Hello from the Bush

Greeting friends and family. I apologize for my lack of posting, but mail home is painfully slow and this is the first access to a computer I have had since my arrival and I only have 10 minutes. Niger is great, Yesterday I went on an impromtu giraffe safari and saw a whole herd. It is super hot here and it is considered the cold season now. I am learning Hausa, eating rice with my hands, and sleeping under the stars. Good news, I passed the foreign service exam! Mom will post more on my adventures soon. I love you all!

How to get from Holland to Niamey

Authored by Michael on October 23, 2009--two days after departure from Michigan
Dad & I left Holland at 4:15 a.m. EST. I slept maybe 2 hours that night, mostly as a result of nerves. Mom cried when I left which was sweet of her. Everything went smoothly at the airport; I made it through in plenty of time. I went to my gate, sat down next to some guy with ripped jeans and tried unsuccessfully to pass out. I did catch about 30 minutes of sleep waiting for my connection in Milwaukee, WI. When I got to Philadelphia and claimed my luggage, I saw the guy in the ripped jeans near baggage claim. Turns out his name is Aaron; he is a volunteer from Portage, MI! Together we caught the shuttle to the Radisson. By the time we made it to the hotel we were almost late for our meeting so we quick checked in and went to conference room 8.
These are some of the more interesting things I learned at staging in Philly:
1. Camel spiders, native to Niger, are the size of frisbees
2. We were expected to eat lunch before our 6 hour meeting so the 2 egg McMuffins dad bought me in Hudsonville at 4:30 am were clutch
3. You aren't supposed to touch anyone with your left hand
4. All 39 people in my Peace Corps group are super awesome and 5 of them are from MICHIGAN!
5. I am the only male volunteer assigned to agriculture; there are only 6 other guys--and all the girls are very pretty :>)
6. You will get sick in Niger
Once we were finally released from staging at 7pm, we decided to spoil ourselves with one last luxury. Fourteen of us decided on a nearby steakhouse. We all spent an obscene amount of money on an amazing steak filet and glass of red wine. We were all excited and shared lots of rumors about what we might find in the country.
On Thursday we were up and checked out early. We got on some tour buses for a trip to Philly. They parked us at the US Constitution Center, right next to the Mint, Liberty Bell, and Independence Hall. We were marched into a drab government building where we were each given a WHO card, a necessary travel document that makes me feel like I am being featured in a Dr. Seuss novel. We all got yellow fever shots and were led back to our bus. At this point we were abandoned by our training coordinators who bid us good lunch on their way back to D.C. We proceeded to JFK and boarded the 7pm flight to Paris.
I planned on sleeping for most of my trans-Atlantic flight as the in-flight movies were all bad. In addition, a fellow volunteer game me a Dramamine to put me down. My body and the infant of a hasidic Jewish couple had other plans. The Jewish child was screaming for most of the night and the Dramamine was not kicking in. I tried to help it along by drinking 2 things of wine and some liquor but by the time we landed in Paris I was wide awake. After a 2 hour layover, we boarded a flight to Niamey continuing to Ouadougov. O found it somewhat ironic that 80% of the 1st class passengers were Nigerien in fancy suits and the economy class was all Caucasian. After that I began a very strange sleep/consciousness cycle. I don't remember taking off from Paris only suddenly realizing that we were airborne. I chatted occasionally with the 81-year-old missionary on her way to a med clinic (nudge to Grandma). Air France installed a camera under the plane and broadcasted an image of the ground to the video screens of all the passengers. From this I learned that the Sahara desert is very big and dead. Arizona deserts have ground cover and cactus; the Sahara is all nothing, just sand. The screen constantly showed a big collage of neutral colors with no green in sight. The desert continued until the plane was putting down the landing gear and bushes appeared on the sand. The 81-year-old looked down and said, "Wow, look how green it is; you'd better look now because this is the most green you will see here."
We landed at Niamey "Airport" and stopped on the tarmac. Our Airbus 330 was certainly the biggest plane at the place, and I only saw one other plane with a jet engine. We were unloaded onto the tarmac and loaded into buses for the 100 meter trip to the "terminal". I made a quick stop at the men's room only to discover 1 working toilet with no seat, cover, lid or flushing device. Welcome to Africa. We were warmly greeted by Peace Corps staff in the dirt parking lot. All of our luggage was heaped on the back of a pick up truck, and we were smashed into 2 vans for a trip out to our training cite. Even though I was prepared to see rural poverty, I was blown away by what I saw just on the ride out to the training village. I am going to end my post now, but I already have a whole book's worth of stories and experiences to write about, and I have been here just 24 hours. You will have some good reading in the coming weeks and months.

