How to Write a 6-Month Recap...

Despite the time gap since my last entry, I actually didn't forget that I have a blog. So here is a recap of my activities since last reported:

As my last entry states, I finally found funding through USAID to repair the broken foot pump in my village. At the end of April, a technician from the Department of Hydraulics came to the village with brand new pump parts and with everyone crowded around, he replaced the broken parts in one afternoon. Within three days, we could get strong streams of clean, clear water out of the pump. A week later, I sent two motivated "gear-head" village men to the regional capital to learn pump maintenance. They spent a week there and even went on a few field trips to take apart and put back together various pumps. They brought back with them a utility chest of saws and wrenches and happily demonstrated the uses to me. Six months later and the pump is still fully operational. A pump fund was created with the founding of the pump committee. The committee members have been holding meetings on their own without my initiative and have been reminding people about paying their dues for using the pump. The families in our community have been excellent about paying to the pump fund once a month. During the rainy season, when most families have very little money – let alone enough food – only eight people paid the pump fund dues. However, now that harvest has started, everyone has repaid their debts in full.

In addition to the successful pump project, I have worked on establishing a primary school in the village. My counterpart and I went to each family concession in the village and also the neighbor village to write down the names of each child whose parents wanted them to enter school. It was a difficult process but we successfully recorded the ages of each child (they had to be between 5 and 8 years old to be included on the list). Incredibly, the majority of students to be enrolled in school are girls. Once this list was complete, my Peace Corps Agriculture supervisor helped me to write a cover letter in French to the Gaya School Board Director. Then he met me in Gaya where I traveled with my village chief to meet with the Director in person. The school year officially started on October 4th. However, most teachers did not begin classes until the 18th, which is when our teacher arrived. At the time, I was at a training session seven hours away. I just finished yesterday and will be returning home today to finally meet our new teacher. The kids were all anxious to start school when I left and I hope they are enjoying this new opportunity. Only one man in my village has ever attended formal schooling and he was not able to continue beyond two years of primary school. Despite this, or perhaps because of this, the villagers are completely supportive and enthusiastic about having a school. For example, we needed to make an enclosed shade hangar for the temporary school and so all the men of the village took time out of harvesting their crops to build it in one day. Now I just hope we have a good teacher and the kids keep up their studies.

One side project I have been doing since August is tutoring my friend Dizey in French. She was chosen as the secretary for the pump committee because she is a motivated young mother and is the only semi-literate woman in the village. About five years ago, the village had an adult Zarma literacy program in place. It has since ended but Dizey was the one woman who attended every class until the end. Yet it has been years since she last practiced reading and writing. We have practiced writing the alphabet in uppercase and lowercase letters and quickly moved on to months and the days of the week in French. She has been so quick to learn French vocabulary and money that we have been able to move on the greetings and grammar. I hope that before I leave she will not only do the bookkeeping for the pump committee with total confidence but even be able to hold a small conversation in French!

Now on to Peace Corps updates: Two weeks ago I came to Niamey for my Close of Service Conference. My Ag/NRM (Agriculture/Natural Resource Management) stage of '08 has two months left in country so we were all required to come to the capital to do paperwork and to learn about how to get a job in the States (you know, among other important reintegration tips). But after this conference, the prospect of assimilating back into the US seems more daunting now than ever before. I have not left West Africa since 2008 and I feel completely left behind by America. I have not lived under the Obama Administration and have never seen an iPad. I have been having fantasies about buying apples at the grocery store and panic attacks about choosing breakfast cereal. I am impatient to see my family and friends and to get a decent job but already planning long and complicated road trips to escape a settled life. My Close of Service is like the fast approach of a public speech or a standardized test. It is looming closer every day, scaring me to death, but also making me anxious to get it over with. Thank goodness that most of my villagers now have cell phones. I tell myself every day that I will keep in touch with them and so this is not goodbye or "the end."

