woah

the last few days have been pretty crazy. I look around and I'm like, wait I'm 18 and I'm really doing this. Deus has this very rich Indian friend named Ifan, forgive if I butchered the spelling, I can hardly say it and we've gone to his house for dinner two nights in a row now. It's the first house I've honestly thought could be in the United States just as it is, and he has a swimming pool, fancy wines, a big screen TV, impeccable house. It's all very strange we go to his house drink a glass of French red wine and discus Dubai or national soccer leagues or things I don't know anything about. It was really intimidating the first night but he's a nice guy and its fun to talk with Kate from America and him. They cook some of the best food I've had here. He works in a fish business, or maybe owns, its in the family I think. Selling Nile Perch, which I actually ate last night with a little prompting about how my B vitamins and such were probably low from weeks of spinach and ugali, which has the same ingredients as wheat paste. The Perch wasn't bad though, and by bad I mean it didn't taste like a fish or "fishy" so it was pretty good. He will be the one going with us, actually driving us, actually having his driver drive us in his fancy car when we go to Serengeti. Still haven't gone, todays excuse is that Ifan had some guests show up unexpectedly early. I'm not sure exactly when we're going. Still it should be rad, I'm looking forward to it the more I read about it. Its all so surreal. Living the lifestyle of the rich and the famous in an African mansion, even if its make believe and we do sometimes just sit around and watch MTV and diss on everyone...
The only other thing worth mentioning, but almost not really because its so disturbing, was about three days ago when one of the neighbours was trying to teach her child to read. The mom held the book she was reading from in one hand and a really thick stick in the other. She seriously just kept going at her kid over nothing. "READ", and if her kids crying too hard to get anything out, whack whack whack, on the head, the arms, the back, the face even until the stick broke and she got a new one. If this wasn't disturbing enough theres the fact that I watched the whole thing from a close distance for probably half an hour and never said a thing. yeah I don't know the language that well, yeah I don't know the lady that well, yeah it isn't my place and I'm a foreigner here and its not my place but I really don't like what it says about me that I just sat by and watched some lady take out repressed anger on her daughter with a tree branch. It kept me up at night two nights in a row. Clearly some part of me, the stubborn, spite-fire say anything in the name of justice part of me that was there as a little kid got lost somewhere, probably in a bush at my high school...