Little victories

I've written before about the importance of little victories for any Peace Corps volunteer. The little victories really, truly are what get you through the tough times. You absolutely have to celebrate them and milk these little proud moments for all they are worth. They are what Peace Corps service is all about. Here is my latest one (hopefully this translates...I think it will):

First, two important bits of background information.

1) Gambian money is disgusting. Especially the small bills, which of course are what are used the most. Every once in a while you'll run across a crisp new one, but 99% of the time, these bills are grubby and a little smelly and crumbled and torn (tape and/or staples are commonly used to repair them). The bank seems to pay no attention to the state of the bills when you take out money, but many shopkeepers refuse to take the most tattered ones. This results in most Peace Corps Volunteers carrying around several disintegrating bills that they can't seem to get rid of.

2) The smallest unit of currency that is worth anyone's time here is a 50 butuut coin, which is worth about 2 cents. 50 butuuts will buy you a cheap minty (a cough drop that people eat like candy here) or two 50 butuut coins will buy you a small icy (maybe 1/2 cup of kool-aid frozen in plastic bag). However, left over from days when they were worth more, there are 25 butuut coins floating around, which no one ever wants, because they're really pretty useless. Like a penny basically, except most people don't carry wallets regularly here, and most of the coins are pretty big, making coins in general even more annoying than they are at home.

Ok, so now the story. I was in the market this part week buying some vegetables for lunch and when I gave the girl running the vegetable stall my D50 bill, she refused to take it because a small corner was missing. Now, in the past, I would have just sighed, given her a different bill, and made sure to fold up the bill carefully before I tried to use it again. However, for whatever reason, that day I decided to fight it. In my slowly-improving Mandinka, I told her in no uncertain terms that she knew perfectly well that all Gambian money looks like this and it's certainly not my fault and she was being ridiculous. To my surprise, she (and the other vegetable women) laughed, agreed that Gambian money was "not good," and she took the bill. As I was waiting for my change, I watched her dig around in the bottom of her container of money to give me by D2 change in 25 butuut coins. I swear she had a smirk on her face too...she was clearly messing with me. Usually I just roll my eyes and take the coins, but not today. Before she could even try to give me the offending coins, I called her out on what she was doing and said that I knew she had D1 coins in that container somewhere. Again, to my surprise, it worked! The women erupted in laughter again, told me I was a Mandinka woman now, and I walked away my vegetables and my two D1 coins on top of the world. :-)