As I mentioned earlier, I attended a training this week. It started right after the Close of Service conference. Five of us Ag/NRMs '08 and one MCD (Municipal Community Development) from '09 were asked to become VATs (Volunteer Assistant Trainers) for the incoming FARM/CHA (Forest and Agriculture Resource Management/Community Health Agent) stage. We spent a week with the Nigerien language trainers and Peace Corps staff to prepare for this new group of trainees. They arrived yesterday, October 22, and we went to the airport, accompanied by warm bottled water and a welcome banner. Forty-three of them stepped off the plane, making our group of six look even more tiny. They were fresh faced and enthusiastic despite the 24-hour plane ride. Some of them were even happy with the Niger heat because Paris had been freezing and the airplane ride was just as cold. I will be their VAT in November and can't wait to get to know them. I'm glad I decided in the end to become a VAT. I had heavy reservations about taking on the job and sacrificing my precious time in village. But Peace Corps Niger needs all the support and enthusiasm that it can get right now. I feel proud to help and I think it will assist me to close my service without regret and as a more rounded volunteer.

Till Next Time!

Good News!

Everyone loves good news. Especially in Africa!

My primary project has been funded! As most of you know, I have been working non-stop to find funding to repair a broken foot pump in my village. The project began the second I moved into my village in March 2009 and my new villagers said, “We have no water! We can’t do anything until we fix our pump!”

The village does in fact have water but it is difficult to get and dirty once you get it. We share the 50-meter-deep open well with nomadic herders who use our drinking, cooking, and bathing water for their cattle and goats. Everyone in the village but me must settle for unfiltered water that causes a plethora of gastro-intestinal and parasitic illnesses.

This well, in addition to being a health hazard, is a pain to use for the women. They are the ones responsible for pulling water from sunrise to sunset. Their hands are hard, bumpy and calloused from pulling hundreds of these waterlogged buckets every day. Thousands a month. Millions a year. The pump, when working, is operated by foot. The strength of the leg muscles ensures that retrieving water from the pump is a much easier task than pulling water with the arm and back muscles. I can’t wait to see the hands of these hard-working women become soft and beautiful again for the first time since childhood.

Without a functioning pump, the daughters from age 8-15 are often the ones in charge of pulling the water and carrying it home. When speaking to the village women about girls’ education, many are reluctant to let their school-age daughters go to school. Since March 2009, I have been explaining the value of education, especially for females, to every mother and father that will listen to me. The goal has been to gain support in bringing a primary school teacher to the village. The mothers all agree that with a pump, the domestic work load would significantly decrease and their daughters could go to school with full support of the entire family. The fathers have already compiled a list of 60 girls and 40 boys that they want to go to school.

I am also excited for the pump because it will lead to a cold season vegetable garden starting next November. The isolation of the village makes it hard to buy vegetables. The lack of water makes it impossible to grow vegetables. Currently the only source of vitamins in the village is bush weeds that are collected and dried in the rainy season. As an agriculture volunteer, I have been impatiently waiting for my project grant so that I can finally begin some gardening work in Niger.

I will post more updates once the repairs are actually made. Today, I’m headed back to the bush. I have already told the villagers the good news via cell phone. Now it is time to tell them in person. This will probably call for a fete, complete with roasted sheep!

Some Updates Since November

It came as a shock to see that I haven't written on my blog since November. For anyone, three months is plenty of time for things to happen, lives to change. Out in the bush, my life stays fairly constant, interrupted only by small moments of excitement or bits of information from the outside world.

