Strange McStranger: “Are you a doctor?”
Me: “Oh, um, no.”
“Oh, your shirt says Muscular Dystrophy.”
“Oh, no, this is an organization I volunteer with.”
“Ah. Are you American?”
“Yep…”
“How’s Obama?”
“Um, he’s good.”
“He’s black.”
“Yep. Sure is.”
:Exit elevator:
I hate the elevators here and would gladly take the steps, if the steps were illuminated and had hand rails… or rape courtesy phone… or came equipped with pepper spray. The stairs are creepy and the elevators are awkward. Nigeria is not helping my social skills, at all.
It’s National Sibling Day!! Well, according to Facebook, so who knows. I have siblings. I started with 1, then ended up with 4 and I’m the youngest of the group. It’s quite a story, in fact. However, I have the benefit of being the youngest, but they didn’t know I existed until I was nearly 13 and they were well beyond their traumatize-your-little-sister phase. Never once have I been locked out of the house or attempted to be sold to a neighbor kid for a pack of baseball cards. Ok, I have no idea what siblings do, in fact. However, I can teach you all the rules of playing board games by yourself.
I do have to state, for the record, that my siblings probably wouldn’t like me nearly as much as they do had they grown up with me. There’s a little self-awareness for you.
My best expat friend and I went to the store today. We were supposed to go to the orphanage so I could cuddle little kidders, but the driver forgot about us. Or the office forgot to tell the driver. Or…something. I’m not amped up about it now, but for the hour and a half that we sat in the lobby, I was fairly heated. So, when a driver did show up, neither of us were just going to send him away.
Being an expat, there are a lot of gray areas. I’ve read that a good place to get your fruit is from the side of the road. Underneath a nearby bridge is supposed to be the best. Um… I’ve never bought anything under a bridge. Ever. Do I just walk up the stand and start picking stuff out? Is there a protocol? And good grapefruits ( <— That’s called Teacher Cursing. I’ve got plenty more where that one came from.), I really don’t want to haggle. I hate haggling, but it’s a standard here.
So, we decided to go to a nearby store and peruse. We’ve been living off hotel food for months now, so the whole cooking aspect has not occurred yet. This store is fairly similar to a US shop. One benefit of this trip is that I learned that there is a separate scale to weight your fresh fruits and veggies, before you bring it to the register. Who knew? And I’m going to ignore the fact that the cashier was highly amused at the poor oyibo who didn’t know how to shop. And I think she cheated me on my change. Why won’t they just provide the cashiers with change?? WHY?
I also learned that there are goat bouillon cubes available. I’ve never had a need for goat flavoring. I’m not sure I ever will. But if I do, I know where to go. Mmm goat.
My final rambling topic:
We saw this on the road today, and I instantly started mocking. “Highly inflammable… what is that? Water?” Laugh it up, philistine. Did you know that flammable and inflammable are synonyms? I feel like I’ve been living under a rock. A flame retardant one.
