Juba, Sudan
I liked the movie Blood Diamond. Contrary to most of my friends who either thought it was rife with of Titanic-like melodrama, or that the storyline was too sensationalized, I was of the personal opinion that it was timely, and that it had a good balance of the documentary and the entertaining. Whatever my excuse, the reason I mention the movie is that there is a scene where diCaprio (sp?) meets O’Connelly at the tiki bar, and upon finding out – to his disgust – that she is a journalist, indicts her of the heinous crime of being one of those foreigners who use hand sanitizer everytime they touch something local!
Of course he himself wasn’t exactly dedicating himself selflessly to the health and prosperity of Sierra Leoneans if you remember correctly! His line however sums up my mental state regarding hygiene though.
As I was packing to leave Boston, some of my ‘well-wishers’ made generous offers of contributing everything for my personal hygiene starting from toilet seat covers, to hand sanitizers, mosquito nets to deodorants, pen-knives and suncreens and even some other quite-unsolicited items, if you can get my drift! Although I usually do not take anyone else’s except my own opinion seriously, this time I was nailed. It was a strange new place, and I had heard that death by crocodiles was quite a common occurrence, so who knows what other hazards were lurking in wait for me?
The due visit to Target was made, and after we were done with it, the cart was full of junk from the health and pharmacy section. All for one person! I was feeling rather special, and quite enlightened too, because thanks to Sarah, I now knew the difference between Imodium and Pepto Bismol. But even if I didn’t, there was enough supply of each that I could take both at every dose had I needed to. This reminds me of a friend whom I have never met personally, but whose daily intake of Valium impressed me enough that I had to add her as a friend on facebook. This friend – whom we shall call Baloo from here onwards – is a human miracle as she survives purely on a diet of coffee and pulao and aloo. (For the non-Bangladeshis reading this, this is equivalent to coffee, twinkies and fries in terms of nutritional value). Feeling like Baloo, I contentedly packed my newly acquired lotions, tablets, capsules and sprays. I felt invincible – if I had a cape, I am sure I could have flown myself over to Sudan without the aircraft!
…
Well most of the product advisory came from people who were concerned that I would be unrecognizable when I returned … because I would be sunburnt and skinny. While slim I don’t mind, but ‘dark’ for any South Asian woman is the ultimate curse. I therefore prepared a morning routine for myself that would put backstage makeup artists to shame.
The day starts early here. After I missed the ‘bus’ a few times my first week, I realized that I should really not depend on my body clock. The alarm was then set for 6:30am. Following a teary goodbye with my bed, I proceed to the showers. Thankfully the geyser works on most mornings, and I can take a warm shower if I wish. (Even at the ungodly hour of 6:30am, I can see some people leaving for work, which keeps me from congratulating myself too much for being able to wake up at that time!)
Returning to the tent, I have to make a decision on what to wear. Although I brought short-sleeved summer clothing, it is wisest to wear long sleeves and long trousers to deny access to malaria anopheles mosquitoes. That is the reason you see many of the women here wearing long-sleeved Indian tunics.
And now it is the turn for the beauty products. First is the roll-ons for deodorization so that even if have to look like a sweat-oozing monkey, at least I don’t smell like one! Then it is time for the talc. I have a fat bottle of talcum powder that smells of something they put on us when we were children. By this time I have started sweating again because they have turned off the air-conditioning and the effort involved in taking a shower and then walking back to your tent is guaranteed to make you perspire. So the lathering of talc on every inch of skin is to be done calmly yet speedily, in a way to avoid further exertion.
Next is the suncreen. I have been judicious enough to being several types of sunscreen. The two that I have unpacked till now are a spray and a lotion. The spray goes on all exposed parts of my skin, and is quite a nice sensation because it is cool and fizzy. Short sleeves equal to more spray, so in the spirit of conservation, I wear long sleeves on most days. For the ladies out there – spray on sunscreen is the best thing to hit the planet, because you can even get that part where your ear-lobes meet your neck, quite nicely! Yeah! The lotion suncreen is a little thicker – not to mention pricier – and is only to be used on the face and hands.
And then I wait, for the spray and the lotion to dry so that other products may be layered on. After drying, I use moisturizer on my elbow, knees and ankles, because my mother tells me to. You will realize that I’ve put on talc and a spray-on sunscreen, but nothing moisturizing, and I certainly do not want to age in this sunshine, so thus the moisturizer. The sunscreen for the face is sufficiently moisturing, to take care of that part of it!
And then comes the protective part – insect repellent! I have a heavy-duty deet 40 insect spray that can even be used in the Amazon forests! That is sprayed on my arms, feet, and neck. And then that is dried. As the last layer cakes on, I pat some powder on the face that has by this time, started to bead up with sweat from getting ready. On some days, I add on some eye-liner to top it all off, but when I step out of my tent with nothing to show for the ten whole minutes of preparation, except my shirt already clinging to my back.
I was very proud of my meticulous routine that I had successfully completed for my first week. On the second week it was even better because I could do it in sub-eight minutes, and wasn’t even missing my bus anymore! But then I found out that I had been so worried about the ‘sunburnt’ part of everyone’s predictions that I had forgotten to pay attention to the ‘skinny’ part.
On day when some cargo was being weighed, I jumped on to the scales to see whether I had lost anything. And by the name of all the mangoes I’ve eaten here, boy did I receive a shock – I had packed on a whopping eight pounds! It is all that rice, oily curries and sitting in an air-conditioned office for ten hour stretches! And add to that the fact that I do not have a mirror to look at!
I needed a new game-plan. The alarm is now set to 6am, and I wake up early to get some exercise in. So the goal now is to manage to stay the same weight and colour when I see everyone again!
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