Insecticide

One result of living in a warm and humid climate is the prevalence of insects. To combat it, people use insecticide. With the low cost of manual labor, most houses have maids. Being use to exterminators, I rarely think of spraying for bugs or about insecticide. These items came together in a negative way several days ago.

Coming home from work, I entered my room and inhaled. Yes, inhaled a deep breath. That deep breath smelled like lavender and made me cough. This was the start of my problems.

Smelling the lavender, I thought it was air freshener. After putting down my bags, I headed to the kitchen to find the maid. She did not understand air freshener but did understand that the lavender smell was too strong. She has trouble understanding me and I have trouble understanding her, but I thought we worked it out.

I, still thinking it was air freshener, went back into the room, changed our of my work clothes, organized, stepped out to breath and cough, took out my laptop, and turned on the air conditioner "Wow, this air freshener was really strong" went through my head several times. Thoughts about the maid trying to make my room nicer with a scent that made me cough also entered my head. Then, I started to make fun of perfume smells. All of this, as I was coughing. Never did it enter my mind that I needed to leave. Air freshener is meant to be smelled. Large quantities might annoy the senses but should hurt the body, should they?

Another severe fit of coughing send me back to the maid. She thought she had sprayed too late in the day and went to open the window. I asked her not to spray again and got drink of water determined to not let the smell bother my day.

After wasting time in the living room, I thought the room must have aired out. No, no, no, it had not. Opening the window meant she opened the curtains. This did not let in any fresh air. The open door let the smell out into the hall. I had another fit of coughing just passing by the door. Window and door finally open, and probably letting in small bugs, the room could finally air out.

Realization finally dawned on me, it was not air freshener. The maid had sprayed my room for bugs. The bug spray in the can smells like lavender. I was inhaling insecticide thinking it was air freshener.

Two days of sore throat later, I rationalize that spraying insecticide in a room is not normal for me. This makes me feel better as I nurse my injured body. The result of lavender bug spray, a maid trying to do her job, and an oblivious American is burning in the throat and no bugs.

Naked Man

Last Wednesday was Decoration Day in Liberia. Traditionally, people go to the family graves, clean them up, and decorate. Along with this custom, people also pour beer on the graves. Some people have aiming problems and instead of pouring on the ground, the beer goes into their mouth. This is a simple mistake and I feel the dead understand the difficulty of the pouring task but still appreciate the effort.

With a day off, I found myself driving out of town to relax. This is when I saw naked man. He was completely without clothes, shoes, and did not care. Walking down the side of the road, naked man took up several feet of the car lane causing traffic to veer around him.

I had to say "Naked man", when I saw him. My companion, who has been here longer, completely missed it. After so many years, random naked men can be easily overlooked. While he was not walking fast, the car was heading at a comfortable speed the opposite direction, making the moment brief but notable.

This is not my first naked, or near naked, man to see walking down the street. Once, I had to drive around a naked man laying in the middle of the street downtown. Several times I've seen scarcely clothed men walking around with only a cloth wrapped around them or pants with failing zippers. I was warned of this habit upon my first arrival in the country. Naked men regularly appear when soccer teams score a goal and on holidays with drinking involved. People rarely take much notice of them.

Decoration Day creates a higher probability of a sighting. Besides this, the day is normally very traditional. People travel from cemetery to cemetery to see visit the dead. Like all family holidays, a debate exists as to which graves to visit in the time limits and with traffic issues. A few arguments occur about normal family conflicts. People wear nice clothes and usually everyone's visions of the day do not turn out as expected, running into distant relations, arguments about where to go and how to clean, or simple disappointment from the day not being "perfect".

But for humor, there is always a naked man walking down the street.

Roasted Pig

It's not often that I am in the room with a whole pig. This one was unique because it was thoroughly dead and cooked with a knife in his back. While I do eat pork and various other animals, I don't like to see them cooked whole. The first time I tried to cook chicken, the feeling of the meat reminded me too much of my cats leg and I stopped. Things change and I ate pig skin that night dipped in sauce.

Staring at Flowers

Of the many tasks I should have been doing, staring at flowers was not one of them. The flower connected to a vine with thorns and leaves that move when touched. Even at my age, I still found myself touching the leave, watching them close, waiting for them to open, and then touching again. The flower looked more beautiful the closer I zoomed.

My eyes should have been looking everywhere but at the ground, but that's where they focused.

Fisherman

Seafood is wonderful, fish, crab, lobster, shrimp, and others. The fresher it is, the better. I am always in search of fresh seafood, especially since I live in a country with a long coast two blocks from my home.

Meet fishman. He advertised seafood delivery. Also, he had a case of "miscommunication" with a friend. The friend ordered fish and shrimp, fishman said $20, fishman delivered fish and shrimp, and then friend found out that the size and type of fish brought was worth $1.20 in the market. Neither the friend nor the fishman spoke in person about the size and type of fish. Politely, I call it a "miscommunication" because the fish and shrimp were delivered for the price and I have lost my fishwoman.

