Pathetic. Mangy. Tiger-Striped. That describes the dogs you’d see wandering around town. If you had a stick and raised your arm even slightly, they would piss themselves. But for some reason, ALL of the female volunteers were terror-stricken by these dogs. No exceptions. Every woman there suddenly reverted to a primal nature and panic took over.
Me? I would push the button on the scream box and watch the dog run away, tail between it’s legs leaving a urine trail in its wake.
I LOVED my Scream Box! It was an audio grenade. A few of the first volunteers in country had been mugged. So, everyone got a personal safety device after that. I never needed it, but I used the hell out of it, and wow was it loud! One day, during training, I pulled the pin and tossed it into one of the other classrooms. Joy.
I had so much fun that I bought one a few years ago. Same good times.
I really have no idea how effective such devices are at deterring criminals.
I eventually moved out of my home stay family house. It was scary! Meanwhile, my friends lived around the corner in the house of the son of the former President. It would be like living with Chelsea Clinton. Anyway, those people were really great. We went from scungy, moldy, pink-eye to stark white and hyper clean. I was trying to think of a way to represent my stay with this second family. I had a flash. Or a flush. Toilets in Suriname are weird. They have a shelf.
One day, I went to the bathroom and found a visitor, a little frog, chilling out on the rim. This started a “thing” I had about frogs and generally have about wild animals; I don’t like surprises.
If you are ever presented with the opportunity to willingly place a wriggling maggot the size of your thumb into your mouth and chew it up, it may require some coaxing. They will try to convince you that it is in fact, “a sweetie!” You might think that means, “Sweet” or “Tasty.” In fact, it means “This is fucking nasty. Don’t ever eat this.” I dodged the maggot bullet and never got the chance to tell the Surinamese to spin.
There is another tasty snack known as “kwi kwi be.” Kwi kwi is a type of catfish. It looks like a plecostomus (one of those fish that sucks the glass in aquariums). “Be” is the word for “Belly.” I imagine it’s akin to the Louisiana dare of “Sucking the Head” from a crayfish. But, the offer is presented similarly to the writhing maggot. Hey, let’s see if the stupid American will suck the guts out of a catfish! We’ll tell ’em it’s sweet!
Fuck that. My friends were not as fortunate. Kwi Kwi Be was presented.
They take a fish, cover it in salt, and then let it dry out in the sun for a while. Then you see if the dumb American will eat it. I had to eat some gross stuff in Suriname. This was the first. Fish jerky. Salty as hell fish jerky. You want to know what it tastes like? Pour a half cup of salt into your mouth while smelling the trash can. That’s the best I can come up with. On the plus side, you won’t starve to death. The bad news is that you will instantly develop hypertension.
Recent Comments