The joy of language

Quick congratulations to Tiffany! For those of you not in the know, Tiffany Lankes is the Sarasota Herald Tribune’s best and coolest reporter. Less impressive, but certainly worth mentioning, she was recently announced as a Pulitzer Prize finalist for her work on the series “Broken Trust.” For those of you really not in the know, that’s huge. (and Tiff, I think winning at your age would have been a little tacky. Wait until you’re 27).

Have you ever heard someone say, “I don’t know why someone wouldn’t like me?”

This is a really valid comment. I was walking with three girls today when I heard it and the other two quickly said similar things about themselves. I’m no philosopher and it’s late, so I won’t point out all the reasons this statement makes sense to the speaker. I get it and so should you.

The thing is, I can think of plenty of reasons people might not like me. I can be a bitch for no reason, I laugh at the wrong times, I often say inappropriate things, etc…. No worries, I like myself fine, but I have no trouble seeing why other people (who don’t read this blog) might not.

It was this self-awareness that had me worrying about the host family evaluations. It needs to be said that I have an awesome host family. I wouldn’t change a thing - okay, just lied because I would love to shut everyone up between the hours of 11 p.m and 6 a.m. - they are nice, patient, and perhaps best of all, they don’t care too much about what I am doing. This is a good point to make. My host family members are like professional Peace Corps hosts. They have had 30-odd volunteers in the past. I like to tease my host mom that she is the Peace Corps mafia (it actually is sort of funny when translated), she knows everything before anyone else does.

I know someone else who is also staying with a family that has had a lot of past volunteers. She’s a cool girl, but not delighted with her host family situation because she feels like she is just another person getting lost in the shuffle and no one is making any special effort to show her things and introduce her to Senegal. One could argue I am in a similar situation, (they’ve let me blend in as much as the white girl who doesn’t speak the language can) but the big difference is I love it! I don’t want to be someone special, I just want to sort of take it in while no one else is looking. Now, if you were a host family really excited to introduce an American to Senegal wouldn’t you hate me?

It’s week four and the peace corps staff visited all our families to see how we are getting on. Aside from the noise issue, I really have no complaints. I even like that the 18-year-old and I are sometimes catty with each other after dinner, it’s that relaxed. Things had been going so well that this past week I have had myself convinced I was doing something wrong, that I had inadvertently offended everyone but was oblivious. I don’t want anyone to think I was losing sleep over the possibility (I don’t need everyone to like me), but I was prepared to hear some unflattering things when I sat down for my evaluation this afternoon.

Now, I don’t know how seriously they take these evaluations and the woman who does them is understaffed, but I got nothing. It was perfect, no complaints. This is probably due in large part to the fact that the Senegalese “don’t like to trash other people,” said a volunteer who has been here longer.

Crazy, huh? A culture that doesn’t like to say bad things about people. Don’t know if it’s true but I’m just going to go with it and count myself lucky. There have been no actual indications that I am upsetting anyone, so overall I am very pleased.

Maybe the best part of the evaluation (since the whole thing turned out to be pretty much a non-event) was my host family’s response when asked about my language progression.

I think the direct quote was, “she has trouble with the pronunciation and memorization, but it is clear she is motivated and we can see she is trying very, very hard.”

I don’t know what you get out of that, but I think the I sound “special needs,” and I can guarantee you my (real, American) siblings agree. Apparently everyone can see the wheels grinding in my head when I attempt Pulaar. I think I also look panicked and wring my hands a lot, which explains the “are you okay?” from the language teachers.

I wrote more about how language was coming along, but figured it wasn’t in my best interest to post and will just leave it at ‘slowly.’ If I am saying the same thing in four months it’s okay to wonder, but for now stay relaxed. Lord knows, I am.

Okay, back to my current book. Can you believe someone actually commented today that they didn’t my serious novel was the sort I would be interested in? Clearly I have to work on my image. Someone send me Tolstoy.

*In the interest of accuracy I want to say that I am ready to sleep, not read. I’ve been ready for the past 90 minutes. But there is no, and I repeat, NO concept of reducing the noise level so other people can sleep. No joke, two nights ago I woke to what sounded a lot like a toddler banging pots with a metal spoon. The toddler was crying in another room and wasn’t to blame. It was the 18-year-old girl reorganizing the pots and pans right outside my window. It was midnight.

Comments

[snakeyes]

I think I should send you earplugs, the really nice foamy kind

[Jackie]

Your trouble with the language takes me back to when you were trying to learn Russian. dobryj dyen'!! With the way you picked up that language, I would have thought you would be fluent in Pulaar by now.

[andrew]

The 18 yr. old sounds hot.

[andrew]

Send pics. of the 18 year old.
When you get a chance