07/06/12-A Daily Dose Of Laughing Cow

The one thing I never thought would be a problem for me is my biggest problem here in Sierra Leone........the food.

Growing up Filipino, the cuisine is a "head-to-tail" food culture where we don't waste and eat everything under the sun. I love trying new food, I'm willing to try anything at least once.

In Sierra Leone, rice is the main staple and fish is the primary source of protein......easy peasy for me. Bring on the fish with their head, tail, skin, and bones......been there done that. I thought that I would be one step ahead in comparison to my other PC Trainee peers who have mostly eaten fish in fillet or stick form.

So tell me why I am secretly eating a wedge of Laughing Cow cheese in my tent right now. Or why I have a secret stash of ketchup that I sneak into my plate of rice and plasas when my mom isn't looking.

Like a good Filipino child I am incapable of telling my mother that I don't like her cooking. Peace Corps said that we can tell our families to make us something different because they are provided with a stipend for hosting us but I just can't get myself to do it. So here I am, a closet cheese eater with ketchup rations.

I love the foundation of their cooking here......pepe & yabas (hot peppers & onion). I don't even mind using pamayn (palmoil), I would just use a significantly reduced amount.

I actually liked the food when I first got here and was excited to try all the dishes that Sierra Leone had to offer. But after only being in this country for 2-3 weeks, it was evident that I had tasted every dish that this country had to offer. There is a reason why there is no "Sierra Leonean" restaurant to be found in America. Your choices are casada lif, petete lif (there are 3 kinds, don't ask me to discern between the 3), cren-cren, granat soup, and granat stew. The difference between the granat soup and stew???? Beats the hell out of me, they both look and taste like stew!!!

I also realized that my problem wasn't with the food here, it was actually the lack of varietal choices. Yes, I admit it, I am spoiled. The Bay Area is awesome where I can eat Ethiopian one day, Vietnamese the next, and a tasty gourmet burger with truffle fries the day after. I am spoiled by my diverse never-ending options.

So why the Laughing Cow? Well, for one, I love cheese. Eating bread and cheese is a nice break from the never ending cycle of rice and (insert stew here). And why the secret ketchup? Well, I think that has to do with my personal preference of liking contrasting flavors. The pepe & yabas is good but I just wanna add that "vinegar" contrast. That and also a PCV resource told me that she used ketchup during her host-family stay to keep the food down. It was a great survival tip for me. I've also became a soda drinker, I have a soda after lunch to just wash that flavor down. They just drench the food here with pamayn, I smell it sweating out of all our pores during the long lecture days. It's all seeped into our systems. One of the Salone 2 PC Resources who actually loves pamayn and doesn't mind using tons of it has actually started turning orange due to its high content of beta-carotene. The palms of his hands are literally orange after one year of being here.

I already have a few ideas in mind of how I will modify the recipes and other dishes I can make with the same ingredients. This will have to wait until I get to my site which isn't too far from now. The Salone 1&2 Resources have also given us other recipe ideas and options to staying healthy in Salone. I'm really gonna push for organizing a PC Salone cookbook for Salone 4.

I've kinda converted into a part-time vegetarian in the past few weeks. Beans have been my primary source of protein. The red meat here is really tough and the fish here is really fishy (seeing the market fish made complete sense of why the fish is so fishy) and chicken is expensive. So I only eat chicken when they offer it for lunch at school.

I try, I really do. Everytime I see the plasas I go, "Ok, maybe I'll like it better today." Well, all I can say about that is I tried.

It's all part of the cultural exchange process. This past Tuesday's lunch had fries instead of rice.....you should've seen the faces of the Sierra Leoneans, lol. We, trainees, were freaking ecstatic over the fries. I joked around with the Salone staff as they referenced that lunch as "cham-cham" (snacks), lol.

So for now, I try to eat some rice with a tiny bit of plasas. And I just asked my mom if I can just have kokumba (cucumber) or paynapul for dinner sometimes "bikos boku res mek me belli tayt" (too much rice makes me constipated). Cucumber and pinapple is pretty affordable b/c its in season. That and I just need some fresh produce and a natural form of fiber b/c my body isn't used to eating so much white starches.

Note to self: request for care-package tuna