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Thursday, June 2, 1977, 9:00 pm, Day 492
Today was Market Day. There is no market in Kamiendor, but once a week on Thursdays, one is held in Densembadu, the next village two miles back down the road. Today has been my first chance to go in 3 months. Before, I always happened to be somewhere else on Market Day. I went to it today, though. This market is really a big deal around these parts. Besides the buying and selling, it also provides an opportunity for the people to dress up and to meet all of their friends.
Today was the largest turnout yet that I have seen. I would estimate that there were probably 1000 people there. I met a few of my people there, people that I knew from before in Kamiendor, but that aren't in Kamiendor now. They all came either from their farms or from the neighboring villages.
Today, at the market, I also took the opportunity to try to make it up to all of the people that have been feeding me. I gave each of my ladies some money and went around with them at the market, helping them out when they wanted to buy something but didn't have enough money. This was also a time of trial for me. I think that I am basicly thrifty and that it shows up as being stingy or krabit, as they say in Krio. I also feel a bit guilty, with me having more money than I can use, and all of them not having hardly any. I am trying to force myself to be a little more free and liberal in my spending, and today I think that I succeeded pretty good. I would almost rather not be in this position of having lots of money, because alot of the time all I hear is "give me..., Give me..., Give me...", and it gets tiring after awhile. Today I was giving my ladies more than they asked for. One asked for ten cents and I gave her one Leone instead. It made them happy and it helped to lessen my guilt feeling by repaying them for the times that they offered to feed me.
All in all, I think I had a good enjoyable successful day today at the market.
This afternoon I got out my Kono "dictionary" that I am making and managed to fill up two pages with names of different things. I also wrote down the Kissy names for the numbers from one to ten. I am still not able to pick up anything from a Kono conversation yet, so I have a very long way to go. I think that part of the problem is that some of these conversations are probably in Kissy, but I can't tell the difference.
Friday, June 3, 1977, 10:00 pm, Day 493
It has been raining just about every night lately. I can really tell the difference, too. Everything is a new fresh green, and the rain has washed the dust out of the air so that the views are really great now from Kamiendor.
Everything on the Kamiendor water design is now completed and is just waiting to be turned in now. Today I went out and saw where we would have to get the sand to use for the concrete for the water system. The closest place is at the Meli River, which is two miles away. The villagers will have to pile it on the bank and then a tipper will have to be hired to haul it all to Kamiendor. Besides going out to the Meli River, I also did a bit of hiking down the hill from Kamiendor to the well site, over to a couple of villages, and then around and back up the hill again to Kamiendor. It felt good. I felt good, also. I had my Kono dictionary with me today and was able to get another page of names of things. I also redid the page that I had for numbers. I am now able to count up all of the way to 999,999 if need be, in Kono. Before, I had to stop at ten, and then start over again because I didn't know anything higher.
Friday, June 10, 1977, 7:00 pm, Day 500
I came back up to Kamiendor today after being away a couple of days. While in Koidu, I found a package of 80 balloons which I decided to buy and take back up and give to the kids. Things were going fine but now I wonder if I shouldn't have done it. I was trying to give each kid one, and only one, balloon. Most of them kept coming back though, claiming that I hadn't given them one yet. I know all of the kids by face now, so I knew those that I had given and those that I hadn't, so they weren't fooling me any. It got so that in handing out a balloon, trying to make sure that it reached the hands of the person to whom it was intended, I had to literally fight my way through about ten extra pairs of hands that were trying to grab the balloon first. Things were just getting out of hand. I handed out almost 60 balloons so far. I then went out to visit the folks around town, but after a bit I found that I couldn't visit anyone because every place that I tried to go, I had about 20 kids hanging around all telling me at once why I should give them a balloon. I just couldn't get rid of them. They wouldn't leave me alone.
I felt like beating the whole lot of them, and in fact, I did slap one girl a time or two. I didn't give out any more balloons. I felt like just taking the balloons and holding them up in front of them, and then setting the balloons on fire. That way, nobody would get them. I didn't go that far, though, because finally the kids got the hint and decided to leave me alone. I guess it probably would have been better to have at the beginning just gathered together a crowd of the kids and then throw a bunch of balloons out over them and let them fight each other for them.
I will be getting some company up here in Kamiendor this Sunday. Sunday afternoon, Kathy Larson (Sia Kayima) and Nancy Nobles (Finda Tumbudu) will be coming. They are 2 of the 3 Peace Corps girls that are here in the Kono District. The reason for the visit is that on the Monday following, they are to have a teachers' workshop at the primary school near here. They will therefore be spending the night at my place. This will only be the third time in 6 months that I have had company, and the first time since the end of January.
I will have to bake something up for them but I am not sure what, either a cake or cookies. It will probably be cookies, though, because next Wednesday they want me to attend a dinner party for Chris Helm (Fiaya Musu) who is the third Kono Peace Corps girl. I might try baking up a cake for them to surprise them. It might be a bit tricky, though, because the cake will have to be transported from Kamiendor to Tumbudu, a distance of 51 miles, or about 3.5 hours by motorcycle over the bumpiest roads in the world. I might be able to manage it though, if I wear my backpack and then have the cake and the frosting well wrapped in separate containers.
It seems that I will be seeing these girls alot lately, since I also spent last night with them.
Sunday, June 12, 1977, 7:00 pm, Day 502
Well, Nancy and Kathy are not here yet, and there is probably a good chance that they might not make it at all. I expected them at around 6:00 pm. By 6:15 they hadn't arrived and a big, hurricane-force wind came up, followed, predictably, by heavy rain. At 6:30 it got dark. If they were on the road someplace when it started to rain, they probably stopped at the first house they found to wait out the rain. One would really have to be stupid (like me, sometimes) to try to travel in these rains. Also, I cannot picture a Honda 70 being able to make it along this road, and especially up Kamiendor's hill when it is dark and raining. It is hard enough for my XL175 during good riding conditions. Anyway, the hungeries got to be a little while ago, so I ate up my portion of the rice chop, but I am still saving enough for Kathy and Nancy, if and when they finally show up.
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