Since I last wrote, I spent a happy, carefree November in the village until receiving a text message from the Peace Corps office in Niamey that there was a failed attempt to kidnap American diplomats in the north of the country. We were told to immediately gather in our respective regional capitals and wait for further information. Upon reading the text, I had a flashback to the last time I was consolidated to the capital due to kidnappings. This was in January 2009. I left my village and was not allowed to go back, even to pack my things or say goodbye. This time, my hands were shaking as I packed my bag. I packed as if I would never return to my village. I only brought my solar charger, my Gosho (Buddhist writings of Nichiren Daishonin), a shirt that held sentimental value, and my bottle of perfume. If we were evacuated, I had all my valuables (I keep my violin in the regional capital hostel so it was also with me). However, by the next week, everyone in my region was allowed to go back to their villages with increased travel restrictions. One region was closed in the east of the country and many friends there decided to go back to America rather than uproot to another Nigerien village.

Then last week, there was a military coup d'état in Niamey, Niger. The military stormed the presidential palace on Thursday, February 19 and forcibly took the president, Mamadou Tandja and some of his cabinet ministers into custody. Although it is standard for the international community to condemn a military coup, thousands of Nigeriens, West Africans, and others throughout the world rejoiced this rather smoothly carried out operation. Why? Tandja was himself democratically elected in 1999 following a military coup. In the constitution drawn up in '99, the president is allowed two, five-year terms in office. Tandja served for two terms, after being re-elected in 2004, but in 2009, he decided that his job wasn't done. He claimed that it was the "people's wish" for him to serve for an additional three years to finish the job he started in office. I will not go into the details of the political events from August to February in which Tandja guaranteed himself a further three years in office. You can read all about this in the following BBC profile on him: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8181537.stm. The conclusion is, however, that the military stepped in on February 19 to oust Tandja and bring the country back towards democracy. A civilian prime minister has already been put in place temporarily and the country is now preparing for parliamentary and presidential elections in the coming months. I also assume a new constitution will be drafted to be voted upon as well.

These additional BBC Articles might be helpful to read:
A Coup for Democracy?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8537043.stm

Niger Junta Bars Itself from Future Elections
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8536497.stm

I was in Gaya when I first heard the news on the 19th. Not until I reached my post did I receive the text message that all Peace Corps Niger volunteers were on "standfast," meaning we could not leave our villages until told. We also could not leave our homes from six at night until six in the morning. Being in a tiny village in the middle of nowhere, this was no problem for me. The standfast and curfew were lifted only a few days later after it became apparent that the situation was calm and under control. The night of the coup, I did not know the severity of the situation or if violence was erupting in Niamey. I turned on the international news, which said that gunfire was reported in Niamey and the president was taken to some unknown military base. This didn't sound promising so I switched to FM radio to hear what the locals were saying. The only channel on was playing military marching band music. I decided to get a good night's sleep and listen to the news the next day. By that time, only one day later, it was apparent that the situation was under control and the military was as anxious as everyone else to return to civilian rule.

For now, I am moving along with a water project for my village. The political upheaval in Niamey and the terrorist problems in the north have only been mild obstacles for me in my work. On the whole, it is business as usual. I'm currently writing and revising a project proposal to turn in this week. I have no doubt that Peace Corps will be in Niger for many more years to come. This country deserves positive international attention through programs like the Peace Corps and I hope that politics and extremism will not stand in the way of grassroots development and cultural exchange.

Hey, it's a Bana!

Today I saw hippos! My friend’s parents recently came to Niger for a visit. Today they planned to do a boat ride and find hippos on the Niger River and invited some Peace Corps friends along. Hippos can be found along the Niger River as far south as Niamey. I’m not sure why they don’t hang out farther downstream. We didn’t have to travel far when one of the people on our boat spotted two hippos peaking their heads out of the water. When they saw the boat, they got suspicious and ducked under the water. Then, being very sneaky, one hippo at a time would poke his eyes and ears out of the water to check if we were still there. The men manning the boat had a few tricks to get the hippos to stick their heads out of the water. The hippos didn’t like when the boat engine was revved or when the men tapped the side of the boat. I snapped several pictures of the hippos from far away. But just when I let my guard down the bigger hippo swam about 10 feet from the boat and stuck his whole head out of the water. No picture but that was amazing. I don’t have my camera on me right now but soon I’ll add a hippo picture to the blog.

