Just passed the year mark of official volunteerdom this August! Here's what I've been busy with, and what I plan for next year.

Justifying my existence thus far:

-Home visits to ~40 people to discuss malaria prevention, nutrition, and water sanitation

- CPC (weekly baby weighing) with causeries (info sessions) on malaria, ORS, and how to read your baby's growth chart.

-CPN (prenatal consultations) - I'm not super useful here unless there are lots of women - in which case I take down their weight and blood pressure.

-Work with church youth group (Abstinence talk), and women's group (how to make citronella lotion)

-Work with hairdressers and barber's guild - how to make citronella lotion (also I am learning to braid)

-Taught 2 people to play chess

-Science camp for girls in Assoukoko and Tchifama (Kara's village) - 32 girls total

-Planted 40 moringa trees, but only 2 survived

-Guest lectures on menstruation, condom use, and ORS in Kara's village

-Trained women's group of Atchintse (neighboring village) to make citronella lotion

-Helped label and organize books and paint a sign for the newly opened Pagala library

-Info session on mosquito nets in Alele (neighboring village)

-Chaperoned in "Take our Daughters to Work Week" with volunteers in my region

-Designed t-shirts for the above and a handwashing awareness set of soccer matches

-Elected co-editor and small village correspondent for the PC Togo health work journal "Et la Sante?" Wrote one article and a radio station guide.

-Was a Camp UNITE counselor.

-Swam in a river and maybe have snail fluke disease

-Own a pet cat named Courage (coo-raj)

-Drank a lot of tchouk

-Visited Dapaong, Agou, Atakpame, Sotouboua, Lome and volunteers in my area

-Had 3 visitors survive

-Read over 100 books

Goals you can hold me accountable for:

-Continue home visits - at least 50

-Continue CPC - do at least 20 causeries

-Continue work with workshops and church groups: making citronella candles, Diarrhea prevention and ORS, Family planning, Enriched flour (like a protein mix).

-Plant 50 moringa trees that live long enough to leave the nursery

-Start an English Club at the CEG (middle school)

-Start a Science Club at the CEG

-Start a Chess Club with random people I meet at tchouk stands.

- World AIDS Day condom distribution at tchouk stands and training of tchouk vendors to explain condom use.

-National Science Camp co-coordinator

-Be a better co-editor for et la sante (i.e. do more than write one article)

-Look into building pump(s)

-Research traditional birth attendants and (hopefully) coordinate a training for them

-Have a stamp made

-Make a Fulani Barbie

-Walk to the River Assoukokonu and the forest

-Live in Yegue for a week

-Take the life size inflatable skeleton on a bush taxi ride

-Have another visitor survive

... a great many of these goals were conceived of and will be completed with Kara, the volunteer in Tchifama, and Maurice and Jean, the affairs social and conseil agricole boys of Assoukoko. Hooray for collaboration!

So... in collaboration with the Girls' Education and Empowerment volunteer 33 km from me, I am in the planning stages for making 2 science clubs - one in my village and one for hers. I could blog about what it'll be like, but why do that when I could just post the letter I just emailed out to potential donors?

What: Science clubs with the objective of teaching students to think critically about the world around them through experimentation and observation (at each session an experiment will be conducted and discussed). The first few sessions will focus on the experimental method (how to write a hypothesis, procedure, etc) and afterwards sessions will depend on what materials are available, but we hope to incorporate a wide variety of subjects - astronomy, physiology, ecology, chemistry... anything fun and informative.

Where: Assoukoko and Tchifama, 2 small, rural, villages in the southern Centrale region of Togo.

Who: 30 students aged 12-16 from the local middle schools (15 per village - all the students from Tchifama will be girls). The students will be nominated by their professors.

When: Bimonthly meetings beginning September 2010.

Why: We feel that it,s very important for students to have the opportunity to have hands on time in the sciences. Because class sizes here start at 60 students, lessons are understandably focused on memorization, and students are not familiar with interactive methods of learning (and this is often the most memorable part of science classes for US students).

How you can help: We are starting from scratch! If you have suggestions, templates, ideas or materials for experiments that you or your organization would be willing to share, they would be most welcome. (Togo is a french speaking country, but we would be able to translate from english).

...end professionalism:Other things I've done this trip (to the capital) include getting a Ghana visa, buying soy sauce, eating cheese, drawing pictures for a health brochure another volunteer is working on (including a picture of people using a condom), filling out my work reports, gone to planning meeting for a 'take out daughters to work day' and other odds and ends. I miss village.PS I have pet kitten! Her name is courage - COO-RAJ (french) and she is part raccoon and yowls a lot and has scared the mice all out of my part of the house. I'm a little obsessed with her...

Dispensaire = rural health center.

Here is what the dispensaire chez moi is like:

Rooms:

2 Get well/rest rooms

Birth room

Bandaging room

Pre-natal consult room

General consult room

Social affairs office

Pharmacy

People:

MAJOR = head nurse

MATRON = midwife

GERANT = pharmacist

AFFAIRS = social affairs worker

That,s not a whole ton of people, considering our dispensaire serves 7 villages.

Their jobs overlap a lot, whoever is in town takes care of everyone that comes in.

Also there are about 14 ASCs (community health workers) in the area (2 per village) they go on medicine distributing campaigns, record deaths and births, and meet in assoukoko once a month for training and reporting.

Top three reasons people visit our disp =

palu (malaria. we have rapid tests, but the staff don,t like to waste them, so almost all illnesses with fever are called and treated as malaria)

accidents (moto, machete, burns etc)

babies (pre natal consultations, birthing, growth monitoring)

While I have internet, here's what happened last time I was in Pagala (stitches time doesn't count).

November 21 -

Up to the car port in Assoukoko - only one car waiting to go to Pagala, so I got in and waited for it to load up with market women and their market goods. 15 minutes later the driver of the mazda pequod (the usual bush taxi I take) drove up, and, seeing me in his rival's car shouts: OHHH! the women in the car around me titter. He gets out and strides over to my window.

"Madame!" he says, "tu m'as lassier?" you have left me?

"Well where the hell were you?" I ask politely.

"You should have waited" he says, shaking his head mournfully. and with that he throws his hand over his heart and stalks back to his car.

Got dropped off at the post office to mail my letters and waited there an hour while my phone was charging. Also picked up the peace corps mail to take to Emily's house. wait there for an hour reading while my phone charges.

The post offices are all painted bright yellow and blue.

Met Emily and Grant at Plaisir's (the bar in Pagala) and we had beer and Emily drew on Bienvenue, the little girl there (Emily carries around permanent markers for the sole purpose of drawing monocles and mustaches on people. sometimes pipes). Emily also gave me a "Property of Robbie" tattoo to stop Plaisir's advances. We eat egg sandwiches for dinner.

Moto-ed back to her house through the crowded market. My moto driver dropped me off and began to spout English phrases to me, ending with: "I love you...ok?"

"Um..." I point to my tattoo and say: "I'm married"

He looks at it and nods thoughtfully, "Ok. Just a little then."

November 22 -

Woke up confused as to why the spot of light in the room was at my feet instead of my head, where the window in Assoukoko is. Fenway, Emily's dog, sees me sit up groggily and stands to attention outside the screen door. I fall back asleep.

Eat BLUEBERRY pancakes for breakfast (Emily had freeze dried blueberries sent from the states and apparently adding vinegar makes them into buttermilk pancakes - WHO KNEW? She has agreed that I can be her kitchen apprenti). We go to her savings and loans meeting and it is comedy of errors as per usual.

We are also going to Lassa (small village north of her) this afternoon for another savings and loans meeting. She brings Marie, a woman who was in her first group who agreed to help translate for the newbies. As we are leaving a guy carrying a platter of food bumps into Marie and spills it down her front. She gives him a vrai death glare and goes back to change outfits. So we are late. But it doesn't matter because none of the women are there yet. Lassa is a ghost town! We wander through, half expecting to see tumbleweeds cross our path. Finally we find the house of one of the women, which is also a tchouk stand. She gives us the universal : 'Oh Crap. I completely spaced this out' look and we wait there while she changes.

A man comes up and says: "welcome to our African village. This is an African home. Try this African drink."

I do not want tchouk on an empty stomach, so I decline.

"You need this. You need to experience Africa." he persists.

Emily and I exchange long suffering glances and I try to explain that I drink tchouk morning, noon, and night chez moi and she goes off to torment the crowd of children that has gathered. She mimes ninja moves at them, and as we walk back to the meeting house, women in tow, she picks up a little girl.

"J'ai volu l'enfant" she announces I have stolen the child.

The crowd follows, including the little girl's increasingly nervous older brother.

When we reach the meeting house he pipes up bravely, "Give her back"

Emily takes a menacing step toward him and arches her eyebrow: "You want to save your sister?"

He takes a hasty step back and the crowd of enfants jeers, so he stands his ground and, impressed by his fratenal devotion and bravery, Emily returns his sister to him.

The meeting is the first this group has had - in order to explain what a savings and loans group is, and what they'll need to do to form one (materials to buy, the roles needed - president, secretary, money-counters) etc. I am jealous-hopeful while watching the meeting. I'm jealous because Emily is awesome at this. and hopeful that with time so I will be.

We walk back to Pagala, arriving just before dark. Exhausted, we collapse at Plaisir's and split a coca-cola. Somehow end up dancing the chicken dance with the women and children in the bar. Make our escape, buying ginger for our sauce for dinner tonight. The kitchen apprentisage continues.

Si: Have they given you an estimate for how long you're staying? Or is it pretty much wait and knee?

I am still STILL in the med unit because my knee is not a super speedy gonzales on the stopping oozing front. It's more of a mosey gonzales. I soak it and bleed it and wash it and iodine/antibac cream it and bandage it and it gets better a bit each day.

