Tear

5/12 Install tomorrow and we are terrified. What will we say, what will we do, what will we eat, what if they don't like us? And then... what if they do?



I passed another level of the biking video game of my life last week when I took on Thiès, blinded by tears in my eyes. I almost crashed into a donkey. The tears fell for my Thiès family as I left them. I didn't think I'd cry, but as I was saying goodbye, they held out their left hands to shake. I've known this custom sionce India-- if you shake with that dirty hand (used for wiping) you're insulting. You can't leave someone on an insult so you're bound to see them again to eradicate it. I've even done it a few times in "aww" moments. But when my sisters and neene held out those hands, locked eyes with me and said, "Do you understand?"... the moment took more magnitude and took the built-up emotion from the week and swear-in... and came out of my eyeballs. Ko mi baby. Luckily they teared too so I didn't look completely ridiculous.



Right before this sob-fest, I gave them their sericce (gifts). The soccer ball and pump (thanks for sending, mum!) were GOLD. Mamadou, Amadou, and Aliou must have hugged me 48 times. They looked like they won the lottery. My sisters loved the bracelets more gracefully and kept disappearing and reappearing with ones for me. I even got a "bin-bin" which is a waist "necklace" hidden under the clothes associated with seduction and making one's butt bigger. I also see a lot of babies wearing them... I'm pretty sure all these things were from their own belongings. I also recieved a bag of mangoes from our tree. The other gifts I gave were cookies, a little pocket knife (thanks, Heath!), these extra tweezers my mom sent ( they were confused by them and I realized no one has stray eyebrow hairs here. My sister started plucking her arm hairs with them but found it painful. Then she satisfied herself with using the little pocket knife scissors to slowly do the job), slippers, and that little fishy magnet game from Mrs. B. This was funny because they assured me it would only be for Ami since it's a toy. But once it was opened, they all proceeded to lose track of everything else in life. Even neene played to my GREAT amusement. She did not catch a fish.



(I never finished writing this and don't really feel like it now... The end!)