I Can't Sleep

So, I have a really hard time sleeping at night. I know I mentioned to you all that I was on this malaria medication called Mephloquine, but when our doctor listed some of the side effects of the medication (insomnia and paranoia), I really didn't think that it was going to effect me. Much to my surprise I think that I am suffering from the insomnia and a very mild case of paranoia. Besides the insomnia at night, I also have rats in my ceiling. Every night I hear a different sporting event occurring just above my head. Two Monday’s ago I think was the track meet and Friday was the wrestling match. I think they just started a soccer league last week too. lol. The other night when I was sleeping I heard something role across the floor of the ceiling, and then I heard about 4 to 5 rats scurry after it just over my head. The days of the track meets I just lay in the bed petrified, as I listen to them running back an forth from one end of my ceiling to the other, praying that one of them doesn't fall through and land in my bed. The days of the wrestling matches it sounds like there fighting. It is the most terrifying thing to listen to during the night.

When I came back from my site visit about 5 weeks ago, after being gone for about a week I returned to my room to find a strange odor. It smelled like mold. My sister suggested that although she didn’t see it that there might be a mouse in my room. So of course when I went sleep that night in the middle of the night I was awakened by the sound of a “mouse” under my bed. My heart was pounding a million beats a minute while I searched for my headlamp to scare it aware. The moment I turned it on and flashed it around the room I saw 2 RATS, not mice run across the floor of my room. I thought I would die. I didn’t sleep the rest of the night. The next morning I searched frantically around my room trying to figure out how in the world they got in with no holes in the walls. To this day I still don’t know how they got in but the reason why they were there in the first place was because I had accidentally left a piece of bread in one of my bags while I was gone. Big mistake. It had been devoured by the time I got back and I’m sure the old bread was contributing to the odor in my room as well. Since the day I saw those rats they haven’t come back in my room (even though every night I am paranoid that they will) so they’ve just been tormenting me from the ceiling instead. Lol.

The Voleur

The Tuesday during the week that I was fasting, just before I had woken up to eat with my family I heard this bleating mouton across the street and this conversation (in Sousou) between two men. I didn’t think anything of it because I hear moutons all the time, but it was just strange that it was so early in the morning. So as I ate my meal in my room I heard the conversation across the street gradually grow louder as more people joined. At this point my sister had come into my room and explained to me (because I can’t understand Sousou) that the man across the street had just stolen the mouton, and the previous conversation I had heard was the exchange of someone in passing asking the voleur (thief) if that was his mouton. I know that it doesn’t seem that serious in the states but stealing anything here is a major offense to everyone. It’s understandable. But God have mercy on you if you get caught stealing by the community because hell will surely be paid. Basically what was happening was that the voleur had just been caught and the entire neighborhood came outside. I’m not sure who he stole from but there had to have been a mob of about 40 people congregated outside at 4 in the morning yelling and cursing him. (Clearly at this point falling back asleep was not an option. Lol.) The berating escalated over a span of about an hour and then in the final hour around 5:30 they beat the living the daylights out of this man. I heard every single crack of the stick on his bare skin and every scream/cry of agony as the neighborhood watched. I thought it would never end. In the last 5 minutes I heard the mob pass my house as they chased him down the street (I’m assuming to the police.) And then finally there was silence. Now I know stealing is wrong and it’s especially detrimental if you do it here, but for the of life me I couldn’t understand how they could do that to him and all I was thinking is that I hope they don’t kill him. But apparently from what my sister told me, that was not the first time he had stolen and that’s why his punishment was so brutal…. I guess. I don’t really know what to say about this situation. All I can advise is don’t ever steal in Guinea.