Ali says that people who don't pray 5 times a day will eat fire. That's the expression they use for going to hell after death- apparently just burning in it isn't graphic enough.
Ali is a driver of the car which goes back and forth between El Qidiya and Nouakchott, he lives there sometimes, and sometimes here. His ethnicity is mixed, his skin is like the color of caramel sauce. He's tall, probably six-two or so. He's funny and persistant and shrill (his voice can get shrieky). His hairline's receding, though he's only twenty-six. He's says I'm going to be charcoal, but he's my friend.
Everyone wants me to become a Muslim. They're convinced its the best religious option on the market, not that they've done much shopping around, and that the rewards are manifold -'Oh, when you become a Muslim, ' they exclaim, 'what a party we'll have! We'll eat meat and drink milk - everyone will come.' The downsides of not converting (the fire thing) speak for themselves.
Almost everyday, religion comes up in some fashion or another, although we are strongly discouraged from discussing it (no arguments here) The worst part is that debate about the existance of god, or any of the juicy and trivial particulars therein are null and void. God's existance is not in question. Everyone knows it, (of course) - to deny it is to be ungrateful, wicked, blind and sinful. The concept of non-belief in god has zero support. That means we're all obliged to profess our undying love for the Christian religion, something which makes me and many of my fellow Americans a little sick in the tummy. Every time I'm forced to say I'm a Christian (Nasrani) a little part of me shrivels and dies inside. Still, Christianity is one of the three 'religions of the book' mentioned in the Qu'ran and so is afforded a god-sanctioned modicum of respect. Supposedly. Although that argument rarely goes very far in my village.
'We're all people of the book' I say, 'you have your religion and I have mine.'
'Oh, yes, yes' they answer, 'But Islam is better. Islam is so gooood! Why aren't you a Muslim?'
Maybe all of this bothers me more than it would a person of actual faith. I have little patience and no respect for this unqualified, unsubtle and uneducated dogmatism in America, much less here.
'Do you know, ' I ask them, when they tell me I'm going to hell, 'that there are millions of people who are right now saying the same thing about you? But those people are awful,' I add, 'those people are stupid.'
'Of course they are!' they say, 'because we're not the one's going to hell.'
No, I think, but there's no way to explain it, that's not why....
Anyway, the other day Ali's evangelism was especially out of control. We were eating Hruub, grilled cowpeas in the pod, and he was starting to shriek. It had been going on all morning, all through tea, and none of my standard arguments were working 'But my family is Christian, how can I change?' and 'I pray, just not like a Muslim. I Jesus-pray.' and 'Why don't you respect me?' (this one's from the heart) 'I respect you!' Nothing going. Finally I had to step outside. I wanted to wash the garden mud from my arms and feet anyway.
I sat down against one stony side of the house, in the sun, and Lemrobbit brought the maqarresh over to me and waited while I rinsed off. Then he said 'Now watch' as he began to wash his arms and wrists and hands with a little splash of water scrubbed hard against his skin. 'Do you know this? How we wash to pray?' I said, 'No, please show me.'
He cleaned the patch of skin between each elbow and fingertips 3 times, his skin squeaking. He washed his face twice, his nose and cheeks contorting like a rubber mask under his finger's pressure. His skin gleamed, black and shining and he smiled as I watched him intently. He washed his long brown feet and ankles, the insides of his ears, the fuzzy top of his head. It was so beautiful, after Ali's screeching it felt like a sigh, so quiet and respectful and polite and innocent. Lemrobbit is just like that - a tall 19 year old with a wide smile and no malice. This is where Mauritania's goodness lies, this is why it is so hard to find.
When he had finished, I said, 'thankyou Lemrobbit' and I'm not sure if he knew why, but I hope he did.
Friday, December 29, 2006
Thursday, December 28, 2006
Rubber ducky
The other day I took a bath out in the open, near the well, under the date palm trees and the sun. Since then, I've done it three more times, though the weather has been progressively cooler so the bath becomes more than anything a battle between my wish to be not-filthy and my wish to be not-freezing. You never know how quickly you can get clean until the wind is blowing on your wet and naked hiny. Brrrr...
The bath itself is nothing to write home about (ironically) but if you want to be just like me, and take one Mauritanian style, first go out and find your nearest water-well. Then fill up a bucket (the cut-off bottom half of a plastic ten liter jug) Don't fall in! Find a secluded spot, away from the sheep, and soap up with your handkerchief and the brownest soap you can find. Then rinse, and jump back into your clothes as fast as you can. Yikes!
Unfortunately, the last time, as I was performing that final step, hopping around one-footed trying to put my pants on, I came down hard on a woody plant stem, still stuck in the ground, and it went straight through my sandal and 1/2 inch into my foot. I couldn't believe it!
Anyway, there I was, like a scene out of an old western, trying to pull the stick from my foot, like when they pull the arrow out of some cowboy-hatted ruffian. And because I couldn't grab it well enough with my fingers, I even had to yank it out with my teeth ( I know, right?!) By the way, it does hurt more coming out, in case you were wondering. I realized afterward when the wound began spewing blood, that it hadn't been such a grand idea to do that in the middle of the fields at 2 o clock, with no one around, but I didn't pass out or anything that dramatic, so crisis averted. Still, I've got to start looking where I put my toesies - every other day I run into the huge rocks on the ground everywhere and slice gaping holes in my feet. What a tool.
Later that day, Sidi Mohamed stopped by with his crappy boombox which played horrible dubs of Arabic dance music, and hung out for a while. He's been doing this a lot lately - I think he got the notion from somewhere that I don't have any music to listen to, or at least nothing with the entertainment value of his squealing jams in Arabic. 'Should I leave the boom-box?' he asks, when rising to go, 'No, you take it' I say generously, 'what will you listen to'
He has a repertoire of about five tapes, dusty cassettes with opaque plastic covers, which he keeps in the jiggling kangaroo pouch of his bou-bou. A few of them are recordings of authentic Mauritanian music, which I actually love. It's austere and acoustic, rhythmic and complex and mournful.
He has another one, filled with American hip-hop and club songs from about 3 years ago. He has M&M, and 50-cent and other soulful crooners, all playing at about twice their speed, and the other night he, a head-bobbing Lemrobbit and I listened to the thumping beats as the sunlight faded. It's strange to hear this blue-worded, sexualized music with such strict and pious people, but of course they can't understand a word of it. So whatevs.
Dancing is a limited sport here. Lemrobbit's adorable head-bobbing aside, most people dance, when they do, (in short, giggling bursts) like awkward eighth-graders. That is to say, when they try to imitate the way they think Westerners dance (how would they know? There are no televisions here. It's all heresay) When they dance the way they're supposed to, the way that comes naturally, the way that's evolved in the desert, it's lovely and sensuous and subtle and sexy (though they would never think it). All that extra cloth from their bou-bous and muleffas suddenly makes sense, it's like two more arms. But that's just me anthropologistizing. Mostly, they couldn't find the beat in a bucket.
