Perspectives

Sisters, twins or just friends

Butterfly which we raised from a caterpillar

It’s interesting how in different cultures people automatically assume different things. It’s also funny to think how your own perspectives get altered by the places you live in and the people you talk to.

It makes you wonder whether what we mean by our ‘opinions’ on subjects are in fact only reflections of the mixture (or not) of places where we have lived...

If another person lived exactly the same life as me would they be the same? I think, probably not.

My sister and I by English and Chadian standards look about the same age even with our age difference. Despite this we don’t look like sisters to most English people and because we look the same age they assume we are just friends. I don’t know if that is just because our hair colour is different but at our school which is quite French although we are in different years and talk to each other a lot, people who don’t know us think we are just friends as well (perhaps this is because in their eyes sisters aren’t always best friends). In fact, one of the teachers thought I was American and my American friend was me just because she has the same hair colour as Ruth and that would make her more likely to be Ruth’s sister (regardless of our accents from opposite sides of the world). Ruth has also been asked by someone in her class who the ginger haired white girl she talked to during break was!

On the other hand when we go to market (with headscarves on so you can’t see our hair) all the Chadians automatically assume that we are twins! We always get asked whether or not we are twins and no one will believe that Ruth is in fact two years older than me; maybe this is just because they would love to meet white twins?

Similarly, at the Arabic course that we have been doing during the summer holidays even when the others found out Ruth was the eldest (after assuming I was because I am more sociable) they still thought that simply meant she was born a few minutes before me and that we were twins. Interestingly enough we wear headscarves to our Arabic class.

Maybe it’s just our hair that makes all the difference.

Hot and Cold /Good and Bad / Normal and Unusual Weather

 



Sunset outside hospital in rainy season

 

Another example of people’s impressions on things being changed depending on the country came to me when I was reading a newspaper. I read that they were planning to close schools and offices over a certain temperature (ABOUT 25 OR 30°!) The temperature in Chad rarely goes below this.  In the rainy season (now) when it’s meant to slightly cooler its 28° throughout the day. If they said this in Chad we would next to never go to school. The lowest temperature was 17° at night in January- February time! In Chad 23° is cool yet the same temperature in England is a heat wave.

When you look out of the window up at the sky your point of view will change according to the country:

If you look up and see a blue cloudless sky in England you would think it’s great and feel like going to the beach. In Chad it is like a cloudy day in England, ordinary. You don’t even think about it.

If you look up and see a cloudy sky and see that it’s raining in England you would be disappointed but in Chad you would go outside and enjoy it. In England it is classed as an ordinary and common thing however in Chad it only rains during four months of the year. You might think that Chad has less rain fall per year than England but this is not true. According to BBC weather the average rain fall per year is the same.

Lily in a puddle/lake which appeared in the rainy season

Gardens

When you see grass in England it is everywhere and normal. You can only occasionally see it in Chad. When you see it it’s either in a rich person’s garden or a posh hotel or it’s the rainy season. The amount of times you would need to water the garden to make it like England’s grass is so much that you would spend half of every day watering. You would probably need to employ a full time gardener to have grass all year round! If they left it alone for a few days it would shrivel up and die. 

If you sow some flowers in summer in England you could just leave them and they would grow without too much trouble. In Chad you need to make sure you’re not planting just before a thunderstorm where the seeds would get washed away or forgetting to water them every day if it’s not raining that much. But things still manage to grow during the rainy season and by the river. What are these animals?





 

Bye for now

Ruth and Rebecca