Oh the irony never ceases to amaze me

Ahoy,

So yesterday was certainly interesting. I'm writing an update to my blog in which I make note of the situation in Africa: namely that technology here is unreliable at best. I mean it's kind of hard to write 15 emails AND post on a blog when the power goes out randomly.

So I'm writing my post about you know, my homestay family and life in a real-live Senagalese house, and I signed off saying something like "well I'm going to go before the power shuts off and I lose this entire post." So I hit "publish post" and guess what happens.

no, the power stays on.

The freaking internet dies. I dont know what happend, how it happened. but the entire post was gone. I swear to it. You know i think these Senagalese are on to something here..

Theres a belief in spirits here that pass through the air and cause mischeif. theyre called jinne, and come in both the good and evil flavors. if an evil jinne happens to be coming by at the exact moment when you compliment someone, then the jinne will come down and bring some horibble misfortune upon the kid or whatever. you know, its like murphy's law. this is why a senagalese mother will stare at you in horror if you say "oh what a cute kid you have" but will think the world of you if you tell that same child she's ugly as a villain. you know...not like i would know.

now i was told that these jinne couldnt read, that they would only act if you said something. well. apparently theyre evolving. or learning. or something far far worse...invading our computers. i mean can you imagine what would start happening if a whole army of spirits invaded our computers and started screwing up everything we did? chaos would reign! the dead would crawl out of their graves and start walking down the streeet! the cab drivers in dakar would actually use their meters!! cats and dogs would live together in harmony!!

its a scary proposition, and i dont want it to happen.

***

oh my god it almost happened again. i go to save it and somehow the damn jinne deleted it. luckily i had copy/pasted it. so i could retreive it. but i swear these jinne are out to get me.

***

Ok so my family. well my african family. theyre cool. ive got 2 younger brothers...4 and 5 which as anyone who knows me is like what ive always wanted. theyre cute (or ugly?) and all...but they follow me around a lot. which as anyone who knows me is precisely what annoys me. so now that classes have started im kind of hiding at school..not that i dont go home. its just you know..you gotta give a guy some space to keeps his sanity..

my mother and father are nice. the food here is fantastic. rice and/or french fries with meat (and though i dont know what it is, it aint the mystery meat you get for school lunches) and a fantastic sauce. i mean its got some serious taste.

speaking of meat. funny story:
so this past saturday we go out to a club. you konw nothing special...i mean ti was fun but thats not the story. so i got back at 2.30 and it wasnt 3 before i got to bed.

fast forward to...oh say 7am. i am awakened by the most god awful screal (for thats the only word that can truly describe what it was) from behind my house. it sounds like a swiss yodeler blowing his nose into a fog horn over the PA system at madison square garden. now take that sound, and put it through one of those machines that plays tapes backwards and fast forwards it. now turn the volume up to 11 (this is what those amps were made for) and youve about got it. so that sound every three minutes for no less than 3 hours. thats right. at 10.00, i heard someone walk up. a guy said a few words, and after one last screal, it was silent. i checked my clock. thank god.

well after that i layed in bed for a while...though i couldnt go back to sleep.
so later that day, my little brother says to me "did you hear the lamb this morning?"
"how could i not have" i answered.
"well you know what we did with it?"
no
you sure?
yeah im sure
we KILLED it! (at this point he gets really excited and laughs...i mean its really kinda cute)
really?
yeah.
and you know that meat we had at lunch today?
yeah.
we KILLED it!

so now i know what clarice starling was trying to silence in going after buffalo bill...and i feel exactly what she was feeling. id rather face a serial killer in a girl suit in his own basement in the dark than have to endure another hour of the screaling of the lambs (or maybe they were goats)

welcome to africa jake.

Karr (thats for the jinne)
love
jake