Year 2 - Week 29: Cruelty

Another night in pain, another night without sleep. One night of this, I could handle. Two nights of this is just a little much. To this point, I've done everything that the book and our medical people told me to do, quite possibly too much. It's pretty bad when the only time you can even consider sleeping is immediately after gargling warm salt water. I felt like that's how I spent most of my day: gargling and then considering a nap.

In my mind, there could only be two diagnoses for this ailment: strep or tonsillitis. The salt water and advil should have been enough to knock out tonsillitis and the pain wasn't getting any better. In my mind, it was strep. Maybe it's because when you don't know, you tend to go to the worst case scenario, but I feel like this was reasonable. I knew it was bad when I wanted to take antibiotics to knock it out. Usually, I will put off taking pills until I'm near death. By Sunday afternoon, it got to the point that I wouldn't mind taking drugs to resolve this.

I knew I reached this point at lunch. Richie and I were eating our eggs and potatoes for quite possibly the 500th time. As usual, we split a loaf of Mambone bread, which has a slightly hardened crust. I took one bite into the bread and I couldn't swallow it without cringing. Richie, the beneficiary of my almost half of bread, laughed at my pain. If nothing else, there is no shortage of schadenfreude in this house. If he were in my position, I'd be laughing at him too.

After a third round of warm salt water, I was able to squeeze out a small nap. It took me a while to fall asleep because every time I had to swallow, I would get that much further away from crashing. That's the kind of pain I was in. Thankfully, I caught about an hour's worth of sleep. Rested, and having not done a whole lot of work the last couple of days, I felt the need to be productive. My students are scheduled to take a midterm on Friday, so I spent a couple hours in the afternoon banging out the exam. I may be sick, but I'm not going to be totally lazy.

Given that I could not even swallow bread, I figured that my dinner options were limited to pasta. Spaghetti was about the softest thing I could eat. I managed to get through my meal no problem, but after that, I was shot, wiped out. I needed a good night of sleep. I popped an ibuprofen and a sleeping pill, and within minutes, before I even had the chance to gulp, I was asleep.

Asleep I was for a solid nine hours. The night of sleep was as necessary to my health as water or sunlight. I finally woke up when I heard the door open twice within five minutes. The first time was Richie leaving for class. The second time was Richie, having canceled class, coming back in the house. Ten of his forty or so students managed to make it to class. Most of them, it appears, were still at home or heading back to school after Independence Day. With that, this one-day holiday became five days. I know things usually take longer in Mozambique, but this is getting ridiculous.

I spent the morning with salt water, with the intent of being able to eat my entire lunch. I didn't want to give Richie the pleasure of seeing me struggle to eat bread. I probably shouldn't have eaten my bread, but I did anyway. Things were a little easier today, but every bite was caused plenty of pain. At least I didn't have to teach today.

Following his morning canceled classes, Richie canceled his afternoon classes. By mid afternoon, he was getting antsy and wanted to go to the villa. I decided I should probably get my legs moving as well. When three colleagues joined us, I knew it was going to turn into a beer run. I would have to turn that down and go with a soda. On the way to the villa, our medical people called and told me I could go on antibiotics. Success!

While in the villa, a colleague and I went on the hunt for electrical wire. One of things that really bothers me is the lack of power outlets. There are only three in the entire house and none of them are on the patio, my favorite place to work. I figured if I put an outlet on the patio, I could work out there with the computer for hours on end. I had a plan in my head: since I couldn't run wire in the guts of our house, I'd run it along the walls. Electric wire between two adapters would make for a MacGuyver extension cord. It wouldn't be pretty, but it would get the job done. The wire was a lot pricier than I thought it would be, and since it's the end of the month, I'm just about out of money. This project could wait a couple days.

My parents called while Richie and I returned from the market. Most of my family was in town for a baby-naming ceremony at our house. It's one of the last major events I'll miss at home. The months are few now.

I popped my meds as soon as I finished our stir fry dinner. I've been put on ciproflaxcin. Cipro is an atomic bomb antibiotic: it apparently destroys everything in its path. I've always known cipro as the drug you take when Pepto Bismol is not doing its job. I never thought I'd be taking it for strep, but here I am, popping three cipros a day. Within hours of popping the first one and a half pills, I started to feel better. Amazing. I knew it would be a good couple days before I was back to 100%, but at least I could go to sleep without the help of a pill tonight.

Tuesday started out almost exactly the same as Monday, with the closing of a door. Richie and Sozinho went on a mission to Mambone to buy starches. I know this is going to be hard to believe, but we managed to knock out our twenty-five kilogram (that's 55 pounds for those of you in America) sack of rice. Sozinho did his part by finishing off twelve kilos of corn flour. Their mission was to find a smaller sack of rice. We know there are ten- and twelve-kilo bags, and we're banking on Mambone to have them.

