Old update #2 Demystification

Written over Demyst: November 6-13, 2009
Fifteen days down; 784 to go! Things are cooling down here in Niger, the weather becomes tolerable around 5pm, and it is getting legitimately cold at night. I finally broke out my light sleeping bag. I am adjusting to life in my town. We did a tour of the village the other day, and now I can navigate the streets confidently in the pitch black that blankets the town at about 7:30pm each night. Suddenly where the moon is and what cycle it is in has become very important. While the moon has been relatively bright for the past few nights, the moon is rising later and later each night so when we go to visit our friends after dinner we are often tripping over the garbage littering the streets. I have been playing lots of cards in the past week. My roommate, Matt, gave his cards to our kids to play with; big mistake. In less than 5 days half-eaten cards had found their way all over my family's compound. The queen of spades somehow found its way 3 blocks down the street. To avoid my kids, some of us have been meeting for games in our huts. I taught a bunch of fellow PCTs how to play Up and Down the River and now we play it almost everyday. We find ourselves avoiding the children a lot. Don't get me wrong, the kids are great, and they are really good and really patient teachers, but there comes a point when you don't want 6 very dirty, naked African children grabbing for your hands and asking for your camera. The novelty of friendly African children has completely worn off. We were sitting in our test gardens yesterday, and a group of Zarma-speaking children stood at the fence screaming, "FoFoFoFo!" (hello) "Comment to t'appelle" which means, "what is your name?" in French and is the only French any of these kids speak. We ignored them for 1/2 hour.
I have been reading tons since I got here. I finished Birds without Wings and polished off Blue Like Jazz in less than 2 days. It was really good, thanks, Diana! This, however, means I have already halved my supply of books (so send more!)
We all look forward to the core days we have on Tuesdays and Fridays. The name of our training site in Hausa means "top of the rock". We like it because we can eat a lot of fruits and veggies, spend a few minutes with air conditioning, and we can behave like Americans for a few hours. After our language and shots are done, we change into shorts, put our Ipods on speakers and play volleyball for 2 hours. Yesterday was a special core day because the American Ambassador came to speak to us. She is a stately African-American woman who is nearly finished with her time in the Foreign Service. We got to ask her lots of questions and she gave us some hope that the travel ban to Agader would be lifted. She also told me that 15% or so of Foreign Service officers are former PCVs so that gave me a lot of hope for getting in to the Foreign Service after my PC service. Ambassador Allen gave all of us her card and stayed for lunch with us. There was meat in our rice for lunch, and for dessert we all got a meningitis shot! After lunch she had to go to a meeting with the Prime Minister; things are not well in Nigerien politics.
Now I am on Demystification, aka 'demyst'. This is the period where we leave our training town and spend 5 days with a real PCV in the field. My "demystifier" is named Errin and her site is in the Dosso region. Her village is 10 km from the main road and any electricity. The cool thing about this area is the giraffes. We got dropped off by the PC "magic bus" (magic because it has air conditioning!) off the side of the road where Errin met us. She told us that we would be walking 10K out to her village. Luckily, a few other PCVs showed up and wanted to go out to see the giraffes. One of the PCVs had her parents visiting her and they wanted to see the sites. The very last herd of West African giraffes lives in this region. There are only about 150 of these types of giraffes left in the world, and they are all here in Niger. We all hopped on the bandwagon and drove out to the bush for a giraffe safari. My fellow demystee, Alison, and I were sitting in the back of an SUV driving through the bumpy fields We were warned not to lean back or we would risk the backdoor latch failing and falling out on to the dirt. After 20 minutes our guide pointed right and suddenly we were in a herd of 13 West African giraffes. It was amazing! Here we were in the middle of the bush chilling next to a herd of endangered giraffes. There was a baby between 1-6 months old in the herd; it was really cute. It was a surreal experience; giraffes are really mellow creatures. You can walk right up to them, maybe 20-30 meters away. They stare at you like a confused puppy, and then they keep eating. I took tons of pictures! Following our mini-safari, the other PCV's dropped us off in Errin's village, thankfully sparing us the walk. Her village is considered the epicenter of nowhere because the water table is so low and there are few water sources around here. The town well is 50 meters deep and women can pull no more than 7 buckets without exhausting themselves. Errin tried once but it tore up her hands so now she leaves it to the locals. Errin has her own concession with a shade hangar, small hut, latrine, and a pet cat named gutter. Her hut is surrounded by a millet stalk fence which has collapsed 3 times in the last year. Last time the neighbor's cows came and ate her roof. Her millet-stalk door had fallen apart so, after playing some cards, we set to work making her a new door. It took us about an hour, but eventually we threw together a sturdy door out of millet and a few strips of cloth. The next day we were toured around the village. It took a few hours because literally everyone and their cousin insisted upon greeting us and inviting us to sit. We met the chief of the village, a wide-eyed friendly old man who, according to Errin, sits under a big tree and reads the Koran all day, although we really have no idea how much Arabic he actually understands. Various aid organizations are active in this village. The EU has build a grain bank and an Islamic aid organization built a foot pump at one of the wells and a health clinic that is occasionally staffed.
