last friday and saturday our Youth Leadership Programme hosted a youth-elder conference at the benab (big tipi-like, thatched roof gathering place) in annai. at first i thought it was lame, but then it got really neat! i learned how to spin cotton from some of the female elders, and then on saturday i learned how to weave my own basket out of mokro bark! i will put up some pictures sometime soon.
i had a really bad sleep on friday - we've been sleeping in our hammocks, which is difficult for a girl who only sleeps on her stomach. so on friday, i woke up 8 or 10 times that night (too hot/had to go to the bathroom/uncomfortable/baby next door was crying) and was so exhausted the next day that rawle organized for me to use one of the extra bedframes and mattresses. so now i have a bed! it is sooo nice. my former hammock is my current bedsheet. i think i might sling up my other hammock outside and put my hammock mosquito net on it, so i have somewhere to chill in the evenings. but i won't put it up yet, because there are some sketchy guys staying here for a few days...
on saturday night, some guy jumped over the wall of the room next to ours and punched our friend gilbert in the stomach, and then jumped out the window. scary!!! fortunately, because of the scare of crystal's attack earlier in september, we pushed to have our room super secure, so when that all happened, our room was safe. we have two doors, both of which have locks, and our windows all lock, and the space between our room and the next ones and the ceiling has been boarded up. so we don't feel too scared. but i feel scared for gilbert.
on sunday crystal and i just bummed around all day. went for a quick bike ride, sat around and radiated heat.
on monday i took a day trip to lethem. up until now, there has only been one bus that runs through Guyana, heading southwest on sunday, tuesday, and thursday, and heading northeast monday, wednesday and friday. but just last week, the North Rupununi District Development Board started running a bus every monday, wednesday and friday that goes to lethem (two hours southwest of here) in the morning and returns in the evening. it's great! i went to the bank and was thankfully able to withdraw some money that my mom had transferred, and then i bought some chocolate bars and fruit juice and some towels to do yoga on. then i bussed home! it was a good trip, and hopefully the bus can keep running. i really really like bus rides through the rupununi after dark. nice and cool and relaxing. oh! i forgot! rawle also took me to brazil for a few hours. lethem is right on the border with brazil, and we took a speedboat across the river to brazil, and then spent about an hour at rawle's brother's. i'll need to get a visa if i want to spend more time there, but i think i will get one, as long as rawle takes us there. i wouldn't want to travel through brazil alone. also, rawle drove me around on his motorbike/vespa! that's my first time! i am in love, and almost tempted to buy one in canada, except for the fact that it would be totally useless to me for most of the year.
yesterday was a gong show. sometimes i think this place is a nazi regime. it's basically run by that crazy british ostrich lady, mentioned earlier in my blog. she controlls everything by e-mailing her spokesperson here (the british puppy-loving girl) 20 times a day. they are just really crazy, and moniter everything we do. now crystal and i have to write down our personal internet time in a little logbook. give me a break. i'm not 12 years old. AND one of the ladies in charge told our cook that she wasn't allowed to take things out of the shop and charge it to bina hill's account, that she could only cook what was in the cupboards. so yesterday for supper we had noodles and cake. not for celebration. because there was nothing in the cupboards. no flour to make bread. what a joke. but i bought 4 packages of oats when i was in lethem, so i know i'll never starve. also, thankfully, i've discovered that orange juice and orange-carrot juice is available at the shop here! i won't get scurvy!
on a completely unrelated note, i think i am getting over darcy. but it might just be that i am preoccupied/excited about the possibility of going to school next year AND joining the rowing team. nevertheless, it feels good.
13 years ago
2 comments:
my friend kerry lived in lethem when she went to guyana doing aids/hiv stuff a few years ago. weird. it's pretty small isn't it? maybe some of the people remember her.
hmm. yeah, it's pretty small. how long was she here for? apparently another one of my friends' girlfriends worked in guyana a few years ago, a little bit north of here. strange. i hadn't even known the country existed until about 3 months ago.
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