Where do I live?

Tuesday January 23

My village has two parts: the village and the center of town.

The village is a huge area where most everyone lives. The area is surrounded by a man-made fence to keep livestock out. It takes about 20 minutes to walk from one end to the other. It is a wooded area with lots of huts, cassava gardens, orange trees, bamboo groves, avocado and mango trees. The mosque is in the village towering over the trees.

In the center of town, there is a huge tree, a small mosque, and a couple of concrete buildings where a tailor stores his machine, where rice, flour, and other goods are stored. Here there aren’t many trees. It is mostly wide open land with concrete houses on plots of land surrounded by fences to keep the sheep out. There is a football field. Both the middle school and the elementary school are here. Here we have pump water powered by solar panels. In the village, they have wells. The well-groomed dirt road passes through this part of the village.

Sometimes I wish I lived in the village under cool trees, in a mud hut; however, I am also quite happy living in the center of town with my close by running water.