A Delightful Fall Day

Mom, the current blog administrator (aka CBA), Dad & sister Lauren had a delightful day! The cell phone rang at 12 noon with a strange number on caller ID. I took a deep breath, answered the call and heard the much awaited words: "Hi mom, it's me". The wandering Westendorp checked in with the family! Thanks to a fellow PCT, he borrowed her cell phone long enough to give me her number so I could call him back on Skype (at my expense, of course!) We were honored to then connect with him on Skype and talk for about 40 minutes. I will give a quick synopsis of the conversation.
-he loves it there!
-it is very hot....temps have reached 122 degrees to his knowledge
-time goes very slowly...he says it seems as though he has been there for 3 months instead of 1 1/2 weeks
-he is enjoying the company of the other PCT's. He said they are quite a compatible bunch
-he is reading a lot
-he lives with a family of 6--2 parents and 4 children between the ages of 3 and 12. The children love the PCT's and cling to them....he's adjusting to that!
-he has a new name Habibou....pronounced Ha-Be-Boo
-he eats a LOT of rice. He is adapting to eating rice with his hand and adjusting to the fact that his hand is not always that clean when he uses it to eat.
-he has encountered the bush taxis but is a little hesitant to ride in them. He says they load them up with 20 or more people, put the chickens and the goats on the top and the cows in the trunk. Definitely a transportation adjustment!
-there are letters en route to me that will, in usual Michael flare, describe his trip there and his first few days. I will post them as soon as they arrive and you will get a better picture through his eyes.
He hopes to get a cell phone at some point that will allow him to communicate with us more regularly. Until then we will wait for the next scheduled communication in 2 weeks.
But for now, we will enjoy THIS day!!

Safe arrival in Niamey

The team of Nigerian Peace Corps trainees arrived safely in Niamey last week and posed to take a photo for us! The only other news is that they all survived their first African monsoon! Stay tuned for future posts!
the mom--current blog administrator

