September 16, 2007- Disney Land

 

So, I think we are out of eggs.  Or else we are being punished again for not finishing meals.  Or else we’re being rewarded for eating most of our meals, which are wicked spicy. Instead of egg sandwiches, we were fed bread.  Just bread.   White bread. This could mean anything, or nothing at all. We’re past the point of psychological warfare, here.

While John and I were eating, we watched the show:

Juliet and Emma, ready for church.

Edem had come by to wake the kids up at the crack of dawn to get ready for church.  It was quite a production.  Emma was running around with one sock on, Juliet was chasing him with the other, and Gabriel was chasing her holding Matilda’s switch.  The older girls were primping and trying to keep Nancy from removing her pants for the third time.  The older boys were dressed and sitting around looking annoyed and adorable, all lined up in their jeans, crisp t-shirts and button-downs, and slick pointy-toed shoes.  Everyone had on their Sunday best.  They finally made it off to Church, but I decided not to go.  Three hours on a hard bench listening to scripture in Ewe wasn’t something I was up for.

Edem disappeared just before Sister Francisca led the throng through the gates, and moments later Barnabus came back.  He had left earlier to get a tro home but returned saying the roads are still bad so there’s still no tro tro out of Kpando to his village.  He’ll try again tomorrow.

While trying to reach Edem to tell him about Barnabus, a family of six showed up.  They were dressed well enough, and sat quietly at the picnic table.  The woman explained that her husband had died and she and her brother wanted to leave the four kids.  Now we really really wanted Edem to come back. 

John and I went into the office to call Edem again, then went back out on the porch and sat with them. In the middle of an incredibly long and awkward silence, which I spent judgmentally scrutinizing the family and trying to determine their motives, Tim showed up with his parents.  They were carrying an enormous suitcase.  Tim’s parents wanted to give a donation of toys to the home, and they opened the suitcase up right then and there.  The woman and her brother exchanged a wide-eyed look and the whole family gawked as Tim’s parents rifled through the contents of the suitcase.  It was like Christmas in September.  Our audience started to grow as passersby stopped to hang over the fence and gape at the white folks lavishing the orphans with cheap plastic toys from China.  Who wouldn’t want to leave their kids in such a paradise?  It’s no wonder kids yell out “YAVO!” on the street and stick out their hand expecting a gift. 

In the middle of this circus, our kids started to return.  They bee-lined it for the toys, of course, gleefully snatching up whatever they could get their little mitts on, free-for-all style. 

I thought about how useless this stuff is.  Not only is it useless stuff that’s going to be shredded to bits in under three minutes flat, it’s making the neighbors think that this place is Disney Land.  As it is, perfectly well dressed, finely quaffed adults are throwing their babies at us. 

As Nancy sauntered past us holding out a plastic squeaky toy and squeezing it incessantly, I thought about the gifts that I had brought.  I had a suitcase full as well.  Mine wasn’t opened up in the middle of the compound as church was being let out, but certainly people would know that the new kick balls and soccer balls the kids were playing with at the stadium were a gift from a yavo.  My school supplies were helpful, but the art supplies even seemed a little superfluous.  Diapers.  That would have been helpful.  Formula.  Medicine and hand sanitizer.  Antifungal medication.  Stuff that isn’t showy and obvious.  It’s not as fun to give, but it’s not about me, after all.  Next time I’ll know better. 

Edem arrived in time to see the shit-show.  He smiled and shook hands with Tim and his parents.  He thanked them profusely for the toys, which were now scattered all over the compound, some of them already in pieces.  Nancy handed me her squeaky toy, which had taken quite a beating.  The squeaker was mercifully dislodged.  I removed it completely and shrugged my shoulders.  “Sorry, Nancy-pants.  It’s broken.”  John silently mouthed “Thank you.”

Edem with his new Safe Sex sign in the office.

When everyone had been fed, and Edem had sent the mooching family of six along their way, I conducted a Sex-Ed follow-up session.  The girls told me, once again, that HIV/AIDS was contracted by sharing bread, so we started again at the beginning.  Now, these are kids whose parents died of AIDS, and some of them are positive themselves.  They don’t know that, of course.  They’re too young.  But you’d think they’d know better than “if you share bread.” I’m not sure if they didn’t understand me the first time, or if they just didn’t believe me.  Probably a little of both. 

So I explained then quizzed, and explained again, and quizzed again, and explained some more.  “Minua, is it easy to get HIV/AIDS if you are smart?” I ask firmly.  “No.” she says.  Good.  Phew.  Although, if they’re learning the whole bread bullshit at school, this probably won’t be the last time they’ll need to be set straight. 

This was my last evening, and I spent it on the veranda with John and Mauwli, chatting and swatting mosquitos.

September 15, 2007- Evening- Peeing on the Road

 

Banabas

After dinner a young boy showed up at the front gate.  He said his name was Banabas and he was wearing dingy pants and a clean black and orange locally made dress shirt.  He says he’s 17, although he looks closer to 13.  He told us that his parents died of AIDS and his 70-year-old Grandfather can’t take care of him anymore.  We sent word to Edem and waited for him to arrive. Kids are supposed to be referred by a social worker or we can get in trouble with the government.  Edem came quickly and talked with the boy.  He made sure he was fed well and tried to send him home, explaining that he would need to talk to the boy’s family and a social worker, but it was late and no tro tro was going to his village tonight. 

