then suddenly my olfactory senses are bombarded by these new odors. It is not a pleasant surprise but not much one can do about it.

Well, that is about it for this writing. Perhaps I will update the next one sooner and keep it a little shorter. That would be nice eh?