Chicago, Mount Pleasant, & Grand Rapids

21 Days and counting until I lift off for the Peace Corps and I am really enjoying the time I am getting to spend in and around W. Mich. This weekend I made trips to Chicago, Mt. Pleasant and Grand Rapids. I managed to get myself invited to go to Chicago last Thursday with Ms. Ensink’s AP World History class. Our resident Korean Max Kwon is in the class so I was going under the auspicious label of “chaperone,” although I was more interested in talking with Thelma Ensink and seeing the Art institute than monitoring fifteen mature high school students. On Thursday morning we carpooled to Michigan City and caught the commuter train into town. The day was thankfully uneventful and after a morning in the South Asian and East Asian collections, we were released to explore the museum at will. Although I have an undying interest in world history, my favorite gallery in the art institute is the modern art gallery.
A lot of modern art I don’t understand. For example one artist chose to place bags of kitty litter throughout the room. Another artist spent millions having a bunch of Japanese guys carve a life-size replica of a dead tree trunk he saw in California out of stucco. The fun of modern art for me is that you never know what you will find when you walk into the next room. Although I may not understand a 2 ton carving of a decaying log, it certainly was a surprise to see. There were a few pieces in the modern art section which I did understand were incredibly interesting and powerful. It is like the artist and I are tuned to the same channel mentally so that he can send messages to me through his art. This is also why I prefer to go through the galleries alone, so I can be taken by what I enjoy and not feel the need to explain my fascination.
On Saturday Mom, Dad, Alaina (Aaron’s significant other), and myself piled into the fun bus for a day of athletic spectating. First up was my sister cross country meet in Lowell. Lauren Beth Westendorp is gradually becoming a great cross country runner, and she got her time down to a 24:39 5K. The course was soggy and the air was damp for the entire meet which bore bad tidings of things to come later that day. After packing Lauren back on the bus to Holland we continued on to the fun and excitement in Mt. Pleasant. Central Michigan University is located out in the “Deer & Beer” country of Michigan, a region of the state with which I am only vaguely familiar. While the natural scenery was quite attractive, I felt as though if we broke down we may be eaten by a roaming moose or polar bear. Arriving at CMU’s large and lively campus was a welcome sight. We stopped to stretch out and wait for Aaron to meet us at a 7-11 where various Central students were making their pre-game alcohol selections. Miller Light appeared to be the beverage of choice. Aaron appeared from a building in short order and showed us to his dorm where he needed our help hack-sawing the chain off his bicycle. He also gave me some official team merchandise to sport during the game which was really cool.
Central Michigan has a really cool football program going on in Mt. Pleasant. They have a medium sized but comfortable stadium with lots of fan support. It is a good experience without becoming too overwhelming. Mom had brought up helmet-shaped Jell-o and a pasta salad for tailgating with team parents. Other team moms had brought fried chicken, casserole, and other feast-like dishes. We left tailgating early, however, because warm-up is the only time when Aaron is actually on the field with a football. It was at this point I remembered my best friend from middle school was going to Central for meteorology and after a few well placed phone calls (thanks Obed) I managed to get in contact with him. Cort showed up just after the game started and just as the rain began. As a meteorologist, Cort corrected me as the precipitation we were experiencing was technically “drizzle” not rain. Regardless of what it was, it “drizzle down poured” for a good part of the first half and we all got soaked. The game itself was over before it started. Central was playing Akron, a team from Ohio with a pathetic looking kangaroo for a mascot and an inexperienced quarterback. The game lost its tension when Akron had negative total yardage in their first 4 or 5 drives while Central had racked up 14 points. The final score was 48-21, but the play on the field suggested that Akron should be thankful for losing by a mere 27. After the game Cort left and we met up with Aaron for some late Applebee’s and pleasant family conversation. I spent the drive home using my mother’s phone to send text messages to my little sister demanding that various chores be completed before our arrival. Overall a great day.
On Sunday I took Sally to Grand Rapids for the Artprize contest. I picked her up at the Janssen’s house where she had been enjoying a Sunday meal. Once the Janssen pet cat had been successfully located and returned to its cage we continued onto Grand Rapids. Downtown G-Rap was packed. One artist had just dumped 100,000 paper airplanes off 6 downtown skyscrapers much to the delight of the 20,000 people gathered below. Sometimes places were too crowded to actually enjoy the art that was on display. We located Sally’s restaurant pal Maude and walked through the un-crowded DeVos Place while Maude told us a story about flooding 7 stories of the Days Inn. Hilarious.
This week I am back at Habitat, but at a different house, this house was just started and still needs a roof on top of it.