I am earning lots of jealousy from the other volunteers for getting to stay in the med unit. There is a girl with dysentery here and she only got to stay one night in the med unit before they moved her out into a hotel. She glares at me when she sees me. She is probably glaring at me through the wall right now. I would glare at me too. Cause come on, dysentery vs. wounded knee??

I need to go back to village. am getting cabin fever something fierce. Even the availability of cheese, internet and hot showers cannot alter it.

Still in the med unit. STILL. Because my knee keeps leaking? and my ankle keeps swelling.

Every day I get it cleaned out by the very patient Peace Corps Medical Officer.

Everyday she says : "Sorry, sorry, I'm trying to be gentle"

And everyday I reply: "mphghghgh" because my knuckles are lodged in my mouth to keep me from hollering.

It always disturbs me to see her reach for the tweezers and scissors to cut the scabs and fatty tissue buildup off, but today we reached a new level of panic when she said pensively: "I want to make it bleed. There is not enough blood flow here." I must have looked like she'd just proposed amputating my leg because she continued: "if it doesn't bleed it can't heal." ...This time I fit most of my arm up into my mouth. I wish...I wish she wouldn't tell me these things. I can take pain (well...sort of), I just can't take my imagination.

It is getting better though! Petit a' petit. She put sugar in it yesterday and that seemed to help. Also I've been soaking it. Hopefully Tuesday.

I feel like such a slouch being here. I want to go back to village. There is only so much facebook one can take before becoming unhinged.

...went to the wrong damn Easley.

"Subsumed by the raw, frigid waters, Oliver gave up. His fatigued muscles slackened; each vertebra meekly surrendered. Poseidon’s swells tightened around Oliver’s limbs like a giant fist shaking up at the sky in victory. Oliver’s face was vacant and tilted downwards. Through apathetically parted lids, he watched as funnels of dark flotsam channeled toward the beckoning sea floor. "

Note: Nothing to do with Togo and everything to do with drowning.

Happy December! I like welcoming this month with a bit of melancholy.

I was allowed outside the med unit walls today and used said freedom to go to the museum. A real live museum! Credit placement: Justin found it online. Why didn't we come here during stage? This would have been a nice compliment to the history lecture we got.

What's inside?

- Musical instruments (metal bells of different shapes, drums AND a large gongophone which you the tourist are allowed to play. It's like a piano made with metal bells. Justin did Fur Elise.)

- Pipes (some with long stems covered in fur, some with 2 or 3 holes for tobacco, some carved to look like little people)

- Weapons (spears, long rifles, and the charming 'head-breakers' that look a little like wooden ice picks)

- Pottery, Statuettes, Farming tools, and other things ubiquitous to this type of museum.

- 5 Taxidermied animals - 2 little crocodiles, 2 weasely cat things, and a hawk.

- Pictures of men with impressive facial hair from the colonial era

- Artifacts from the slave trade

-Some awesome woven hats.

- An old price list in English and French a hundred plus years old that looks suspiciously like my current shopping lists. Oranges, Yams, Sheep (ok that's not on my list) and even Tchouk (Pitto in english??).

Overall a fun time. and only 1,000 to get in.

The local languages in Assoukoko are Kabye, Ewe, Kotokoli, Bassar, Moba, Akebu and one I think I'm forgetting. I learned some Ewe during stage, and I'm continuing lessons with that as well as learning Kabye.

(p.s. kabye is great. in kabye 'serpent' is pronounced 'doom', and sheep is 'hey you' (with female sheep being 'hey you hallo'...these are obv. not the appropriate spellings).)

Anyway, during my last Kabye lesson we got on the subject of sourcery. This is how it happened (in French):

Me: "How do you say 'I'm afraid' in Kabye?"

Teacher: "Oh, you don't need to be afraid."

M: "But just for fun - how would I say it -"

T: "There is nothing to fear here. You can walk alone at night, no problem."

M: "Yes I know, I feel very safe"

T: "But don't go off the main path on dark nights."

M: "Yeah, cause I'd get lost"

T: "Also there are people who would take your blood."

M: "Yea- ...wait WHAT?"

T: "People who take blood."

M: "But - - - like vampires?"

T: "No, no there are no vampires in Assoukoko"

M: "Then who - why -bwahhh?"

T: "People who murder people in the night to take their blood from them and sell it."

M: "Here? Often?"

T: "Last week, on the road to Atchintse (3.5 km away - I've walked that road!!)

M: "But why? who would they sell blood to?"

T: "We-ell...here in Africa...we have lots of sourcerers."

M: "We don't have sourcerers in the U.S."

T: "Oh there are lots in Assoukoko. You can't tell by looking at them, of course. One man here, he eats and chats with us just like a normal man. But when he says someone will die, they die. I will show him to you."

M: "Um...thanks."

T: *takes a jar off his desk and opens it* "See this? A sourcerer can take your soul from you and put it in a jar and seal it and then you cannot breathe and you die." he then provides an alternate explanation for torcicollo - a sourcerer puts a rock on an image of you and you can't turn your head.

M: "But how do they get your soul out? Do they have to touch you?"

T: "No no, they will come outside your window at night and call it out of you. If you feel something pulling your soul out at night you need to pray very hard. That is why we go to church. Jesus' blood is the only thing to protect from sourcery. You must come to church with me this sunday."

M: *sigh*

Older volunteers had recommended that I just say my church is in the U.S. and people will leave me alone about religion. But I really wanted to be an ambassador for atheism, so I made the grave mistake of trying to explain what that is to people in village. The most common response after my patient explanation of what atheist means and why I am one (simply: my parents are, it's common in the U.S.) is a thunderous look accompanied by a IL FAUT ETRE CATHOLIQUE. (you MUST be catholic). Lesson learned - Lie.

I only brought two books with me, and the choice was agony. 'If you had to be stranded on a desert island and could only have twoooo books', being my approach.

There is a 'top 100 novels' list taped to one of the bookcases in the Atakpame transit house and I perused it in that faintly smug way, mentally ticking off ones I've read. Then I saw its provenance. TATTERED COVER. Whaaaaaaaaaaaaa? I hopped up and down for a moment, making squeaking noises, eyes bulging, then ran outside and drag fellow Coloradans over to look.

This was more pleasing to me than

I thought I'd be the only volunteer who'd think to bring Dante's Inferno? 3 copies I've found so far. Moby Dick? 2 copies! I even found The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, which I'd been on the verge of asking mom to send me.

August

Interesting Times (Pratchett)

Haroun and the Sea of Stories (Rushdie)

September

Mosquito (Spielman)

Moby Dick (Melville)

Roughing It (Twain)

Life of Pi (Martel)

October

The Historian (Kostova)

Origin of Species (Darwin)

Selected Poetry (Tennyson)

November

Persuasion (Austen) Physics of Xmas (Highfield)Pillars of the Earth (Follet) Fall on Your Knees (MacDonald)Wild Thoughts from Wild Places (Quammen)

Lust for Life (Stone)

Me Talk Pretty One Day (Sedaris)

When you are Engulfed in Flames (Sedaris)

Prodigal Summer (Kingsolver)

Murder on the Leviathan (Akunin)

Jingo (Pratchett)

Lords and Ladies (Pratchett)

Reaper Man (Pratchett)

Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)

Soul Music (Pratchett)

Candide (Voltaire)

Into the Wild (Krakaeur)

I'm here in Lome the same time that many volunteers are C.O.S.ing (close of service-ing) and it is bizarre to talk to people who will be HOME in less than 48 hours. So alien in fact that these volunteers feel like a different species to me. I can only look at them in wonder as people who don't feel they need to stock up on snickers bars just because they are in the capital.

It's got me thinking. Time is warped here - the days, the hours, crawl laboriously by like an exhausted man in the desert. But the weeks, and especially the months come rushing into my life and back out again like trying to cross a busy street.

There are Things I have to do before I leave here.

Because, I don't know if you knew this about me, because I am fond of making lists and resolutions, I have written the following down:

ToGo ToDo:

Work:

Complete at least several of these projects (and others, as they come up):

- Moringa -

- Find moringa growers in Assoukoko and see who would be willing to make and sell moringa powder. DONE

- Call a village meeting and give a presentation on the benefits of moringa (its leaves have numerous vitamins and minerals) to encourage people to buy. Was supposed to happen tomorrow, but I'm stuck here at the med unit.

- Plant at least 25 new moringa trees (have to wait for the rainy season this spring)

- Repeat in surrounding villages (Atchintse and Alele)

- CPC (baby weighings)-

- Assist with the CPC every week. DOING

- At the beginning of each CPC do a causerie (presentation) about health topics (nutrition, breastfeeding, family planning, handwashing, dairrhea, AIDS prevention, malaria prevention...)

- Do similar presentations every week at CPN (Prenatal consulations)

- C.E.G. (The middle school) -

- Form and train a group of peer educators (basically, students who are interested in learning more about health, and are then willing to train and do presentations for their peers).

- Form an English club or tutor for English class

- Savings & Loans Group -

- This is more the realm of business volunteers, but it is something the president of women wanted to do and that I think would be beneficial. Basically, form a group of 15-20 women who save collectively and from there can take out loans for business ventures etc. I've tagged along to some of Emily's meetings with her groups to see how it runs and she has said she'll help me with this.

- Library -

- Emily found a locked room with over a hundred books that used to be Pagala's library. She has figured out a way to employ a librarian and to keep the library open so that it can be used again without books getting stolen / things falling to disrepair. Because I have Library Experience, I've asked if I can help work on cataloging the books etc.

Currently (since I have internet access) am looking up cataloging/check out processes advice. Will also ask help from Dr. Flachman when I write next.

-Health Book-

-Ben is putting together a health manual based on 'where there is no doctor' for local community health workers. I offered help since I'd like to be able to use it in Assoukoko as well, and so we've split up topics. I'm working on hygiene and sanitation, nutrition, pregnancy, and childhood (the last one I'm a bit vague on still).

