Rooster Rears and Bicycle Spokes

Last Friday was what I would describe as a very Peace Corps Day.

I was risen from my slumber sometime in the 6^th hour of the morning by the sound of students’ voices on the front porch, calling “excuse me!” so I went outside in my PJs to greet my eager learners. They took my two empty red buckets and went chattering to the water pump to fetch water for me.

I had decided to visit the family of one of those students, Rassul, who was currently pumping water. He lives way out in the mato (the bush). But my bike had a lot of broken spokes, so the first task was to find someone who could fix my unreliable 1.5-wheeled transport. My neighbor, who is capable of doing the job, was out of town, and it’s a mystery as to when he will be back. So we walked to the market to find another handyman, but his house was empty. He had traveled just the previous day. We went to the third guy and last option…success! If I went to buy the new spokes, he would install them for me. This whole process, summarized down to 7 sentences, actually took about 5 hours.

The bike-fixer was next to the house of two of my other students (see the post “The Things I Carried” for pictures of these two hilarious brothers in nose glasses) so they brought us chairs and water and we sat waiting for my bike to be fixed. After a test run on the new spokes and a fee of 15 mets (60 cents) Rassul and I were on our way.

He assured me that it only takes 30 minutes to get from the school to his house by bike, but let’s remember that he makes this trip every day, twice or sometimes four times a day. So imagine a small hiking trail through the woods that goes up and down over hills and across rivers (I rode across two log bridges, with no railings. I didn’t fall off.), and me trying to navigate this pathway on my rickety bike with no gears and 30% brakes. I am certain that Rassul made me go in front just so he could watch me struggle. On some of the uphills, I had to get off my bike and walk because my legs are simply not that powerful. On some of the downhills, I had to get off my bike and walk because my brakes are simply not that powerful. I was afraid of losing control and plunging into the forest. And my wise sister once taught me from firsthand experience that even grabbing onto a tree would not have given me safety.

I finally made it huffing and puffing to his house. I was offered a straw mat to sit on, and Rassul brought me a glass of water, which I gratefully gulped down in one breath, because my throat was so dry (I think it was the water that made my stomach hurt for the following 5 days...but I'm all better, mother, don't worry!). I wondered to myself how he makes that trip every day for school. School starts at 7, what time must he have to leave his house? Suddenly all my complaints of living “far” away from my high school seemed ridiculous.

I sat on my mat, admiring the quantity of chickens and pilaos (a giant mortar and pestle to grind corn to make cornmeal mush patties) that his family owns. On his family compound, there was the main house, made of mud-bricks like most of the houses in Nauela. There was also a round structure with a straw roof that serves as the kitchen, a chicken coop, and a number of other small box-shaped buildings that I couldn’t identify. I sat amidst the chickens, which wandered around me and sometimes hopped on top of my bag or pooped on the ground near my feet, for about 45 minutes. A giant rooster strutted around with his tail feathers high in the air. Then he settled down outside the kitchen with his rear end facing me. It looked like he had buttcheeks, but it was just bunches of feathers. Of course it struck me as hilarious, but there was no one around who I felt comfortable sharing this with.

My stomach rumbled. Rassul brought out a plate with some mini bananas. I ate 3 of them. Being hungry, I’ve learned, makes everything taste good. After another 45 more minutes, his mother brought out a plate with 3 hard-boiled eggs, 4 cornmeal mush patties, and some cooked tomatoes. Lunch! I was overjoyed. Rassul and I each helped ourselves to one cornmeal mush patty and one egg, and some tomatoes. We ate with our hands, as is the custom for most of Nauela. Plus, food tastes better when you eat it with your hands. 

After lunch, I talked to my Rassul’s mother about the possibility of him applying to an international high school. He’s one of the most motivated students in the school, and I want him to know what kinds of opportunities exist for his future, besides his grandmother’s field (see the last paragraph of blog post “It’s Not Ee-gor, it’s Igor”) where the bananas came from.

And then we sat around for awhile longer. I watched his siblings catch a chicken – a very entertaining spectacle. The chicken squawked and tried to find sneaky hiding places to escape from the gaggle of kids chasing it around the yard, but after a few minutes, it was dragged out from under the chicken coop by a triumphant little girl. I imagined the family would eat well tonight; chicken is a rare treat.

As we were getting ready to go, we noticed that my bicycle tire, the very same that had been fixed that morning, was once again flat. Rassul found some makeshift tools in his house and took the tube out of the tire. He put it in a bowl of water until he spotted the culprit, a hole in the tube, easily located in the water by a small stream of bubbles. I sat to watch him and learn – now I was the student and he was the teacher. As we were sitting there operating on my bike, I heard his little sisters chatting “My name is….” They were speaking in English.

“I teach them English,” Rassul said. “At school, I am student; at home, I am teacher.” Are we sensing a theme here?

As the bike recuperated from surgery, I got ready to leave, and his family brought me a kilo of beautifully bug-free dried beans. I poured them into my bag. Then they brought the unlucky chicken over to me. I didn’t take it right away, because I couldn’t think of a way to say, without being rude, that they should keep it for themselves.

“Are you scared of the chicken?” they said.

“No I’m not scared of it!”…I just don’t know how to explain that I’m shocked that you’re offering me a chicken! That’s what I was saying in my head. It was very generous of them to give me that gift. I tried to say thank you in their local language. I think I said it correctly, but they just laughed.

It would have been impossible to get lost on the return trip, because there weren’t many turns, but Rassul accompanied me almost the entire hour to my house, before turning around and making the trip for the 4^th time that day. He carried the chicken for me on his handlebars, because I was afraid of crashing my bike and prematurely ending its life. On one of the uphills, when I had to walk my bike, the book The Little Engine That Could popped into my head, so I told Rassul the story, in a mix of English and Portuguese.

I would not be killing a chicken that day. My colleague had invited me over for dinner, and we were going to eat rice with dried fish, but now we had a chicken! So I dropped it off at his house on the way back. I went home to shower, and he called me when he was almost finished preparing the chicken. Once at his house, I sat on another straw mat in another yard waiting for a delicious dinner, also to be eaten with our hands.

Colleagues and straw mats...

...and food, eaten with the fingers. This is not finger food. This
is rice and beans and salad. I love eating with my hands.
Don't tell my parents.

I had to share this picture with you.
You can just see the evil emanating from my eyes.