Cincinnati

It really hasn’t registered upstairs that I am about to leave the developed world for over two years. I haven’t really given myself time to savor my time home. Instead I have been running around the state visiting friends, tying up ends from my Turkey trip, and planning out my next 30 days at home.
One of the big things pressing on me right now is that my Grandpa Westendorp is sick. He was diagnosed with kidney cancer last week. The cancer appears to be aggressive and grandpa has been weakened by a heart problem so he has been suffering allot lately. Grandpa Alphenaar died almost a year and a half ago and I was forced to leave the country before the funeral for school in Paris. Now with Grandpa W in uncertain waters I feel bad leaving the country for so long.
This weekend I made the long journey down to Cincinnati to finish up some paperwork from my Turkey trip and say goodbye to my college friends. My mother, being the dear that she is, left me her tank of a van to take down to Xavier. Although driving 6 hours through rural Indiana and Ohio sounds about as much fun as having a foot amputated, I got my driving directions from NPR.org which came attached to a list of every NPR station along my driving route; transforming my drive from a boring labor to an introspective educational experience.
After getting slightly lost and nearly causing a head on collision in suburban Fort Wayne, I made a pit stop for dinner at Aunt Kim’s house. Kim is my dad’s sister and it had been a long time since I had seen the Fletcher family because of college and my summer travels. Though over half the family was away from home, Kim, my cousin Ryan, and I enjoyed a home cooked meal and updated each other on our lives. Ryan loves baseball and after dinner he wanted to go downtown to see the Ft. Wayne baseball team play and invited me to come along. The Fort Wayne ‘Tin Caps’ were bucking 17 years of truly terrible baseball by making the minor league playoffs. The three of us journeyed downtown to enjoy a few innings of baseball during which the Tin Caps scored and took the lead. Unfortunately I had to leave before the game finished in order to make it to destination before it got too late.
Unlike quality NPR stations like 104.1 in West Michigan which broadcasts the BBC World Service all night long, all the stations in Indiana and Ohio play classical music until the early hours of the morning. This did not make for good listening music so I preoccupied myself by arguing with the commentator on an AM conservative talk show.
Upon my arrival I quickly fell into my comfortable habits when I was back at school with my friends. We wasted 3 hours on Friday playing Frisbee golf through a park, watched long hours of college football on Saturday, and made frequent trips to Chipotle for burritos. On Friday night we had a great quantity of people over to the house I was staying at for a party. I spent so much time talking with my old friends about Turkey and the Peace Corps that by the time I went to bed at 2:30 I was exhausted and completely hoarse.
I had to leave Cincinnati at 7:00AM on Sunday to make it back to Michigan on time for Cousin Bethany’s birthday celebration. My absence at this festivity in the past has resulted in excessive chastisement directed to me by Bethany. Since I was not planning on flying back to Michigan in September of 2010 or 2011 my attendance at this event was essentially mandatory. Additionally, Alphenaar family parties are one of the biggest things I am going to miss when I am away so I really wanted to make it. I also used this opportunity to give my grandmother her 75th birthday present: a 6mm air soft handgun. She has been having trouble keeping deer out of her bird feeders so we are hoping a few bruising air soft pellets will scare them off. This also means my grandmother is going to be stalking her backyard with a pistol, something I would pay good money to see.

I got my staging information today and booked a flight out of Grand Rapids at 6:45 on October 20, 2009.

ITS HERE

The suspense was awful. A few days ago our neighbors decided to have a tree removed and the sound of large mail-truck-sounding vehicles in front of my house all day was enough to drive me mad. The suspense was partially broken last Thursday when I got an e-mail telling me that I had been accepted and that my package was coming. The e-mail, however, contained no information about where I would be going or when. All the important stuff was in the elusive FedEx envelope.
It arrived on Tuesday. It would have been here on Monday but it was Labor Day and while all of you were out eating hotdogs and enjoying the weather, I was wishing the day would end so normal mail service could resume. I had just returned from my first 7 hours working at the local Habitat for Humanity house. I was contemplating what I would do if yet another day went by without any news when the big white truck came bumbling down the street. I met the FedEx guy half way up the lawn. It was all I could do not to give him a hug. Instead I awkwardly exclaimed, “You have no idea how long I have been waiting for you!” Laughing, he told me he had noticed the envelope was from the Peace Corps and asked me where I was going. “I am about to find out!” I interjected. Sensing the suspense, the FedEx guy waited with me as I tore open the package and shouted “I am going to NIGER!”
When you Google Niger (pronounced “knee-j’air”) the first thing that comes up says “Niger is one of the poorest and least developed countries in the world, with over 80% of its territory covered by the Sahara desert.” I am going to have my work cut out for me. One of my favorite teachers at Holland Christian spent a year in Niger at one of the schools there so I am looking forward to lunch date with her to discuss what it is like on the ground. The Wikipedia site, which I encourage you to browse through, lists six national languages and 90% of the country is Muslim. The largest city and capital is Niamey, a city of only 1 million people that contains no credit card machines. My over 200 pages of introductory material told me to familiarize myself with the cultivation of peanuts, highland rice, sorghum, and cowpeas before my departure on October 17th.
For the past 24 hours I have been rushing to fill out registration forms, passport and visa applications, medical releases, and reading through manuals. It is amazing how one envelope from Washington can complete change my life. The next 27 months of my life. Communication in Niger is not easy, but I am sure I will find a way to keep this blog updated.