Hippo is “bana” (pronounced bong-a) in Zarma. They’re huge, violent, and are supposedly delicious. A volunteer living far north up the Niger River, where there are many, many hippos, once ate hippo meat that also fed the entire village.

This trip on the river to see hippos was a helpful reminder that I am in Africa! When I was on a boat in Niger's Park W, I saw six bathing elephants and a couple of baboons. Another time I was in a bus driving from the south towards Niamey and three giraffes ran across the road just like any old deer, or more Niger-appropriate, just like any old sheep. I wonder what the next animal will be!

Visiting the old "vill"

During the first week of September, I visited my old village. From December 17, 2008 to January 26, 2009 I lived in a village called Faria Beri, located about 120 km north of Niamey. After a kidnapping in January of European tourists on the Mali-Niger border, all the new volunteers on the roads north of Niamey were required to relocate. The Peace Corps director of Niger promised to let me visit Faria Beri after six months if no new kidnappings or terrorist activities occurred in Niger. Things have been quiet here (in relation to Al-Qaeda at least) and so I was granted permission to visit.

I wasn't sure if I could actually spend the night in my village. Apparently my counterpart (the guy I worked with in the community garden) moved closer to the road and my old hut is now the exoders' bachelor pad. For the first day I stayed with another volunteer who lives 5 km from Faria. We walked over to my village for the day. My counterpart asked me to come back and spend the night. So I roomed with his second wife for the next two days and hung out with my old friends. Most of Niger is fasting for Ramadan but despite this my counterpart and I took a walk to his farm and went to say hi to some people in a neighboring village. The millet in this area is much smaller than in my new area at the very southern tip of Niger because of drought and pest problems. Much of the millet I saw here had been ruined completely by caterpillars that eat the seeds in spirals up the millet head. When we went to the neighboring village, we happened to see the Agriculture Agent for the area and spent a long time talking to him.

It was overall a great trip and I was extremely thankful to my Peace Corps director for allowing me to visit (the only slight obstacle during the trip was that my old latrine had half collapsed and at times I was nervous it would collapse). When I left on January 26 for a doctor's appointment in Niamey, I thought I would be coming back the next day. Instead I was missing for a month and then the Peace Corps director of Agriculture came to my village without me to pack all my things. It was a miserable and traumatic time for the villagers and for me both. We were all extremely happy to see each other again.

My plan is to visit again in February at the end of Cold Season to help out with the garden harvest. When I lived there I spent hours every day in the community garden with the women's group and my counterpart and learned all kinds of things about gardening. But I left before any of the vegetables were ready to harvest. If I go back at the harvest, not only can I observe the harvest for the first time, I can eat tons of salads!

Ghana, Farming, Spirit Possessions

I have quite a few updates to make since my last blog article...two months ago! I did go to Ghana and sipped cold beverages by the water. It would have been much more ideal if the water wasn't full of discarded black bags that lapped the shore. Two of us walked into the water in Cape Coast but did not go farther than ankle-deep because a pair of shorts tangled around my foot and a wooden board hit my friend in the shin. Ghana is a surreal place for someone who just spent six months in the poorest country in the world. There is a tropical divide somewhere in the north of Benin/Togo/Ghana that separates "developed West Africa" from the rest. In the bus to Cotonou, Benin, I was shocked to see the forests of palm trees. Mango trees were everywhere, ripe with huge pink mangos. People didn't seem to know what to do with all their fruit. In Ghana, the highways were lined with stands selling huge watermelons every few meters. Another thing, Nigeriens love to point out to me (as a white person) that I'm an "anasara." The Ghanaian word for white person is "obruni" but I don't remember being called that once. Instead, street vendors will rip you off mercilessly and Rasta bros offer drum lessons and treat you as objects that they can handle without asking. I loved the weather in Ghana, the marked infrastructure (electricity, garbage collection, running water, and, evidently, functioning schools), seeing the ocean—no matter how dirty—and eating all kinds of new food. However, I also felt relieved that I would go back to Niger where I can speak a local language, where people respect me, and where strange men can't touch me.