What I like much better than the transplanted boombox tunes, is Sidi Mohameds one-string guitar, called a gimbra. It's not so much a guitar as it is an old metal bowl, covered with a calf-skin, stretched and hardened like a drum, with a stick jutting out. It's hideous; it's makeshift and marvelous. I can't believe that is produces any sound worth listening to but it does - Sidi Mohamed plays a whining and hypnotic ostinato, his fingers sliding the octave (finding harmonics - for real) tapping the brittle cowskin drum in rhythmic counterpoint. The tuning is maybe just an interesting accident - it's some sort of odd octagonic scale (for you theory geeks) The music is repetative, he plays five minutes of the same two bars, but the voice would twist and wind over top of it, if it were there. He doesn't sing, because he's too shy, but I can hear it anyway.
This inevitably brings up all of those questions, even if I don't know it, about what place music has in my life still, and what place it's going to have when I come back. Oh goodness. Luckily, all of that can wait a few years. Along with sodapop, plumbing and the rest of civilization.
The bath itself is nothing to write home about (ironically) but if you want to be just like me, and take one Mauritanian style, first go out and find your nearest water-well. Then fill up a bucket (the cut-off bottom half of a plastic ten liter jug) Don't fall in! Find a secluded spot, away from the sheep, and soap up with your handkerchief and the brownest soap you can find. Then rinse, and jump back into your clothes as fast as you can. Yikes!
Unfortunately, the last time, as I was performing that final step, hopping around one-footed trying to put my pants on, I came down hard on a woody plant stem, still stuck in the ground, and it went straight through my sandal and 1/2 inch into my foot. I couldn't believe it!
Anyway, there I was, like a scene out of an old western, trying to pull the stick from my foot, like when they pull the arrow out of some cowboy-hatted ruffian. And because I couldn't grab it well enough with my fingers, I even had to yank it out with my teeth ( I know, right?!) By the way, it does hurt more coming out, in case you were wondering. I realized afterward when the wound began spewing blood, that it hadn't been such a grand idea to do that in the middle of the fields at 2 o clock, with no one around, but I didn't pass out or anything that dramatic, so crisis averted. Still, I've got to start looking where I put my toesies - every other day I run into the huge rocks on the ground everywhere and slice gaping holes in my feet. What a tool.
Later that day, Sidi Mohamed stopped by with his crappy boombox which played horrible dubs of Arabic dance music, and hung out for a while. He's been doing this a lot lately - I think he got the notion from somewhere that I don't have any music to listen to, or at least nothing with the entertainment value of his squealing jams in Arabic. 'Should I leave the boom-box?' he asks, when rising to go, 'No, you take it' I say generously, 'what will you listen to'
He has a repertoire of about five tapes, dusty cassettes with opaque plastic covers, which he keeps in the jiggling kangaroo pouch of his bou-bou. A few of them are recordings of authentic Mauritanian music, which I actually love. It's austere and acoustic, rhythmic and complex and mournful.
He has another one, filled with American hip-hop and club songs from about 3 years ago. He has M&M, and 50-cent and other soulful crooners, all playing at about twice their speed, and the other night he, a head-bobbing Lemrobbit and I listened to the thumping beats as the sunlight faded. It's strange to hear this blue-worded, sexualized music with such strict and pious people, but of course they can't understand a word of it. So whatevs.
Dancing is a limited sport here. Lemrobbit's adorable head-bobbing aside, most people dance, when they do, (in short, giggling bursts) like awkward eighth-graders. That is to say, when they try to imitate the way they think Westerners dance (how would they know? There are no televisions here. It's all heresay) When they dance the way they're supposed to, the way that comes naturally, the way that's evolved in the desert, it's lovely and sensuous and subtle and sexy (though they would never think it). All that extra cloth from their bou-bous and muleffas suddenly makes sense, it's like two more arms. But that's just me anthropologistizing. Mostly, they couldn't find the beat in a bucket.
What I like much better than the transplanted boombox tunes, is Sidi Mohameds one-string guitar, called a gimbra. It's not so much a guitar as it is an old metal bowl, covered with a calf-skin, stretched and hardened like a drum, with a stick jutting out. It's hideous; it's makeshift and marvelous. I can't believe that is produces any sound worth listening to but it does - Sidi Mohamed plays a whining and hypnotic ostinato, his fingers sliding the octave (finding harmonics - for real) tapping the brittle cowskin drum in rhythmic counterpoint. The tuning is maybe just an interesting accident - it's some sort of odd octagonic scale (for you theory geeks) The music is repetative, he plays five minutes of the same two bars, but the voice would twist and wind over top of it, if it were there. He doesn't sing, because he's too shy, but I can hear it anyway.
This inevitably brings up all of those questions, even if I don't know it, about what place music has in my life still, and what place it's going to have when I come back. Oh goodness. Luckily, all of that can wait a few years. Along with sodapop, plumbing and the rest of civilization.
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
The spirit of democracy
Now they play loud music all the time.
In Tijikja, it came from right outside our compound, the same 10 second song fragment on a loop, blaring from ratty speakers under a white tent.
In the market there was another song playing, and as I wandered toward it like a rat through the rubbly maze of dirt paths, one gradually faded into another, after a clash of initial cacophony.
It followed me to El Qidiya (it was like a bad dream) and set up shop in big tents, store fronts and an abandoned house, newly splashed with the white-painted logo of the PRDR.
This is the 'campaign' . Supposedly campaigning is confined to the two week period between November 4th and 19th, in which the various parties (about 1 million) spew out their state apportioned cash on things like this, the tee shirts, the posters, the tents and the music.
These are the regional campaigns, but Kahn, one of my supervisors who came to visit tells me its the same everywhere. "In Nouakchott," he says, his hands to his head, "you can't sleep! It never used to be like this- why this music, all the time? This does not make me want to vote." Later, he returned from the market and reported on his inspection of the campaign 'headquarters' - "It was just some small kids and their tapes" he said. It's like the Wizard of Oz. Didn't anyone ever tell you not to look behind the curtain?
Meanwhile, my return from Tijikja also found me moving out of my old house and into a new one. The day before the move, I dropped by my house, actually just one (10x20ft) room, to clean up. Its previous occupants had been animals, their dung, rusty metal bits and (a lot of) dirt. So me, and soon a few new little friends (they turn up like clockwork) started sweeping away, me with a grass hand broom, they with old palm fronds, making clouds of dust which swirled and gathered in the streaky sunlight.
The next day, I wrangled a donkey cart, and me and the 9 year old 'driver' loaded my junk onto the flat back, fastened it in with one tattered string, and we were off! (at a slow meander)
I hadn't been relishing the thought of parading through town with all of my crap -3 huge American bags, and the assorted other supplies I've picked up since coming here seems like an obscene amount of detritus for one person to have, when most families have less. Still, I needn't have worried, hardly anyone was out to gawk at me. It was after one o clock and the market was closed. BTW, donkey travel is pretty reasonable, a trip across town was only 200 ougiyas (about 80 cents) Still, I tipped the little rascal an extra 100, and gave him a miniature orange. Someone's lucky day...
My new house is almost identical to the old, except for a big hole in the corner of the roof and a missing door. And though it doesn't look like much, you'd be surprised what a few colorful plastic mats layed over dirt and bumpy concrete can do in the way of ambiance. Suddenly a barren hovel becomes livable. And if it doesn't... well, you still live there.