Holland

Holland is a great town. There are sandy beaches, a beautiful lake, tall trees, fresh air, and at least some cultural heritage. What I like most about Holland is that all the people who support and care about me can be found here (or at least nearby). These amazing people include Mary T who drove six hours round trip to come get me from the airport with my mother, Dan and Diana who are always ready to come play a round of cards, and Aunt Mary who always amazes me with how much she cares, just to name a few.

This trip home, however, has been somewhat spoiled by what is going on in my life and it has left me feeling anxious and frustrated. The major problem is that I don’t know why I am here. Am I here on a short term visit or am I here for a more extended stay? This question stems from the absolute silence coming from the Peace Corps Placement Office. I am nominated for a project leaving in late October and it is likely that I will be invited on to a 27-month mission in Sub-Saharan Africa. However, likelihood is not certainty and there is a possibility that my project could be significantly postponed. So what will I do then? Do I get a job? Do I try to get into grad school? Do I just wait around?

So I sit here in Holland living out of my mother’s basement with no purpose, and no plans past next weekend. It is a college graduate’s nightmare. Not knowing why I am here has affected all of my plans and activities. I feel paralyzed by a sense of powerlessness. Should I make arrangements to visit friends and family I will not see for three years or schedule job interviews? What do I tell other people about my future plans? My mother keeps telling me that God is teaching me patience, but considering I was originally told this information would arrive in sometime in April I think I am entitled to a little anxiousness.

Against the good advice of probably every psychologist, I have been hiding from my problems by staying busy. Since arriving at home my time has been divided between landscaping the Church Parsonage, baby sitting, mowing lawns, volunteering at the city mission, and re-decorating my little brother’s bedroom. My mother had always planned on redoing Aaron’s bedroom once he left for college, along with about 18 other household projects. However, this particular project was quickly moved to the top of the priority list when my mother arrived home from work to discover that I had ripped all the wallpaper off the walls. Because I volunteered to do the majority of the labor, I was co-opted onto the decorating committee where I obstinately refused to lift a single paintbrush unless I was allowed to paint something colorful. My suggestions for variations on purple, blue and yellow were quickly vetoed by the family matriarch. The deadlock was eventually broken when we agreed upon a good color for the back wall. Sorry Aaron, I am not telling what color it is you will have to come home and see it for yourself.

My work at the City Mission has also been quite eventful. Everyday the Mission makes the rounds of all the local thrift stores picking up all the junk that even the thrift stores can’t sell. I estimate that 80-90% of the stuff donated to thrift stores eventually ends up at the mission. Once it arrives there, the men living at the mission sort through all the clothes and throw them into massive compactors which crush the clothing into big fabric bricks. These are then exported to a wholesaler in Canada who ships them to poor African nations where the clothes are sold to African merchants who sell it on the streets. This dumping of old American clothing on developing nations destroys domestic textile industry, prevents job creation and only serves to increase foreign dependency. On the other hand, what else can we do with it? At least someone is wearing it. Nothing like a little moral ambiguity to get you up in the morning.

I am working there because there is so much clothing coming in from the thrift stores that the compactors can’t keep up and the growing mountain of used textiles has consumed about one third of the workroom and blocked a major shipping door. The people I have met at the mission could fill a blog post all by themselves. Overall it is a pretty unhappy bunch. There are guys convicted of DUI’s doing their 30 hours of community service, guys who got stuck in the recession and had no where else to turn, and guys who divide their time between working at the mission, AA, and meeting with parole officers. The stories are even more sobering as I consider my own awkward life situation.

I am going to keep blogging as I find out more about my future. Pray that the FedEx man comes soon with a big packet for me!