Unfinished Stories

I haven't left the compound in two days and all I have are unfinished blog posts that need more details or photos to go with them. Claustrophobia is metamorphosing into slow days that involve studying French vocabulary and drinking fanta until my head explodes from sugar overdoses and playing with Keba and swimming in the pool when it gets dark. Also contemplating The Wall that we're surrounded by and noticing the parts that have spikes on top (other walls surrounding other compounds have glass or rolls of barbed wire). The color of the mold changes depending on what areas get most light and in some places the cement is flaking off. At night time there's randomly placed florescent bars that light up the perimeter and all the geckos go crazy catching the bugs that are drawn to their glow. I'm thinking of photographing the whole thing, square by medium format square for some future installation, and then filling in the details inside.

Owen is teaching me how to swim better. I used to be good! When I was little I lived in an apartment complex for a while that had a pool. I'd spend so many hours swimming in it that my (then very) long blond hair turned slightly green from the chlorine and would lump into dreaded mats. My dad would call me his little fish. Somehow after being on the swim team in 6th grade I lost all knowledge of how to move efficiently through water--it's not like riding a bike. Now I've forgotten how to simultaneously hold my breath and stop water rushing up my nose. Whenever we submerge ourselves Keba loses it and runs around the pool barking hysterically.

I'll try to hunt down the missing pieces of the things I want to share. The ancient decades-old reused beer bottles and the writing on the wall advertising the club next door, and gay culture (it exists!) and the disgustingly rich Congolese couples I saw at a restaurant the other day who profit off the gold and diamond mines in the center of the country. Those mines are some of the richest in resources in the world and epitomize the grossest forms of human rights violations. Makes me never want to own diamonds.