After two weeks of campaigning and loud music, the elections took place on November 19th. It's an all-day thing, everything stops. It's true by the way- they dip your finger in purple ink. Because we're explicity forbidden by Peace Corps to be involved in any and all forms of politicking, I never got much of an insider's scoop, but this is the first free election held in Mauritania after last year's military coup. The peacefulness and good faith with which this took place (the military actually did hand over power, like they said they would) got us a mention two, count 'em two days in a row on the BBC (no one ever talks about us), but if you'd lived here for a while, you'd understand why it couldn't have been any other way.
Still, it's also obvious that the details of the democratic process are, at times, unclear here. Again and again people would ask me if I was voting.
'No.' I'd reply
'Why not?' I'd stare at them for a moment.
'Because I'm not Mauritanian.'
Without flinching, they'd always ask the same question. 'Well what's wrong with you?'
Oh boy, I'd think, how much time do you have....?
In Tijikja, it came from right outside our compound, the same 10 second song fragment on a loop, blaring from ratty speakers under a white tent.
In the market there was another song playing, and as I wandered toward it like a rat through the rubbly maze of dirt paths, one gradually faded into another, after a clash of initial cacophony.
It followed me to El Qidiya (it was like a bad dream) and set up shop in big tents, store fronts and an abandoned house, newly splashed with the white-painted logo of the PRDR.
This is the 'campaign' . Supposedly campaigning is confined to the two week period between November 4th and 19th, in which the various parties (about 1 million) spew out their state apportioned cash on things like this, the tee shirts, the posters, the tents and the music.
These are the regional campaigns, but Kahn, one of my supervisors who came to visit tells me its the same everywhere. "In Nouakchott," he says, his hands to his head, "you can't sleep! It never used to be like this- why this music, all the time? This does not make me want to vote." Later, he returned from the market and reported on his inspection of the campaign 'headquarters' - "It was just some small kids and their tapes" he said. It's like the Wizard of Oz. Didn't anyone ever tell you not to look behind the curtain?
Meanwhile, my return from Tijikja also found me moving out of my old house and into a new one. The day before the move, I dropped by my house, actually just one (10x20ft) room, to clean up. Its previous occupants had been animals, their dung, rusty metal bits and (a lot of) dirt. So me, and soon a few new little friends (they turn up like clockwork) started sweeping away, me with a grass hand broom, they with old palm fronds, making clouds of dust which swirled and gathered in the streaky sunlight.
The next day, I wrangled a donkey cart, and me and the 9 year old 'driver' loaded my junk onto the flat back, fastened it in with one tattered string, and we were off! (at a slow meander)
I hadn't been relishing the thought of parading through town with all of my crap -3 huge American bags, and the assorted other supplies I've picked up since coming here seems like an obscene amount of detritus for one person to have, when most families have less. Still, I needn't have worried, hardly anyone was out to gawk at me. It was after one o clock and the market was closed. BTW, donkey travel is pretty reasonable, a trip across town was only 200 ougiyas (about 80 cents) Still, I tipped the little rascal an extra 100, and gave him a miniature orange. Someone's lucky day...
My new house is almost identical to the old, except for a big hole in the corner of the roof and a missing door. And though it doesn't look like much, you'd be surprised what a few colorful plastic mats layed over dirt and bumpy concrete can do in the way of ambiance. Suddenly a barren hovel becomes livable. And if it doesn't... well, you still live there.
After two weeks of campaigning and loud music, the elections took place on November 19th. It's an all-day thing, everything stops. It's true by the way- they dip your finger in purple ink. Because we're explicity forbidden by Peace Corps to be involved in any and all forms of politicking, I never got much of an insider's scoop, but this is the first free election held in Mauritania after last year's military coup. The peacefulness and good faith with which this took place (the military actually did hand over power, like they said they would) got us a mention two, count 'em two days in a row on the BBC (no one ever talks about us), but if you'd lived here for a while, you'd understand why it couldn't have been any other way.
Still, it's also obvious that the details of the democratic process are, at times, unclear here. Again and again people would ask me if I was voting.
'No.' I'd reply
'Why not?' I'd stare at them for a moment.
'Because I'm not Mauritanian.'
Without flinching, they'd always ask the same question. 'Well what's wrong with you?'
Oh boy, I'd think, how much time do you have....?
Sunday, December 24, 2006
Road notes
le 4 Novembre 2006
A few thoughts while traveling to Tijikja:
1 Travel in this country is a nightmare, it's like drinking bleach and being punched in the gut.
2 El Qidiya is 60k (2 hours) away from the paved road- that means the path is dirt, rock, sometimes lacking, sometimes impassable and in the middle of nowhere.
3 Cars go back and forth infrequently and irregularly. Plus time is plastic here.
4 Sometimes you have been waiting for a car to spontaneously arrive (for a long time) and when it does, the driver decides to grossly overcharge you (can you guess why?). In fact, this almost always happens, though the degrees to which they are money grubbing assholes, to which they are willing to negotiate, and to which I am prepared to refuse, vary.
5 Riding on top or in the back (with, on, or in the baggage) is dangerous and can be cold but there is a lot of fresh air and I feel less car-sick. Riding inside is usually hot, stuffy, cramped and awful, but safer, in that you are actually inside the car.
6 Is this girl in front of me puking because she's riding in this rollercoaster of a car, or is she traveling in it because she needs a doctor?
7 The drivers drive really fast.
8 I'm surprised these cars don't fall apart (this road is bumpier than Diane Rehm's voice. Just kidding, I love you Diane!)
9 Taxi brousse (renting a 'place' in a car) is glorified hitchhiking. Lets face it.
10 Sometimes gendarme guys can be cool. The one who snagged us a car tonite towards El Qidiya was friendly and polite, and I felt bad for him – its just him, his neat little beret and his cigarettes, pacing in the lonely dark by the road, boots clicking, waiting to stop every car that passes, for no particular reason.
11 Yes, yes. The stars are lovely, but the moon ….. Why don't I ever remember the moon being so eternally present before? The moon lights the world as though a pregnant stage, with a green, luminous half-glow which anticipates the spotlights.
12 Riding on the back of a wind-whipped truck can be fun for a while, even thrilling, as you clutch the metal bars for dear life, passing in flashes through the hot and cold air patches in the moonlit landscape, but I have to pee!
A few thoughts while traveling to Tijikja:
1 Travel in this country is a nightmare, it's like drinking bleach and being punched in the gut.
2 El Qidiya is 60k (2 hours) away from the paved road- that means the path is dirt, rock, sometimes lacking, sometimes impassable and in the middle of nowhere.
3 Cars go back and forth infrequently and irregularly. Plus time is plastic here.
4 Sometimes you have been waiting for a car to spontaneously arrive (for a long time) and when it does, the driver decides to grossly overcharge you (can you guess why?). In fact, this almost always happens, though the degrees to which they are money grubbing assholes, to which they are willing to negotiate, and to which I am prepared to refuse, vary.
5 Riding on top or in the back (with, on, or in the baggage) is dangerous and can be cold but there is a lot of fresh air and I feel less car-sick. Riding inside is usually hot, stuffy, cramped and awful, but safer, in that you are actually inside the car.