So far it's in outline stage, next comes french translations, then typing it up, putting in pictures, and printing and binding.

Togo:

- Be at least minimally conversational in Ewe and Kabye

- Take pictures of Assoukoko, Pagala, and Atakpame

- Visit Dapaong

- Buy 30 pagne as gifts for people at home. Try to find beads.

- Have at least 7 skirts made to wear in the states to the embarrassment of my dad

- Visit the national museum

- Go on a very long walk (maybe to Ghana?)

- Get a scar. DONE.

- Finish a bowl of fufu. DONE.

Free Time Self Improvement:

- Learn French to near fluency -

- Try out 100 recipes, at least a few in a Dutch Oven

- Read more Classics

- Study the A.P. Bio and A.P. Art History guides mom sent me

*I have decided that I want to be a high school biology teacher, with a possible art history elective. So I should prob have some idea what I'll be teaching.

Now that my house is more or lessish furnished, I'm trying to track expenses. Thus far I have:

An average week:

in Assoukoko:

8 smallish onions - 200 cfa10 cloves garlic - 100 cfa

12 bananas - 100 cfa

4 oranges - 100 cfa

4 sachets of bouille - 200 cfa

8 beignets - 200 cfa 1 cup rice - 100 cfa1 bag pasta - 300 cfa5 eggs - 500 cfaFried bananas - 100 cfa

Soja (tofu) - 150 cfa

6 packs Biscuits - 300 cfa

Sugar - 100 cfa

1/2 cup peanut butter - 150 cfa

Water fetched from pump - 200 cfa

3 hrs Ewe and Kabye lessons - 3000 cfa

I go to Pagala every other week(ish) to stock up on stuff, enjoy big town living:

Ride to Pagala and back: 3,000 cfaDrink(s) at Plaisir's (the bar in Pagala) - 800 cfaPhone cards - 2,000 cfaStamps for letters - 1,250 cfa *please notice that I spend more money on stamps than on beerBatteries (radio) - 600 cfa16 candles - 700 cfaToilet paper - 150 cfa Loaf of bread - 200 cfaBox oatmeal - 800 cfaBox matches - 10 cfaSomething for whatever Emily is cooking (ginger, most recently) - 150 cfa

*I've bought flour, salt, margarine, vinegar, oil, and powdered milk in bulk here so they aren't in the weekly expenses

...it's just that the med unit has internet and so all my posts are done when I'm here.

I was supposed to be helping slaughter a turkey today. But the gods have sent me a very clear THOU SHALT REMAIN VEGETARIAN message when they crashed the moto I was riding to Pagala to do the aforementioned.

We were tilting and then suddenly I was sideways and taking body part inventory - head, torso, arms, legs, check check check, ch-ohhhhhugh.

I stood up and brushed myself off. I said something manly and tough. I then carried the driver the remaining 40 km to pagala, where I stitched my own leg back on with dental floss, using only a few moringa leaves as painkiller. Then I killed a turkey.

Is what I would write if I lived like I daydreamed. As it turns out, I'm kindof a wimp.

So, take two:

Sat up, saw that my knee was looking a little...um...ohmygod blood. Took off my socks and made a bandage with them. The driver told me to get back on the moto, we have to go to the health center. Isn't there a car we can call? can't we wait for a car? I babbled, notes of hysteria sliding into my voice as I looked at the moto and contemplated getting back on. Wiped my face nervously and got blood all over it. Hadn't noticed my arm was bleeding.

Luckily for me, the moto wouldn't start.

Then the chief rode by on his moto and yelled at the driver, and told me he would personally take me to the dispensaire (health center) back in Assoukoko. You can't turn down a ride with the chief, so I climbed on. We got within 7 km of Assoukoko when we ran into another moto going the other direction.

Maybe it's better if you go to the hospital in Pagala, the Chief decided. So I switched again, got on the other moto and we began to drive back toward Pagala. At one point the driver left me on the side of the road because he had to go back and get something. and I stood for 10 minutes on the empty road looking at the tall grass and feeling extremely sorry for myself.

An hour later we arrived in Pagala where the doctor pronounced stitches.

I've never had stitches. I'm sorry America, I did not give the impression that we're super tough when it comes to things medical. Luckily, Emily was there to meet me and sat with me the whole time letting me crush her hand and sniffle while they cleaned it up, stitched it up. She asked if this is my way of getting out of doing Thanksgiving dishes? and she drew a turkey on my bandage.

The hospital didn't have the antibiotic I needed, so Emily found me a car and I went to Lome. where I am now. My xrays came back to say: nothing broken, you are a big baby.

But no one needs to know any of that.

All they need to know is:

oh man! where did that scar come from?.

.. Africa

During preservice training there is a week long visit to post. I didn,t have a stove and was scared of street food, and consequently ate biscuits and peanut butter every meal that week. I came back thin enough to frighten my host mom into giving me cooking lessons.

Now I am older and wiser and easily navigate the street (yes, just one) of Assoukoko.

And here is what I find:

At night:

Bouille = hot porridge. bag = 25cfa, 50cfa if you get peanuts in it

Koliko = like french fries.ish. Sold with spaghetti and piment sauce for 100cfa a bowl

Egg Sandwiches = an omlette in bread. Served with hot chocolate. 350cfa. DELICIOUS. I thought this was only available in towns until about a month ago when my counterpart casually pointed out the place. Also found out only last month that he speaks English. What next? He,s going to tell me he has internet?

Mornings/Midday:

Rice with piment sauce

Beignets = fried balls of dough. 25cfa each

Soja = tofu with piment ginger sauce. 25cfa each.

Togo tots = mantioch tater tots. 25cfa for 4

Peanut toffee sticks

I haven,t found fufu in village and I sort of miss it. My neighbor sells pate, but it is fermented eugh

Fruits

Oranges, Bananas = billions

Grapefruit, not sold on the street, but found someone with a tree and they let me take them

Coconut on market days

Mangoes and avocados but not currently in season

Drinks

tchouk= the only thing available 24.7 in town. Warm mill beer, more on that later

Can get coca cola, fanta and beer from the bar across the street from me, but don,t.

Learning to cook with the help of the volunteers around me, especially Emily in Pagala, and the PCV Togo cookbook Where there is no Whopper.

I,d given myself up for lost, doomed to a life of ramen and restaurants, when I had a realization:

Cooking isn,t all or nothing. Edibility has amaaaazing range. So if it doesn,t make me gag and doesn,t make me violently ill (a little bowel trouble is of course to be expected), it,s a win! I have an infinitely forgiving palette. I know that I,m new at this and working without grocery stores, or electricity (did you know that eggs don,t need to be refrigerated? for up to 3 weeks? amazing!), or spatulas, or wikipedia (for mystery words like simmer) So I,ll get better. Ca va aller.

I can't receieve texts from the states, which is a shame. But other volunteers keep my thumbs occupied often enough. . .

EL: While you have computer access, can you print a copy of the words to "Twas the night before Christmas"?

EL: What do the Togolese call the metal thing you cook on?

B: Ok, recipe this week: 1 large onion, 1 cup uncooked rice, 2 cups water, 1 magi cube, 3 cloves garlic. Cut up vegetables, put eveything in a pot. boil until rice is tender. done! other volunteers are worried about my lack of cooking skills.

EP: I just agreed to go on a date with the Togocell guy if he makes my cell tower work. He has fewer than the normal number of teeth.

Ca: Moringa is coming to Colorado!

EL: Margarine will last til your close of service date or death. whichever comes first.

B: How do I keep compost from smelling?

Ca: Damian says don't get robbed in Ghana! in response to my text about getting rob at the ghana airport in May

EP: I am in a hatchback riding with 9 people, 5 kids, some sacks of flour, and a cow.

Co: I just had my first fire battle with Lion Ants!

Ca: I saw a vampire child today and thought of you.

Ca: We have three geckos in our house. One of them is named Brunhilde.

K: Is it just me or does it take water forever to boil?

I've gotten some crap for not posting an address, so here is:

Emerson Easley

Corps de la Paix

B.P. 3194

Lome, TOGO

West Africa

All mail goes to the Peace Corps Office, which then sorts it and sends it to our 'clusters' and since I'm in the Pagala cluster (Pagala is the nearest big town), I go there every other week to pick it . This is a 3.5 hour bush taxi ride (7 hrs round trip) or 3 hr round trip moto ride. So on average, it takes me a 3ish weeks to receieve letters, and 2ish weeks for letters I send to arrive. Not bad!

My physical address is something like: Assoukoko, house near where the girl sells the pate in the mornings. You can try googlemapsing that.

If you write me I will write you! But...don't expect awesome stationary with elephants etc on it like Rachael has from Uganda. Notebook paper FTW!

Orientation in Philadelphia. We did not sing camp songs.

Orientation in Lome, June 6th. Learned to bucket bathe.

Training: Language and Technical. 11 weeks, Gbatope, living with host family (mine was the best host family, more on them later)

Swear in: August 20th

Post: Assoukoko: new site in the Pagala cluster, small village, 5 different local languages, mixed religions, in the mountains at the end of an infamous road. Banana availability: awesome. Avocados: rumored. Electricity? Negative. Running water? Negative. Internet availiability: hahahahahahaha. Cell phone coverage: Surprisingly good.

Community Health and AIDS Prevention volunteer. In the 'observation phase' - learning Kabye and Ewe (local languages), improving French (especially Togolese French, the flow of which can best be likened to iambic pentameter). Deciding on possible projects: Nutrition classes for pregnant women and new mothers? Anti-HIV and Reproductive health classes at local middle school? Moringa planting? Possible savings and loans women's group with help from SED volunteer? On va voir.

Basically all you need to know about my past 5 months here.

What am I doing today?