While they were out, I had a mission of my own. Our neighbor came over with the electrical wire he promised, so I could get to work on putting in a new power outlet. I had all the pieces prepared; they just needed to be connected. I thought I had everything hooked up, but the outlet still wasn't working. I found out which end wasn't working the hard way: zap! A whole bunch of electricity went straight through my arm. Note: when working with electricity, turn it off or wear rubber gloves. The one -- and as it turns out, the only -- shock would not deter me. A couple minutes later, I had everything working. Sweet!

Richie and Sozinho were also successful on their mission. As they walked in, Sozinho had both the ten-kilo bag of rice and the ten-kilo bag of corn flour on his back. Richie tried to take one of them, but as Sozinho explained to us just does ago, the younger person carries the stuff. Age has its advantage. They walked up to the house just in time for lunch. Lunch was eventful for me, as I was able to get through the entire meal pain-free. This day has gone way too well.

I had a couple of classes to give Tuesday afternoon. We continued on our magical journey with the question how, surveying questions involving duration of time -- how long -- and questions of degree or size, such as "how cold" or "how big". I knew that I got through to one girl when I read her response to the question "How hot is the temperature today?" She is one of the girls who lives in a house that recently got hooked into satellite, and it's pretty clear from her answer that she's been watching the news. Her answer read "Today's temperature is 27 max, 18 min". I couldn't help but laugh.

When the energy came on late in the afternoon, I went over to the director's office to print out my exam. To save paper and money, I wanted to print two exams to a page, but for some reason, the printer was cutting off the bottom twenty percent of my exam. Frustrating, certainly, but I think I can figure out how to manipulate the copy machine to get two to a page.

I was pinned into dinner on my own tonight when Richie decided he was going to eat fish with Sozinho. I didn't want to cook anything special, so I looked at our canned food and saw I could just about put together a Thanksgiving meal. I know it's June, but who's going to stop me? I put together a can of sweet potatoes, a can of green beans, and a can of roast beef and had myself a tasty meal.

The entertainment today was a World Cup game of epic proportion. Spain was playing Portugal for the right to advance. I was counting on Spain to get me back on the winning track. I went six for six over the first three days, but Japan failed to beat Paraguay to keep me perfect. The game was as advertised. Portugal had some excellent chances but couldn't cash in. As the game went on, it became obvious that Spain was the superior time. They eventually made good on one of their chances and held on for a 1-0 win.

If nothing else, I've come to appreciate what a cruel game soccer is and what a vicious tournament the World Cup can be. Through group play, Portugal did not surrender a single goal. They tied 0-0 with both Ivory Coast and Brazil and squeezed in a thorough 7-0 dismantling of North Korea. In spite of this, they don't even win the group. Their reward for not giving up a single goal was a match with the number one ranked team in the world. They give up one goal, and their tournament is done. It's a wicked world.

By Wednesday, things should just about have returned to normal at school. One would think that six days off would be enough to celebrate Independence Day. Nope. Richie came back a failed man. Despite combining two groups of students, the classroom was still half empty. Class canceled No sense in teaching to a quarter of the students.

The bad luck, however, stopped with Richie. I made a run over to the market, where I had nothing but success. The first success was being able to make my exam fit two per page. The power of the zoom button is truly wonderful. Secondly, I found some items for beautifying the house: a new mirror for the bathroom and "abraçadeiras". I don't know what "abraçadeiras" are called in English, but they are plastic u-type nails that stick wire to wall. Someone who has worked in a Home Depot would know what to call those suckers. The third -- and quite possibly, the most important -- success was the presence of avocado in our market. What? This is excellent. A night of Mexican food would be in our future.

After lunch, I sat around hoping that someone would come get me so I could knock out my class early. Amazingly, no one came. I'm shocked that all of the teachers due to give class actually gave class. Whatever. I kept myself busy by securing the electrical wire with the "abraçadeiras". The last thing we need is to trip over electrical wire. We trip over enough shit as it is already.

Finally, my time for class came along. The length of this class depended entirely on the students. I gave my students the information about their exam on Friday. I told them the format of the exam and the topics that the exam would cover, and then opened it up to questions. "Questions or doubts? Anyone? Anyone?" Nope. A year and a half into teaching and I still don't understand this. If you have absolutely no doubts, you should be getting 100% on every exam. These students flutter around 60%. I've done what I can; the rest is in their hands.

Alexis was at the house when I got back from class. This is her last full week here. Watching people leave, especially when we've been here for longer, is painful. It's depressing to watch people come and then leave. I must give credit to Alexis though. She was dropped in Machanga with almost no training. At 19, that can be overwhelming. Hell, even with the ten weeks of training that we had, getting dropped here was overwhelming for us. I remember those days all too well. Anyways, I told Alexis that she could stay for our Mexican bounty if she wanted, but her host institution would have none of it.

Bummer for her, because this food was delicious. We went all out on this Mexican food night. We probably had enough food for three or four people, but that wasn't going to stop us from finishing it. We are so rarely full here that we take advantage of it whenever we get the opportunity. Needless to say, we went to bed very full.

