Saturday, September 6th

I dropped my watch in the toilet today and had to fish it out with my hand. Bummer.

We spent our morning doing inventory in the pharmacy storeroom. Oh joy. : ) It actually wasn't that bad and we got done a lot more quickly then I thought we would.

We spent the rest of our day at a pagan funeral. What an experience!!! Even the drive itself was interesting. 45 minutes on a crazy dirt road with Robin just plowing right through! It was great! Although I hit my head on the handle over my cardoor twice. Ouch. I am still learning the art of riding out here. I think the trick is to sit slightly to the right (to avoid bumping heads with the driver) but lean slightly to the left (to avoid hitting your head on the car), keep your body loose, your tongue out from between your teeth, and your eyes on the road! Here are a couple of videos. I hope all of the bumps don't make you sick!

When we got to the village we went to see the body. It was in a casket with a piece of glass cut into it so that you can see through to the face. They wrap the body up really tight in white cloth so that only the face is showing. This individual passed away three weeks ago, so they had put some powder on her face to help hide some of the decomposition that was already taking place.

The Christians don't participate in all of the fetishes, sacrifices, dancing, etc., so after we saw the body we went up to the area where the Christians were gathering. The men and women sit separately and they sat us with the men which apparently was supposed to be a way of honoring us.

They have a very formal pattern of greeting, most of which goes way over my head. First you go around and shake everybody's hand. Every. Single. Person. (Each one of them will say something to you that you don't understand (if you're me) and you will proceed to give them the finest awkward smile that you can muster). Then you sit down and they will ask you for "the news." This information is supposed to be passed up from the youngest to the eldest, each person adding their share as it goes, and then the eldest shares the news and the purpose for the visit. In this case, the purpose for our visit was obviously for the funeral. But the first time, you always say something along the lines of, "It was a good day for a visit," and then later, when they ask you again, you say, "Oh yeah, by the way, we also came for the funeral." This didn't make any sense to me until I realized that every single time we greet each other in the U.S., we ask "How are you?" and every person responds, "Fine," and then later, as you continue to talk, you discover that the individual is not really "fine" at all. It's a greeting pattern. We humans certainly are a strange crew.

Sometime in between the multiple times that they ask for the news, they get up and come over to shake your hand again (more awkward smiling) and return to their seats. Before you go, you ask for the road and they "give" you the road. Then you shake everybody's hand. Again.

Rule #1: When in doubt, shake their hand.

They served us rice with peanut sauce, the typical African meal at weddings and funerals, and it was VERY good! Everyone eats with their hands, but they brought us plates and spoons, another way of honoring us. Robin said they would bring utensils to anyone they saw as highly educated, even if it was an African. Some of the kids were selling these little bags of donut-type things and bags of juice, so Robin bought some and brought them over to me. You drink the juice out of the bag by biting into the corner and then sucking as hard as you can because if you drip on yourself, it stains your clothes. So there I was, trying to bite into the bag carefully, yet decisively, as 40+ amused African men looked on. Thanks, Robin. : )

Several hours later, it was time to bury the body, so we headed back down to join the others. They were still dancing around the casket when we got down there, so we watched that for a while. I wish I could have taken pictures! I didn't fully understand the deal with picture-taking but it had something to do with capturing a spirit and that being a very bad thing. Everything at the pagan funerals is done to appease "the spirits," so that they will allow the spirit of the deceased the freedom to reach its final destination. I don't know a whole lot about animistic religions, but that was my simplified understanding from what I learned that day.

Family members and close friends were dancing with these plumes of blonde horse hair and tree branches while groups of musicians from surrounding villages walked around the casket playing their drums and wooden xylophone-looking things. They were wearing fairly extensive costumes with brightly-colored straw-like material layered down their clothes and helmets covered with large, dark feathers. Everyone was just playing their own beat. At least that is what is sounded like to me.

After a while the began to move the body and the masks came. I wish I could explain these. They are these elaborate full-body costumes and I am still unsure exactly what they represent, but it has something to do with the spirits. One person told me they represented the spirits and that the people were afraid of them. Another person told me that they are not necessarily bad, they are just another fetish and part of the tradition. I tried to find some pictures online that represented what I saw but, naturally, there are not very many pictures of funeral masks! These two pictures were the closest thing to what I saw:

We returned home to find half of a dead chipmunk that Robin's cat, Purcee, had left laying in the middle of the living room floor. Ewww!!!! Naturally, I took a video of him eating it. : )

Even after just a few days, I can say that this is different than the other missions experiences I have had. We actually have kept fairly busy, but I have seen how life as a missionary is different with downtime, a routine, independence, etc. I am trying not to overthink everything, but I am also trying to go into every experience imagining what it would be like if I wasn't going home in 12 days. It's so hard to know what to think. I realize things would be completely different if there wasn't such a language barrier, but still...I just think about things like having to cook everything from scratch, or not having anything to "do" (besides read) in the freetime after work...I don't know....after the novelty of it all wore off, it could really be a struggle. But if God leads me somewhere, that is all just details! Yeah, of course there will be struggles, but that is where HE shows HIS strength through MY weakness! So really, it just becomes a matter of discerning His voice and His leading, following in obedience, and resting in His grace on the best and worst of days.