I remember the Latin quote that is the title of this post from Dr. Fletcher my ancient history professor at Acadia in 1970. In the days before the evils of second hand smoke, he would stand at the front of the class, fire up his bent bulldog pipe with a kitchen match and smoke Sail full aromatic tobacco while lecturing about the wonders of Juvenal's Satires. At times a spark would fly from the match and land dangerously close to the polyester mini skirts of the girls sitting near the front. It was a minor miracle that combustion never occurred.
At the time I never thought that I would be employing my own guard. But there you go. Security is a concern here because it is widely believed that Mzungus are fabulously wealthy and in Kibaya this is not far off the mark. Our guard, Pascal Anthony, guards us from dusk until dawn seven nights a week. I suspect that he has a few naps in the wee hours but he is here and that is what matters.
Debra, Peter and Pascal Antony
He sometimes works on construction projects in our back yard. I don't really know what this structure is as my Swahili is not up to discussing the finer points of architecture and Pascal Antony’s English is pretty basic. I will try to find out more about his project. If you can successfully guess what it is please enlighten us. First prize is a one night stay in our house in Kibaya (transportation not included). Second prize is two nights.
Anything can happen because TIA but the fact that we are supporting Pascal Anthony, his wife and his two kids may mean that we are less of a target. Of course when you look at his picture you might wonder, how this little guy could guard us. I sometimes do.
But, he is armed with a whistle, a flashlight, a stick, a machete and get this, wait for it. . .a bow and arrow. You just have to respect a guard who is also a skilled archer. Lawson Hayman, Debra's father, would have called him, 'a good little fella.'
We don't go out much after dark. Night life in Kibaya is non existent so there is not much point really. The security issue is also a factor. I don't want Pascal Antony re-enacting the Battle of Hastings with him playing the Normans and me unknowingly playing King Harold whilst returning from a night on the tiles.
In the evenings we watch television shows and movies on our computer. We have an external hard drive loaded up with TV, movies and 3,000 books which can easily be transferred to our Kindles. We are unlikely to run out of books anytime soon. I am reading David Lodge's, Deaf Sentence. Debra is reading Outlander by Diana Gabaldon. Currently we are re-watching the old British TV series, Upstairs, Downstairs.
We also employ a cleaning lady. Since I am now the duly elected VSO gender representative for Dodoma region I guess I should call her a cleaning person. Her name is Amina. She has one child, a son, who is in Form Four at Kiteto Secondary School so he is in his late teens.
Debra and Amina outside B-9 (Our house)
Amina comes in four mornings a week to clean the house, do the laundry and iron everything. She even irons my socks. Everything needs to be ironed as the heat from the iron kills any Tse tse fly eggs that have been laid in the damp clothing.
Once a week Debra sends her to the market where she gets the best halal beef in Kibaya. After an earlier alarming incident involving Jik Bleach with new extra whitening power, my clothing and Amina, Debra has hidden the Jik.
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