Thursday, August 8
This morning Mary made a porridge for us for breakfast. It's made from corn, and toasted or something, so it's actually light brown. For lunch, she made fried plantain with Red Red (a kind of stew). We couldn't get enough of it!
George bought grass cutter from the marketplace for dinner the next day. This looks like large rat, and lives in the brush and eats Elephant grass from what I understand. Marilyn decided to pretend it was a new found pet called Squeeky to see our reaction. Then we got to watch him being turned into dinner with a large knife and one of those huge aluminum tubs they use for everything.
After a tour of the village, we tried our hand and making making the other part of dinner - Fufu. This takes a bit of getting used to, but it is a favorite with many- Even Akpene. Basically cassava and yams are boiled, then place in the mortar, and pounded until it resembles a large dumpling. It is eaten by scraping a bit off with 2 fingers, then some sauce is taken up with it, and normally swallowed without chewing. This part is a bit difficult for the uninitiated. (I gaged twice), so I tried chewing it. Kind of like chewing paste. I discovered you can get it in Seattle, so I might try again one day.
We continued our tour of the village, coming to the river about a half mile away to see how water is fetched.
In our drum class the kids did another amazing performance . They are so fun to watch. Emmanuel recorded it for me and took photos.
For dinner, we had Squeeky and the fufu. Squeeky tasted pretty good!
Later that night, we worked on the bikes over at George's compound for the ride in the morning. There was this 6" moth that liked like a butterfly hanging around on the ground. The small kids there kept picking it up and trying to get rid of it, but it kept coming back to hand out under the fluorescent light.