Watch the Walk

"I'm not saying this to scare you," my friend started in, but the way she continued seemed like her intention really was to make me afraid of walking home. She told about the "crazy person" who's got a problem with white people and has bothered another friend who lives here. Sometimes he carries a knife. And he's big. And he's not reasonable. This was a bit of a new type of situation to be concerned about. The streets are normally pretty safe for me here. I have to be smart about traffic, and I don't generally go out by myself after 10 PM, but the chances of running into an actual problem have been low. I might be harassed verbally, but I never worry about my physical safety. But men who are mentally ill are a different class of problem. And how did they get that way? "That person stole from his family, his father didn't know he was the thief, so he put a curse on him. And then the guy went crazy." "They used to mix battery aci...

"My sister, I hear that you've changed. Is it true? You're not one of us any more?"   A friend of mine got this call from her brother recently, the call that many people here worry about. Belonging is an important concern here. Each person belongs to a family, to a neighborhood, to a town, and then to different associations or schools or jobs, or whatever. But family comes first. And rejecting family, or being rejected by family, can carry significant consequences for all areas of a person's life. Now, it's been a few years since this friend changed. Her family's known for awhile about it, but in typical island conflict style, they've not raised the issue and she's not addressed it either. This has given her time to learn and grow, to show her new life in the community, and to bond with others who have made the same change in their lives. But now her family is making moves to have a confrontation.  When her brother called, she invited him to come...

The "stop and go" class "Getting started is the hard bit. Once you get going, it gets easier." That's what they say, right? So we put a lot of effort into starting things, anticipating that, once truly begun, they'll carry on easily. But sometimes things that have been going consistently still die easily. The English class that has two holidays in a row-- two days of missed class might mean that it takes two weeks for all the students to show up for class again. Or the work schedule that is consistently going well, and then someone is sick. And then another person is sick. And next thing you know it's been three weeks since everyone was at work on the same day. Or maybe a goal that you set forth: good habits you want to adopt or bad habits you want to drop. A couple of failures can stop the momentum and then... you're fighting inertia instead of just riding the wave of your success. As Simon Mignolet said, "Momentum is an amazing thing when it i...

  The stack "So you'll get there, and you'll see a veranda, and a stool or chair in the corner. Put your passport on the stool." I'm currently waiting on the bigger island for a flight to mainland Africa, but in these times we live in a negative Covid test is required before boarding that flight. That type of testing isn't available on my island, and same-day testing isn't available even here on the bigger island, so I had to come three days ahead of time to get tested. At 7am I went to the testing site, where they'd taken over a malaria project's compound to handle Covid testing for travelers. Sure enough, there was a veranda, a few chairs, and one stool in the corner with two passports on it.  I put my passport on the stack. More people came, more passports were added to the stack. Eventually someone showed up for work and took the stack inside, but more passports were quickly added to the stool. "Thrilled" to travel  Since I was sittin...

We often say that island life is more chill and easy-going than life back in the US. But there are times when it seems like the entire place is holding their collective breath, waiting for a real or metaphorical storm to pass. It depends on the time, but typically it's one of two things: A cyclone is coming. or  Political problems are anticipated.  It's interesting to note that the things we do to prepare are pretty similar: we stock up on phone credit, make sure we've got supplies for a few days of staying home, and pay attention to reports of what's going on. This time it was politics that caused the concern. The rotation of political power between islands has been disrupted and a significant date was approaching. Neighbors and friends were on high alert, encouraging caution in going out, keeping a good amount of supplies at home, and telling us to be careful. The significant date came and went... there were some days with extra military presence, quieter mornings as ...

There's a certain class of comment that is common on Clove Island, but rare in the US. Besides the ubiquitous questions about marriage, islanders also like to talk about weight gain and weight loss. They notice slight differences in arms, faces, collar bones that show or not, and of course how you fit your clothes. But weight gain isn't generally viewed in a negative light on the island. A woman who is plump is seen as being in good health, but a woman who is skinny is a subject of concern: - is she getting enough food? - is she worried about things and not eating? - is she being worked too hard? Homemade dumbbells - is she sick with a health condition that prevents her from keeping weight on? And it's not a taboo topic like it is in the US. In English classes here we teach how to describe people, but we've also learned to clarify to students that calling someone fat isn't considered a compliment. I can't tell you the number of times I've had students descri...

It's always better to do work projects together. Well, in island thinking, anyway. And I get it. A lot of activities require some step that is just plain labor intensive. For example, the other day I was learning to make these lovely snacks: Bhajias I'd arranged with a friend who would teach me to make bhajias, I'd gathered a group of friends to all learn together, and our "teacher" had told me the things to have on hand:   - small red beans   - onion   - garlic   - eggs   - spices   - oil for frying She told me to soak the beans the night before, so they'd cook well on the day of. The ladies all gathered, and 10 minutes after the appointed time I called our "teacher" to make sure she was on her way. She was, but she said we could get started before she got there. "Take the skins off the beans" she said. The skins... off the beans? I verified. Yep, that's what she'd said. So we spent the next hour and a half peeling 1 pound of littl...