The regional driver, Conde, packing the Kankan car for a trip across the country. If we don't leave around dawn, we can't make it home by dark. A very long trip.
I finally got tired of trying to convince women they should do a small amount of work to save themselves time and work later on by turning their three-rock cooking system into a fuel-efficient stove. So I decided to build my own so I can cook with wood, in public, and demonstrate how, why, and what.
The nice thing is, I can't work alone, ever. There are always children with nothing else to do. So even though I'm not working with the target audience at first, I still end up teaching the inevitable crowd of children how to build a stove, why build a stove, and later they'll cook with me.
At the end, I had a lot of extra mud so I smoothed out the walls perfectly with a wide apron and then built myself a chair in front of the stove so I can sit down in comfort molded to me as I stir my pots of rice and sauce. The stove will be in use about three weeks after construction so it has time to adequately dry (otherwise it will crack severely with the first few cook fires.
I tried to keep her work load to a minimum - because she was on vacation and because it's better for my work if I can talk to people about why as a man I, too, can haul my own water, wash my own clothes, cook my own meals, and do all that for her as well. Nonetheless, it's fun to pump water.
One of the first days at site we went to the field with my family and helped them stamp on their rice to shake the grain loose from the straw. My sisters kept asking me how many bundles of rice I'd done so far; I kept replying I hadn't finished my first one. They have to make it a competition to entertain themselves and I didn't know we were counting until they asked...
I made Stephanie bike the 35 kilometers between my site and my regional capital, four times. She would get tired, obviously, so I would nap while she recovered.
Stephanie integrated so well, you wouldn't even be able to pick her out of this photo if you hadn't already seen her in a photo pumping water. My family loved her - they even gave her a gift when she left.
I eat moni for breakfast every morning. The first morning I brought it home in a giant bowl. To cool it off, you have to pour it from a large gourd spoon over and over.
Steph didn't like moni that much and had to look for alternative food sources.
On the way to the field to stamp on rice I took a side trip to photograph my number one enemy: the bush fire. People set them to avoid them later when hunters set the bush on fire to scare out their dinner. It's a nasty cycle that creates large swaths of rock from formerly lush forest.
Like I said, I took advantage of Steph's presence to show people that men work even when they are living with their "wife." Yeah, Steph was my fake wife for a her visit - to avoid people always asking to buy her from me.
Again, doing women's work is a good way to show men they are capable of more than sitting in the shade all day.
At the same time, my work is to share American culture. Granted the kids still haven't gotten the hang of not showing everyone their hand, but what are you going to do?
And I sing for them. When they're good. It's a good way to entertain people with activities they don't consider insane. That said, it's hard to sing and play and say hi to every single person who comes up to watch and listen.
After three weeks, Steph had had enough and we headed back to Conakry to drop her off for her flight home to blessedly cold Belgium, land of chocolate, beer, fries, and waffles.