6 Is this girl in front of me puking because she's riding in this rollercoaster of a car, or is she traveling in it because she needs a doctor?
7 The drivers drive really fast.
8 I'm surprised these cars don't fall apart (this road is bumpier than Diane Rehm's voice. Just kidding, I love you Diane!)
9 Taxi brousse (renting a 'place' in a car) is glorified hitchhiking. Lets face it.
10 Sometimes gendarme guys can be cool. The one who snagged us a car tonite towards El Qidiya was friendly and polite, and I felt bad for him – its just him, his neat little beret and his cigarettes, pacing in the lonely dark by the road, boots clicking, waiting to stop every car that passes, for no particular reason.
11 Yes, yes. The stars are lovely, but the moon ….. Why don't I ever remember the moon being so eternally present before? The moon lights the world as though a pregnant stage, with a green, luminous half-glow which anticipates the spotlights.
12 Riding on the back of a wind-whipped truck can be fun for a while, even thrilling, as you clutch the metal bars for dear life, passing in flashes through the hot and cold air patches in the moonlit landscape, but I have to pee!
A Poem
le 1 Novembre 2006
It's the day of All Saints, for whatever its worth. (These saints, all of them, what is it they supposedly do?)
Anyway, the other night I returned to the bediya. The sons, the grown ones of this family, primarily the two called Cheikh and Jiddou, whom I talk to the most, are my friends. At least, I think they are, though every time I see them and have a little visit, I am progressively more unsure. These invitations, are they sincere? If so, how sincere are they?
These are the sorts of agonizing questions which creep up on one (foreigner) here – I thought for a while that I had left them behind in America, but now I realize they follow me everywhere - I'm never sure what translates and what doesn't, what is said and not understood, what is left entirely unspoken, and of that what is determined by culture, which by choice and circumstance. What does the body language mean? What do big white smiles, or the utter lack of them indicate? In a culture where men hold hands, what does it mean when they do, or when they don't hold mine? Are they held back by their own knowledge of my culture and the wish to be sensitive, or by a simple lack of intimate feeling?
My role as a foreigner, unfamiliar with culture and language, requires me to be almost constantly, obscenely vulnerable, for me to throw myself out there with a kind of naïve earnestness which asks pardon for all the blunders I am no doubt committing, and the inadequacies I can not surpass. Consequently, I'm never quite sure if this display touches their own reserves of honest emotion, or if they just smile, when they smile, because I'm an odd American who speaks with an accent. Maybe I'm asking too much. Does he like me? Does he really like me? This is the way in which I become a twelve year old girl. Sheesh .
Anyway, the other night I returned to the bediya, from the garden after watering. I rode with them on the donkey cart (shareet) in the gathering dark. Our gardens are under the palm trees and in the setting sun, their tall, lolling silhouettes are just spell-binding. And the moon was out –it's waxing now- so all the world had an unearthly glow, the kind which makes one's skin look lime green. By the time we reached the bediya I was half asleep from the rocking warmth of the donkey cart, and so they plopped me down on the softly blanketed mat, and we rested under the vast canopy of stars until the milk came.
I drank a whole giant cup of sheep's milk and one of cow's, and then we ate cous-cous and meat from the platter. Since I cook for myself since coming to El Qidiya, I've forsaken my hands and have been eating with utensils (I managed to find both a fork and a spoon in this country) and so that night eating cous-cous was not exactly a welcome change but at least it felt like coming home to a spouse whom you know intimately, though dislike.
After dinner Jiddou and I walked back to the village. I protested that he needn't walk all that way but he said 'I am afraid.' I said, 'What are you afraid of?' He said, 'I am afraid you will be lost.' So we strolled together in the moonlight, walking by all the things we had passed on the way: the rocky plains; the poisonous 'baby-boabobs';
the weedy, wild-peanuts; the white horse. I wanted to ask him so badly about his family, about how he likes Mauritania (really), how he feels about how blacks are treated here, what he wants to do with his life, if he feels he can do anything or only some things. But my language still falters, and so we just murmured about sillyness, or were silent in the windy dark.
It's the day of All Saints, for whatever its worth. (These saints, all of them, what is it they supposedly do?)
Anyway, the other night I returned to the bediya. The sons, the grown ones of this family, primarily the two called Cheikh and Jiddou, whom I talk to the most, are my friends. At least, I think they are, though every time I see them and have a little visit, I am progressively more unsure. These invitations, are they sincere? If so, how sincere are they?
These are the sorts of agonizing questions which creep up on one (foreigner) here – I thought for a while that I had left them behind in America, but now I realize they follow me everywhere - I'm never sure what translates and what doesn't, what is said and not understood, what is left entirely unspoken, and of that what is determined by culture, which by choice and circumstance. What does the body language mean? What do big white smiles, or the utter lack of them indicate? In a culture where men hold hands, what does it mean when they do, or when they don't hold mine? Are they held back by their own knowledge of my culture and the wish to be sensitive, or by a simple lack of intimate feeling?
My role as a foreigner, unfamiliar with culture and language, requires me to be almost constantly, obscenely vulnerable, for me to throw myself out there with a kind of naïve earnestness which asks pardon for all the blunders I am no doubt committing, and the inadequacies I can not surpass. Consequently, I'm never quite sure if this display touches their own reserves of honest emotion, or if they just smile, when they smile, because I'm an odd American who speaks with an accent. Maybe I'm asking too much. Does he like me? Does he really like me? This is the way in which I become a twelve year old girl. Sheesh .
Anyway, the other night I returned to the bediya, from the garden after watering. I rode with them on the donkey cart (shareet) in the gathering dark. Our gardens are under the palm trees and in the setting sun, their tall, lolling silhouettes are just spell-binding. And the moon was out –it's waxing now- so all the world had an unearthly glow, the kind which makes one's skin look lime green. By the time we reached the bediya I was half asleep from the rocking warmth of the donkey cart, and so they plopped me down on the softly blanketed mat, and we rested under the vast canopy of stars until the milk came.
I drank a whole giant cup of sheep's milk and one of cow's, and then we ate cous-cous and meat from the platter. Since I cook for myself since coming to El Qidiya, I've forsaken my hands and have been eating with utensils (I managed to find both a fork and a spoon in this country) and so that night eating cous-cous was not exactly a welcome change but at least it felt like coming home to a spouse whom you know intimately, though dislike.
After dinner Jiddou and I walked back to the village. I protested that he needn't walk all that way but he said 'I am afraid.' I said, 'What are you afraid of?' He said, 'I am afraid you will be lost.' So we strolled together in the moonlight, walking by all the things we had passed on the way: the rocky plains; the poisonous 'baby-boabobs';
the weedy, wild-peanuts; the white horse. I wanted to ask him so badly about his family, about how he likes Mauritania (really), how he feels about how blacks are treated here, what he wants to do with his life, if he feels he can do anything or only some things. But my language still falters, and so we just murmured about sillyness, or were silent in the windy dark.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Le fête
le 24 Octobre 2006
Yesterday was the fête of 'iid al-fidr' and nobody went to the garden. I showed up at 8:30 to water, and I was the only one there, the garden surrounded by shoulder height weeds and date palms, retains coolness longer than the burning plain. I was just glad Ramadan was over (I have many reasons).
