Our friend, D-Dub

Jordan here: We have a friend that we’ve come to call D-Dub. This is simply because we have no idea what her real name is and when we describe her to each other, we just call her ‘the deaf woman’, hence DW, D-Dub. I’ve mentioned her before, but since we see her nearly everyday, I felt she deserved her own entry. She lives in the compound next to us and she’s got to be 60 years old. Each day she grunts at us as we pass to head to school or catch some breakfast and gives us a sort of “so big” pose indicating she’s asking us if we feel strong. We return the gesture as she smiles and giggles to us through her 5 or 6 teeth she still has. Although she has “told” us several times, she tells us which children are hers, and whose mother the children belong to by pointing to her breast and making a suckling motion with her mouth. She also feels free to walk into our compound with various things to dry on our cement patches ie ground nuts, peppers, etc. I guess that’s okay. She doesn’t usually bother anything. She helps keep some of the kids in order around our place and sometimes she gives us small produce things. Sometimes she comes in when we’re not in the mood to communicate with her. It can be frustrating! It takes me back to the days of playing and coaching baseball. In other words, since she doesn’t use any recognized ASL (American Sign Language), her sign language is all her own interpretation. Just like my signs to tell a runner on first used to be a whole lot of rubbish and if I scratched my butt at the end, that meant steal, I feel myself making a series of hand and body signs and think to myself “I have no idea what we just said to each other”. Today she came and was startled by a group of dragonflies sunning themselves on one of the walls. To explain that she thinks they bite her (I’m not sure that’s true) she actually pulled out her breast and showed me her insect bite on her chest. Hmmm, just another “holy crap, we’re in Africa!” moment. All in all, she’s wonderful neighbor who nearly always has a smile for us. I can only imagine in her many years the things she’s seen and could tell me about the old days. However, I just think it may take longer than usual. But who am I kidding, I’ve got some time today.