Tea? Actually...maybe not....

So I am now staying with a Gambian family which means I am an participant of a true Gambian experience. So far, the Gambian experience I have gathered is that they tend to spend vast amounts of time sitting. Sometimes just sitting, most of the time watching awful, and I mean AWFUL Nigerian and Ghanaian soap operas and drinking green tea.

I don’t mean green tea in the UK sense of “calming herbal tea to drink when you’re feeling all floaty and mellow”. I mean hardcore, turn your liver black, dissolve your teeth sickly sweet amazingly strong SHOTS of green tea. Being the polite human being that I am I have somehow given everyone the impression that I am inordinately fond of this tea, and so I am frequently given some. As I have described it comes in a shot glass and is such a dark green that I originally thought it was shots of coffee. It also comes in batches of four. Hence my surprise when I had somehow dispatched with the first shot and was just downing (subtly) copious amounts of water and reassuring my petrified taste buds that they would learn to love and taste again when... along comes another shot. I was reassured that this was weaker than the previous, I can neither confirm nor deny this statement.

The soap operas are rather hilarious. So far these are the topics they seem to cover on the most regular basis:
Incest
HIV
Selling babies
Topping up phones
Maths lessons

My favourite scene so far has to be, in a moment of heart-felt teenage angst and despair a young boy in a fit of torment was throwing his basket ball repeatedly against a poster... of R Kelly.
Another classic was a documentary about a guy from Panama called Jeff who wanted to attend a Muslim festival and need a VISA for his trip. Approximately 15% was about him converting to Islam and the festival. The remaining 85% was him waiting for his Visa.

***SPOILER ALERT***
His Visa didn’t arrive in time.

When I arrived on the Friday it was Tobaski, a big Muslim festival the equivalent of our Christmas. In the morning the head of the family has to slaughter a ram and then there is a big feast. I did, (unfortunately) miss the slaughtering of the ram, but the munch was all fantastic. Because of Tobaski Therese has lots of family members staying, who speak very little English but with whom I continue to preserve to communicate with.

The ones whom I seem to spend the most time in the company of are an ancient old grandmother and her 8 month old grandson. Neither of whom, unsurprisingly speak a word of English. The baby seems to view me as some sort of confusing inanimate object. So far I have been climbed all over, cried at and licked. I do get the impression the grandmother is also a bit of a legend. On one occasion however, my ingrained need for polite conversation against all the odds was tragically foiled. Don’t ask me why but somehow, I was trying to convey to her that I had been bitten a lot by mosquitoes recently and that I thought I must have sweet tasting blood to them. I have no idea why I thought this could be conveyed through international hand language but it seemed worth a shot. I failed, miserably. Evidently she hadn’t understood what I was banging on about as about half way through my mosquito impression she got up and left. She then returned with some, joy of joys... green tea. An unexpected result.

This was the hint I needed; I stopped any attempt at verbal communication and retreated to read War and Peace. I am however, maintaining a totally inane smile whenever anyone walks near me or looks in my vague direction.

On the Sunday I was invited to (unsurprisingly) drink green tea with some local Gambian men. This involved sitting on the street, drinking tea, staring into space and occasionally having some chat about how I can’t speak either Wolof or Mandinka.

Current mosquito bite count = 18. BASTARDS.