Since we've been back.......

Things didn't change too much while we were gone. The rainy season kicked in full force and it's extra hot when it's not raining. Like everything else though, you get used to it. I have however had a little trouble getting used to the cold showers again, and therefore seem to keep kind of an odor most of the time. I hope Jessa gets used to that.

After about three days of being back I got really sick. It was a leftover chest infection from The States that turned into full blown pneumonia once I got back into the humidity here. I decided I would go to the hospital if it got to the point where I couldn't walk but my doctor back home was able to diagnose me via mom and some extra strong antibiotics that we keep on hand made me better after about a week. It's extra miserable being sick here. First of all you wonder if it's some kind of crazy exotic disease because it's a good possibility. Second of all you don't have the luxury of A/C and a comfortable sofa to curl up on and recover. It's 90 something outside and my temperature was up to 102 at one point. Miserable. All better now though.

We're making it a point to really enjoy our last month here before we leave for our Central America trip. Last weekend we went to Marudi creek. It's a black water creek about 1 1/2 hours out of town set in a very peaceful area with benabs (sort of lack small huts) for hanging hammocks and coca-cola colored water. I've never seen anything like black water. It's very clean, clean enough to drink but so rich with minerals that it's almost black. Supposed to be good for the skin, I'm not sure but definitely a good time.

In the coming weeks we plan on visiting some Amerindian villages, kind of what we would call Indian reservations at home but less for more choice and beautiful land. You can apparently stay the night in hammocks and kind of enjoy their way of life for a day or two. Should be a blast.

Work wise, things are going well here. I'm busy as usual at Habitat and Jessa is finishing up her project at work measuring the effectiviness of a workbook in teaching phonics throughout Guyana. I think she is getting good results so far.

A couple stories to finish off the blog. I don't know if we've ever truly explained what a minibus ride is like but we had a memorable one last weekend on the way to and from Marudi Creek. God definitely has a sense of humor because the maniac that dropped us of for the creek happened to be the first bus we found to take us home. So a minibus is a type of Toyota mini-van called a Hiace. It's a little bigger than your standard mini-van and can legally carry 15 people. 15 is crowded but they never stop there. It's usually closer to 20. I literally had a grown man sitting on my lap for 1 hour on a previuos trip. This weekend's bus was called "Lion Heart." Getting a bus at the market is half of the fun especially when your with a group of 5 "whities" (yep that's what they call us to our faces). They grab and pull you in every direction promising comortable seating and a quick departure all of which we now know is untrue. We chose quickly and poorly this time. Mr. Lion Heart drove about 90-100mph the whole way there. But that's not the exciting part. Overtaking is where it gets fun. We would call this passing at home. So it's a two lane highway with not much shoulder and there are cars pulled on the side of the road every where. To properly over take a vehicle you must first check to see if there is a car coming the other way. If there is then you start honking like a mad man and driving directly at the oncoming traffic. Mr. Lion Heart was the king of this. He weaved through the traffic like a magician to the sweet sweet sounds of the 80's. Just imagine 100 mph, windows open, an old man slighltly sitting on your lap, racing at oncoming traffic, and the music plays "Gloria, Gloria, I think they got your number”. An experience I won’t soon forget.

My next story takes place about an hour ago. We've recently had a string of robberies outside my office. Nothing major, just women having their necklaces ripped off their necks. We've had 3 in the last two weeks and one was a co-worker of mine. A young guy usually watches as the girls go across the road to get something from the corner store and when they come back he cycles up on them slowly and slaps them on the chest and rips off the necklace. He then cycles away quickly into the neighboring rough part of town. Today's guy wasn't so lucky. So we heard a scream and all ran outside to find a girl from the next door office crying with a cut on her knee. It had happened again but this time a guy saw the kid and said he knew who he was. He sped off and we thought nothing of it. About 30 minutes later we hear a mob coming down the street and go out to see what the fuss is about. We find several men pushing a young kid down the street to meet his victim. About 100 people came out from various offices and it looked like we were going to get to see some real Guyanese justice. They all crowded around the kid and the women started yelling at him while the men gave him a bit of beating with motorcycles helmets and fists. It looked like it was going to get out of hand so I decided to jump in the crowd and yell in my best Guyanese accent “don’t beat the boy, you got to call the police”. Turns out one of the guys was a cop, they did stop the beating though and my co-workers let me know he got off really easy. Finally a car came and they threw him in with the cop, hit him a few more times, and then sped off to the police station I assume. It turned out that the boy wasn’t the one that robbed my co-worker two weeks ago but Clifton (our admin, pictured on the right) still told her “me give de boy a few lashin’ for ya, but I vex wit me self cuz I nah hit he hard enough”. Endearing huh? I thought so.

Ahh Guyana. I will miss you.