Typical Day in Village

5:30am: Eyes open... Why am I awake?

6:00am: Prayer call, not so bad when they have a normal person do it, excruciating when they have the sick old man do it and it sounds like a donkey braying in pain

6:05am: Trip to latrine then back to bed to snuggle with cat

8:30am: Get out of bed (because this is a decent time to get up)

9:00am: Open door and greet family. Visit bitik and decide what I want for breakfast

9:30am: Breakfast maybe chocolate spread and peanut butter on bread. Yummy!

10:00am-12:00pm: Read, paint, talk with children, hang with family.

12:00pm-2:00pm: Make lunch, cooked over a wood fire, takes a while.

2:00pm: Lunch, if I'm lucky it is fish balls with domada

2:30pm-4:00pm: Brew Attaya with the boys next door and chat out on the porch.

4:00pm-6:30pm: Play with children, practice my pathetic Mandinka

6:30pm: Bucket bath, must get to this before the sun goes down

7:00pm-8:30pm: Visit with family, sit out under mango tree in compound

8:30pm: Dinner

9:00pm: Off to bed to read for a while ( I have read a lot of books!)

Sleep!

Get up and do it all over again tomorrow. Soon I will find work to do in the village that will begin to take up some of my time but now I am mainly working on integrating with the family and getting to know the village.