Vanilla Mommy

As much as I wish I could, I can’t deny the fact that today while in the taxi I was not so cordially referred to as a “Vanilla Mommy.” This, ironically enough, was like the icing on the cake for what is adding up to be a spectacular month. I hope you are picking up on the sarcasm, because I am laying it on pretty thick. I don’t mean to complain or bitch too much; it is just that the one year slump is sticking to me like white on bread.
So, okay, as an example, this is my day as it started coming into Maseru this past Friday, and mind you this is all before 9am, before crudeness is even circling in the minds of non-perverted Americans. I get up at 5:30am, no electricity, no problem, I’m used to my electricity going off in the morning, get out to the bus stop around 7:30am wait about 5 minutes for my taxi, and get a front seat, pop on my iPod and rock out as much as possible to In The Heights, the fantastic new (at least to me) musical mom just sent me. Things are going good, then, I’m like 5 minutes outside of Maseru, and well I’m white so I stick out like a sore thumb, but that doesn’t make it right for some Mosotho man to point at me, make a symbol with his hands indicating God knows what to me, that’s all it takes to make me feel like I mean nothing, that I do stick out and that whoever this schmuck is, is taking advantage of it at my expense. I instantly feel degraded and on top of it the Basotho on the taxi with me, just laugh, furthering both embarrassment and the feeling of worthlessness. Once, thankfully, off the taxi, I go arm myself for the half mile walk through the taxi rank with the friendliest encounter with a Mosotho that I will have all day, the man who sells me my Diet Coke every time I go into town. He’s nice to me because I am probably the only person in the taxi rank who would by a 1 liter of Diet Coke and because I’m a white person who speaks Sesotho to him. However, once out of my little miracle soda shop, I am met with glares by Basotho of all sorts. I guess in America we are taught that staring is rude and inappropriate; the Basotho missed out on that lesson. I literally walk through the rank, am grocery shopping, in a taxi, and etc and find people just staring at me, goggle eyes and all, so I’m always like “yes?” and they just keep looking and don’t even reply. What the hell is with that? I mean do I have a permanent sign on my head that has “go ahead stare all you want, I don’t mind.” Really what is with that?
Okay so that’s my first five minutes in the taxi rank. Then as I proceed down the alley, it is stocked with stands selling junk, owned by extremely vocal Basotho. They will take any excuse to yell absurd comments at me. Everything from “Lahoua!” (Sesotho for “white person”) to “mommy” to “give me your drink!” The one that really pisses me off is when they ask for my soda. You never ask an addict to share their addiction. I mean that’s just common sense. And I can guarantee you if I have not had adequate caffeine that morning, I rip any Basotho a new one who asks for my Diet Coke. I really can’t repeat what I say, because it is rather inappropriate. While all of this is happening I am constantly dodging the cars that I swear speed up in order to try to hit me. They must be in some sort of game where they get more points if they hit a white person. I know I can hear them slam on the accelerator if they even have the slightest chance of hitting me. So this brings us to about 8:30am, and I’m not even to the main part of the city in Maseru. Blerg, about sums it up, and this is just a normal day.
A horrible day is this. First of all it is last Saturday and I had been stressed out doing lesson planning for the new Community Health volunteer group coming in. There were a ton of people in town, making our transit house horribly packed and hard to get on an internet computer at the office. Okay, no big deal, nothing a vodka tonic or two won’t help ease. Well so I’m on my way to the office, which is in an okay part of town, not great, but not bad, so as I turn the corner, I notice the extremely conspicuous man standing there, outfitted in complete camouflage and brandishing a machine gun. Well, I guess the tiny factor of him having a gun, gave him all the confidence in the world and as I was walking past I hear this: “Hello Madam, but may I ask you a question?” He doesn’t wait for a reply for me, assuming that since he has a gun, who is going to give him a hard time, right? “But madam, will you be mine for the loving?” HOW DO YOU SAY NO TO A MAN WITH A MACHINE GUN? Tell me that. I basically ran the rest of the way to the office, scared as hell that this guy was going to put a bullet in my behind. So that’s a bad day. And suffice it to say more than one vodka tonic was drank and I may or may not of had a private dance party in my room.
I mean, really I complain about all this stuff, but I guess I just try to take it in strides and write it off to the fact that Lesotho is this horribly warped place, as least from my point of view. It’s like in any other place no one would get away with this stuff and most of the time my inner monologue is screaming “what the {insert inappropriate curse here}!?!” ARGGGHHHHH. I’m guessing that a lot of this is this inevitable one year slump that every volunteer who came with me is going through. Nothing is surprising anymore. Even Ntate Machine Gun on the corner, I’ve seen him before and have gotten harassed by him before (although never so creatively worded before, which I must give him props for clever wording, that doesn’t often happen here). Everything just goes straight to frustrating. Frustrating and ridiculous and absurd and inexplicable.
So that’s my rant. I wish I could even explain that this is just a onetime occurrence and that to not judge all Basotho, which really you shouldn’t just based on my experiences, but when it happens to you EVERYDAY? What else can you think? You stop thinking and just shake your head because you know whatever you do is pointless because some jerk-off who thinks he’s God’s gift to mankind, just made a hand gesture to you that’d make a sailor blush making you feel worthless.
Well have a great week. I mean from where I stand next week is bound to be better than this week, when I got called a “vanilla mommy” oh and I didn’t even tell you about the horrible day I had which included going to build a garden (which was actually pretty fun) where I got manure in my mouth, sliced two of my fingers open on aloe plant thorns and then my bras strap snapped and broke. So yeah, as I see it things can only go up from here. Right? So have a great week, pray that Ntate Machine Gun got relocated and that this week goes better!!! Salang Hant