April 2nd

This is a post that I typed at by CBT site. April 2nd:

So these last 12 days haven’t been as hard as everyone said it would be; but there have still been some hard days. Its as if sometimes the language just clicks and other days I’m so tempted to just lock myself in my room and scream! It gets really hard when people just come over to my compound to mock me or laugh at the crazy taobob who has no clue what they’re saying. Sometimes it's hard to laugh at yourself after you're incredibly tired from language class, the heat, and being constantly busy; but 2 minutes later something amazing happens and you forget all about your worries.

So breakdown of whose living in my compound:
sister)Awa - her 2 daughters absa & lena (she’s married to a maribou but lives in our compound)
sister Aicha - 17
brother Mohammed -14
sister Miyrum - 12
brother Gebby - his 2 sons elij & ibrahim- I think I met one of his wives today…I’m not positive though
brother Jom - I don’t even know if this is his name.
One other brother I forgot his name…
Some lady I don’t know her name but her kid Mohammed LOVES me. I want to keep him.
brother Abdou- his daughter Abbi
My 3 moms - Binta, Miyrum, Ramatat
My baaba
Me!!
*No one’s wives live in our compound… I think my brothers might just be here to work and take care of my baaba or they’re looking for new wives. I don’t know what’s going on and I wouldn’t understand their responses so I don’t ask.

Story involving my niece: Abbi whose about 4 years old, tried to beat up a 2 year old for shaking my hand because she doesn’t want to share me and doesn’t like it when other kids want to play with me. So I literally held Abbi back while she was going at this kid full force.

Oh by the way I also live right next to a mosque and the mosques here have surround sound speakers that they blare the prayers on which is soooo loud and theres a feedback noise cuz it’s too loud for the speakers. And I'm in the middle of the market around the corner from my house is the market. So not only are the children pretty intense, the location of my compound is pretty intense as well.

To give you guys a brief overview of my language here are the greetings in Pulaar -- you have to say this in the entirety….
Asalamalakum
-Malkum Salam
No mbad-daa?
-Jam tan
Ada selli?
-Mowdum
No mbadu-daa e ngulaaki?
-Mowdum
No mbadu daa e tempere
-Mowdum
No mbadu daa e golle?
-Mowdum
No galle maa wadi?
-Ebey jam
No baaba maa wadi?
-Omoy jam
No neena maa wadi?
-Omoy jam
No gorko/debbo maa wadi?
-Omoy jam

That’s the greeting. It’s normally mumbled and you’re just responding fine and peace only. Then you can get into the real business of the conversation. I normally just stop at ada selli and my family tries to make me continue but honestly no one is listening, by the way this is a very fast back and forth thing so I could be asking someone these questions and they’ll be asking me at the same time. It’s messy. I normally try to throw a ahumdallah in there after I ask no galle maa wadi to show the people I’m amazing.

Kill record of bugs in my room is 3. But it’s so hot here the cockroachs die just by being in my room so including the cockroachs I didn‘t physically kill I‘ve got 7. And honestly killing 3 bugs aint bad- my room is amazing, one girl had a mouse in her bag and another had a giant rat running around her compound.