Once in a Lifetime...

And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack/
And you may find yourself in another part of the world/
And you may ask yourself…well…how did I get here?
And you may ask yourself, how do I work this?/
And you may ask yourself, am I right, am I wrong?/
And you may ask yourself, my God, what have I done?/
Same as it ever was…Same as it ever was...
– Talking Heads “Once in a lifetime”

Oh music. You can express so many emotions I feel in one song. Okay, so I don’t exactly live in a shotgun shack (unless you count my training village lodging… okay that might have been a bit shack-ish). My current place has electricity, an amazing host family and is pretty close to the city so it’s a pretty sweet deal.

But I digress. I’m feeling a bit…homesick. I just talked to my family on Skype the other night and it was simultaneously healing and hurtful. Don’t get me wrong. I am extremely happy I am in the Peace Corps and living a new life, but damnit if it isn’t hard being away from family. I am missing my niece and nephews as they grow up, I am not eating the same foods I am used to, and I kind of just miss hanging out with my siblings and friends.

However, this is what I wanted. Peace Corps gives us this little emotional flow chart of the typical highs and lows that a volunteer experiences throughout their service and as odd as it sounds, it’s sort of comforting to know that what I feel is normal and temporary. But this experience…wow. It’s different. I have been away from home for almost 7 months and I can feel the dip into the valley of homesickness. It’s that empty feeling in the pit of your stomach and it sucks. Shall I continue to wallow in self-pity? Ehhh…okay, I’ll stop now. Self-pity annoys me and I have to go to work.

(14 hours later…)

Okay, so its 14 hours later and I’m feeling much better. Phew…what a day! I think sometimes when you are feeling low, life shows you how awesome things really are.

So today, I:
• Presided over a fierce debate at my HIV support group between people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) and people that have negative status but still work with PLWHA and what the role of the HIV-negative supporters should be (the issue was unresolved. I think I will expand on this in a later post)

• Visited the farm that the support group owns. Showed a local beekeeping NGO the hives we have (currently at 4 because the other 14 burned in a fire) to see if they could help us in production and proper methods (they said yes). Also checked on the construction of the honey storage/processing building/watchman house (made completely of mud bricks, straw and wood. Talk about sustainable!). Helped the men chop some wood using an awesome bam-bam club (yes, like in the Flintstones).

• Talked to my local internet café dudes. Found out the one whose name I thought was Yaya is really Lamin. I have been calling him Yaya for the past 5 months and was slightly miffed that he never actually corrected me. It’s going to take a lot of effort calling him Lamin from now on…

• Hung out with my Nene (mom) and other women – ate some mangoes and drank some ataaya (aka Gambian crack; aka super sugary green tea in highly concentrated form).

• Hung out with my Baba (father) at his general store. Discussed the meaning of Skype and then talked about possibly selling solar lamps that a former PC volunteer was marketing in the Gambia.

• Grabbed some water from the tap in our compound, washed dishes (while listening to Zeppelin…naturally) and watched an episode of Arrested Development.

Okay, so now I’m feeling a lot better. It’s weird how the highs and lows happen so quickly here. Sometimes I feel like I’m on a super emotional rollercoaster and other times its just smooth sailing. I guess that’s why they say this experience only happens once in a lifetime…