I've had a cough for over three weeks and when I got a fever to go along with it Sunday night I was...overjoyed. I'd thought, in a depressed sort of way, that me being drowsy and lethargic for over the past week was just part of a slow progression into me becoming a terrible volunteer. But now - fever! 101! If these cold war era thermometers from the med kit are to be trusted, this sleeping business could be medical! Consulted the SHIT (Staying Healty in Togo) book and self diagnosed bronchitis and pneumonia. Called the med unit and they told me to come to Lome.

Slightly daunted, I was, but with help from Emily (Pagala volunteer), I figured out how to get there. Got to ride a moto part way, and it is impossible to feel pessimistic on a moto.

In the taxi brusse down the Rue Nacional, the driver pointed out all the potholes and asked if chez moi the roads are like this.

Well, chez moi is Assoukoko, I reply, a touch smugly, so...

Oh man! That road's THE WORST! he supplies, and I'm pleased he knows it.

But he persists: chez vous the real chez vous and I mumble something about when it snows it can get bad.

We arrive in Lome and I step out of the van, to get into a taxi he's hailed for me to get me to the Peace Corps bureau. I walk around one of the driver's apprentices, taking a step onto what appears to be solid, if not littery and a little bit moist ground.

You know where this is going...do you know how deep it's going?

Half up my thigh into an open sewer, a veritable river of filth.

I managed to pull my leg out double time but my shoe decided to stay put. If it were a tapette (flip flop) I'd have left the damn thing, but I'm wearing my Keens because they don't allow tapettes in the peace corps offices. I cannot afford to lose half my Keens. Stared a moment at the black sludge in horror, and braced myself to fish it out. The driver saw me move for it and blocked me, making his poor apprentice get it for me. I stood there on the side of the road, one leg and half my skirt covered in...something far too foul smelling to be toxic waste alone, shoeless, trembling, watched by all the passengers in the bush taxi, protesting, trying not to cry as I watched the apprentice fish out 3 other poor lost shoes before finding mine and all the while laughing hysterically at myself inside my head. I could not have dreamt up a funnier welcome to the capital.

The taxi driver took me to the bureau, filth and all and I cheered myself up by trying out my Kabye language lessons on him. All I said was "Thank You" and "See you" but he smiled like mad and said: "You speak Kabye!" I shrugged modestly (haha) and felt very pleased. I may smell to high heaven, but look how well integrated I am linguisitically!

The happiness melted away when I entered the offices. Everything here, everyone here, is so SHINY and CLEAN and PERFECT. I felt like a monster. Did Marat feel this way after a jaunt in the Paris sewers? No one visibly recoiled at the sight of me, bless them.

I slunk into one of the positively spotless bathrooms (complete with flushing toilet and OH MY GOD a sink) and tried desperately to wash my skirt and shoes. It just made them muddier, and if possible, smellier.

Resigned, I went up to the office and ran into the medical secretary, who is one of the top ten most beautiful women I have ever met. She looked especially fresh today, wearing lilac pumps and a flowery spring dress.

"Emerson!" she says, looking genuinely pleased to see me though I only met her once at orientation, "welcome!"

The fact that this lovely person knows my name and is stooping to talk to me makes me feel all the worse. She shows me my room - it is perfect and beautiful, sky blue sheets, pink covers, cold tile floors, a bathroom with a shower HOT WATER INCLUDED, and mirror.

The med unit cook comes and asks me what I'd like for lunch. I am dizzied.

Not only am I too filthy to be here, I am nowhere ill enough to be here. This should be reserved for PCVs on their deathbed.

My cough is behaving like that frog from the cartoon with the guy...you know? Guy finds an amazing singing dancing frog, but whenever he rushes to show someone it acts like a normal frog. I scold my cough fursiously on the way to the exam room You behave now, damnit! I brought you all this way to meet the med staff and you'd better come out and introduce yourself. If you can interject yourself into all my language lessons and talk to me all night long, you can certainly make an appearance now.

The nurse does her best to make me feel that them putting me up is worthwhile. "We'll get you something to treat your acne (which I hadn't mentioned) while you're here too!" she says brightly.

PCVs that have come down here in the past 3 month have come for: dysentary, malaria, monkey bites, blister beetle, fainting, moto accidents...what did you go or emerson?

Oh...I had a cough and acne.

I'm here! Filling up paper journals to be eventually loaded when internet is closer, stronger, faster, better.

I wasn't going to post more about movies, this being a travel (eh) blog and all, but to be fair, Angels and Demons has an awful lot of Rome in it. I...I have seen it 3 times now.

I know that as an Art History major I have a duty to shun Dan Brown - but he put Ewan McGregor in a - what was that? a cassock? something priestly. WHO CAN RESIST?

Plus, this is a movie I saw with Rob, and afforded probably the only opportunity in the history of movies for me to gloat over the uselessness of physicists vs. art historians (though, thanks a lot Hanks, for confirming the pompous bastard stereotype for us).

My second favorite character was the assassin, which I feel should worry me. But doesn't. I just have an appreciation for efficiency.

Saw the Decemberists last night at the Fillmore.

Are they just...the best? I'm not much of a concert goer (donating those genes graciously to Si), so usually when I go to a concert it's a tagging along with friends sort of concert of convenience (exception MIKA). The stage set was pretty, the lights were great, omg his voice is better in person. And, on whole, they are more rockin' live. They played my favorite song (We both go down together) towards the end, followed by my second and third favorites (O, Valencia and Yankee Bayonet). Che bello.

The crowd was ughgghghguihhghtiygh. But that was bound to happen.

Stood on the floor up close for awhile, but began to get crowdaphobic. Would have probably stood it out anyway if it weren't for the fact that some goddamn tub of lard standing in front of me lit up a bong. I moved squeamishly away from him. Then two more people scooted in front of me and lit up theirs, so I fled - taking comfort in imagining them all being tasered to smithereens by security. I hadn't brought a change of clothes for work the next day - going to a middle school to help give a lecture about HIV prevention - and damned if I was going to show up smelling like skunk.

This is a Sperm Whale Jaw (at the Field Museum). HUGE, right? Did you know they only have teeth on their lower jaw? I did not know this.

Si is posing under it for scale. She is reading Moby Dick in her English class (Oceanic America), and had me read it since I wanted to sit in on the class while visiting. (BTW - the class was held in special collections, which has one of the first editions, signed by Melville to a friend he whaled with. I covertly stroked Melville's signature and got magic word power from the contact - I'm waiting to use it for something fantastic.)

I say "magic word power" because ...

"In bony, ribby regions of the earth, where at the base of high broken cliffs masses of rock lie strewn in fantastic groupings upon the plain, you will often discover images as of the petrified forms of the Leviathan partly merged in grass, which of a windy day breaks against them in a surf of green surges. "

How lovely is that? This is a man who knows how to wield language. This happens, like, every chapter. me swooning.

Whales scare the beejeepers me, but I'm sympathetic to their cause in an abstract 'yes, whaling is bad' sort of way. But I still found myself rooting for these fools aboard the Pequod.

In a MASH-O game played later that night, my profession was 19th century whaler, and I died, fittingly, on a shipwreck. Woot.

The Hall of Plants is my favorite part of the Field Museum. It's not for everyone, in fact, it may be the least popular exhibit there. Which meeeeans that it is devoid of the swarms of low-attention-spanned humans with their whining kids demanding ever more interactive and flashy exhibits? *runs over to it* (Ok, so, I like working in the aforementioned flashy exhibits, but when I visit a museum I go to relax. I want to quietly contemplate curiosities. I want to stroll around with a man in a top hat saying things like "How very odd," perhaps whipping out my monocle for a closer look. It's a tragic case of born in the wrong damn century.)

It is a dimly lit hall with rows and rows of good old-fashioned glass-case displays presenting all manner of - take a wild guess here - plant life.

Generally the case has a few different specimens of the plant, along with some information and examples of what it is used for.

Like so: Btw - how creeptastic is Si?

We especially liked the case with peyote cacti, opium plants, ergot and mushrooms (We'd both taken Biological Poisons and Toxins for our Bio elective).

Oooo the carnivorous plants case was also fun to stop by.

We saw soapberry bushes, breadfruit and jackfruit, and learnt that mangoes are related to poison ivy. For my birthday Si had given me the book Fruit Hunters - the exhibit made for a very nice companion, since the book doesn't have pictures.

Also there are dioramas, which, frankly, will never get old.

These cliff dwellings were built about 800 years ago by a people called the Anasazi (No. Anasazi is a Navajo word meaning 'ancient enemy' so now to be PC we blandly call them 'Ancestral Pueblans' instead.)

They only lived here for about 100 years before VANISHING! (No, they did not vanish. They migrated further south and became the Hopi and Zuni tribes of Arizona and New Mexico).

We don't know why they left! Maybe there was a plague...of ZOMBIES! Maybe aliens abducted them! (No. They probably left because there had been a series of unfortunate droughts and so they went in search of better food / water prospects. There is no evidence of violent deaths - and especially no bodies found with the brains destroyed).

It seems that between the tour I took in 5th grade and the one I took last week, archaelogists have done their darndest to make things less ineresting.

Still, a beautiful place. Rob and I climbed down to the Cliff Palace, Balcony House, and Spruce Tree House for a look around, then went on a hike to see the petroglyphs on the aptly named Petroglph Trail.

One fact dug from the depths of my 11 year old brain did remain true:

The skeletons buried there mostly have no teeth because when they ground corn, bits of the grinding stone would mix in and wear down the enamel on their teeth until they fell out.

So. I've been doing quasi-legit traveling these past few weeks (Chicago, Mesa Verde, Santa Fe, Taos, and Sand Dunes) and haven't posted about it. I will. I might.

This is partially due to the fact that I've been away from computers and partially due to the fact that OH MY GOD I'M LEAVING in 19 days.