Little did I know that Niger was falling apart in my absence. When I turned on my phone upon crossing the border from Benin, I received all kinds of frantic texts about the president dissolving the Parliament and several that just said "The Grand Marche is on fire." That is the shopping area in the center of town where thousands of established and shanty stores sell goods. With all the insanity, we were asked to leave Niamey and return to our villages; ideally the very night we had finished our 31 hour trip. I opted to leave the next day, you know, to save my sanity and all. I then visited several friends' villages and participated in a radio show about the difference between love relationships in Niger and the US. Finally, I returned to my village and almost immediately got the field that I had worked almost two months to get. For a week, I uprooted bushes and painstakingly weeded the plot. Then with incredible timing, right after I bought peanut seeds, the heavy rains came and a villager offered to plow my field for me with an ox plow. The next morning two women came to my field to help me plant the peanuts, plus hibiscus and sorghum that my village friends gave me. For about four hours we planted by digging holes in the loose ground with our feet, dropping in a pinch of seeds (only one peanut per peanut hole though), and covering the hole with the same foot. My two friends did a fast and flawless job. I was all over the place, zigzagging my lines. I'm self conscious that when the plants start to significantly grow, my lines will be incredibly crooked. But that doesn't matter now. The point is that I'm a farmer! What an incredible new chapter in my Peace Corps service. The political instability in the cities makes me nervous. I just hope that, like any other political problem in the history of Niger, it will blow over soon.

Then last week, I took a quick trip to the Konni region, the closest Hausa-phone area. One volunteer was hosting a possession ceremony in his dominantly animist village just outside of Konni ville. I was incredibly impressed by the start of the festivities. Two men played a calabash drum with claw-like drum sticks (drum claws?) and a fiddle made out of a gourd. The violin (called a "gourge") had a thick bow, like a bass bow, and the man played it in the crook of his arm. I hope to go to another one of the ceremonies soon and next time, I will try to buy one of these fiddles to take home. The musicians played for hours and only stopped once, ironically, to pray. Then the animist hosts brought out a big bag of clothes and asked three of the Peace Corps volunteers to dress up. There were cowry-shell vests and crowns and all kinds of beautiful skirts made of cloth and leather. During the actual possession, the possessed ones wore fabric that they held over their heads that I recognized as traditional Nigerien weaved cloth. In the Balleyara market, a fabric seller showed me this hand-woven fabric and explained that most households in the olden days only had one stretch of fabric. Everyone was naked until they needed to go out somewhere and would actually take the clothes from the current owners back. I asked the price of this fabric and the vendor just laughed and said there was no way that I could afford it. Imagine my surprise seeing the animists with several pieces of this fabric. I wonder how long they had owned this fabric. The actual possessions disappointed me. It felt staged for the benefit of the white tourists. In my own region and in smaller villages of Konni, there are daily animist events. I want to show up at a whim to one of these and see what the people do when no one's watching. It is still intriguing. But as of yet I'm not impressed.

Soon I'll head back to the bush to work on my small farm. Expect some tamed blog entries in the future. I plan to keep a low profile for a while.

Ghana- beaches, food, English, I'm there

In two days I have my first West African vacation! We’re towards the end of hot season in Niger. Instead of starting my field of peanuts and sorghum and the subsequent backbreaking labor that marks the beginning of rainy season, I felt it more appropriate to reward myself with a vacation. For two weeks I don’t have to crawl up a mango tree or sprawl out on a plastic mat to make the 130 degree weather feel like 110 degree weather. I will instead be in Ghana, intermittently sipping icy beverages on the beach and jumping into the ocean. Refreshed with the ocean air, sea salts, and delicious Ghanaian street food, I will return to my little haven at the southern tip of Niger to start my backbreaking labor of four months.