Back in Village

Hi everyone! I'm been back in village for a week now but came to Farafeni for the weekend. Its a bigger town with an internet cafe and cold sodas. My host father lives here with his second wife so I always have a place to stay if I need it. There are other volunteers in the region and we want to meet up here in Farafeni a couple times a month. There's a bar here and a huge open market that goes late into the night. It's really beautiful at dark because all the little shops and food stands are lit up by kerosine lanterns and then the dust settles down and it looks like fog. We checked out a Gambian brothel the other night which was easily the seediest l've place I've ever. I need to buy a table at the market today and hop on the bush taxi home before dark. This has been easily the coolest week of my life, meeting all kinds of new people and learning about my village. I didn't speak English for a week. There was a naming ceremony and they named the little boy after me (Bubaccar). I also walked to the rice fields where the women work long hours. Its about 2km from village on a rough path and they walk back with huge loads of rice on their heads. Other women go to the abandoned refuee camp to use the pump their to wash clothes. It's an eerie place all delapidated and over grown with tall grass. My village health worker used to teach an adult literacy class in Mandinak but had to stop after the money dried up. I would like to get that going again...