I woke up Thursday morning feeling better for the most part. I would love to credit the magical healing powers of the avocado, but even I know better than that. Cipro is a wonder-drug and in three days, it had done its job almost perfectly. My throat still hurt a bit, but I'll blame dehydration for that one.

Thursday was a largely uneventful day, especially in the morning. My class for Thursday was already planned. My science-track kids would be getting a lesson they should have received last Thursday. And yes, to their dismay, they would be tested on it tomorrow. It's their own damn fault, really. If they had celebrated the holiday on its designated day instead of a day early, they wouldn't have had to worry about this class today. It was no concern to me.

That said, when the time came around for class, I made sure to spend some extra time on the lesson. While it is their responsibility to learn it, it as just as much, if not more, my responsibility to teach it well. For some reason, this group of kids really struggled with the difference between "how much" and "how many". They needed me to explain it or three times, which was slightly annoying because the other group figured it out right away. By the end of the day, I think they had it figured out. I'd find out tomorrow. So would they.

Late in the afternoon, I had to finish making photocopies for the exam tomorrow. I got two exams to fit on the page yesterday. Now, just needed to make copies for everyone. Remarkably, the school slashed it's photocopy price by 60%, meaning I wouldn't have to charge students for this exam. More importantly, I would have enough money to make photocopies and arrive in Chimoio.

The rest of the night was quiet. Richie and I made stir fry and followed that with "Dogma". "Dogma" is one of my favorite movies. It never fails to entertain.

The calm before the storm was Friday morning. The only thing I had to do Friday morning was splice my exams in half so every student would have an exam. And making sure that Sozinho didn't get his hands on an exam before the scheduled time.

If the morning was calm, the afternoon and evening were chock full of excitement. I had exams to give, which is always lovely. I didn't have any cheaters, a lovely recent development. More interesting than that, though was the school director was giving an exam at the same time as I was. This is usually unimportant and uninteresting, but this was the first time that I had seen a typed exam of his. He had sat in on my formatting lesson, and while there was certainly room for improvement, the formatting on the whole was pretty good. It definitely brought some joy to my day.

Whatever joy it brought, however, was torn down piece by piece in the hours that followed. Not wanting to grade exams in Chimoio this weekend, I spent the afternoon grading exams. On the whole the kids did well. But still, grading exams sucks. The real destruction of my happiness came at night.

A bunch of us were watching the Uruguay-Ghana game. With all of the Portuguese-speaking teams out an only one African team remaining, everybody was rooting for Ghana. The entire game can be summed up in a single moment. In the last minute of extra time, Ghana had a penalty kick to win the game. They sent this twenty year old kid -- the one who scored the game-winning goal against the U.S. -- to the line. He has the goalie beat, but he clanks it off the crossbar. You could tell the kid was wrecked. Still, when the penalty kicks started, he was the first to kick (and he scored his). But their fate was sealed. They needed a miracle to beat Uruguay, and they got it, but the crossbar robbed them of advancing. It was clear going into penalties that Uruguay would advance.

I went to bed, feeling for this poor kid. It actually kept me awake for a good hour, thinking about it. My mind is bad like that. I eventually got to sleep, but I can't imagine that this guy will be sleeping for the next little while.

I was on the road early Saturday for Chimoio. I didn't really want to travel to Chimoio, but there was a party and I'll be damned if I'm going to miss a party. I was committed to two things: not using the Machanga road and not using the chapa. The first was easy. I crossed the river and made my way to Mambone. As I walked into town, I noticed a CARE car. CARE is the organization that the Volunteers in Vilanculos work for. I've always wanted a boleia with these guys, so of course the one time I'm able to get a ride from them, I'm not going to Vilanculos. I waited around for two hours for the car to leave, which sucked, but the car went 140 kilometers per hour the entire way, getting to Maluvane in record time.

My luck didn't get much better for the rest of the trip. I sat at Maluvane for hours, waiting for a car to head north, but it seemed like everything was going south. I eventually got into a big-rig heading for Tete -- which would have dropped me exactly where I needed to go -- but for some reason, he got stopped at the bridge across the river. I got out of the truck and waited another hour until a pick-up truck finally stopped for me. The ride was great -- fast and free. The whole trip to Chimoio cost less than 50 Meticais. It made all the waiting worthwhile. But between the strep, the soccer games, and the waiting, all I could think was "man, this was kind of a cruel week."

Once I was in town, there were only three things I wanted to do: eat, drink, and be merry. Eating was easy. The Volunteers in town killed a pig, someone brought a cake, everything was delicious. Drinking was a little more difficult, but I still managed to do my part. However, all that drinking pretty much eliminated my chance at achieving goal three. I was tired as it was and the booze knocked me out. Just about everyone went out around 10:00 to continue the party, but I was finished. I crashed fast.