The Village Sights and Sounds

Last month, I began talking about the village I live in by what I look at most often - the ground. Now I would like to describe the other, more distinguishing attributes it consists of. These characteristics can be divided into the landscape, the houses, and the people.

The Landscape

Our village is positioned on the side of a hill with a low grade. I wouldn’t have noticed this fact except that on one of our daily walks, the other missionary women took me on a new route which took us far from town and up another hill which provided us a view of our home. Of course, after I knew the village was built on a hill, I began to notice that we are constantly walking up- or downhill to go to town or come back home. As I mentioned before, our roads are more like dirt paths with giant ruts. These are lined with tall wispy grass and bushy undergrowth. Because these overgrown areas are great habitats for not-so-friendly pests, especially during Dry Season, they are usually burned with controlled fires. So most of the time you will see blackened patches of earth and rock next to roads and paths. Then there are the trees. What wonderful African trees! It took a while for me to notice how different they were from the ones in the States, but now it’s hard not to notice and be awed at God’s creativity. Everything is interesting such as the branching out of their limbs, the variation in leaves from long and smooth to large with rough edges to tufts of flowers, and how much fruit one tree can contain! Not only are the orange, mango, and avocado trees full, but so are the papaya trees! Now, until I came here I don’t think I’d seen a papaya much less seen it on a tree, so I guess I was a little shocked by the sheer size of the papayas here. Most are larger than the largest gourds I’ve seen in the States and some are easily the size of watermelons. Now imagine 10-15 of these massive fruits hanging from tree branches no larger in diameter than my forearm!

So although there isn’t much color on the ground, the trees make up for it with their foliage and fruit. I’ve also been told that when Rainy Season starts, all the dust that’s settled on everything (leaves, rocks, houses…) will be washed away and I will be amazed at the transformation that occurs and just how clean, shiny, and bright our village can be.

We just walked up half of this hill on our walk.
This is looking back down over the road toward town.

An orange tree we passed on one of our walks.

The Houses

We definitely do not live in a city, but by West African definitions, I would say we live more in a town rather than a village. I say this because almost everyone here lives in a concrete home surrounded by a concrete wall (which acts as a property line indicator more than a home defense system). There are a few concrete huts, but very few people live in thatched or mud huts. You see plenty of the latter inside compounds but they are used for livestock, kitchens, extra bedrooms for visitors, and tool storage.

Most of the concrete houses have at least a couple of barred windows with lockable metal shutters and a tin roof. The bars in the windows are present to prevent theft when you’re home and want the windows open for a breeze; the shutters are closed and locked to more thoroughly protect your home when you leave it unattended. Most missionaries make screens for their doors and windows that not only help keep the bugs out, but also dust. As for the tin roof, it is really only noticeable when it rains, because then it sounds like you’re in a can in the middle of a hail storm.

Two large African trees on a main road leading into town.
Those are houses in the background.

The People

Note: I am still very much at the beginning stage of learning about the people and culture I am living in, which means I can only describe what I see and understand, not people’s motivations or reasoning for what they say and do.

Other than learning the word “white person” or “western,” one of the first things you might discover when you get to our village is that - unlike in America - it is considered polite (and is almost expected) for you to greet people when you pass them. Whether on foot or on a motorcycle, whether going in the same direction or opposite ones, you must at least partake in a basic greeting. My conversational ability is incredibly limited, but I have learned the general construction of most portions of the extended greeting. Here is an example:

Person 1: I greet you.
Person 2: I greet you.
1: How is it where you came from?
2: Peace only. How is it where you came from?
1: Peace only. How is your family?
2: Peace only. How are your kids?
1: Peace only. How are your parents?
2: Peace only. How are your animals?
1: Peace only. …

I think you see the pattern. Although I can’t actually construct most of the "How" questions, I can usually recognize when they are asking me something that begs the "Peace only" answer.

When you encounter and greet people on the road, you’re bound to notice that they are definitely African. The clothes and methods of transporting goods and children are the epitome of a national geographic special. They sew their own clothes from cloth purchased in the market. Women wear straight wrap skirts with a matching top and headwrap. Whenever I wear my African outfit it’s hard to make my American fashion sense OK with being clothed in the exact same material from head to toe (literally). The traditional outfit for men is loose cloth pants with a long dress-length shirt that has side slits up to the hips for ease of movement. A more casual outfit for men is pants (younger men will wear jeans) and a shirt.

