Babies! Inspired by Babies!

Funny things people in village have said to me regarding babies and my lack thereof:

-You look good with that black baby. You should have one before you leave! (women)
-You look good with that black baby. You should let me give you one! (men)
-Madame, you like too much the black babies. You should take one home with you.

So as I’ve stated many times in the past, I LOVE the babies in my village. They are just so cute and diverting (when they aren’t peeing on me for lack of diapers). Also, I would say a good 50% of the women I know in village are pregnant or just had a baby. This was actually perfect timing because I am on a mission to get someone to name their baby after me before I leave. My main tactic for accomplishing this mission is to (semi)jokingly point to the bellies of my pregnant friends and ask how “Petite Dione” is doing. We all giggle and move on to another subject, but I figure if I do this enough the name has to stick with at least one of them, right?!? I had a moment about a month ago when I thought Project Petite Dione was a-go. One of my friends had her baby and her daughter saw me on the way to the market and told me all about it. She literally said, “Petite Dione had arrived!” I asked her several times if that was the real name of the baby and she said yes. It is traditional in my village to gift a new mother with soap because she will have to be washing a lot of things now that her baby has arrived. Wanting to surprise and impress everyone with my integration skills and thoughtfulness, I jumped on this tradition with rabid dedication. So I bought some soap and went to visit the new mother of “Petite Dione” and see my namesake. I walked in and they dumped the tiny infant in my arms. She was everything I could ever want in an African baby namesake; cute, tiny, adorable, and sufficiently plump. I turned to the mother and asked what the baby’s name was. She said, “Dione!”. Just to make sure they weren’t humoring the yovo, I asked again, “But…what is her real name?”. She said, “Oh, its Geraldine”. Wa wa.