"Peace Corps Don't Screen Crazy!"

One of my host uncle's isn't the sharpest tool in the shed (speaking of tools, the Cameroonian axe is a big stick with a steel blade wedged in).  About a month ago, he told me I was a missionary.  He said this because I was reading the Bible.  He obviously couldn't tell the book in my hand wasn't the word of God, but Middlesex, an amazing modern novel about a hermaphrodite.

 

Just a fews days ago, after having an awkward conversation about why I haven't had kids yet and the benefits of having a wife (we've had this conversation before... a couple of times), he then told me he was coming back to America with me.  Needless to say, not a very tactful transition.  Then this past Thursday, he told me I was Chinese.  I said I wasn't, he said I was.  I was having a great time, especially considering that my G-I tract has had a life of its own this whole week and I just wanted to go lie down in my room (without a wife).  A samarai movie came on TV a little later, and I asked my host brother Osuman what movie it was.  He replied, "Chinese."  I just said, "Ahh," and let it go.

 

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I'm getting really anxious about going to post this coming Thursday (I hope to have my new address by Friday).  It's the realization that I'm going to be completely on my own that's making me lose sleep (really, though, I'm not that isolated at all from other PCVs, but still).  It's incredible to me that I'm finally reaching my goal of being a PCV after nearly a year of starting the whole application process.  I knew it was going to hard, but I'm just now realizing that it's going to be f***ing hard (pardon the francais) with stage winding down and thinking about packing up all my stuff again.  However, it is going to be nice to not be living out of my suitcase and having the freedom that attracts people to the Peace Corps in the first place.

 

During the swearing-in ceremony Wednesday morning, each stage (Health - moi - and Agroforestry) are wearing their own matching panyas (spelling is probably wrong, but African fabric is what it is. Talk like Yoda I must.). It's going to be funny... funny-looking.

 

I'll more than likely get the chance to write again before Christmas! Someone send me a bootleg copy of Casino Royale, and sorry if I'm not responding quickly to everyone's emails, I'll get to them eventually, I promise.