June 3rd 10.15 AM.

One night last fall after a lecture at the DMNS, Dad and I were driving home through City Park and discovered a dinosaur. A huge dinosaur on a flatbed. No guards, no security, just SITTING THERE.

"Siena. Can you be outside in 3 minutes? Good. Bring a camera. and the explorer hat."

She didn't ask questions, reason #1,296 that I love her.

Jai came also, asking persistent questions and being very skeptical when we would not tell her where this was leading.

We pull up next to it and get out of the car.

"Climb on up!" Dad says, giving Si a boost onto the flatbed. She immediately sets about exploring the giant.

Jai hangs back nervously. "I don't think we're allowed to do that."

She is our family Copper. She frequently reminds my parents of the speed limit when they are driving, and I would not be at all surprised to find out that she has a few citizen's arrests under her belt. Reason #1,296 I love her.

You know what else I love? DINOSAURS.

Now this one is set up in the museum parking lot. Please go look at it and know that we got an adventure out of it.

When people travel they might come back to houses overtaken by fruit flies (damn you left-out bananas!), dust, water damage, whatever. My problem was, predictably,* zombie infestation. Luckily, my army men were able to hold them off 'til my return.

*I say predictably because Dad and Jai had bought the Zombies!!! game extension pack earlier that week.

Some things a normal person would consider too large to haul around while traveling. Big Piggy is one of those things. And since Si is not a normal person, he accompanies her back and forth from Chicago. Who is Big Piggy? The name is pretty descriptive.

On our road trip back from Chicago last spring, the family divided itself into two different cars - Dad and Jai in the van for this leg, and Mom, Si and I in Rob's car. Growing bored with the landscape, we soon turned our attention to the family pastime - playing tricks on Si. Dad and Jai hatched the excellent plan to kidnap Big Piggy. I was put in charge of distracting Si at the rest stop while the abduction was carried out. Distracting Si is one of the easiest things in the world, so it went quite successfully. We all piled back into our cars. Si, buckling her seatbelt, begins to sense that something is amiss, and looks around. Then the van pulls up beside our car and she sees:

and screams.

This is not only amusing to our family, since her friends in the dorm are also in the habit of kidnapping him and leaving ransom notes / pictures of him in danger. Making Si indignant is one of the great pleasures in life.

Zephyr a Psyche.

Henri-Joseph Ruxthiel.

1814

What a pretty statue! Look how marvelously in motion they are. Taken from another angle that would make for a really nice blog header, n'est pas?*

But why do we really love this?

Because we love the story of Cupid and Psyche.

Psyche is beautiful (this always causes problems in Ancient Greece). Aphrodite gets jealous and orders her son (Cupid) to make Psyche fall in love with something hideous. But Cupid accidentally pricks himself with one of his arrows and falls in love with Psyche. Psyche is ordered to go to the top of a mountain, where the west wind carries her to Cupid's palace. He comes and makes love to her every night, but tells her she must never look at him in the light. Her sisters convince her that her mysterious husband is a monster, so she lights a candle to find out one night. He is beautiful to behold and she falls in love immediately, but some hot wax drips on him, he wakes up and, furious she disobeyed him, leaves her. She wanders wretchedly about and is forced to do all sorts of hopeless tasks on her quest to find him, but in the end she does and they are married. It is a beautiful story when told properly (i.e. not here).

This isn't a sculpture of Cupid and Psyche - this is of Zephyr (the west wind) carrying her to Cupid's palace. I like the idea of Psyche being carried by the wind mostly because I like the idea of psyche being carried on the wind. There is something very freeing about it.

*I created this blog as installment twelve of my thirty-four part series Ways to Procrastinate Writing my B.A. So, as you can imagine, utmost care and, above all, TIME was put into selecting this important feature.

...and the alternate angle selected was part of my Buttocks of the Louvre series.

Dunno why, but I am feeling some serious Chicago nostalgia as of late. So today's topic is Navy Pier!

Navy Pier has a hokey carnivalesque feel to it. Which means that I probably like it. There are hot-dog, cotton-candy, and popcorn vendors, men in pirate costumes, photo-booths, rides... Some of you snobbish people aren't yet sold on the idea, eh? Why on earth would you want to spend time there?

It's a Pier. I have a mostly love relationship with Lake Michigan. It makes our winters hellish, but. it's so pretty. Just sit and stare at it. A good way to make hours disappear.

I remember arriving in Chicago and bemoaning the fact that without mountains, I had no idea where West was anymore. "Oh," people say helpfully, "just use the lake to tell directions! The lake is East." To which I give them a look of extreme skepticism that I hope replies: Um. The lake is flat.

Smith Museum of Stained Glass

It may be difficult to convince your boyfriend that this would be a fun place to explore, but not impossible! Just tell him it's free admission, you can take food in, and you can take pictures. Is he convinced yet? Still not entirely? There is a stained glass window of Michael Jordan. Not one that belonged to him, one depicting him. Seriously. If he still isn't going in, it's time to dump him.

The Ferris Wheel

Dur Emerson, we've seen Ferris Wheels before. They're only the lamest ride at every amusement park ever. Nononono. The Ferris Wheel was BORN in Chicago. For the 1893 World's Colombian Exhibition. The Ferris Wheel is Chicago's answer to the Eiffel Tower (The Parisian marvel from 1889). Paris, je t'aime, but I think we won this one. Your tower stands there looking impressive? Ours moves. People were actually quite terrified to ride it. So just imagine the roller coaster hasn't been invented yet, summon up all your derring-do and hop aboard.

The best time to ride is at dusk, because not only does the Ferris Wheel light up, but the view of downtown is, to be hokey about it, magic.

The final essay for one of my courses (The American Built Environment) had to be about a place in Chicago. The pretentious sounding title of the course (seriously art history department - built environment?) actually proved quite helpful, since it meant you didn't have to write about a building per se. Obvious choice?

CEMETERY.

I am a graduate of the Never-Heard-of-Sparta Decorating School. Blank, staring walls make me nervous.

The room was the sunroom/Lisbeth's cello practice room until I moved into it. It worked out quite nicely, since my roommates figured that half size room = half size rent check.

Rob found most of my furniture using the magical and mysterious (to me) craigslist. Figuring out how to fit it was a tetris game and a half. I had a bed from Ikea whose slats kept slipping off and spilling my mattress to the floor (problem solved cleverly with duct-tape), a nightstand used as a desk, another nightstand for my printer, a bookshelf left by a previous resident deemed too manly for Amanda's room and thus donated to me, and a closet that fit most my clothes. And there was even enough room left over for 3 people to stand on the floor. at the same time.

3 of my walls were windows, and since I'm not a fishbowl sort of person, I covered them up with tapestries, old skirts, and whatever I could find. Then used clothespins to open them up wherever I needed light. I like small rooms, and it was very cozy in the winter and airy in the spring. Here is a rather blurry Si at my computer. And it's true, that the thing I miss most about my room there is having Si pop in to do homework/eat dinner/take my jackets or sweatpants because she'd always underdressed for the weather and it was a long walk back to her dorm.

Amanda-who-Knits decided that she and I would live together my fourth year. She found the apartment and two other roommates (Kate and Lisbeth), signed the lease, and I was left with the difficult task of showing up.

You enter the apartment with a key (If you have one. I didn't have one for 19 days last winter because they changed the locks and technically I didn't live here - it's a 3 person apartment). Up one flight of stairs is our glorious abode.

The hall - We had a message board. As far as I can tell, the only times it was ever written on was to update the Jihad of the Week (Puddles, PhySci homework, Snow, Hyde Park, etc) and the This week's Masterpiece Theater. Living with English majors made for Jane Austian entertainment. Kate owned the dvd for pretty much every single British period piece ever made.

On Lisbeth's door is a poster of Edward Gorey's Gashlycrumb Tinies (A is for Amy, who fell down the stairs /B is for Basil Assaulted by Bears, etc). She and I bonded over this joy in seeing little children done-in in creative manners.

The living room was notable for couches, tv, etc, a Beatles Poster, a non-functioning fireplace with a mini camping grill stuck in it and a Jesus surrounded by 4 pirate mugs on the mantle. Also a framed poster of Venice that Kate found in a trash-bin. In this picture is a glimpse of my room through that door.

My favorite memory of the living room is the night the power went out and we all gathered there to pool our candle collections and eat Lisbeth's digestive biscuits until it came back on.

The bathroom was small. Our sink was about half the size of a normal sink, which meant the floor was always quite wet. The shower took a day and a half to drain sometimes. We didn't clean it that often, but living with non-neat-freaks meant that everyone was fine with me leaving my agar plate in there to grow my foot bacteria for Bio (it needed somewhere humid and warm, ok?)

The kitchen - We had an impressive collection of tea. An entire two shelves were devoted to tea. In winter the most likely place for any of us to be while avoiding homework (especially Lisbeth and I) was waiting for water to boil.

I have sweet memories associated with the Sweeney Todd poster. Like the time I came home and heard "A Little Priest" playing from the kitchen, so I wandered in there to find Lisbeth under the poster, listening to the music, chopping up some very red meat.

The stairs and yard - out the kitchen was the back yard. The stairs are wooden and get very slick in the winter. I'm sure the neighbors have seen me tumbling down them many a time, laundry and cup of detergent flying every which-way.

I didn't use the yard for much besides taking out the trash and going to the sketchy laundry room. This is because the yard was usually occupied by The Wrestlers. The guy's wrestling team lived below us and so on sunny afternoons you would hear the pleasant pitter-patter of ping pong balls plopping into beer cups. In. The. Afternoon.

There was also a duck or chicken wandering around. I used to talk to it while going to and fro from the dumpster. Then I learnt the unfortunate truth - The Wrestlers would buy this bird at the beginning of the season, keep it in the yard and slaughter it at the end of the season for their bbq. When Si and I found out, we made a plan to free the current duck, but then couldn't find it. I hope its safe somewhere.