Afterward, I took the opportunity of the people-less landscape to explore the gardens around ours - the whole garden area, a big stretch of land to the south and west of the village, has been surrendered to palmeries and weeds, basically. This is the place from which we carve our gardens, elongated, elliptical, or spherically asymmetrical 'bleyds' (places), fenced in with grillage and cultivated by an extended family or two.
I walked and walked in the sun, over the cracked earth and bushy grasses, and peeked into the abandoned gardens. I walked all the way through the strip of weeds and green, and burst into the rocky plain leading to the north city. Then I turned around.
That day, I saw these things:
A big, dead lizard, about 3 feet long and gilla-monster-esque, frozen (and fried in the sun) in the motion of death, being eaten by bugs and all other such ghastly things.
A big, gnarled tree, standing in the middle of a giant clearing, underneath which stood a donkey, quietly trying to be invisible and blinking in the cool shade. After I came closer, I saw that it was a sdrr (jujube tree) its branches all tangled and thorny. Though all the berries were unripe, so I did not pick them.
When I turned around, I saw a white horse, across the way, swishing its tail, though it had not been there before. It was like a storybook.
Then, suddenly, there was a boy coming out of the thorny bushes, and he was shaking a rattle; running. He was herding a raggedy flock of sheep with the noisemaker. He was, in fact, a shepherd boy. He continued to wield the noisemaker (it was an old metal can, like a Folgers, smashed closed, and filled with, I don't know, stones maybe). He disappeared. Almost immediately, he returned and I walked over to him, curious. His name was Mustava and he had bushy, mixed-race eyebrows. He was, I think, 11 years old. Mustava walked with me for a little while, and this is what I saw next:
We came to a little depression in the land, from which sprouted, like the mythical beanstalk, a gigantic Baobob tree. Baobob trees have silvery brownish-gray and smooth-ish bark. Also pointed, ovular leaves of shiny green. They sprout branches irregularly in a whimsical way, sometimes from every direction. This one looked like it was three trees in one. It was enormously, regally large and fat, and its tall canopy reached high, high way up. You probably don't understand what the big deal is, but I can only say that it was lovely and I had been searching for it…
After my garden excursion, I was resting on the path heading toward town, when a group of young men invited me to walk with them to the 'bediya' (it means the 'countryside' or 'the bush', and refers to anything outside the village). Not knowing exactly where that indicated, I finally relented following. (NB Whenever offered something, or invited somewhere – almost never here - I always refuse a few times and ask the question back at them ) – "you want me to come with you? Haag? (true?) Okay, why?" – to make sure I'm clear on the point.
Eventually we came to a little bleyd about 2 kilometers away, in the middle of the savannah-esque Turga scrub-forests, with a few tents and sleeping platforms and makeshift fences (the presence of roaming animals is implied).
Under the tent it was coolish and shady, darkly hung fabric on the top, worn plastic mats and fleece blankets spread over the sand underneath in between the wooden poles, random things and metal chests piled to one side and a light-less corner. I drank the rotten milk shniin (unavoidable) and was told to rest. Okay. I got two pillows shoved under me, though I protested that one was plenty. They said, 'Non, non, non!'. They made me lie down, 'tki, tki!', they said.
There was a succession of people coming and going in between dozings, my original escorts left save one, others came and stayed the rest of the day - There was a pile of bou-bous sprawled out on the blankets which some of the family's grown sons took turns ironing (with an old fashioned device, filled with coals). Another one repaired and blackened sandals (the end of Ramadan is the time when people break out their new – or apparently revamped - threads to represent in style). In between all this, we chatted and made funnies. Africans, when they like you, are adorable in the shy and amused smiles of their affection. The other times…. well, we'll let that be for now.
We ate a little mishwi (grilled meat) but I mostly got the grilled liver because I'm a guest and it's choice (who's choice?). Later we ate more boiled sheep, with sheep sauce and bread (mmm, good). And they laughed at my every move (they were surprised that I knew how to eat) but unlike many of the people in El Qidiya, whose laughter is either outrightly snide, or tinged with a self preserving derision, theirs was honest, and I simply love them.
After a while, I said my goodbyes, promising to return, and wandered back to the village chewing my msewek (a stick 'tooth-brush'), and feeling temporarily better about life in El Qidiya. At least I had a tummy full of sheep, which I suppose is all that anyone can ask for.
Yesterday was the fête of 'iid al-fidr' and nobody went to the garden. I showed up at 8:30 to water, and I was the only one there, the garden surrounded by shoulder height weeds and date palms, retains coolness longer than the burning plain. I was just glad Ramadan was over (I have many reasons).
Afterward, I took the opportunity of the people-less landscape to explore the gardens around ours - the whole garden area, a big stretch of land to the south and west of the village, has been surrendered to palmeries and weeds, basically. This is the place from which we carve our gardens, elongated, elliptical, or spherically asymmetrical 'bleyds' (places), fenced in with grillage and cultivated by an extended family or two.
I walked and walked in the sun, over the cracked earth and bushy grasses, and peeked into the abandoned gardens. I walked all the way through the strip of weeds and green, and burst into the rocky plain leading to the north city. Then I turned around.
That day, I saw these things:
A big, dead lizard, about 3 feet long and gilla-monster-esque, frozen (and fried in the sun) in the motion of death, being eaten by bugs and all other such ghastly things.
A big, gnarled tree, standing in the middle of a giant clearing, underneath which stood a donkey, quietly trying to be invisible and blinking in the cool shade. After I came closer, I saw that it was a sdrr (jujube tree) its branches all tangled and thorny. Though all the berries were unripe, so I did not pick them.
When I turned around, I saw a white horse, across the way, swishing its tail, though it had not been there before. It was like a storybook.
Then, suddenly, there was a boy coming out of the thorny bushes, and he was shaking a rattle; running. He was herding a raggedy flock of sheep with the noisemaker. He was, in fact, a shepherd boy. He continued to wield the noisemaker (it was an old metal can, like a Folgers, smashed closed, and filled with, I don't know, stones maybe). He disappeared. Almost immediately, he returned and I walked over to him, curious. His name was Mustava and he had bushy, mixed-race eyebrows. He was, I think, 11 years old. Mustava walked with me for a little while, and this is what I saw next:
We came to a little depression in the land, from which sprouted, like the mythical beanstalk, a gigantic Baobob tree. Baobob trees have silvery brownish-gray and smooth-ish bark. Also pointed, ovular leaves of shiny green. They sprout branches irregularly in a whimsical way, sometimes from every direction. This one looked like it was three trees in one. It was enormously, regally large and fat, and its tall canopy reached high, high way up. You probably don't understand what the big deal is, but I can only say that it was lovely and I had been searching for it…
After my garden excursion, I was resting on the path heading toward town, when a group of young men invited me to walk with them to the 'bediya' (it means the 'countryside' or 'the bush', and refers to anything outside the village). Not knowing exactly where that indicated, I finally relented following. (NB Whenever offered something, or invited somewhere – almost never here - I always refuse a few times and ask the question back at them ) – "you want me to come with you? Haag? (true?) Okay, why?" – to make sure I'm clear on the point.
