swing swing swing!

Today was a hot, sticky, fly-filled day. ...and you know, the heat and even the sweat doesn't usually bother me too much. It'll never stop, so you just sort of get used to it. But some days...man. When Burkinabè greet you with "Il fait chaud, oui?" you know that il does in fact fait chaud. Fortunately the rain has FINALLY come (just today, about two hours ago, as soon as I got into town), which has significantly cooled things off and will finally give all of the farmers in the villages some work to do in the fields...the drought has been pretty scary for a lot of people this "rainy" season. If crops don't grow, there won't be enough food to eat for the next year. Straight up.

Back to today being hot and sticky. Man. Today was just a day for me to feel stressed and irritable. It happens in Africa, too. Here is a petite list of little things that mixed heavily in my soul today. BRACE FOR VENTING:

* hatred of packing and moving, exacerbated by the dense heat that fills my little house and surrounds all of the things that have accumulated and gotten dirty over the past two and a half months along with the good intentions of my host brother who was really trying to help me but really just not

* flies swarming all around my sweaty body when I finally give in and decide to take a bucket bath as an attempt to de-stress a little

* sweating the entire time that I am taking said bucket bath

* CLOGGED RAZOR when all I want to do is shave my dirty sweaty legs -- I find myself wanting to do this more often than you might think I do...I feel like it's a control thing. I may sweat and smell and have muddy feet, but damn it my legs are smooth. Or not.

* listening to a ridiculously repetitive call-in-and-give-your-friends-a-shout-out radio show for a very long time wherein every five seconds some bouncy looped African beat is interrupted by the same exact DJ to listener exchange

RAH.

I've noticed that I'm getting a little freckly on my arms in a way that I don't think I ever have before, and I wonder if these freckles are here to stay. I'm uncomfortable with permanent sudden changes to my body. Also also, this spot on my bottom lip that I thought was a bruise...?? ...turns out that's probably a freckle too. WEIRD. Sometimes people here poke at the freckles on my arms and ask me if they're mosquito bites, which has lead me to realize that the concept of a freckle is very hard to explain to someone who doesn't have them and has never seen them. Sometimes, like hot and sticky today, people here, like my little host sisters, poke at the places on my face where I'm breaking out because of the heat and the sweat and the stress and ask me if THOSE are mosquito bites. And then I decide to bike into town.

Here is a little list of home-things that I miss:

* Noho / Moho culture

* little bars and concert venues

* driving down Hartford Rd to get coffee -- for some reason that stretch of road has popped into my mind a couple of times

Okay...so that's not a whole lot, but really I haven't been too homesick or miss-y. Even about food, though stagaires talk about American food ALL the time. As I type, in fact, I am listening to a Nasara conversation about American food and good beer. Coincidence, but not a very surprising one. These convos don't make me hungry, just a little put off. It's akin to always bringing it back to conversing about being with some good looking celebrity. Sure, ok, Brad Pitt is hot, yes. That's a given, it doesn't really need to be said every day. You're never going to meet him or be with him in any way, so let's talk about something else.

Here is a list of things that I appreciated today:

* standing with my bike in the heat riiight in the middle of the day, having showered and changed and started my trip down the dirt road into town, and feeling GOOD...no flies, no sweat, just warmth and pretty clouds and green and brown fields.

* the smell and feel of tiger balm that I rubbed onto my ouch-ing shoulder

* noticing and enjoying that my hair is longer than it's been in a long time

...ok. So that's all well and good but now I'm stuck in Ouahigouya for a bit because it's rainy which makes biking uncomfortable muddy and long, and I don't really want to be alone but I don't really want to be in a social situation that requires any sort of effort. I just want to sit in a comfortable place with someone or someones and listen to music or read and not feel the need to talk if no talking is happening. You know?

I'ma get myself out of this funk right quick. ...which I hope means by tomorrow morning. Maybe I'll go to bed early tonight. Or something.

I think I'm going to go to ECLA, get a warm coffee, talk about my feelings to anyone I know who happens to be there and wait for this rain to stop.