When I was keyless, I had to coordinate with my roommates to make sure I'd be able to get inside. Over time this proved very frustrating, since Kate and Lisbeth were always out at night for Theater rehearsals and Amanda worked nights. One night in particular I'd been waiting forever for someone to show up and let me in.

Rob decided to help out, so he led me around to the alley back-entrance.

"See? It's locked, It's always lo-"I was in the middle of saying when he climbed up on the trashcan, leapt into the back yard, and unlocked the gate for me.

As I stood gaping as the door swung open, he smiled brilliantly and said - "Feel safe?"

I think that I applied to and ended up attending the U of C almost entirely based on the school slogan: "Where fun comes to die."*

It didn't disappoint. and Winter quarter is the worst. THE WORST. Recognizing this, the school administration created two things: a day off - a lumped President's /MLK Day called "Undergraduate Break Day" (more affectionately known as "Suicide Prevention Day"), and Kuviasungnerk Kangeiko.

These words mean something along the lines of 'happy times' and 'samurai winter training' respectively. What happens is this: For a week (with luck the coldest, snowiest week of the year) you wake up at 5.30 every morning and traipse over the the gym. This is the only time apart from P.E. tests at orientation that most Chicago students ever enter a gym, so that is sort of exciting. Wow, what do they call this place again? Is that from the Greek gymnasion? What is the purpose of all these odd machines?

You check in at a front desk (name and house) and if you're from Maclean they ask you what dorm that's in. This picture is of Maclean's team my third year. Second year Maclean's team was me.

You go up to the track and run into crazed, blood-thirsty teams like Dodd-Mead who have managed to rouse every person in their house to participate, are all wearing the same t-shirt (something like " Kill! Kill! Kill!"), and have a team banner. Then everyone runs around the track a few times. You don't remember signing up for this part.

Then you do a 'salute to the sun' yoga routine.

Then you split off into groups to get a lesson in whatever is being taught that day. I went to Karate, Fencing, Bhangra, Swing, and others that I don't remember because it was 6 in the morning.

Then you get a bagel! Then lucky people go to the dining halls to eat breakfast and home to sleep, and people who work at the Library at 8 every morning trudge over there.

On Friday you all meet at the gym and from there walk to the Point (Lake Michigan). This is actually pretty cool - hordes of students marching through the silent snowy foggy streets.

There, just before dawn, you call up the sun using the power of Yoga. To do this requires laying down for 'the Cobra' in the mud and snow repeatedly, and feeling secretly like a badass for doing so. Though not as badass as the kids that strip to do it. And the sun comes up (as much as it ever does in Chicago in the winter), and you get to go collect your free participation t-shirt. Because, isn't that what it's really all about?

*"The Level of Hell Dante Forgot", "Where Hell does Freeze Over" being my next two favorites.

Siena took this. I think it says everything there is to say about waiting for the CTA.

I think I was a pretty morbid kid. I remember researching with relish all the gruesome bits of history. I remember having a 5th grade crush on the boy* that went to Europe because when he came back he wowed me with knowledge about medieval torture devices that he had seen museums display that our piddly Renaissance Faire dungeons couldn't compete with. So I was pretty psyched to go to Europe with my family and get to these scary places myself. Aaaand - predictably, ended up freaking myself out.

*I'm not referring to him as 'the boy' to protect anonymity. I honestly don't remember his name. Also - I'm pretty sure it's a good thing that I got so thoroughly scared that I stopped being attracted to men well versed in historical torture techniques.

June 2, 1998

Today Siena, Dad and I got up early and got on the bus to Madame Tussaud's. This is a was muesem that a lady named Madame Tussaud created. It started when she made a death mask of Marie Antoinette. Then the muesem kept growing. It has many actors (here I list them - Harrison Ford seems to have been important to me - props younger self!), tennis players, musicians, all this in the Garden Party. Then we go to the Grand Hall ...blah blah blah... We then see the Chamber of Horrors. Light by red lights there are the heads of famous people stuck on spikes on a bridge, murderers locked behind bars, the guilotene that beheaded Marie Antoinette. Joan of Arc burning in the fire, Valid the Impaler holding someones head. We see torture devices and all. I feel so completely sick and I can't stop shaking.

Yes, yes. I spelled his name "Valid the Impaler" because, clearly, I was an idiot in 6th grade. Who doesn't occasionally have trouble with 'museum' though? There's no shame in that. And I did journal in cursive, I think that counts for something. I rather enjoyed flipping through this journal mocking my younger self for spelling mistakes, quaint phrasing, etc. I don't think young me would like me very much.

I recall being very excited to see the Chamber, then getting to the top of the stairs that led down there, and thinking suddenly, wildly, nonononono! We sent dad down first to scout it out and see if it'd be too scary for us. He came back unscathed, so we went down and through that hell. I remember feeling a little lied-to. I also recall thinking it horribly unfair that Siena was totally unfased by it all, since she's three years younger than me.

After leaving the museum, leaving Europe, I had nightmares at least once a month for six years, SIX GODDAMN YEARS, about being stuck back in the Chamber of Horrors. From my dream log:

I dreamed I was back in the Chamber again - but this time the walls were black and fiery. I came to a part where the hall divided and didn't know which way to go.

I dreamed I was in a large Tudor style house and Vlad the Impaler is chasing me through all the rooms. He catches me and tells me that I have to behead my friend with a shovel. I'm wearing a long navy dress.

I dreamed I was touring a museum and when I came to the history of torture section I got sick and dizzy and couldn't leave.

etc etc etc.

I'm sure that now I would go back, walk around the Chamber of Horrors and think "Seriously? This is what had me all freaked out? Seriously?" and maybe pat ol' Vlad on the back and have a good chuckle. But Hah....No one in a million years for a million dollars is getting me to go back down those stairs.

On whole, I don't see why people lalalalalove San Francisco so much. It's chilly and hilly and peopled and expensive. I think it's one of those places that I just don't get. Like New York. I can only reason that people who want to live in these places have simply never been to Denver.

Know what though? I'm feeling benevolent today, so I'm going to talk about the redeeming features. Because I did have a verrah nice time visiting.

Top of this list is Fisherman's Wharf. Really? Fisherman's Wharf? Oh Emerson. You're such a tourist. Shut up. Fisherman's Wharf has two awesome things going for it.

#1: Sea Lions to ARK at. This never gets old. Rob and I stood at this pier goading them on despite our slowly hypothermializing limbs when I visited in August. (Aside: This is now how Rob wins fights with me now. By going "ARK ARK ARK ARK" to make fun of my arguments.) Jai, Si, Mom and I repeated the exercise this trip. Also sometimes the jerk sea lions push each other of the dock just for the heck of it. This is fun to observe in a schadenfruedistic sort of way.

#2 Musee Mechanique. I tried to get the fam to go here from day one. "It looks sketchy" Mom says doubtfully. But in the end I prevailed. Folks, IT WAS SO SKETCHY. and by sketchy I mean AWESOME. It is basically just rows and rows of automatons, music boxes, fortune tellers, and arcade games in an old warehousey place. It's free to get in, because the machines all cost 25-50 cents to operate. They all have an antique feel - you imagine yourself walking around a carnival in the 50s or somesuch.

I only had a few quarters to spend, so I wanted to make the most of it.

At first I was tempted by the little "Execution"and "French Guillotine" dioramas. But a sort of dread descended on me as I actually contemplated putting my quarter in. Madame Tussauds, you have ruined me forever.

Instead I put mine in "Message from the Sea." Little tinkling music played and a ballroom of figurines walzed jerkily around and around as a little boat bobbed outside. Might be one of the most melancholy things I have ever seen.

I also put a quarter in the "Opium Den" diorama and watched as the pathetic little drugged up figures rocked back and forth smoking as skeletons and monsters popped in and out of windows and doors. Again, had a terribly saddening effect upon me.

There were all sorts of little xxx peep boxes "Naughty Marietta" etc that I was dying to look at. But, gotta set an example for the younger sibs.

There was a man walking around in a dusty old Charlie Chaplin suit, sort of dancing. we think. Mostly he just followed us around staring glumly. We're not sure he actually worked there, so I classed him under "probable serial killer / wandering ghost" and tried to avoid being separated from my group.

Jai and I put one of our quarters in "Fireman's Race" - where you each spin a little wheel around to try and move your fireman up his ladder to the burning building at the top of the diorama. Halfway up, Jai saw that I saw winning and shoved me away from my wheel. Repeatedly. She's got a competative streak in her, that one. Si gave us both lectures about how rescuing the little man in the building was more important than the race and we ought to be ashamed of what terrible firefighters we are to let personal vendettas get in the way of our job. Jai was unrepentant.

Speaking of scary-Jai...

I'm not sure when the Jaidee-Spongebob feud began. Certainly when she was quite young. Some hatreds are just innate, I guess. As Si : Mimes, I : Monkeys, so Jai : Spongebob. In any case, it is pretty clear who walked away from this battle the victor.

St. Patrick was Welsh. (One of those things that somehow makes sense.)

He met Ireland when he was 16, after being kidnapped by Irish raiders and taken over there as a slave.* A few years later, he escaped and returned home then went back to Ireland to start converting. Which, to my mind, makes him sort of a badass.

Course, if I were him, I'd have fudged things a little and been like: "Commandment One: Anyone who kidnaps is going straight to hell."

3-leaf clovers are important because they represent the holy trinity. So why do we think 4-leaf clovers are superlucky? Doesn't it worry people a little that some mysterious 4th entity is sneaking into our clover trinity sometimes? Oh, God has sprouted an extra head? How lucky!