Eventually we came to a little bleyd about 2 kilometers away, in the middle of the savannah-esque Turga scrub-forests, with a few tents and sleeping platforms and makeshift fences (the presence of roaming animals is implied).
Under the tent it was coolish and shady, darkly hung fabric on the top, worn plastic mats and fleece blankets spread over the sand underneath in between the wooden poles, random things and metal chests piled to one side and a light-less corner. I drank the rotten milk shniin (unavoidable) and was told to rest. Okay. I got two pillows shoved under me, though I protested that one was plenty. They said, 'Non, non, non!'. They made me lie down, 'tki, tki!', they said.
There was a succession of people coming and going in between dozings, my original escorts left save one, others came and stayed the rest of the day - There was a pile of bou-bous sprawled out on the blankets which some of the family's grown sons took turns ironing (with an old fashioned device, filled with coals). Another one repaired and blackened sandals (the end of Ramadan is the time when people break out their new – or apparently revamped - threads to represent in style). In between all this, we chatted and made funnies. Africans, when they like you, are adorable in the shy and amused smiles of their affection. The other times…. well, we'll let that be for now.
We ate a little mishwi (grilled meat) but I mostly got the grilled liver because I'm a guest and it's choice (who's choice?). Later we ate more boiled sheep, with sheep sauce and bread (mmm, good). And they laughed at my every move (they were surprised that I knew how to eat) but unlike many of the people in El Qidiya, whose laughter is either outrightly snide, or tinged with a self preserving derision, theirs was honest, and I simply love them.
After a while, I said my goodbyes, promising to return, and wandered back to the village chewing my msewek (a stick 'tooth-brush'), and feeling temporarily better about life in El Qidiya. At least I had a tummy full of sheep, which I suppose is all that anyone can ask for.
Saturday, November 11, 2006
Modest joy
le 15 Octobre 2006
Though almost nothing in this country is worth buying for any but the most (specifically Mauritanian) utilitarian reasons, a few things which I've acquired since my arrival have endeared themselves to me.
Thing # 1
My Wajiil. A wajiil is like a cross between a hoe and a pick-axe, and its made by finding the intersection of two tree branches, at about 45 degrees, and attach to one a flat, iron blade, about 6 inches across at its broadest, which cuts the dirt as you bend over, dragging it toward you. It's traditionally made, one of the few handcrafts that you can find in the country which hasn't been supplanted by factory produced, plastic shit, the others being wooden mats, a kind of carved bowl, and a smoking pipe which looks like a 1920's era cigarette holder's stem.
The wajiil, ostensibly, has no artistic value, but I happen to think they're graceful and fine. I've been covetous of one for weeks.
After arriving at site, I had no tools – after we moved out of M'Beidia, we stuck all the shovels and well buckets in storage. Supposedly they are coming from Nouakchott 'within the next few months', a classically ambiguous example of Peace Corps in (in)action, but in the meantime, I, desirous of starting a garden and tangible work, I began to seek out a wajiil.
Everyone laughs whenever I ask them if they can sell me, make me, or kindly tell me who can provide me with a wajiil, and I'm not sure why. In fact, I am sure why, but I hate the reason. It’s more of a black-Moor thing, I think; most white Moors, and the upper classes of many Arab peoples in general view manual labor as the strict purview of the lower classes - which in this case means black. I suppose in that context, I see how (racist) people could see the humor in it. Still, all the laughter and deflections have resulted in me not finding a damn wajiil until recently.
Anyway, I finally uncovered one last week, and I was so happy, I didn't even mind that he charged me 2000 ougiyas for it (about 5 dollars). Plus, the price was written neatly in blue-bic letters, on a little scrubbed off patch on the carved, tree-branch handle. I almost wept. Prices are never displayed here (of course they're not). Neither are they constant, especially if you're white.
My wajiil is strong and noble. I've named him Suliman. I've just now done this.
Thing # 2
My plastic, low-quality sandals.
Okay, let's give them a bit more credit than that. They have white foam bottoms with a diamond pattern on their surface. They have thong straps of shiny, blue plastic. They are the so-called "Region" brand, Made in China. They are size ten.
From America, I, nervously preparing for the desert climate, brought 3 pairs of sandals, and they no longer seem applicable. In fact, one of them has been broken for a long time, and the others, while sturdy enough still, seem like relics from a Byzantine time, overly complicated and obsolete.
I've walked miles and miles (or kilos, rather) in my little blue thongs, and they've only just begun to crack. They've walked bravely over stones and burning sands, they've been pricked by thorns and bent ever which way by my fidgeting toes. They're 250 ougiyas (about 1 dollar) and they're sold ubiquitously over every square inch of this country.
My Chacos weigh a thousand pounds, and trap the thorns which get stuck in your toes and give you strange, geometric tan lines.
Nothing, listen, nothing will protect your feet from getting cracked and rough and tired and brown and callused and eaten away by all of the things which eat away every form of life here.
One would do better to save the packing space for vacuum sealed tuna, and trail-mix, and invest in a pair of ‘Regions’.
More 'things' to come!
Though almost nothing in this country is worth buying for any but the most (specifically Mauritanian) utilitarian reasons, a few things which I've acquired since my arrival have endeared themselves to me.
Thing # 1
My Wajiil. A wajiil is like a cross between a hoe and a pick-axe, and its made by finding the intersection of two tree branches, at about 45 degrees, and attach to one a flat, iron blade, about 6 inches across at its broadest, which cuts the dirt as you bend over, dragging it toward you. It's traditionally made, one of the few handcrafts that you can find in the country which hasn't been supplanted by factory produced, plastic shit, the others being wooden mats, a kind of carved bowl, and a smoking pipe which looks like a 1920's era cigarette holder's stem.
The wajiil, ostensibly, has no artistic value, but I happen to think they're graceful and fine. I've been covetous of one for weeks.
After arriving at site, I had no tools – after we moved out of M'Beidia, we stuck all the shovels and well buckets in storage. Supposedly they are coming from Nouakchott 'within the next few months', a classically ambiguous example of Peace Corps in (in)action, but in the meantime, I, desirous of starting a garden and tangible work, I began to seek out a wajiil.
Everyone laughs whenever I ask them if they can sell me, make me, or kindly tell me who can provide me with a wajiil, and I'm not sure why. In fact, I am sure why, but I hate the reason. It’s more of a black-Moor thing, I think; most white Moors, and the upper classes of many Arab peoples in general view manual labor as the strict purview of the lower classes - which in this case means black. I suppose in that context, I see how (racist) people could see the humor in it. Still, all the laughter and deflections have resulted in me not finding a damn wajiil until recently.
Anyway, I finally uncovered one last week, and I was so happy, I didn't even mind that he charged me 2000 ougiyas for it (about 5 dollars). Plus, the price was written neatly in blue-bic letters, on a little scrubbed off patch on the carved, tree-branch handle. I almost wept. Prices are never displayed here (of course they're not). Neither are they constant, especially if you're white.
My wajiil is strong and noble. I've named him Suliman. I've just now done this.
Thing # 2
My plastic, low-quality sandals.
