The Ugly American

Kushe-o!

It’s day 7 here in Salone. That’s right everyone, I’ve officially survived my first week as a PCV. I’ve eaten so many foods that neither my stomach nor eyes can identify, I've learned to speak broken Krio ( mi Krio small-small) and I’ve learned how to dance wherever I go.

What I’ve not done is look in a mirror.

I didn’t realize it until just recently. I was sitting and talking with a good friend about the fact that my mother was overly concerned about my eyebrows. Then I realized that I had no idea what my eyebrows looked like. In fact, I hadn’t seen my face in over a week.

The American shock value hit me, and I really thought about what the reality of that was. In America, you're practically accosted by mirrors everywhere you go. If you have a day where you look shitty, you’re going to be reminded often. Constantly when I'm going around guys I find attractive I’ll find myself smoothing and plucking, checking to see if there’s anything that I can fix, because of course, if my hair is mussed, he’ll just keep on moving.

So much of the American values are set in looks. How thin you are, how sleek your hair is, how well you put on makeup. Here in Salone, things are beyond different.

It’s a whole new world where beauty is something totally different. The Salone people love a good smile and ‘Owbibodi?!” (How are you) in the morning. I've never felt more beautiful than I do here. And I’ve gotten 5 marriage proposals thus far, so apparently I look fine too.

But the thing that I value the most is how much people in my groups could care less. When I came to the mirror realization, my friend reassured me “ You look good. You always do.” And I believed him. Because it didn’t matter that I as pouring with sweat or wearing my tres-attractive zip-off hiking pants. What did matter was how much fun I’ve been having and how much I simply enjoyed being with everyone.

This is a good lesson for me to bring to my girls. Both in the classroom here and back in America, but the other girls I care about too- my sisters, particularly. I spent too much time dressing to impress and not getting what I wanted in return. But when I let myself be who and where I was supposed to be, I found myself surrounded by 42 awesome new friends (Some, let’s admit, are totally hot and don’t seem to be turned off by the fact that no girl here wears makeup).

The experience seems strange to me. Like there's something that I'm missing. But then I think that maybe America is the place that’s backwards. That maybe Salone knows something about being happy that we simply don’t. We think they have a lot to learn from us, but really, there's so much more that we don’t know. Feeling comfortable in our own skin is only part of it.

But it’s a start.