In my 4 years at Chicago, I never saw the river dyed green. I was there the day afterwards last year, but the river looked only slightly greenish, which is normal. Si saw it this year though, and said it was impressive-ish. So maybe I'll put that on my to-do list.

This year, I went out with Rob and Seth. We decided to avoid overtly Irish places, since they wanted to eat as well as drink and the crowds were bound to be obnoxious. First we went to the Cherry Cricket. The bagpipes should have clued us in that this would be a too-festive place, but we went in anyway. So. crowded. They'd added a huge tent-room in back to accomodate people and it was still full. Worse, full of twentysomethings. Great, now I have my peers' germs all over me.

Well, if all bars were going Killarney for St. Pat's and were going to be full, we had no choice but to defect to the enemy. Ohhh Britannia. We went to Pint's Pub, and immediately got a table. Ah calm. I ordered a Strongbow cider and a cup of Earl Grey tea and the waitress did not even look at me funny.

Rob and Seth played Bar Billiards - which is like pool, but better. You have to shoot the balls into holes of varying point-values, but there are pegs standing up and if you knock them over you don't get your points that round - or lose all your points if you knock over the black peg. Rob wants to build a table for their apartment.

I feel like I shouldn't have to wear green cause I've got it in me in the form of ancestor-folk. The Quinns (mom's side) and the Riordans (dad's - his grandma was Kitty Riordan, which is a great name). I wear it anyway and Rob pinches me anyway. Can't win.

All in all, tradition is a funny thing. Why do we drink beer to celebrate St. Patrick when it would make more sense to kidnap Welsh teenagers?

*If Liam Neeson were his father, everyone in Ireland would be dead. There would be no Irish, no St. Patrick's Day, and (in fact) no Liam Neeson. Watch Taken, you'll understand.

Peace Corps stole my passport (technically I guess I gave it to them because I didn't want to go downtown and fill out extra forms to get a new one), but this spring is rapidly becoming travel-shaped even in its absence.

March 24-27: San Francisco with Mom, Si, and Jai.

April 25 - May 2: Chicago to visit Siena.

Early May: Southwest Colorado and Santa Fe with Rob.

Other than that, I am still at Denver Health writing and editing curricula for HIV testing with the nicest people in the universe. Seriously. Googlemap 'best co-workers ever' and you'll probably get Denver Health's STD clinic / HIV Prevention Training Center address (No, no, you say, there's always ONE. They can't all be so great. That would be a violation of the that one rule. Trust me, I've been looking frantically for them. Because, until I find them, it's gotta be me.)

I've also been training to be an exhibit guide at Expedition Health at DMNS. Which means that not only will I get to spend at least once a week at my favorite place in the 'verse, I also get to learn how to dissect sheep brains, caffinate daphnia, and why you have to pee more at higher altitudes.

Been taking Self-Defense classes with Jai to fill the Krav-shaped void in my life. No one ever fight Jai ever. I think even the instructor is a little wary of her.

And I've been helping mom make power points for her Art History class. Also organize her slide library. I've gotten to go in and give a guest lecture a couple times - Art of Japan, Bosch, and a Famous couples in Art History / Representation of love in art. Being an art history teacher would be awesome! except for the grading, the administration, and having to have a new lecture prepared every day.

Anyway, back last September I thought it would be unbearable to have to wait til June to go to Peace Corps, but I am actually very pleased to have been here this winter and spring. Things work out, ney?

Where to today my pretties?

I hear you chanting "Nordlington! Nordlinton!" and you can't deny that it's just because the sound of it makes you giggle. (If it doesn't, you should put an umlaut above the 'o' and realize that it is pronounced Nerdlington. I'd put it there myself but can't be bothered to learn how).

Rob and I stopped here for the night pretty much just for the name. Well I did. Rob does, you know, research in guide books and things before making decisions.

May 8, 2007:

Two facts: Nordlington is situated in a giant bowl formed by an ancient meteorite. The Suebi tribe lived here. If you've read Caesar, you know what badasses they were.

Our first stop was the City Wall Museum. It's in a tower. We walk up the tower for a very nice view. Each level has different exhibits in it. Rob points out the different holes in the walls for cannons and archers to fire from out into the beautiful countryside. Exiting the museum we walked 3/4ths the way around the walls for a nice view of the city at all angles.

Then we search for a hotel (the first ones we try are all booked but everyone is super helpful - one owner walked us to the next hotel with her umbrella through the rain. Aw, Germans. Sometimes I really like you. Especially in restaurants where you are totally reasonable and so non-French I could hug you - here in Nordlington we were boring and ate at an Italian place - just because Schweinfliesschspitzel didn't sound that appetizing at the time).

We ended up staying at Der Braunes Rosen, right next to the cathedral, because it was cold and rainy, we stayed in at night - watching some Morgan Freeman moved dubbed in German. The wind is howling outside.

May 9, 2007

Climbed Der Turm Daniel. 300 steps to the top. We got in for free because the tower is under construction. At the top we met the night watchman, who told us how he climbs the tower twice a day. "And three times today because I forgot my book on my bicycle."

He pointed out the rim of the crater in the distance and a stork's nest on the roof.

The Ricskrater Museum (sp?)

Devoted to the meteorite. Hit 15 million years ago. The impact was equal to 250,000 Hiroshima bombs and rock was thrown from the landing site to 400 km away. The town cathedral is built from the stone - suevit.

U.S Astronauts came here to research and brought back some moonrock as a gift. We saw it. It looks like rock.

Made a stop for Rob's Donner Kebob lunch fix.

Staat Museum

History of Nordlington museum. The woman at the front desk was very kind and, much to Rob's dismay, gave me a guide book in English roughly the size of War and Peace. Things I learnt:

-A cave called "Hexenkuche" (witches' kitchen) was found with ancient heads buried in it - mostly women and children slain by a blow to the head and then sprinkled with reddish dirt. Also jewelry made from deer and dog teeth.

-Celts came and began minting money here 450 - 15 BC.

-Romans took over 15 - 400 AD

-Weaponry: spatha - long dbl edged sword. sax - short single edged sword. ango - throwing spear with a thin neck and barb on the end (would stick in the enemy's leather shield and weigh them down).

-Buried in tree trunk coffins with figures of two headed snakes carved on them (dead thought to turn into snakes once buried).

-'Die Zunfte" - the guilds. Only members of the guids were considered citizens.

- Streets that have survived from medieval period: Weinmarkt (wine), Brettermarkt (lumber), Eisengasse (Iron lane) - This last one made the LOTR bit of me go aha!

-Was pleased to learn a new (to me) German word: Totengraber - grave-digger

-Unwed pregnant women were made to pay a fine and if they didn't they suffered Glockleinstrafe - which, as far as I can tell, is being made to sweep the streets while wearing a silly hat with bells on it.

We got Apple Strudel! Mit vanilla sauce and cream! Mmmmm

Paris:

At one point during study abroad someone who will remain unnamed had a sort of foot fungus and wanted to buy something to get rid of it. So I of the poor but existent French language skills accompanied them to the pharmacy.

Approached a clerk.

"J'ai besoin de...quelque chose pour les pieds?" (I can never say things in other languages. I have to ask them. "Me llamo Emerson?") In this case I was trying to say : "I need something for feet?"

Blank stare.

"Les pieds malades?" (sick feet?).

More staring.

"Il y a un...fungi?" (There is a ... this is not a word?)

Nada.

"un...champignon? Champignon de les pieds?" (a...mushroom? A foot mushroom?)

Turns out athlete's foot is just called "mycose" which I may have been able to guess if Si had begun attending mycological society events just one summer earlier.

Germany:

Nur echt mit die Fahne

Sept 21, 2007

The drive from Chicago to Wisconsin is ugly ugly pretty pretty pretty. In that order. Nice fields and old farmhouses advertising fresh strawberries. Houses with white porches and American flags. Elderly loitering about on green lawns.

We found the Kettle Morraine forest and drove to our camp site (I never said this would be the un-cushy sort of camping).

Set up the tent with very little hassle. Which means that Rob set up the tent and I watched. Realized that we hadn't brought a flashlight, bug spray or even bandaids. It seems that I take more camping gear with me to class then I do when actually camping.

Went on a short loop walking through the forest. The trees are tall and thin and you can hear the wind whooshing around them. Came upon a meadow and resisted the urge to go prancing through it like a Disney princess.

Rob and I sat and read Ender's Game together til it got too dark. (This is the sneaky way he uses to get me to read any sci-fi book. "Just let me read the first chapter to you, and if you don't like the book you don't have to read it.")

Decided to start a fire. The firewood that'd we'd bought had a sticker on it informing us that it had been packed by The "Amish." Amish with those quotation marks around it. What? Were they not real Amish? Did they sell us fake-Amish firewood?

Rob spent hours hunting down little sticks and other kindling. Once he finally got a small flame started he told me I could put one of the pieces of firewood on. I picked one up and plunked it down and the fire went out. Please imagine this happening with Rob going Nooooooo in slow motion in the background. Apparently (as Mr. Eagle Scout Robert had neglected to tell me) you have to coddle baby fires and ease them gently into the larger wood-world. So with a bit of glaring and muttering, he re-started the fire and did all sorts of boyscouty things to make it grow properly. I was not allowed to touch it until it was time to put it out. Who knew, ok?

I am fifth generation Coloradan. As of my senior year in college, I had never been camping. I, personally, see nothing wrong with this but people freak out when told. "But you live in Denver!" they gasp, and I have to patiently explain that Denver is a c-i-t-y and has museums and a downtown and no, every day I did not ride my horse down a dirt lane for miles to a little schoolhouse for my education. And they stubbornly cling to their logic that Coloradans camp. Emerson is Coloradan. Therefore Emerson camps.

Rob is one of these people. True, I never miss an opportunity to stereotype him for growing up in Kansas. But come ON. It's Kansas. He got it into his head that he and I would go camping and so we made plans to drive up to Wisconsin the week before classes in Chicago.

