19 July 2007, in the shade, Tamtala

It's three in the afternoon and I'm dripping sweat (as usual) here at post*, typing on my laptop, which is run by my new-to-me solar power system! It's one of the greatest things to happen in the past month. Rainy season has brought delight after delight until I can hardly stand how sparkly and pleasant my life in Tamtala is. With the break in the heat, everyone is farming. It's inspiring and humbling to look at how hard my neighbors are working day in and day out. I've helped a bit, but unfortunately there's so much going on elsewhere I'm not at post as much as I'd like. After months of trying to get used to being here, when I find myself out of the village I miss it. I truly look forward to getting back these days.

This past week a team of us Gotheye volunteers transplanted 400 gum arabic trees along with a farmer named Mohammed. This guy is a PCV's dream. He has so much effort, he's educated, a good conversationalist, receptive to ideas, etc. We planted the trees on a hecatre of his land which will become a demostration plot for us and future volunteers to show Nigeriens who are interested in planting gum arabic. It took three hot days of work, during which we entertained each other singing (and, um, rapping) and exchanging proverbs** with Mohammed. He is doing everything we would want him to, including intercropping. And he's great on video.

Which brings me to the next fun and delightful rainy season development. That film major is having real practical implications for my Peace Corps work (a huge relief for those of us who paid for 3.5 years of college). Opportunities for photographing and filming are popping up all over the place. Yesterday I gave the market a shot... It didn't work out so well. Some Nigeriens fear the camera (something to do with spirits). Those who don't won't quit asking for their photo to be taken, and once it's done will hound you for it on paper every subsequent time they see you. And Allah help you if you show someone that your digital camera has a playback function.

Sadly, mango season is coming to an end. The tragedy of this should not be underestimated. Mangoes have been the only fresh fruit available at bush markets since cold season ended. They're getting smaller and harder and greener. And we can do nothing but watch them disappear, leaving us with nothing from the ground except for onions (I eat at least an onion a day). However, rainy season's got our back. The magically sprouting grass gives nutrients to our friends the cows and chickens, so these days we get milk and eggs! The vegetarian in me is a little nervous about eggs (no guarantee they're not fertilized), but so far so good. Here in Songhai land, we've got a sprinkling of Fulans, who are the guys with the dairy cows.

A story about milk: A few days ago I was visiting Kate and filming her prayer caller for another project. Her village, like Lulu's, seems to mirror her personality. It's uncanny. Anyway, her villagers were very sweet to me and quite welcoming. I stayed for two nights. The first night her cheif came over after dusk while Kate and I were inside. She went out to speak to him and I heard nervous laughter and snippets of Zarma, so I ventured out, to where she was holding a live chicken at arm's length and trying to explain that we were thankful for the chicken but couldn't eat it. Vegetarianism (mine, not hers) aside, we'd already eaten, neither one of us has ever slaughtered a chicken, and we'd been warned up and down by Peace Corps about the bird flu. Declining politely seemed to work. The next day we spoke with the cheif and thanked him profusely. After making sure nobody was offended, we had a nice conversation about traditions for welcoming guests in Niger, and the division of labor in the US:

Cheif: "If an outsider comes to town here, we kill a goat or a sheep, and if we don't have one, we kill a chicken. Yesterday when you came you saw me give the small boy two thousand cfa. He was supposed to go to the next village and buy two chickens for you. He came back without any. They had come from the market alive but all died."
Kate and me: (thinking) Bird flu bird flu bird flu bird flu
Me: "Why did the chickens die?"
Cheif: "We don't know, some illness."
Kate and me: (still thinking) Bird flu bird flu bird flu
Me: "That was very nice of you anyway."
Cheif: "But then we got the one chicken and brought it to you. You don't like chicken? Nadia (Kate) has eaten it."
Kate: "I do like chicken. I just don't know how to kill them or prepare them."
Me: "In America one person in the town has all the chickens, and he kills them and prepares them. He saves some in a refrigerator so people can buy them."
Kate: "People buy chicken in a store."
Cheif: (totally blank look) "God is big."
(pause)
Cheif: "So if you don't eat chicken, what should we bring you?"
Me: "Milk!" ("nothing, I'm better fed than you" is not an acceptable response)
Cheif: "Okay. Great! You really hear Zarma! Nice chatting with you."

Little did we know, that night we were to receive three calabashes of milk, and another in the morning. We stared at all this milk and decided on a new slogan. MILK: IT'S WHAT'S FOR DINNER. Don't worry, we boiled the living anything out of it. I hadn't had cow's milk in years. It was odd-delicious-strange. Anyway, it's one more bonus about rainy season.
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Months ago at IST I'd spoken with the forester in Sansane Haussa, my nearest 'big' village (10k away) and home of various provincial government offices. Ahmed is a nice guy. He wears fatigues and eyeglasses. Zarma is his fifth language, so we have something in common. He'd promised me in May that he would come to Tamtala in June to do a gum arabic training and pruning session with me and the villagers. In the months since then, I lost my phone, got a new one, didn't go to market for six weeks; his motorcycle broke, so he couldn't make the trek out here. I finally saw him at market yesterday and he said he'd come this morning. I negotiated to make it this afternoon, arguing that everyone is farming until alula (eary afternoon prayer, about 2pm). So far, no show. Kala suuru. Maybe tomorrow.

