Coming from a family of small women, I was not allowed to participate in hard labor unless absolutely necessary. No matter how much I begged to lend a hand with the ‘manly’ chores, my father would not allow it. Today was the first time I had been allowed to participate in such physically demanding work. We turned prickly elephant grass, which slices up bared skin and leaves you with such an insistent itching only time can heal the burning. We traveled multiple times into town to buy wood, nails and other materials to make an improved hutch for the rabbits. These trips made me realize why my courses stressed how little can get done in countries with limited resources. Most time is spent doing by hand for hours what can get done in minutes by a machine.
Pigs, who I soon discovered to be masters of escape, were chased around and rounded up every few hours. I hammered, I lifted, I pulled, and I performed all forms of manual labor I assumed were lost to my small self. The men who helped us with the work were surprised by my vigor and continuously commented on how hard I worked or how “good of a girl you are.” It took me some time to notice their comments were directed only at me, seeing as I was the only women helping in the hard labor tasks the men usually worked on.
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