Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Namesakes and marriage proposals

Today I awoke in that wonderful morning state of happy warmth and numbness. At 11:00am. :) I love days off. After having such a wonderful yesterday today seemed golden. I took a shower. They can only be two minutes long, so you just get used to turning it off and on allot. I had lunch and then went to Duahla Market again. This time with Katie and Sarah, our new roomate from England. Katie was shopping for her namesake; little two week old girl. The mother was much too shy to tell her what they needed so she got a list from the aunt. We searched around allot and eventually were able to find a baby bath that wasn't part of a package and was less than 30 US dollars. we also bought 3 cans of rice and a small bag of peppers and 5 cubes of soup flavoring and two baby wonzies. It's amazing how small everything seems here. They put spices in bags smaller than my pinkie finger. They treated me to a fried dough twist that the lady patted in a very course sugar. It tasted allot like a doughnut and was scrumptious. I also exchanged 5 US dollars for 315 LB dollars. They were purchasing lappas of cloth and some head scarves. But the exchange had totally thrown me off. Now I was suddenly paying hunddreds of dollars when I had been paying just a buck or two in US. It was dificult to gage whether or not something was too expensive. I felt more comfortable this time. I really started to appreciate. Every one saying hello. And the little children that all wanted to shake my had and give me high fives and the ione little girl in the market that reached up to touch my hair. We stopped at a shack to get sodas-they looked like 50's soda bottles just thinner. There was a little girl that jsut stood there and held my hand. It was so sweet. Katie got a marriage proposal. And there was one man who claimed to "always love Americans and British." He kept following us and told his "Auntie" that he was escorting us. At first it is very unnerving. But eventually you learn to simply apologize and say you need to go. So he proposed to Katie. We all looked at eachother-for a second-each of us thinking-what would you say?- Katie was good: "I am too young, my father doesn't want me to marry."
When I was at Duahla beach the little boys were telling me to come with them to marry one of the men. The only thing I could think to say was that my heart was already taken by God. "Do you have children?" Oh goodness...
Dad don't freak out, your baby girl's not about to come home with a boyfriend. Now Jordan is the one you should be worrying about. Tell him to e-mail me and Kayt too. I want ot hear more from them. Love you all so much-keep me updated!

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