Free Alexandria of Africa by Eric Walters Page B

in and … no, I couldn’t do that. Regardless of their lack of style, I still had standards. I still had myself to impress.

CHAPTER TEN
    I tried to nap but it just wasn’t happening. Instead, I was just lost in thought. All of this, everything that was happening, was so surreal that I kept playing it all over and over in my head.
    I heard the zipper on the tent open. Time to meet my roommate. I sat up and—
    “It’s you,” I said. It was that
awful
Christina person.
    “It is. Very observant.” She slumped down on her bed, right on top of the clothes and belongings that littered the surface.
    I looked at her as she ignored me. She was covered with mud and dirt. Perfect way to climb into your bed.
    “You’re filthy,” I said.
    “And tired. But at least it’s a good tired.”
    I wasn’t sure what that even meant. “What were you doing?”
    “Mainly mixing cement.” She sat up and threw her legsover the side of the bed so she was facing me. “Do you have any idea how much work is involved with mixing … wait, what am I saying? Of course, you wouldn’t have a clue.”
    That was clearly meant as an insult. I took it as a compliment instead.
    “I was also plastering, and I helped to put in a window. The building is almost three-quarters finished.”
    “Were you building a house?” I asked.
    “A school. That’s what we’re here for … you knew that, right?”
    “Of course I knew.” Of course I had managed to block out what they’d been blathering on about earlier.
    “I’d better take a shower and get changed before supper,” she said. She got up, grabbed another “Change The World” T-shirt, a towel, and a little toiletry bag, and started for the door.
    “How long do we have before supper?”
    “About forty-five minutes.”
    I jumped to my feet. “Then I’d better get ready too.”
    She gave me a questioning look. “What else do you need to do?”
    I smiled. It was too late to make a better first impression, but I wanted to be completely stunning the second time around.
    “I want to touch up my makeup, and I really need to straighten my hair. This humidity is playing havoc. Do you know where I can plug in my straightener?”
    “I think Nairobi would work.”
    “No, no, you don’t understand. I want to know where I can plug it in
here
at the camp.”
    “No, you’re the one who doesn’t understand. The generator is only turned on for a few hours each night, after it gets dark.”
    “And this generator thing matters because …?”
    She gave me a Renée-like look. “The generator produces electricity, and your hair thing needs electricity to work. Unless it’s battery operated.”
    “But that would be ridiculous.”
    “Not nearly as ridiculous as bringing along a hair-straightener to the middle of the Maasai Mara.”
    “Ridiculous is not having electricity. Everybody has electricity.”
    “Everybody in the world
you
come from.”
    Yeah, like
she
was from the middle of a desert.
    “Out here it comes from a generator—for those few who are rich enough to afford one. But I guess you’d know all about being rich.”
    The way she said “rich” was like it was some sort of dirty word. I wasn’t about to take that from her.
    “I imagine to the local people we must all seem rich,” I countered.
    “We are. Rich beyond their wildest dreams.”
    “But at least some people come over because they really want to help.”
    “Yeah, that’s true of
some
of us.”
    There was no mistaking that statement. She was one of the “some” who came to help and I wasn’t.
    “But here’s a thought,” I said. “How much better would it be for the people here if, instead of us coming over and doing a little bit of work, we just sent the money for our airfare instead? Can you imagine how many people would have been helped if you had simply sent your money over here instead of sending yourself? The difference would just be amazing!”
    She gave me the dirtiest, coldest look imaginable, said