The Party

A week earlier I had received a text from Katie, “Come to [our district capitol] on the 9th.  No questions.”  With no other details, a failed attempt to meet Katie on the road, and a dead phone battery I wasn’t sure when or where I was suppose to be, so I was very glad to run into Lauren as I was walking out of the Post.  As we attached our packages to our bikes she says, “So… how long has your phone been dead?”, with an intriguing smile.

“Since yesterday.  Why? Is there something I should know?” I asked wearily. 

“Well, we’re on standfast…”

Standfast is the Peace Corps’ first step in the emergency action plan; it means is that we’re not permitted to move/travel from wherever we are and we need to report our whereabouts to the office and be ready to act incase of an emergency.  For all elections or major planed protests and whatnot, we’re put on standfast; it’s more of a precautionary measure then anything, in most circumstances.    

Lauren and I biked to Emily’s house, where Emily and Katie are waiting for us.  Luckily Katie, Lauren, and I didn’t find out about the standfast until we were already in the district capitol, some of our other friends didn’t make it in.  We briefly talked about the standfast and why we were put on it, the recent protests had escalated some, but the gravity of the situation and what it meant for me didn’t hit me for sometime later.  We went on with the plan for the night and the party began. 

The girls gathered around me, “As I’m sure you’ve guessed, this is your bachelorette party” Emily said.  The party was to have 3 stages, the first was spa treatment.  We made a milk face mask, foot bath, and did hair masks.  Filed our nails and feet.  All the pampering our limited means could lend us.  The conversation was the typical conversations had by 4 girls who haven’t seen another English speaker for over a week, supplemented by the gossip from a People Magazine. 

Emily made us dinner-Mac ‘n Cheese made from a brick of Velveeta Katie had received- a special treat for all of us.  Just as we were finishing up dinner Josh called; it was at this point where I realized what the standfast meant for us- we could not take transport to Ouaga in the morning as planned.  This effected him more then me at this point, since his car left at 5 am and mine not until 7.  Still, neither of us could leave the villages we were currently in.  It took a little convincing to get Josh to agree NOT to take the 5 am car, since there were only 4 cars to Ouaga and 3 of them left before 8 a.m., but we made a back up plan- we’d call the Bureau starting at 7:30 a.m. and hopefully he could get on the 8 a.m. car and I’d take 10 and we’d both get there around noon.  Now that that was settled I went back to the party. 

Stage 2 was a board game Emily created, roll the dice and go so many spaces and answer the question.  Some questions were personal (what was your first kiss), some were trivia questions about Josh (what was his childhood security item? (answer: a stuffed rabbit named Bunny)) and some were just silly challenges.  The second spot to the end was “Eat some Cock,” and when I got here Emily pulled out a cake she had made in the shape of cock and balls.  It was made out of banana muffin mix and homemade frosting, and was surprisingly delicious.  Guess there has to be a little dirty humor at a bachelorette party.  Overall I was very impressed with the creativity.  The game took several hours to finish, but in the end I won. Not sure if it was rigged that way or not, but still fun.

 

Stage 3 was a dance party.  A Lady Gaga dance party to be more specific.  There is no hiding that I LOVE Lady Gaga (her beats are catchy and perfect for dancing, there is no denying it).  We were all tried, as it was already around 1 a.m., several hours past our village bedtime, and none of us were as drunk as you would expect for a bachelorette party.  In fact, I don’t think any of us were drunk at all, despite the 4 bottles of Champaign.  But they insisted on a dance party, albeit short, and after a few songs we all crashed into bed. 

 

I woke at 7:15 to my phone ringing.  Josh and I immediately started to get ahold of someone at the Bureau who could tell us if we could come to Ouaga today.  2 days before the wedding and we still had a lot of errands to run beforehand.  Finally just after 8, Josh got ahold the the Safety and Security officer- he told us we had to get permission from the country director herself.  She was in a meeting and would call us as soon as she could, until then we had no choice but to sit tight.  So the party continued on into the morning after.  The 4 of us girls drank tea and coffee, ate omelet sandwiches, and perused the latest magazines we had got in the mail, all anxiously awaiting news from the bureau.  Finally, just after 11 a.m., Josh called.  He had talked to the Country Director- Josh and I, and our 2 witnesses, could come to Ouaga today, but we had to take the next possible car and leave right away.  The first possible car for Josh, and only other car leaving that day, was at 2 p.m., and his witness (and neighbor) wasn’t planning on leaving until tomorrow.  Josh frantically tried to call her, she has poor cell phone service, and prepared to bike to her village to get her.  Thankfully he caught her by phone and she was able to catch their car, 10 minutes before it left. 

As for me, luckily Lauren was my witness and she was already with me and ready to go.  Our bus also left at 2 from the village we were already in.  We waited with Emily and Katie; took naps, read magazines, and played with the tattoo mustaches someone had sent Katie. Finally we all went to the bus station and Katie and Emily saw us off.  Took my favorite bus, KGB, out of the Centre-Ouest for the last time.