Saturday, August 13, 2011

What's in your water??? Mine is full of parasites and magic potions.....

So, it's Ramadan.  This time last year was my first real introduction to what Ramadan actually entails.  In the USA I had a brief encounter with it when I used to teach English to Somalian refugees.  I remember being completely puzzled because practically the entire month none of my students showed up! When it was finally over, my students told me they didn't come because it was Ramadan--I was like, "What's the big deal. You should still come to class!" hahaha! Now I know that pretty much nothing happens during the month of Ramadan because no one is eating or drinking from sun up to sun down.  I attempted to fast this year (definetly didn't do it last year) and I made it four days.  But if you count all of the cheating I did, I actually only did 2. The first day I ate Peanut M&Ms in Pam's room, hiding my dishonesty from the world :) The "last" day of my actual fasting, I was drinking water and eating a power bar like 5 hours into my day.  But I'm not really muslim, so I don't feel guilty. 
By the 5th day, I had intentions of fasting for real and continuing until the end of the month, but I started to feel ill, and my host family told me to stop.  So I did, but because I really was sick with parasite poisoning (again), I actually ended up fasting for real (not on purpose) because if I ate or drank anything it made me throw up or it would pass instantly through my blood clot infested, liquid diarrhea. (Sorry for being so graphic).
 I spent 3 days doing nothing but sleeping and running to the latrine, all food made me nausiated, and I got 2 awesome care packages from my mom and I didn't even eat anything from them until I could actually ingest food.  PC doctors put me on Cipro, which made me feel decent for like 2 days, but this morning I woke up and guess what came back??? Liquid diarrhea + nausea + stomach cramps upon food digestion... .Yup, still sick.  I'm gonna call the med office on monday to get further medical counseling.  My guess is amoebas.  I've had this on-again-off again bout of whatever it is since December. Usually it's only a few couple days ever 2-3 weeks, then it passes, but this month, it seems to be lasting longer.  I'm guessing it was the fasting that pissed the parasites off.
 My host family seems to think I"m sick from eating in the "villages"---aka not at home. I asked them to elaborate, and they told me that other people in the area will put magic potions and such in my food and drink that will make me sick and cast spells on me.  My uncle said, "If another white person doesn't live there, then you shouldn't eat or drink what they offer you."  Um....What??? This is like the 3rd time my host family has brought up the "issues" of eating outside the compound and the enchanting world of witch doctors and magic spells that accompany them.  When it comes to my response to these proposed notions, I'm still at a loss for words.....

1 comment:

  1. how r u feeling now?
    dont pay too much attention to magic potion story. in the village many things that uneducated people can't explain find answer to "bad magic"/ try to see a doctor as soon as you can. I hope by the time you read this you are much better/
    Oh sorry my name is Dominique from Senegal but lives in NYC-NJ since 2000. I decided to stay a bit longer after school.
    I randomly saw your blog so i decided to write.I hope its helpful.
    Take good care
    if you have questions or need answers here domtu798@yahoo.com

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