March 14, 2014 I want to go home. I've been here 6 months - now I would like to go home and see my new nephew, family, and friends. I know the feeling will pass but for a couple days now all I think about is how annoying the men are, how overwhelmed I am, and how much I miss my family.  One of my neighbor girls came over this morning and told me someone beat a cat so bad it died. It wasn't one of my cats, but he was a neighborhood cat who often came to my house to eat and drink. She said it so matter of factly I had to repeat what she said to be sure I understood correctly. People really don't value animals, especially pets, here. I'm glad it wasn't my cat, not that I'm super attached to them, but I would've been upset.  Today I'm going to talk to a tutor about teaching me Fulfulde. I'm nervous but hopefully it will help. I probably need to find a French tutor too.  I decided to get my ceiling re-done. I hate it so much, it's so disgusting. I'm sure I've written about this already, but it is like a thick table cloth material that is weighed down with dirt and who knows what else. It sags so bad and when you push it up and let it go you can hear the stuff up there. There are mice and bats and I'm sure cockroaches that live and die up there. So, finally yesterday I had my neighbor call a contractor to ask him to come look at it. He got off the phone and told me he'd be right back, I thought he was going to run to the bathroom or something. After a minute he came back with the contractor to show him my ceiling. They talked about how much it would be and how much material they'd need. I had an estimate after a few minutes of talking. No measuring, nothing. It was so informal and fast. I'm very much looking forward to getting it done. It will be real wood that keeps things out of my house and it won't sag with the weight of the dirt. I'm going to get some screens replaced and hopefully a new or another mattress. My house is going to be awesome. I think a lot of my motivation is coming from the fact my mom, dad, and sister are coming to stay here and I don't want them to hate my "hut" as they call it. Soon the whole village will know my family is coming! March 15, 2014  Well I stayed up late last night since it was Friday night. I watched tv on my computer and ate M&M's (thanks sis!). It was nice until cockroaches started falling from the gaps in my ceiling. It was raining outside and raining cockroaches inside. The real rain outside was a welcome sound. It's been a while and it is so dusty here, we could use the rain.  I got up feeling like I could do a market run and hang out with some neighbors. I put a small pot of water on my cooktop for some mocha coffee (thanks Alli!). I also started a large pot of water to bathe. I drank my coffee and went to the kitchen to get my bath water. I turned the stove off and grabbed my dirty burnt towel to grab the large pot of water to pour into my bath bucket. I don't know what exactly happened but the pot slipped out of my hands and boiling water spilled down the inside of my calf and my ankle. I instantly put the pot down on my concrete kitchen floor and swore back and forth in my entry way, unsure what to do. It burned instantly, then there was a couple seconds of nothing - I thought maybe it wasn't going to be bad. I was wrong. The pain quickly returned and I went into my latrine and got a washcloth wet with well water. I put it on my leg and started to whine and cry to myself. Eventually I just put my whole leg into my water container I keep in my latrine for bathing. It felt better for a second. I found some acetaminophen and over did it on that. I brought a large jug of water (similar to the container in my latrine) to my living room and have been sitting on my couch since, with my leg in the tepid, dirty well water all day. My poor foot is one big wrinkled white raisin.  I tried waiting for a decent hour to text back home to my sisters. One I just whined to and the other is a doctor who I feel more comfortable asking than the doctor here. Plus, when the hospital has no running water or electricity (except for the occasional generator) I don't think they can do anything for me. I am my own doctor, nurse, and pharmacist.  Thank goodness I can ask my sister for some directions. Also, thank goodness I have this Internet set up, although I'm not sure it's always a good thing. There's something about feeling far away and just whining to yourself; things pass and life goes on. But when I can complain to people back home I get sympathy and I make them worry. Not always helpful. I guess I need to be careful just how "connected" I am. I mean, I'm in a small village in Cameroon and figure I can have some luxuries - like talking to people back home - but I may need to cool it on the complaints. Back in the states we can always text someone and tell them all our problems and sometimes it's helpful but sometimes it makes things worse. More drama, more complaining, and maybe takes longer to move past it.  I just tried leaving my house but it lasted 2 minutes because my leg was burning so badly. It's not a good feeling to have a burn in sunny hot weather. I'm back on my couch, leg in the water, waiting until I can take more Meds. I am fine, but wow, I have new empathy for people who get large burns. This is the biggest burn I've ever gotten and it is terribly uncomfortable. Oddly, this is already my second burn in country - I burned my other leg on a moto a month or two back. That was nothing compared to this. Anyways, enough complaining. Hopefully my burn responds well to ibuprofen, acetaminophen, and tepid clear-ish well water.