Okay, let's give them a bit more credit than that. They have white foam bottoms with a diamond pattern on their surface. They have thong straps of shiny, blue plastic. They are the so-called "Region" brand, Made in China. They are size ten.
From America, I, nervously preparing for the desert climate, brought 3 pairs of sandals, and they no longer seem applicable. In fact, one of them has been broken for a long time, and the others, while sturdy enough still, seem like relics from a Byzantine time, overly complicated and obsolete.
I've walked miles and miles (or kilos, rather) in my little blue thongs, and they've only just begun to crack. They've walked bravely over stones and burning sands, they've been pricked by thorns and bent ever which way by my fidgeting toes. They're 250 ougiyas (about 1 dollar) and they're sold ubiquitously over every square inch of this country.
My Chacos weigh a thousand pounds, and trap the thorns which get stuck in your toes and give you strange, geometric tan lines.
Nothing, listen, nothing will protect your feet from getting cracked and rough and tired and brown and callused and eaten away by all of the things which eat away every form of life here.
One would do better to save the packing space for vacuum sealed tuna, and trail-mix, and invest in a pair of ‘Regions’.
More 'things' to come!
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Safari
le 3 Octobre 2006
I've been repairing the fence. The animals come at night and shit everywhere, because the barbed wire fence is severely lacking. I would say impotent. In many places it is broken and lies, fallen on the ground, tied to its post, limp and twisted.
Ours is one of the few houses in the village which doesn't have a stone wall, and I'm beginning to understand why that is so.
So in the absence of more barbed wire (much like everything else, you can not buy this in El Qidiya) I've been patrolling the perimeter, Leatherman in hand, and twisting up any loose and lazy wires that I can. I don't have a shovel, so I re-dig and deepen the post holes with a garden trowel from Home Depot. Still, the stones made short work of that, and chipped the point of the spade into a jagged, toothy edge.
Still, the cows seem to be noticing: now they can no longer cross through at nights, as they lumber by in herds from the pasture, and so they just come up, adjacent to the fence, and peer over the top with weary disdain. They 'moo' discontentedly and stand still for many minutes, just blinking slowly and chewing with a steady motion. (BTW, cows are so weird: I was coming back from the town the other day and there were six of them on the hot dirt, all in a perfect, straight line, end-to-end, perpendicular to me, just standing there doing nothing, with no one around. It was like a traffic stop. Can you stand it?)
In general, the experience that is Animals in Mauritania, is a big, and all-pervasive one. Animals have almost complete free reign, aside from the times when they are being herded or poked or prodded, and so there are large stretches of time each day when the cows and donkeys and sheep and goats wander around everywhere, following their bliss through the shit-strewn streets, and, ultimately, into my (dirt) yard. Actual pastures are non existent here (how could they be?). It is not uncommon at all for someone to be going about their business, making tea under the tent, and for a sheep to come nose through whatever they're doing, until such a person absentmindedly punches them in the gut and they scatter.
This variety of sheep, god knows what kind, is pitifully and painfully grotesque. I'm serious, they are aggressively ugly, with their raggedy, slumped over bodies, and clumpy hair. It's not even wool. The goats, by virtue of their neat little horns and spry figures, paint a somewhat more attractive picture. Both of their voices, though, sound as if the demoniac ghosts of murdered children inhabit them. It is most unpleasant.
And lest I forget them, I'll tell you now that we have camels here, not too many, but more than in the South, where I only ever once saw one in my village. They're more of a nomadic thing. Usually I see them with a dark, howlied Bedouin, riding barefoot, tugging at the animal's reigns, hooked through a ring in one nostril, sheesh. I've seen them also, parked like a growling, collapsible car outside someone's house.
Still, the other day, walking the path from the North to the South village, I saw, in the place where it opens to a wide, dusty plain, 3 camels ambling about, munching on bushes. I walked towards them slowly, my head bowed, and when I was only a few feet away, I sat down on a stone and watched them eat.
It took several minutes for them to become sufficiently spooked by me to leave, but eventually (inevitably) the one with the longest and most curious neck, decided he (or she) had had enough of me, and they blew that joint, taking off on those long awkward legs, in search of better munching grounds. I think they are beautiful, these camels. I think, more than any other animal I've seen, they look like they're from another planet entirely. They're so totally Star Wars.
After camels, (they're the one-humps, by the way), the next most 'Africa' thing we have here is lizards. In the South, we had a funny little variety, the length of a coke-bottle, with bright yellow heads and slender tails, tapering to nothing. We call them push-up lizards, because of the exercise-like movements they constantly perform to pass the time. In the North, we don't have anything nearly so distinct, just a couple little brownish-green varieties that live in my out-house, and are constantly startling me by flitting around everywhere. I've also seen the spiny tail of a much larger kind (whether a different species, or only the grown-up) periodically darting underneath rocks, at several feet away. Yeeks! Whatever, they're not harmful, but I'm no Naturalist, and I bear no fondness for reptiles. Still, I'll take lizards over snakes.
And according to some sources, there are crocodiles in the country, and people in El Qidiya even say that we have 2 (how sweet) that live in the waters of the Marigot over abutting the cliff. I don't know… N'Beika, the oasis city 3 hours away where volunteers Fred and Greg live, has a respectable bog in which I could see crocs living, and in which they've been repeatedly sighted. But the existence of El Qidiyas carnivorous pair has yet to be confirmed by me (it's thrown into further doubt by the fact that people supposedly swim in the croc-water "Oh, they don't do nothing…." and because one of my sources called a picture of a seahorse, a crocodile). Oh boy.
So one of these must be true: there are more than two, there are none, or the crocodiles are a hundred million years old.
…..Still, no swimming for me just yet.
I've been repairing the fence. The animals come at night and shit everywhere, because the barbed wire fence is severely lacking. I would say impotent. In many places it is broken and lies, fallen on the ground, tied to its post, limp and twisted.
Ours is one of the few houses in the village which doesn't have a stone wall, and I'm beginning to understand why that is so.
So in the absence of more barbed wire (much like everything else, you can not buy this in El Qidiya) I've been patrolling the perimeter, Leatherman in hand, and twisting up any loose and lazy wires that I can. I don't have a shovel, so I re-dig and deepen the post holes with a garden trowel from Home Depot. Still, the stones made short work of that, and chipped the point of the spade into a jagged, toothy edge.
Still, the cows seem to be noticing: now they can no longer cross through at nights, as they lumber by in herds from the pasture, and so they just come up, adjacent to the fence, and peer over the top with weary disdain. They 'moo' discontentedly and stand still for many minutes, just blinking slowly and chewing with a steady motion. (BTW, cows are so weird: I was coming back from the town the other day and there were six of them on the hot dirt, all in a perfect, straight line, end-to-end, perpendicular to me, just standing there doing nothing, with no one around. It was like a traffic stop. Can you stand it?)
In general, the experience that is Animals in Mauritania, is a big, and all-pervasive one. Animals have almost complete free reign, aside from the times when they are being herded or poked or prodded, and so there are large stretches of time each day when the cows and donkeys and sheep and goats wander around everywhere, following their bliss through the shit-strewn streets, and, ultimately, into my (dirt) yard. Actual pastures are non existent here (how could they be?). It is not uncommon at all for someone to be going about their business, making tea under the tent, and for a sheep to come nose through whatever they're doing, until such a person absentmindedly punches them in the gut and they scatter.