You’ll also notice that both men and women rarely ever carry anything in their arms if they’re going a considerable distance. Both men and women will just lift it right up and place it on their head and walk hands free. It seems that with this method the weight of the load doesn’t matter (especially if you have someone who can help you lift it). I’ve even seen men carry 50 kilo bags of rice on their heads - that’s about 110lb! Women too will carry 3 feet tall buckets filled to the brim with fruit and produce and never falter in step or have to steady a wobbly container. Now I would be impressed by this even if they were walking on smooth sidewalks in the States, but they can do it here! (See my previous post to more fully understand this.) I really would have thought it was impossible to walk on these rocky, rutted roads, up and down these hills and mountains, and never need to touch the load to steady it. It’s incredible on market day when there are lines of people walking into town with all of their goods to sell perched on top of their heads. I should also note that these men and women who come to market day with their goods aren’t just walking a few blocks, they’re walking for hours with these loads just to come sell them and then purchase what they need as well. (My next village entry should describe market day - it really is something to see and experience.)

The other item most women here carry are their babies, but there are no car seats, strollers, or any other manufactured baby transportation accessory. Their solution is to use a long blanket (made from bath towel-like material), place the baby on their lower back, and wrap the blanket around the baby and up over their breasts a few times and then tightly tuck in the ends of the blanket. Once the baby is secure on their backs they can do everything they need to do from cook over a fire, hand wash laundry on a washboard, sweep up leaves and dirt with a hand broom (that looks like the end of a stereotypical witch’s broom), or ride on a motorcycle with a large bowl of produce on her head and another child between her and the driver! These women are truly incredible! Now, before you women run out and try this new, cheap and convenient method of carrying children, I should warn you that there is one major disadvantage for women of the American culture (which you may have already considered). That is of course that your belly button soon has two new friends. Over here that is not really a big deal at all since breasts are simply seen as baby bottles and not as sexual objects. In fact, in our region, it is more socially acceptable to be topless than to go without a head wrap!

And I suppose on that note, I will wrap up this post. I pray that I can be as much of an encouragement to you as you are to me. Thank you for your prayers, e-mails, and love! It is with great joy and gratitude that I get to serve our Awesome God in this incredible way and that you are willing to join what He is doing in West Africa by supporting me.

Indebted to Christ and His Will,
Julie

One of the free-roaming cows
grazing outside our compound.

View of the surrounding hills (on a hazy day).
Looking carefully, you can see 3 or 4 hills in the distance.

A quick snapshot of a fenced-in yard
with a couple of thatch roofed huts.

A free-roaming hen with her chicks on a path
to the Litsey's compound.

Macro and Micro

Recently, on several occasions, I have been challenged to evaluate where I am spiritually and to truly seek out my intentions for my actions. In fact, it wasn’t until last night that I really saw all of the pieces come together. It’s always interesting how God will try to get my attention by putting something on my heart, but then I ignore it because it's uncomfortable. He keeps pressing, enlightening, and reminding me; all the while I am striving to evade His challenging revelation. By now I should know dodging God is as efficient as a child playing hide-and-go-seek with their parent. Despite that knowledge, my actions still reflect that of Jonah…

Thankfully, our God is passionate in His pursuit of us. His message was finally received last night, despite my best efforts to elude Him, while going through a chapter in C.S. Lewis’ the Screwtape Letters. Because it impacted me so much, I’ve included the portion of the chapter that really indentifies and describes the very essence of the lie I’ve been using to justify my actions of late (it follows my update). In summary, God has been telling me that I need to follow Him. My response has been that I am because I’m here in Africa, “following God’s Will.” And because I’m continually being reassured that God wants me here in Africa with the Litseys, I know that I am in fact within His Will.

The problem is that since I know I’m doing God’s Will, I then conclude that I can do whatever I want with my free time, because I’m done doing what God wants me to do. Well, for a while now I’ve felt that there was a flaw in my logic, but I didn’t want to face it because I was enjoying doing whatever I wanted during my free time. Then, last night, God couldn’t have made it any more clear that “my time” is not mine at all and never was. I realized that the fallacy I was falling into was in applying the “I’m following God’s Will” from the macro level to the micro level. Yes, I’m here and doing my job, but my heart is wrong. I’ve been taking joy in selfish, unfruitful actions instead of seeking God and seeing what eternal activities He might have me do.

Please don’t get me wrong, I know there’s a time and place for having fun and “me” time. The times that I’m referring to are ones where I knew I was misleading those around me in order to for them to think me busy so that I could have fun instead of being asked to help. They were also fun times that I knew I didn’t need, but wanted because the alternative could have been uncomfortable and challenging.

I’m pretty sure God has plans for me here that stretch beyond teaching, but I have to be open to them and be willing to work at them. God knew the first step in that process was to remind me to whom time really belongs and that I want to partake in eternal, lasting activities. I look forward to seeing how God leads me and what ministries He allows me to get involved in. Please pray that I am open, willing, and disciplined to allow Him to work however He desires through me.

Indebted to Christ and His (macro and micro) Will,
Julie