Parenthetical.net

I’ve started thinking of myself as Snow White (appropriate on a number of levels, obviously) and the guys as my Four Dwarves. They take care of me, feed and shelter me, help my naive self navigate the big bad world, keep me on a bit of a pedestal, and lead sort of mystifying lives of their own, squabbling and joking in their own language. I tried to come up with their dwarf names, but failed to find the right one-word adjectives for their personalities. Oh, well.

Big news of the week: I got malaria! I have now officially visited the tropics, I guess. (RT told me later that people assume “malaria” here the way we assume “cold” and immediately go take a course of anti-malarials anytime they’re sick - you don’t need a prescription for anything here.) It was the worst fever I’ve ever had and I had to ask the guys to take me to the hospital, which involved an hour and a half of finding a car and a driver and driving to Ho. I was pretty scared, I have to admit - it could have been so many truly awful things. The nurses sorted me out pretty quickly, though, and by the next day I was basically fine. One of those things that sucks untreated, but that modern medicine can pretty efficiently take care of. I am confused about why I bothered taking my malaria prevention pills, though…

My project finished yesterday! The books are classified, labeled (by hand on tape), and entered into a logbook. The students all came in for an orientation. B is more or less trained. (He’s not really a librarian by training, btw, which maybe clears up the confusion about why he had trouble with alphabetizing. He’s an electrician who said he’d take charge of the library because the school needed someone to.) It was unquestionably the hardest thing I’ve ever done professionally, possibly the hardest thing I will ever do, because if I ever do a project like this again, at least it won’t be the first time. It was an exercise in stripping library work down to what really matters: it matters that books by the same author are together, it doesn’t matter if “Saint-Exupery” is alphabetized by “Saint” or “Exupery,” for example. (Or at least, so I decided.) I had some very tough days where I heard the voice of my Very Critical Co-worker in my head telling me that I was a disgrace to the profession, but I think I did pretty well under the circumstances. At the least, focusing the school’s attention on the library for a few weeks has to be a good thing!

The school gave me two local outfits with necklaces as goodbye gifts, which was so generous. They are beautiful. I’m wearing the dress now, and it’s like an invisibility cloak. It cuts the obnoxious calls of “yavoo!” and requests by young men to “be my friend and have my contact” down by half, which makes walking around town ever so much more pleasant. (RT, btw, insists that they aren’t being rude or inappropriate; they just want to connect with me in some way. I’m sure that’s true, but it still makes me uncomfortable. I just didn’t want to give the impression that it’s a rude country - it is in fact an extremely friendly, beautiful country, and I’m looking forward to coming back with as many of you as possible!)

So now I’m back in Ho for the day, then starting some traveling tomorrow. A week from today I’ll be back in Accra, getting ready to fly to London, where I’ll spend a couple of days, then HOME! Besides being excited to see you, there is a grilled cheese sandwich and a green salad with my name on it. I haven’t really had anything fresh and green since I’ve been here (or cooked and green, for that matter…I’m sure I’m vitamin deficient in some awesome ways right now), and there’s no cheese in this country (except for this nasty Laughing Cow spreadable cheese food stuff)! Barbarians, I tell you.