All of the PCVs I have encountered comment on how clean and "fresh off the plane" we are. Alison and I have likewise been observing how "weathered" all of the PCVs look. Their t-shirts are streaked and faded in the sun with holes stitched up with sewing kits. I am learning new things like "sun washing" clothes which really doesn't wash them but keeps them from smelling too badly. Or, if you put your water bottle in a clay jar filled with water, it will stay cool even in the heat.
For dinner we managed to put together some spaghetti-type stuff. After we had finished eating, the neighbor boy brought over some locust he had caught and cooked up for us. We were obligated to try them as that same boy had tried some almond M&M's Alison had brought for Errin. He was convinced the M&M's were poison, but he ate them anyway. The locust he brought were fried or something because they tasted like a bad potato chip. After that ordeal passed, we sat out on mats and stared at the stars until 11pm. I managed to get a hold of mom & dad on Sunday, and I found out I passed the Foreign Service Exam, but I don't know how to get to an interview when I am held up in the middle of nowhere.
On Tuesday we got up before the sun came up around 6am. We were meeting up with the other PCVs at the Peace Corps hostel. However, in order to get to the road, we needed to hike 11 km through the open bush to get to the road. If we left much after 7, it would get too hot and we might not be able to go. We got everything in the backpacks and left by 6:45am. We arrived at the road 2 hours later just as the heat was setting in. A Nigerien man flagged down a bush taxi for us. Nigerien bush taxis are just larger than a VW bus and have the approximate body structure of a poorly-constructed tin can. Errin, Alison, and I, as well as 16 other Africans, smashed into this mobile death trap. Errin told us that she once had to sit next to a woman with a bucket full of dismembered goat parts on her lap. After a very hot hour ride, we arrived at our destination and made our way to the hostel. At the hostel I stocked up on books and met lots of current PCVs.
On Wednesday we bussed into Niamey. There is one "foreigner" store and restaurant there; we were so famished that we ordered pizza and burgers at 9am.
I don't know if any of you have been paying attention to the political situation in Niger, but things are not well here. We only get snippets of news from the BBC or other volunteers, but apparently government leaders are behaving in a way that the other countries in the region find undemocratic. In the past Niger has set the example for democracy in the area. There has been free and fair elections here for years now. Therefore, what is happening now is considered a big deal: ECOAS is upset with Niger and some states are talking about sanctions. So keep Niger in your thoughts and pay attention to the news because Niger is really exploring some new territory here.
Being in Niger has taught me so much already about the little things. Mirrors, for example, are a little thing that we never really think about, but when you remove it from your life, looking in a mirror becomes a strange luxury. Little bits of American food or candy are priceless gems here. All of the PCTs share religiously. One of my friends got a package from home and the first thing she did was pass around the dried apricots and cheddar flavored snacks. Another big thing that we miss immensely here is cheese! I never realized how much I love cheese until now. All of the goat/cow/sheep milk here potentially has TB in it, so we can't drink any unprocessed milk or cheese (which is 90% of what is available here). We are essentially getting only one of the food groups consistently, that being breads and cereals; everything else just does not exist for at least 20 miles in all directions. To help out our bodies, Peace Corps has us on prenatal vitamins, but that can only do so much. I have already dropped 12 or so pounds, but I am not yet sick. Some of our other volunteers have not been so lucky. At least 8-10 of the other PCTs have gone up to the infirmary for treatment in the past 2 days--an alarming trend for sure!
Today in gardening we got to plant our veggies. The main season for gardening here is during the cold season even though it may seem counter intuitive to lay down a garden in the middle of November, that's how it goes here. I planted tomatoes, onions, carrots, cabbage, lettuce and sweet peppers. It is unlikely, however, that I will see any fruits of my labor before I am sworn in and placed at my site on December 30.
I find out what village I will be living in for the rest of my term of service on December 1 (Happy Birthday to Lauren!), so that is a big day for me. After we get assigned our sites we go out and spend a week at them in early December, so I will have a really good idea of what my service will look like after that.
I hope all is well back in Michigan or wherever this letter may find you. While I love being and working overseas, I always miss my hometown, my family, and my friends immensely.
--Michael