Waking up in the Village

The morning after was a glorious feeling, being able to wake up to the sounds of birds, the smacking of clothes on rocks and the general chit chat of the local villagers. To me this was the most delightful way to be introduced to the village in the actual daylight.

Since I had been moving around on motorbikes from place to place, I haven’t been able to stay in an area long enough to be able to do any laundry. At this point all my clothing is in a complete state and odour wouldn’t even begin to describe how badly my clothes smelt. So I decide to take this morning to focus on washing all my clothes and I mean EVERYTHING I own.

The way I normally wash my clothes is in a bucket with shampoo but today I decided to do it villagers’ style. I find a washing rock, splash my clothes into a bucket and then chuck them onto the rock one by one. I then rub on some soap and literally beat my clothes onto the rock. It’s at this point that one of my guys yell from a distance ‘Come on Luana. Beat it harder. Think of your ex-boyfriend…. Think of someone you moderately hate.’ To which I attacked my smalls so hard that I actually ended up throwing my hand onto the rock and injuring it. I didn’t actually notice it at the time. It was only when some of the local villagers stopped by to look at the amusing white girl who was attempting to do some washing that I noticed the damage which was done. My knuckle swelled up faster than anything I have ever seen before and blood was trickling from it. The biggest annoyance was that I was yet to complete my washing but I wished not to clean my delicate smalls with my own blood.

It was when I was sat on a chair and the same American was helping clean up my hand that I realised how I hadn’t actually thought of my ex-boyfriend personally at all in such a long time. This brought a beautiful smile to my face for positive reasons. Especially seeing as the guy jokingly telling me to think of an ex in order to beat my clothes harder simply assumed that I had pure anger and hatred for the poor man when this actually couldn’t be further from the truth. I just hope that we are both in the same place since our loving relationship that we would be able to continue our relationship as good friends and nothing more.