A few weeks beforehand I had Yelena and Andrea over. Yelena and I reminisced about Paris and Andrea told us about her study abroad in Japan. At some point I mentioned Rob's plan take me camping.

They did not even attempt to mask their horror.

"I went hiking with my boyfriend once." Yelena said. "I almost died. We were going up this dirt path up and up and up and it was all dusty and hot outside..."

We all shudder the shudder of city-people.

"When my boyfriend and I went, I accidentally got separated from him, and I fell down these rocks and was hanging on and yelling for him but he didn't hear me forever and there were these spiders all around...STAY ON THE PATH" Andrea emphasizes.

"and I heard that one couple was out camping in the middle of nowhere and they were looking through their pictures later and there was one of them sleeping in the tent."

Who took it?? What sort of madman is wandering the woods snapping pictures? We let this horrible story sink in for a few minutes.

"Bears." Andrea adds unnecessarily, "Watch out for bears. My mom says that they are getting more aggressive as their territories get smaller and smaller."

CRAP.

Rob enjoys quoting his professors. One of his favorites is: "If you don't believe in science, you're an idiot." and the other is: "Comets are not Lady Godiva."

He's explained what this means to me about 5 times, and I'm still not sure I get it. From what I gather - as Lady Godiva rides her horse, her hair streams out behind her. (Which is how people picture comet tails. When I say people I guess I mean English majors). But that's not what comets look like. Because comets have two tails, and they stream out from them in different directions. . . Rob has said that if he ever starts an astro blog that will be his first post, so I'll let him explain it properly.

Anyway.

It was February 24th circa 11.00 at night when Rob IMed to ask if I wanted to see a comet. I felt that this would be a far more exciting way to welcome my 23rd birthday than sleeping, so I said yes.

So we drove up to the Boulder observatory. Rob is a lab TA, so he has the keys and skills and whatnot and he and his roommate set up the telescopes. Spent over an hour scanning the sky and could not find that comet anywhere.

We tried to take pictures with the scope camera because you can change the exposure time there and capture more light. No comet, but we did find something that looked a heck of a lot like the batman signal. I am forced to conclude that the comet was headed for earth and batman destroyed it. Rob (a.k.a Scully) said it was probably a scratch on the lens.

I did get to see Saturn, which is probably my favorite thing to look at through the scopes. The rings were perfect that night, and you could see two of it's moons pretty clearly. ALSO - Saturn is the planet that rules old age, so I figure that's a fitting one to look at on one's birthday.

Later I recounted the adventure to Si:

"...But we couldn't find the comet"

"Wha? Can't you see those with your bare eyes? What comet was it?"

"Lula? Luleh? Something?" (Lulin actually)

"Luna? Emerson, you idiot, that's the moon. Luna just means 'moon'. Are you dating the worst astronomer ever? Who can't find the freaking moon in the sky? Babies can point out the moon!" This went on for a while before I could explain that she'd misheard me.

I talked about my apartment in Paris, so here is a post about my rooms in Castiglione. (I switched rooms about halfway through my stay because they needed my old room for new students).

Pros of 1st room:

1) A sink. This was nice because the shower room down the hall doesn't have a sink or mirrors.

2) I had two closets to myself, so one was used solely as a drying rack.

3) The window had bars running over it, so spiders were able to build webs in all the gaps, forming a makeshift screen to keep bugs out. Also, watching the spiders spinning at night is very relaxing. Just so long as none of the spiders get any ideas about floating over to hang out on my face or anything.

It gets so warm at night that you have to leave the window open (also if you don't it is too dark to wake up each morning). In my other room I tried leaving the fan on me to keep mosquioes off, but always felt too guilty for using electricity and turned it off after about 15 minutes. Gave up on the mosquito war. Enjoy your AB+, suckers.

Pros of 2nd room:

1) This was my view. The window from my first room was too high up to see out of, and would have just overlooked the street anyway. I spent houurs at this window, especially at night. Watching the little lights out on the valley is just the nicest thing ever. Better than eating gelato even. You heard me.

2) This room was over closer to the other RC rooms. Which doesn't matter when classes are in session, but for those weeks between sessions when ONLY the RCs are living in the school, it becomes mighty creepy to be living in the ghost hall. Literally. The rooms around me fill with ghosts. Also, I suspect, monsters. (Fortunadamente, the axe-murderers stayed in Paris). True, the ghosts are nun-ghosts, so not that terrifying. Santa Chiara used to be a convent (built in the 1400s. Ok, mostly in the 1930s. But parts are from the 1400s). That gets maybe a 9 on the ghost infestation scariness scale (with 1 being the scariest (orphanages, psychopath detention centers) and 10 the most Casper (ice cream parlors, etc.).

...but it's where some ancestor-folk come from, so I have stuff to say about it. Despite having ancestor-folk scattered around the rest of Europe, we've only really retained Swedish traditions. Which leads me to conclude that Sweden dominates (though the same conclusion could easily be reached merely by purchasing a piece of IKEA furniture).

So, without further ado, Swedethings:

Korv and Glogg

A few years ago I had the fun of helping Grandma and Siv prepare two Christmas specials - Korv and Glug. Potatis Korv is potato sausage. We put down a plastic tablecloth on Siv's kitchen table and dumped all the ingredients out onto it (the meats, spices, potatoes) and mushed them all together. Then I was given the job of washing out the hog casings to pack it all into. What are casings? The "submucosa, a layer of intestine that consists mainly of collagen." (I didn't even know you could buy empty intestines. Or that that is what sausage lining is made of. But it's ok, I turn out to be surprisingly unsqueamish at that.) Then we get a manfolk to put the meat thru the grinder and into the casings - tying them off to make links. Voila - korv.

Glogg (pro. glug) is made with spices (fruits, almonds, cinnamon), wine and copious amounts of grain alcohol. My best memory of this is following grandma through the liquourmart watching her load the cart with wine and everclear and feeling like a badass.

I still eat a bit of Korv each Christmas. I guess I figure that if the animal in question was slaughtered before I became a vagueavegitarian, then it's ok. And Grandma still has korv in her freezer from the nineties. I am not allowed (even now, I think) to drink Glogg.

Tomte

Their name, I just learned, comes from the word tomt (home). They are little elf/gnome people of the house. If you treat your animals right and have good manners and leave the tomte porridge at Christmas (with butter on top), then they'll help watch over your home. If you anger them, they'll cause mischief. They live under the floorboards, so if you spill something on the floor, you should shout a warning to them.

Straw ornaments

Boy do I have a lot of straw ornaments. Also little figurines of ugly rosy cheeked

NilsThe Adventures of Nils (1906-07) is a book that incorporates loads of Swedish folktales with Swedish geography. I read it when I was wee and again last week when cleaning out my bookshelf.* It's fantastic. A summary, you say? A summary you shall have:

Oh Nils. Nils is a boy who, despite being born in Sweden, has apparently never heard of the consequences of angering a tomte, because he manages to tick one off. The tomte turns him into a pseudo-tomte, and in this form Nils ends up traveling over Sweden riding on the back of Goosey-Gander (a tame goose from his farm who is trying his luck with a flock of wild geese). The flock that goosey-gander and Nils end up in is the flock to be in - all over Sweden every animal has heard of this flock. Their like the Ivy-league of goose flocks.

At first the lead goose, Akka, is a total hard-nose and is all "if you can't keep up we'll leave you behind Mr.Tame Goose. And this little-person-thing is definitely not welcome to travel with us." But eventually both Nils and Goosey-gander manage to prove their worth, and by the end of the books, she's become a great friend and protector of Nils. Their overall journey is up to Lapland (think reindeer) from Southern Sweden (Skane) and back again.

Smirre Fox is the main villain of the story. I'll admit it, he sort of terrifies me. He tries to steal and eat a goose on Nils' first night among the geese. Nils rescues the goose from him and so Smirre swears revenge. He is unrelenting. He spends the rest of the book chasing this flock and Nils through Sweden, continually trying to trick less bright animals into killing them for him (a marten, a flock of crows...). I dunno what it is - maybe the fact that animals can all talk to each other and it seems so wrong to be able to eat things that you converse with. The fact that Smirre is always like: "I'magonnaeatyoo" gives me the willies.

*Emerson, why are you reading children's books instead of looking up information about graduate school programs? Listen here, this is not your run of the mill See Spot Run crap. This is Nobel Prize winning literature. True, the Nobel is a Swedish prize, and there may have been some bias here, but it won nevertheless. Btw - I figure between being Swedish-ish and having gone to the University of Chicago, I am practically guaranteed a Nobel prize sometime in my life. So graduate schools, psh.

July 21, 2007

Got to use the mezzaluna tonight to chop garlic. Cutting the pomodorini and using the mezzaluna are my two favorite vegetable related tasks.

July 30, 2007

Paolo wanders into the kitchen with two printouts. "This," he says, coming up to Katie and I without preamble "is the sun" He points to a large circle on the paper. Then pointing to a much smaller dot: "and this is the earth."

Then with flourish, he pulls out the other sheet of paper "This -" he says, pointing to a dot on that paper, "This is our sun." and "these" pointing to much larger orbs now, "are other stars."

Then, satisfied that he has educated us in our insignificance, he meanders back out of the kitchen.

(Grazie a Alycia e Eric)

Peel ~10 lemons with a potato peeler.

Put the rinds in a large glass jar with 1 liter of alcohol (95% = Bacardi 101, 192 Proof) and leave to sit for 3 wks - 2 months in a cool dark place.

It is ready when the alcohol has a pale yellow tint and the rinds are white. You can then take the rinds out.

Boil one liter of water and then stir in 1 kg of sugar until it is dissolved.

Let the mixture go to room temperature (may take a day) then combine it with the alcohol.

Bottle it and keep it in the freezer.