My fishwoman was a maid in the apartments. She was not my maid, but her sister (which here could mean they share a parent, were raised together, or just know each other). I would give her $20 dollars and she would bring me two medium fish, cleaned, with the head and tail removed, and leave them in my refrigerator before I got home to cook dinner.

She was unique in her service. My maid refused the offer when I talked to her about it. It surprised me, turning down money is a rarity. I have to respect when someone refuses extra money for a small service and offers up another in her place.

My reliable and convenient system left me spoiled for delivery and hungry for more seafood.

Back to fishman...

I started to think about shrimp. Luckily, my neighbor delivered fishman's phone number during a moment when I was starting to crave it.

Craving + phone number = order for shrimp

Fishman has music as his ringer. This mean that when I call him, I get to hear almost garbled West African rap before I hear him shouting into the phone in a crowded market. It took effort to figure out when he picked up and the song stopped.

Ordering four dozen shrimp, he was eager to bring them tomorrow. I asked if he could. He insisted he could. I questioned the feasibility, and he assured me. The only lingering question after the conversation concerned cleaning and deveining. I sent a text about it the next morning and heard nothing back.

Go to Monday at 4 pm, I have talked about my cooking options all through lunch. Boil with potatoes, learn how to pickle, cook with yummy cheese grits, stir fry... the options kept increasing and all inspired me into hunger. The image of the shrimp meat, cooked, and on my fork sat in my head.

Then came the call. He could not find shrimp. Correction, he could not find shrimp in the market for the price we agreed. I was standing in the aisle of the grocery store, thinking of what to buy, and suddenly my dinner plans are gone. Poof!

I did not cry but I did go out to eat that night and order shrimp.

Next day, I get another call at 4 pm. Fishman has my shrimp. Where do I live?

Now, our phone conversation had ended poorly the day before. I was upset, he wanted to try tomorrow, I said my plans are ruined for tonight, he said price to much, I..., he..., I..., he..., and I said "I'm done, goodbye." Not a good ending, not a terrible one, but I hung up with no intentions of called back.

But he called me. Like after a dry spell in dating, I still picked up against my better judgement. I knew that he would offer shrimp. I knew that I was just desperate enough for fresh seafood to take whatever he offered. I knew that unless I wanted to find transportation to the fish markets in the afternoon, haggle for a good price, and then clean my own shrimp, I needed to take it.

In the end, I rearranged my dinner plans, frantically organized timing, made a few phone calls to see options for delivery, and asked a favor of a friend to accommodate his delivery. Cleaned shrimp were delivered to my home that day. The only inconvenience I did not have was the price.

I enjoyed the fresh seafood that night. It was worth it.

African Child

I was taking pictures recently and she was completely oblivious. In a crowd of neighbors getting free rice, she wandered around free and unconcerned. She was looking at the ground or her feet with fascination when I noticed her and waited. Finally, She noticed me, looked up and started to make a smile as I snapped her picture.

Cultural Dancers

In Liberia, if a big event is hosted, then cultural dancers area hired. All the ones I have seen have a set of drummers, dancers, acrobats, a beaded instrument shaker (the woman with the red hat, I don't know what its called), and usually a caller, my personal term, who introduces the group.

The drummers bring emotions with their beats and gather up emotions while the crowd waits for the dancers. There is never a need for amplifiers with the drums. The beating of multiple drums layers intensity into the air and makes not beats but music.

The caller tells the group about the county the dancers will represent and about the type of dance or people who live there. Dancers come through the crowd and the show really starts.

I am like a child with excitement every time I see a group. It happens so infrequently that I could be seeing the same group over and over again but don't know it. The drumming is felt in my bones and I have no desire to be anywhere else.

You can see it on the dancers' faces, they don't want to be anywhere else either. I love Liberia.

Intentions of Going Organic

Intentions of being an organic gardener lapsed when faced with sifting through dirt to pick out the trash. Really, there was trash in the dirt from the neighborhood. Plastic bags, metal, shards of glass and plastic bits all littered the soil intended for use in the pots.

Fertilizer gives happy, producing plants and the effort to make it organically seemed lost with the trash.

At least the tomatoes - that might be produced- will be local.

Soon, manual pollination must be done. I feel adolescent whenever discussion the necessity of doing the deed.

Things Forgotten

Times come when writing gets forgotten in the frantic mess of life. Moments to write pass by with only notations in the brain to remember a beautiful moment. Sentences are constructed in the head and disappear as the neurons stop flashing. Without memory, the missing leaves no mark.

And in other times, their is realization of the lost. Pausing in life, a thought dawns that time has past without recording. Now lost, the exact verbs and adjectives cannot be found but the gap exists. Scampering for records, the moment becomes recreated in flashing adjusted to beauty or horror or pain by the neurons lost on their track.

Come back to the routine in consciousness. Hold the words in the head and reach for the pen in the purse to stab them down for time. Stop, and just stop, for a moment while living to make a mention of the wonder that is life. Stop and then move on to reflect on learning and living.

Take out the pen and wear out the ink. Traits of civilizations include record keeping. High levels of society must remember to not forget. Beauty makes the time last longer.

Potato Greens