Green!

Everything was brown and dead, and people were starting to get worried, but then my fellow Linguerian, Mac, did a rain dance with her village out in the bush and saved the day. It involved lots of singing, dancing, chanting, costumes, and dragging people in the dirt. Details here: http://macmacmacafee.wordpress.com/2011/08/19/rain-dance/. That very afternoon, the rains started and we haven't had a day without rain since. Now, Doundodji looks like this:

After one of the gully-washers, I went out into the bush with my sister-in-law and niece to wash laundry in the huge lake that suddenly appeared. There were so many frogs thrilled to be there, it was hard to have a conversation.  

My moringa trees grew like crazy, so I harvested the leaves, made some leaf hammocks out of a wrap skirt, a pillowcase, and my dirty laundry bag, and dried out the leaves. Once it's not so humid, I'll pound them up and have lots of leaf powder to nutritionalize all our food.

 

The rest of my garden is growing too, and all the neighborhood kids get excited about coming out to help harvest veggies (and pull weeds!), who knew kids would be so happy about turnips and okra. Eating them is another story.