Big Love = Big Mistake

A certain degree of sacrifice is necessary when spending three months hopping between rural health centers. Although, I am typing this from my laptop,inside a tent with an attached bathroom… Nonetheless, sacrifices are made.

Take for example when I ran out of conditioner. I lasted about two weeks without, but then decided I was losing far too much hair trying to get a comb through the rats’ nest that was developing. I went to the store in one of the rural towns and decided on “Big Love”. Big Love advertised that is was suitable for all hair types….except apparently mine. Instead of just a rats’ nest, I acquired sticky coating to protect the knots…and this coating attracted all the dust and dirt Zambia could spare. Mmmm.

A couple days after chucking the conditioner in the trash, I lost my razor. I returned to a similar store in search of a ‘stick’, as this is what I was told it was called. No one was aware of this so-called stick, so I demonstrated shaving my legs. My charades routine failed…not a big surprise since leg-shaving is probably not a priority in such rural towns. I then acted out shaving my face…which they understood, but they looked at me strangely for wanting to shave my face. The store owner gave me a blade and it was my turn to be confused. What was I going to do with just a blade? He noticed my confusion and said I would have to learn to shave like an African. He then came over to me and tried to demonstrate how to use it on my face. I thanked him – and then tried to once again explain it was for my legs….I couldn’t bear to leave the store with everyone thinking I shaved my face. But then again, they would probably think it was even stranger that I would take the time to shave hair off my legs…