Why Jamaican Kids Are Awesome

This morning I went to visit a partner of ours in Old Harbour. We were working in the office of a school auditorium. It happened to be Teacher's Day today, so there was a little ceremony to honor them. At one point, the place went nuts- at first I thought the kids were screaming "CHOCOLATE! CHOCOLATE!" but it turns out they were screaming "DOMINIC! DOMINIC!"

I asked the accountant what they were screaming for, and she said this kid Dominic was a guitar genious. Sure enough, Dominic, who looked to be about 10 years old, grabbed a guitar and hopped up on stage. And then, in a momen of awesomeness, proceeded to play RHINESTONE COWBOY, by Glen Campbell! And then a lot of the kids started to sing along! Awesome, Dominic.

Another year...

On January 15 I turned 31. This was the second birthday I had in Angola and admitted was much better than the first. A few friends treated me to cake and drinks at a local bar. Best of all were the special cakes that Weni and Kadja made for me.

Kadja

Weni

If I haven't been posting much, it's because of new internet restrictions at work. I rely on work almost exclusively for internet access. In the past it wasn't a problem but some of my colleagues have taken to downloading movies and, um, "graphic" materials, so Admin had to put a stop to it. Unfortunately that also put a stop to just about everything else, so I have either come in on the weekends, when the restrictions are lifted, or try from home with my very slow dial-up connection. (For the record, I do posting after I'm done for the day and it does violate any policies.) That and I've been very busy with work lately!

Happy Anniversary

Me, one year later, with Bernice of the Sheenan tropa.

As of 4:30 am this morning I have been in Angola exactly one year. It’s been an eventful year, to say the least- one of the most challenging I’ve had.

And how did I celebrate this milestone? I think I broke my toe! I wish I could say it was doing something exciting, but I was just cleaning and jammed my foot into my chair.

UPDATE: Sergey, the former EMT informs me it is not a break, but a bad sprain. Still limping and getting an awesome bruise, though.

Kids do the darndest things

These kids frequent the little playground in front of our apartment building. They also “guard” cars at one of the local supermarkets, and I pay then about US$0.75 to watch over my car when I’m there. I can’t figure out if they are street kids or if they actually have a place to sleep. Even if they don’t sleep on the streets, they certainly don’t have any adult supervision. They are very sweet kids, just without any support emotionally or financially. Sad and all too common.

Last Friday I was sitting on the playground benches with my neighbor Stella, watching her 20 month old son play with the boys. I tried to secretly take pictures of them, but as soon as they saw the camera they went crazy. They started doing these crazy hand signs, and I was a little afraid they were throwing gang signs. I asked them what the signs meant and I just got confused looks. One said, “It’s Os Nigas!” and they got all excited and started to scream “Os Nigas! Os Nigas!” I had no clue what they were talking about so I asked one what Os Nigas meant. He got really embarrassed because he clearly had no idea what Os Nigas was and the other ones started to laugh at him. An older boy, clearly a leader, said, “They are rappers!” And it suddenly dawned on me what Os Niga meant in Portuguese. (Add another “g” to the word and you’ll get it.)

I tried to convince them not to say that word, that it was very bad, but to no avail. Just another American cultural export, unfortunately.

This is how they look when they are not trying to be OGs.