zot in Niger bush camels

I found out yesterday that there is internet at the marche I use, which means I might have access to internet more often, though still probably not more than once every couple weeks. It is, after all, still a major pain to get to.

Today I am going to clean my house. Layers of dust cover almost everything, and I have a build up of trash and empty bottles and cans that I need to either start using for something or get rid of. Dust covers everything here, and so it is a futile gesture, but there are also limits to what a man can live with.

I recently learned the amount that my village had contributed toward having electricity. It comes to about $2 a family and $600 total. That doesn’t seem near enough to get the village connected, especially since I heard that connecting just the mayor’s office would cost $10,000. Still, who’s to say where these numbers are coming from and how accurate they are. However, there is a general feeling in the village that the mayor took their money and has done nothing with it. This is I think a general feeling in the commune and may explain why the mayor is so keen on having a list of partenaires and what they have done together. Of course he wants me to pay for it, which will never fly. Ridiculous in fact.

One cultural aspect that I will probably never get used to is the authoritarianism. My mayor is quite authoritarian, and I tend to be more direct and confrontational than he is used to (West African’s being, on the whole, differential to power figures). The result is that he thinks I am not doing anything because I refuse to do the projects he wants unless he pays for them. It doesn’t really matter, but it rankles to be told I haven’t done any work yet when I am in the middle of at least four different projects.

Rumors are flying about Peace Corps, about security assessments, psychologists, training shakeups, and all manner of things. I have a fond place in my heart for the volunteer rumor mill, which is always so full of juicy gossip. Its not unlike office gossip I suppose, except that we are all much closer and the gossip doesn’t affect our lives much because we don’t actually see each other that much. I am looking forward to my trip to Niamey in April, when there will supposedly be psychologists interviewing us for what can only be an attempt to determine how we are reacting to things like kidnappings and military coups. The last thing I want is another change in my living situation, so hopefully no major decisions are made based on what they find. I can’t imagine that any will be, but then the mind of Peace Corps Washington is a mysterious thing. I am hoping though that some headway can be made to resolve the sense that team Tillaberi is perceived as bad volunteers. Being under the watchful eye of the bureau, especially with all the security issues, leaves us feeling persecuted, whether real or imagined.

So that’s that. I had my zarma lesson yesterday and as usual succeeded in cracking up my teacher, which is always fun. He has delightful sense of humor and thinks me saying things like that I got on the bus instead of I got into the bus are hilarious. It makes for fun sessions and reminds me that there is a world outside of my site, and so I really appreciate my classes.

The last two days we have been having an incredible dust storm. It started during the night on Thursday, when it never cooled off and the wind blew in gusty fits. I knew then that something was brewing. The wind was a stormy sort of wind and I kept getting covered in dust when it would shake something loose. Needless to say it was one night that I really wished I was sleeping inside. But I didn’t realize the extent of the storm until the sun came up and I realized I could only see a couple of hundred yards into the haze. I have some pretty cool pictures.

This is the worst dust storm so far, and it is kind of fun because everything is so surreal. It also makes for cooler days because the sun can’t beat down like it normally does. All of this of course is offset by the fine dust particles that get in your hair, your eyelashes, and in your lungs. I had a heck of a headache for most of yesterday and I suspect the dust played a big role. I went around wearing my turban just so I could cover my nose and mouth sometimes.

This morning seems set to follow suit, though it was a little cooler last night and not really windy. Perhaps the haze is just left over from yesterday and it will take a little time before the dust settles out of the air.

My schedule has shaped into a rather busy piece of work, especially for the next month as I work to get my first youth conferences put together. Right now it goes something like this:

Monday: 9-12 Mayor’s Office, 330-530 Peer Educator Training.
Tuesday: 9-12 Mayor’s Office, 530-600 Cusiness Club.
Wednesday: 9-12 Mayor’s Office, 330-530 Library.
Thursday: 9-12 Mayor’s Office, 530-600 Business Club, 830-10 Scouts Meeting.
Friday: 9-12 Mayor’s Office.
Saturday: 830-10 Primary School.
Sunday: 330-530 Library/Scouts Meeting.

I know that probably doesn’t look like a lot to western eyes, but keep in mind that I have to prep for each training and business club meeting, and that prepping isn’t easy because it involves getting everything laid out in a third language. It generally means I get about an hour or two of break time between the mayor’s office and my afternoon activity, and then another hour or two at night before dinner, and after that I shower and go to bed.

My first conference is April 18th, so we have four more training sessions to get ready. I am pretty excited about it, and plan on having a video camera and a digital voice recorder so that I can make copies and give them to people.

Niger struggles with getting its population to be fluent in French, and so it turns out that in primary school and maybe in college, each class has a stick or other symbol that is given to a student who speaks in a local language. The oddness of this becomes apparent when you realize that a large majority of students, especially in primary school, do not speak French. So they pass their time at school listening to lectures they don’t understand and struggling to copy the lesson that has been written, and that is what passes for education.

I’ve already talked about the fallability of the Guinean education system, of which Niger shares much. But on Tuesday I started my business club at the primary school and ran into it first hand. I presented in local language, because for me comprehension of the ideas is more important that whether they are speaking French or Zarma. But the student’s own reluctance to speak Zarma, and the shame accompanied with being given the stick if they did, coupled with the inability to speak French, led to very low response rates and a pretty rough initial session. Things went better when I divided the class up into groups of five and had them create a list of five examples of small businesses they could do.

My second meeting is today, and I will start by telling them that school is over and they can speak Zarma with no problem. Hopefully that will get rid of that stigma. But it will not be the end of the struggle to encourage a participatory learning experience. Insha’Allah it will happen eventually.

Communication problems are a recurring theme in Peace Corps, and in life in general I suppose. Yesterday a friend came by as I was napping. That I am napping was not enough to indicate to him that I didn’t want to chat, but that is not unusual here. What was funny was the conversation that followed (my name here is Karim):

H: Why don’t you have any food for me, its not good Karim.
N: I don’t have food because I don’t prepare any food, I eat with other people.
H: But you should have food. Why don’t you have any food? I am hungry.
N: (After some thought) I don’t have food because in the morning I buy my breakfast and at night I eat with Abass and Abdoulaye.
H: Oh, you don’t prepare food, you eat with other people.
N: (Banging his head against the wall) That’s what I said!

Its not that he didn’t understand, the difference in conversation styles is hard to explain. Here much of conversation is based around noticing something that someone has and asking if it is for them and if they will give it to you. If you want to keep your stuff, you become good at inventing reasons why you can’t give it to them, especially because just saying “No, it is mine” is not really acceptable.

The result is that no one believes what you say in response to a question, and you get a lot of repetition of questions and responses as each person tries to find out what is really going on. Do they really want this object or are they just complimenting me by asking for it? Can they really not give it to me or are they just waiting to be out-argued? This of course applies to all other topics as well, in a circular and maddening fashion to those of use used to more direct communication.