A Hot Day in the Sun

Day 17
Weight: 222.5 lbs.
Food Intake:

• Breakfast:
  • small cup of pineapple juice
  • polenta (grits)
• Lunch:
  • glass of mango juice
  • Homemade Barley Bread Veggie Pizza (flat bread made from barley and yeast covered with diced tomatoes and enchilada sauce, garlic, green, red, and yellow peppers, and several types of grated cheeses
  • stewed squash
• Dinner:
  
  • glass of pineapple juice
  • stewed squash
  • fried okra
  • 2 ears of corn on the cob
  • some chunks of fresh coconut

I woke up in the middle of the night with extreme indigestion. Too much food too fast. I felt very sick. I walked out of my hut and just sat outside on the ground for awhile looking at the stars and swaying in the night breeze. I drank some water. My throat burned and my stomach threatened. I sat up for about an hour then tried to lay back down. All was quiet, but I didn't sleep very much the rest of the night.

When morning came, I had made up my mind to collect the remaining materials I'd need to finish the storehouse. I met with the council of elders (the 6 men who brought me here -- they seemed to be the decision-makers for the village) about my plans. With a stick in the sand, I drew what I thought was a pretty good representation of three sleds carrying mud bricks. The council seemed to understand and one of them left the hut and returned followed by 6 young men with sleds. Their sleds were much better built than mine and looked like they could carry quite a load. They didn't drag them, but carried them front and back. So eastward we went into the rising sun to retrieve building materials.

Around noon under the hot sun, as we were placing the last of the bricks in a stack near the storehouse, the gong sounded for lunch. These people were really into eating together. Everyone stopped what they were doing and assembled in the courtyard. I ate some more of that barley bread veggie pizza along with some squash and mango juice.

After lunch I tried to make the elders understand that I needed rafters for the storage shed roof. They finally got it when I started making hacking motions at a palm trunk and assigned several native woodsmen to cut the wood for me. By the dinner gong, I had begun to lay bricks having mixed a mortar of limestone and sand. I quickly finished up and made my way to the courtyard. I don't know what the penalty for being late to dinner was, but I noticed that no one ever seemed to come to the table late.

Dinner this evening was corn on the cob, stewed squash, and fried okra. I washed this down with pineapple juice and am headed off to sleep with the sun. It has been a very hot day, but I feel much better than last night.