I live in The Gambia. My job is to encourage improved agricultural techniques among rural farmers. I've spent months learning a new language and assimilating into a new culture. My senses have been assaulted from every direction. I'm out in the field. Ideas about live fencing, irrigation techniques and cover crops running through my head. Then all at once - silence. Because the monkeys are eating all the bananas.

It sounds like a remark from some sarcastic friend: "So, what are you doing in Africa? Stopping the monkeys from eating all the bananas?" It's moments like these that pull me out of cultural submersion and with a swift slap in the face remind me that I'm from New York. That I'm pasty white with Celtic ancestors. That no matter how hard I try I'm never going to quite fit in. I'm a sled dog in the desert. A cat in the ocean. A fish in a tree. A banana tree. And when you put a fish in a tree you should expect it to act a little funny.

When I first arrived here I was living in a village specifically for training. I was there to learn a local language and about local customs. I was also learning that moving directly from a glacier in Alaska (where my last job was) to the humid final months of the West African rainy season was not a physically comfortable experience. The days were well about 100 degrees and the nights not much cooler. I would lay in bed at night and hope to fall asleep. Flat on my back. Arms and legs apart. Totally naked. If any one part of my body touched another they would both start to sweat. And since my back was already sweating - the thin foam mattress soaking it up like a sponge - I really couldn't afford to lose any more fluids.

I had almost fallen asleep. I had reached that in between stage, the few fleeting moments of semi-consciousness before you're totally out. I had reached that point, navigated through the heat and humidity, and was almost at ease... when the cricket started.

Read More

Back to Peace Corps Journal Web Extra