amalthya

Sunday 7:47 pm

Well, I went to the Kivu Sun today and went swimming with Jungla. It was an absolutely fantastic day, and I felt confident and happy.

I did ask them if anyone found my hard drive in my room, and no one had, so I guess it really is gone. The thing is, with Stu having his laptop, satphone, and passport stolen, the hard drive was the least offensive thing that could have been stolen from me. I mean, it could have been my laptop! Or my camera! Am I sad about the photos? Yea. But the fact is that most of them are on Flickr, or petridish, or both.

I feel guilty because it was a gift, too. Considering that almost everyone I know who lives here has experienced some sort of theft, I'm going to perceive it like I got off easy.

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In other news, I'm starting to feel the strain of being nearly-departed and having all these people that I've come to view as close acquaintances come to me with their various requests. It doesn't help that "ask" in French appears to be "demander" ... bah.

Bonane needs planks for his house

Jean Claude needs a camera

Balume's son is having his appendix out

Faustin's kids need something that was un-comprehendable to me, but well, money, for something.

Jungla wants a phone!

In the ideal world, I'd have underpants made of hundred-dollar bills that I could dole out indiscriminately to those in need. Also, because having underpants made of Benjamins would be pretty spiffy.

The fact is that I'm living on the littlest amount possible. I'm white, sure, and my concept of "little money" is a lot, but honestly, my priorities are sort of well, *white shame* buying gifts for my friends back home, and like, the occasional precious Snickers from Trameco. I have budgeted money to get gifts for certain people -- gifts I can only buy with cash... and like.. well.. gah!

It doesn't help that I get this like, rationalization. And yes, I KNOW that it's one of those dual-purpose terms here, and that it means I'm rich -- plush with cash -- but like, it doesn't make me particularly inclined when someone asks me for a favor and prefaces it with "Because you're so fat"

It sort of inspires a "fuck you, take your kid's appendix out yourself you fattist" instead of an impassioned urge to help or sacrifice grysar's birthday gift money.


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In entirely unrelated news, I'm mulling over a post about missionaries, but, totally unlike me, I'm trying to make it as non-offensive as possible because a) my opinions are clearly biased by my general skepticism and b) I know people who are religious and I respect them entirely independent of their religious leanings.

Anyway, maybe I'll finish it tonight.

Wednesday 11:41 pm

Last night at the Chateau Chimpanzee, I wasn't sure why, but I lay in my bed and I cried. I'd been having such a good week, well, at least Sunday was good, but I found myself so suddenly annoyed and upset and lonely and unhappy.

Yes, okay, I was also hormonal -- another reminder that I've been here for more than 2 months... but I think now, in retrospect, that I was somehow tuned in to what a bad day today would be.

It started off alright, and I went and played with the chimpanzees while I tried the iPhoto Library restore that had been suggested in macosx.

I came back, and it had finally finished. I opened up iPhoto and it told me I had only 4,667 photos.

Uuuh.. what? I'd previously had 9-thousand something.

So I check... and the latest DATE showing is JULY 1st, 2005.

Uhhh... again, whhhat!?

I manually open the iPhoto Library folder and drag the stuff I want into iPhoto, and it gives me some weird error.

I open one of the subfolders, and as I open it, I notice photos disappearing. Like, I can see it happening.

I start to panic, but am somewhat reassured that, right after my iPhoto library died, I backed everything up to my external harddrive that I got for Christmas.

I look to the side of my bed for the harddrive and it's not there. I look a few more places, and well, I still can't find it.

The short story is that I can't find it. There are only a few explanations to this conundrum:

1. Although I can't remember doing it, I brought it with me to Gisenyi on Sunday, put it into my basket and it got stolen as I walked there. Of course, if I *did* bring it, it would have been deep in my big basket and someone would have had to dig in there to find it, something I think I would have felt...
   
   Additionally, I carried the bag with two arms in front of me for the last 3-4ths of the walk because it was damned heavy and my arms were getting tired holding it just by the handles. So, it could have only been stolen at the first roundabout.
   
