A Day in the Life of Koumba

Just in case anyone is wondering what an average day during Peace Corps training is like, here’s my usual schedule while at homestay…

7:00 Think about getting up. If I’m feeling ambitious (and it’s not 110 degrees in my room), I’ll do what we’ve dubbed the “prison workout” – whatever can be done in an empty 4 square foot cell.

8:00 Start morning chores: sweet my room, mop (sometimes), wash last night’s dishes, get yelled at by little Koumba if I'm not going fast enough.

8:20-8:55 Eat 5 inches of a Styrofoam-esq bread loaf (with mayonnaise if we're feeling fancy) and drink kinkiliba - a tea made from twigs/branches and excessive amounts of sugar. Under no circumstances am I allowed to leave without drinking tea.

830 (if I get fed in time) Go to the local elementary school to water the garden. Since we live in the desert this is becoming a lost cause, but it’s a good excuse to buy a bean sandwich from the ladies posted outside the school gates and supplement my inadequate first breakfast.

9-1 Class at my teacher Djieneba’s house. Djieneba is wonderful and has made the past 6 weeks both educational and hilarious. As an added bonus, her host mom makes/sells tiny bags of flavored ice – called “Alaskas” – that we eat throughout class.

1-4 Go home, read/nap, eat lunch, wash dishes, read/nap some more. Sometimes it’s just my mom, the two kids and myself at the communal lunch bowl, but often Via (the random guy who lives in the spare room), my dad or other assorted men will join us. I’m not sure how my mom knows how many people to cook for, but she’s usually pretty close to the mark.

4-6ish Meet up with my language group at someone’s house (never mine), make tea, drink tea, practice Pulaar with the family, get made fun of by the family, end up speaking more English than we should, get yelled at to stop speaking English.

6-9 Bucket shower, attempt to study, sit in our courtyard (often in silence), watch tv (when there’s electricity), eat dinner. Dinner is generally a reserved portion of whatever we had for lunch. Sometimes this is great…sometimes it’s cold rice and fish.

9-930 Get in bed insanely early in order to “study,” read or write a blog post! All of this is done under a mosquito net while wearing a head lamp.

10-? Wild dreams/hallucinations brought upon by anti-malaria medication