Three years ago this week I was at an All-Time Low. These days things are looking pretty excellent. The weather is relatively fabulous, work feels good, I understand people when they talk and they understand me (or pretend to). And I can take a break from gardening, type a blog post and listen to Coldplay (because we must acknowledge how far we've come).

But there's a flipside to this oh-so-shiny coin. As peaceful and productive as things are here, news from home has been troubling lately. I feel guilty not being around my family and friends in hard times, and there has been more than a fair amount for those dearest to me this year. Friends here have been reassuring when I've expressed doubts that staying here is the best thing to do, but we Niger PCVs are all in the game of keeping each other around as long as possible. As much as the universe seems to be in line here in my village in the middle of where God lost his shoes, it's not the case everywhere... I am so physically detatched, and my day-to-day is so different, that my mind and spirit are struggling with being in sync with friends and family at home and my life here. No real solution to this one, so no happy ending for now, but that's the end of today's notes.


*Don't get the wrong idea. I don't have internet here. Just the computer and a jump drive. Saves internet cafe time in Niamey.**Compare "Once a crocadile's head is in the water he is swimming" with "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." Deep, huh?
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22 July, Sunday, internet cafe Yantala, Niamey

I have the best luck of anyone in the world today. It is pouring rain outside and deliciously cold. Probably somewhere around 80 degrees. Awesome.

I left Tamtala this morning against the advice of Amirou's wives, but insisting that I needed to get going if I was going to be in time for my meeting. Apocalyptic clouds were grumbling on the eastern horizon. Normally I wouldn't cut it this close, but Ahmed was delayed coming to Tamtala. He didn't show until yesterday; a friend's dad had died (in yet another case supporting the use of "insha'allah"). So I stuck around the village because The Big Gum Arabic Meeting and Work Party has been a long time coming!

Ahmed and the mayor, or someone who works for the mayor (who ever really knows?) in Sansane Haussa rolled in at about 3:30 yesterday. The sound of a motor in Tamtala brings children and adults alike to our little village meeting circle of dirt (right in front of my fu) in curiosity. I'd been talking for days (weeks, months!) telling my villagers that when Ahmed comes we're going to meet and go work on the trees, but oftentimes in the Peace Corps these efforts are wasted because you didn't count on it being Friday, or everyone's farming, or it's a baby-naming ceremony, or a zillion other cultural things of which you, PCV, are ignorant, and better luck next time.

I had luck this time. Tons. I'll give myself a little credit and say I had planned for it being rainy season and I had been doing shameless meeting-promotion chats in the village; and I had patience, and I sacrificed my Saturday in Niamey (not a huge loss there) to be flexible to Ahmed's plans. Most important, I think, was getting Amirou on my side and having Ahmed, professional forester, there to lend credit to reltively skinny pale woman's assertion that THIS is a worthwhile way to spend an afternoon.

But my villagers qre the ones who made it work: 68 adults showed up roughly on time, at least a dozen more trickled in, and there were of course a thousand kids. They all listened (or at least didn't talk through the meeting), and they all trooped out to the gum arabic plantation after the meetiong, machetes in tow, and took it to the house on those trees. We now have 50 or so GORGEOUS, pruned and happy gum arabic trees, and I couldn't possibly love Tamtala more. It's really gratifying that they took me seriously enough to show up, listen to my crappy Zarma (Ahmed and Amirou did a lot of the talking, really) and then be psyched to go prune some trees in the hot sun. Now it's done, and my face hurts from smiling, and Amirou wants us to prune another plantation to the west that I haven't seen yet. Niiiice.

It was difficult to get to sleep last night, but I made it out of the village after the warnings from Ramatou and Oumou, and Dulah's suggestion that I RUN to the road. I hustled down my path, a gargantuan wall of black clouds chasing me. The sand is deep these days (riding a bike wouldn't have worked), and I didn't make it any faster than I usually do, but I wasn't too worried - tiny hamlets can be found all along the trail to the road, and I could duck and cover in any of those. The people there know me and greet me while I'm rocking out to my mp3 player and dancing down the trail. There goes that crazy anasara, singing to herself again. Hey Sakina! You're traveling? Bring me back some bread!

I got to the road dry. With no bush taxis in sight, so I headed south. And the wind kicked up. And I took out the headphones to listen for a car. I still wasn't nervous. Then I got a gust of truly cold air, which made me think of my fancy raincoat packed away in my trunk in my hut. Luckily a taxi came shooting in from out of nowhere at that very moment. I didn't have to haggle the price, it wasn't packed to the gills, and it started raining just as I stepped in. Allah loves me!

In order to give this story a nice pleasant ending, I will not detail the ride into Niamey, during which a teenage boy fell asleep on my shoulder (they'd come from Mali), we spent more time hydroplaning than gripping, and one half of one windshield wiper functioned properly.

The end.