   
2. I brought it with me to Gisenyi and left it in the hotel? I always check my stuff before I leave, I didn't see it, and I can't imagine doing this either. I'll check with the hotel regardless.
   
   
3. I left it here and someone stole it, even though my room is locked, I have the only keys and they were with me.
   
   
4. It's actually here, although I have looked on every surface, every shelf, taken my bed apart, moved everything and checked everywhere.
   
   
5. I'd left it by the door and the chimpanzees reached under it and snatched it.
   
   
6. The boogeyman is trying to RUIN my life.

I'll admit that it's so lame and pathetic but I cried and hyperventilated. Essentially it means that every photo I've ever taken in Africa is (sort of) gone. Of course, all my Flickr pictures are there, but to be honest, they were only maybe 30% of the photos I took each week.

Additionally, all of the photos that were taken during July -- the goodbye bowling, the going-away party -- they're all gone too.

The kicker? The thumbnails are all still there. I still have the high-res version of the life poster, so I could get those photos. Along with the prints I've had already made. But I have these little 180 x 240 mini-sized memories of the last 9 months of my life. Which really just isn't acceptable.

What's so frustrating is that I don't remember taking the hard drive with me. Like, I never take it anywhere because I keep it and the computer separated in case someone were to steal the computer. I might have taken it BECAUSE of the iPhoto library problem and because I might have thought I'd need the backup.

I really want to believe the drive is somewhere here, or at the hotel, and that it's not just a totally absolutely hopeless cause. Not only was the drive (I'm sure) expensive, but the photos on it are irreplaceable. I'm also frustrated because I specifically asked in the macosx community if doing an iPhoto library restore would put the photos in the folder currently at risk. They told me IT WOULD BE OKAY. Why didn't iPhoto take the 2005-2006 photos? You've got me. It certainly leads me to believe that perhaps #6 is not such a ridiculous option -- I mean, who but the boogeyman could be this spiteful?

Especially since before I came to Entebbe I wouldn't have even filtered albums before uploading them, cause I was just zipping up to Petridish. But since Flickr has a bandwidth limit per month, I'd go through and just select the "best" photos.

I live in a 4' x 5' room, I mean there just AREN'T that many places it could hide. Plus, my fucking laptop lid won't shut, it's dirty, the keys squeak when I type now and man, just CAN"T ANYTHING WORK?!?!

To focus on the bright side, having Flickr there is really comforting, or else everything really *would* be gone. Add in that I was smart enough to export *some* of the videos I'd taken into a non-iPhoto folder so that all the video I took isn't gone either.

Secretly, I'd been taking photos of my little green Yoshi in every place I'd been. I had photos of Yoshi with chimpanzees, and really, all over Africa.

I hadn't uploaded any of those photos because it was going to be an end-of-journey "surprise". Now, all those photos are gone.

I sort of feel like crying, or, possibly, dying. I haven't decided yet, but anyone who knows me knows how important my digital packratting memories are to me. Also, if my harddrive really is gone then I have no way to back up my current hard drive and I'm back at square one, worrying that my laptop will get stolen along with everything in it, gone forever.

Either way, today isn't a great day, and I'm not feeling particularly in love with technology whatsoever. In fact, I'm contemplating writing a very angry email to apple the first chance I get.

Would any of my Mac-savvy friends at home be willing to give poor Allure a look-over when I get home? Make sure no other bombs will go off inside him when I get back to Uganda? I'd really appreciate it. Oh, and some help fixing the &*(*&^*^ latch. I've got cleaner back in Entebbe, thankfully. Ohh! And recommendations of a photo program other than iPhoto. That'd be great.

I'm just feeling so tired and discouraged right now... Thankfully, tomorrow will be better.

Monday 11:26 pm

Want to know what it's like, chilling with a chimpanzee on your lap?

Check this out:

Okeysha On An Afternoon



Etaito and Okeysha Playing



It's a hard life being a pimp.. I mean, a Monkey Pillow