And in my house, there is a farm E-I-E-I-O

So in my compound there are a number of animals. Sometimes I feel as though I live on a farm.

I live with two dogs named Martine and Deoje (which means legend in Ngambai). In the time since I have been here, they have each had babies. Martine had 7 babies who were all healthy and very cute, and Deoje had 2 who both unfortunately died. In Chad, dogs are not seen as pets as in Canada, they are used to protect the home, but it is rare that dogs are pets here.

Cat- We have a young cat who I don’t think has a name. It is a bit of a crazy cat, and will run around the compound, but it also can be sweet and it pets itself using my feet when there is food around. I don’t mind the cat, but I do get tired of its constant meowing for food whenever I’m eating.

Tortoises- We have two tortoises living with us as well. They are normally in a small pen however one day they were brought out to walk around and get washed. At one point I saw my cousin standing on the back of the shell, so I decided to give it a try. The tortoises are definitely strong!

Chickens- We generally have between 1-4 chickens wandering around our house. They slowly get killed and eaten and then more are bought.

Pigeons- We have a number of pigeons that live in our pigeon house. They peck at seeds and flap around but they are pretty harmless. I’m not exactly sure why we keep them because I’m pretty sure that I have not eaten one yet.

Goats and Cows- My family does not own goats but many families do so I just wanted to quickly mention that when I walk to Maddie’s house for example, there are many goats grazing, I will see the occasional pig or house but that is rare. Cows are raised by herders who look after them.

Rooster- My lovely enemy THE ROOSTER. For the first month, we had a rooster. It woke me up at night and I was unhappy by it’s cockdoodledooing- I lacked sleep but I slowly got used to it. Then one day we killed and ate the rooster. This was great because I was able to have much more peaceful sleeps. Well a week or so ago, another rooster was bought and this one is even worse than the first. It makes it’s lovely noise day and night. Especially in the early morning it likes to cokadoodle do every often so I wake up and then as I fall back to sleep I hear him again. One morning I decided to count and it was cock-a-doodle-doing every 15 seconds! So far him and I are not on the best of terms. I’m awaiting the day when I can sleep again at night without hearing his voice.

Here are pictures of our tortoises, and our dog Martine when she had her babies with her. Then there is a picture of a chicken with its chicks that I took while visiting a village.

****Update! Since I wrote this we have officially killed and eaten the rooster. The last two mornings have been lovely because it has not woken me up. I’m sure that in the future we will get another rooster but for right now I’m thankful for my sleep!