Mauli arrived and after much debate and discussion Edem decided to try to find the social worker to see if the kid could stay the night and if we can send him home in the morning and start the process soon.  Banabus could very well be telling the truth, or his family is pawning him off on HardtHaven hoping for a handout, so it must be investigated.  Edem called up another friend who arrived in a new car.  As he, the friends, and John hopped in, Edem turned to me and firmly commanded that I “be a good mother and stay with the kids.” Chauvinism aside, I’ve been in this house all day.  All WEEK.  I barely leave and today was a struggle.  And now it’s just me here.  Well, me… and Sister Matilda.

I swallowed it, though, turned on my heel, and chose a story to read.  Diapered and tucked in the twins.  Checked the homework.  Corralled the older children and oversaw while they cleaned up the office and porch for the millionth time that day. 

Minua took Nancy’s hand and lead her off to bed only to end up hollering at her so loudly we could hear from inside the office.  She was barking in Ewe and little Nancy was sniffling and sobbing.  When I walked in Nancy was just standing there, shoulders slumped and a confused look on her face while Minua lectured.  Nancy doesn’t sleep in diapers because they’re too expensive, but she often wets the bed.  Minua is her older sister, so she has to clean it up and she’s sick of it.  Understandably, but yelling at Nancy won’t make her stop wetting the bed.  I explained this to Minua, who was still irritated at me for putting her in time out earlier and all but refused to listen.  She stomped off, passing Elikplim in the doorway.  He sat on the bed next to Nancy and me and started singing.  Nancy stopped sniffling while we folded up a bed sheet and tied it to her bottom half.  She cuddled up and drifted off to Elikplim’s lullabye, me with a lump in my throat.  Just when you think you can’t take it anymore, a little boy sings an orphaned baby to sleep.

John returned alone with permission for Banabus to stay the night and once the older kids were settled in their dorms he and I headed out to the Maxi Spot. 

Big Stars in hand, we bonded over memories of home.  Tim, another Peace Corps volunteer, Frank (an ex-pat who married a local woman and can often be found riding his son around town on his motorcycle, both helmet-less), and another German guy were across the street at another Spot.  John talked me into visiting with them, although I was still sore at Tim for the Vacation Volunteer incident.  I promised to stop being a brat, and we ended up talking about the same topic as last time, but with a positive spin.  We discussed the new-ness of the home, volunteer expectations versus reality, what should happen to keep the home going, and what we all could actually actually do about it.  Small small.

John and I both peed on the side of the road on the way home.

September 15, 2007, Afternoon- Battles

Edem disappeared at some point during the morning, of course, so John and I had been left to our own devices.  After all that talk about periods and sex and HIV/AIDS, I needed a break and went to my room to read and fell asleep. 

I awoke to shrieking.  It was coming from The Hall, which was right outside my door.  A small mob of the kids were fighting, and when my door cracked open the mob descended upon me and the stories started flowing.  And each of them had a different story.  In the middle of the room there was a heavy chair still pinning Nancy to the floor, and Ernestina was standing next to her in hysterics.  Consensus was that Israel was to blame.  He denied it, vehemently, which set everyone off again.  I wasn’t in the mood for this crap. 

I put my hands up in the air and, in my deepest voice, firmly announced, “If the guilty party comes forward, they will be asked to apologize.  If they do not, we will ALL have a time out.”

No one fessed up. 

I started plunking chairs in corners and leading children by their elbows to sit in them.  They were LIVID about having a time out.  I explained that there is no talking during a time out, so they all sat around the complex, in their chairs, glaring at me silently or facing the wall sobbing.  Minua got even more angry with me when she realized that Elikplim had snuck away from the fray and was inside the boys dorm instead of in a time out chair.  When I didn’t’ hunt him down and make him sit… if looks could kill.  Oh, the injustice!

When they were all settled and I took a minute or two to revel in the silence, I tried to impress upon them that this lesson was about honesty, not fairness.  I’m not sure it worked, and although they were retained for less than 15 minutes a few of them were still clearly pissed at me and going to hold a grudge for the rest of the day. 

When The Great Orphans Injustice was over, Sister Matilda served lunch.  Junior and Christopher carried our heaping plates of red-red and plantains into the office and set them on the table.  The beans were spilling over the edges of the over-sized bowl and the plantains were heaped five inches high, and it was all swimming in a vat of red oil and pepe flakes.  My eyes started watering from the hot pepe as I sat down, but I was determined.  I was going to win at least one battle today.  John and I finished every last smoldering bite, accompanied by three water pouches apiece. 

I’m not sure whether we won or not, because come dinnertime we were presented with plates of normal sized proportions of fried yam… and fish stew.  On the one hand fish, or any meat, in a meal is like a holiday around here.  It could be seen as a gift.  A concession.  Admittance of defeat.  We had accepted her Lunch Challenge and won.  If this were not Sister Matilda we’re dealing with here.  She knows that we “do not take fish.”  We’ve told her many, many times.  “Will you take fish, Auntie and Uncle?”  “No, thank you, Sister Matilda, we do not take fish.”  We do not take that ancient, crusty, fly-ridden fish.  This is Sister Matilda we’re dealing with, and so, those hundreds of little fishy eyeballs and tiny bones whisper dangerously to us from our bowls, “this is a see, and a raise.” 

Down the hatch, Sister Matilda.  Down the hatch. 

I plugged my nose and dug in, ignoring the tiny shards of bone that scratched my throat on the way down and the smoky fish-paste smell that threatened to send them all back up, thinking to myself “this is how she kills me.”