This variety of sheep, god knows what kind, is pitifully and painfully grotesque. I'm serious, they are aggressively ugly, with their raggedy, slumped over bodies, and clumpy hair. It's not even wool. The goats, by virtue of their neat little horns and spry figures, paint a somewhat more attractive picture. Both of their voices, though, sound as if the demoniac ghosts of murdered children inhabit them. It is most unpleasant.
And lest I forget them, I'll tell you now that we have camels here, not too many, but more than in the South, where I only ever once saw one in my village. They're more of a nomadic thing. Usually I see them with a dark, howlied Bedouin, riding barefoot, tugging at the animal's reigns, hooked through a ring in one nostril, sheesh. I've seen them also, parked like a growling, collapsible car outside someone's house.
Still, the other day, walking the path from the North to the South village, I saw, in the place where it opens to a wide, dusty plain, 3 camels ambling about, munching on bushes. I walked towards them slowly, my head bowed, and when I was only a few feet away, I sat down on a stone and watched them eat.
It took several minutes for them to become sufficiently spooked by me to leave, but eventually (inevitably) the one with the longest and most curious neck, decided he (or she) had had enough of me, and they blew that joint, taking off on those long awkward legs, in search of better munching grounds. I think they are beautiful, these camels. I think, more than any other animal I've seen, they look like they're from another planet entirely. They're so totally Star Wars.
After camels, (they're the one-humps, by the way), the next most 'Africa' thing we have here is lizards. In the South, we had a funny little variety, the length of a coke-bottle, with bright yellow heads and slender tails, tapering to nothing. We call them push-up lizards, because of the exercise-like movements they constantly perform to pass the time. In the North, we don't have anything nearly so distinct, just a couple little brownish-green varieties that live in my out-house, and are constantly startling me by flitting around everywhere. I've also seen the spiny tail of a much larger kind (whether a different species, or only the grown-up) periodically darting underneath rocks, at several feet away. Yeeks! Whatever, they're not harmful, but I'm no Naturalist, and I bear no fondness for reptiles. Still, I'll take lizards over snakes.
And according to some sources, there are crocodiles in the country, and people in El Qidiya even say that we have 2 (how sweet) that live in the waters of the Marigot over abutting the cliff. I don't know… N'Beika, the oasis city 3 hours away where volunteers Fred and Greg live, has a respectable bog in which I could see crocs living, and in which they've been repeatedly sighted. But the existence of El Qidiyas carnivorous pair has yet to be confirmed by me (it's thrown into further doubt by the fact that people supposedly swim in the croc-water "Oh, they don't do nothing…." and because one of my sources called a picture of a seahorse, a crocodile). Oh boy.
So one of these must be true: there are more than two, there are none, or the crocodiles are a hundred million years old.
…..Still, no swimming for me just yet.
...and repeat
le 21 Septembre 2006
At night we only drink milk.
In El Qidiya this is common, and though we have no cow, the old man next door brings us a bowl each night, filled to the brim with warm white. Sometimes there are flies, also, floating dead on its surface or other sundry particles. These we try to avoid.
In El Qidiya, there is a surfeit of stones –they build from them the houses and the walls, they sit in giant abandoned piles, left from broken down buildings, they are rough and brittle and stark – it looks more than a little like Mars.
I've been here for two weeks, and in some ways the days drag, in others, they fly. The day itself is foreshortened by heat. It's like a third of a day. Every morning I go out with an errand; I plan it. I need to plan everything. I need to write everything down. Every interaction, even the good ones, is exhausting; I miss the children.
White moor culture is not the same, M'Beidia was different. The hospitality of Black Africans is more genuine, at least it's easier to apprehend, and translates, despite the cultural obligation to appear gracious, as somewhat earnest. Hospitality here in the highly Arabacized culture of the North feels more obligatory. They seem more suspicious of outsiders, their stares are cold. I suppose in this setting the word 'hospitality' comes to resemble the word 'tolerance'.
….But then there's the milk.
It's true, there are the people who won't rent to me because I'm a foreigner/non-Muslim/who knows?, the long bearded old men who won't greet me, the limp, half-hearted handshakes and the barely contained dislike, and the women who cover their entire faces when I come around (I hate this, but I'm getting used to it. Plus, it's like 'get over yourself, grandma!')
But many people aren't such bitches: they grip my hand and say 'ehlen' or 'marihaba' (expressions of welcome), and from their eyes, which glint with the berber-rimmed blue, I can tell they mean it. There is Ahmed, a mason who laughs at my language (he is stout and laughs loudly, he has a metal molar). I call him 'not nice', but not seriously; he can not pronounce my name. Ditto for everyone. Also, most people smile when I pick on them, and compare so-and-so to a monkey, and ask about the weather, and haggle: (" 500 Ougiyas is not a good price. Why 500? I thought you were my friend…..") Everyone gets a kick out of me pulling some arcane Hassaniya from the lexicon. They say I speak Hassaniya very well. (I do, btw).
Sometimes milk, too, in the morning from Hassan, the goofy 18 year old, barely mustachioed, son of the PTO president, or another. They bring them in bowls, like the plain, brushed metal ones of nesting sizes, which we used to use for cooking. Some of the bowls are enameled with pretty little flowers on them. They are all of poor quality. The milk I drink right away, gulping the foamy white freshness under the stars, in my white, dress-like nightgown (I feel like a baby) I return the bowl. The shniin or zriig (sweetened or unsweetened fermented milk with water) I pour from their bowl into one of mine, so that later I can dump it out inconspicuously. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate the stuff, and I'll drink anything down without flinching when I'm a guest at someone's house. There's just only so much curdled (in an old goatskin), sour (chunky), and basically rotten milk I can drink in 110 degree heat.
Anyway, I'm resisting the temptation to be frustrated with the silly and arrogant ignorance and tribal instincts that are common to all the peoples of the world (not just here), and to keep a vigilantly open mind, and constantly remember that no matter how much I think I know, I know nothing. The people here are possibly not less kind than those in the South, but their affections, perhaps, are more reserved and closed-off, they are slower to come. In fact, they are stoic, and might only come to foreigners with time.
But stoicism I can dig, and I've got nothing but time.
At night we only drink milk.
In El Qidiya this is common, and though we have no cow, the old man next door brings us a bowl each night, filled to the brim with warm white. Sometimes there are flies, also, floating dead on its surface or other sundry particles. These we try to avoid.
In El Qidiya, there is a surfeit of stones –they build from them the houses and the walls, they sit in giant abandoned piles, left from broken down buildings, they are rough and brittle and stark – it looks more than a little like Mars.
I've been here for two weeks, and in some ways the days drag, in others, they fly. The day itself is foreshortened by heat. It's like a third of a day. Every morning I go out with an errand; I plan it. I need to plan everything. I need to write everything down. Every interaction, even the good ones, is exhausting; I miss the children.
White moor culture is not the same, M'Beidia was different. The hospitality of Black Africans is more genuine, at least it's easier to apprehend, and translates, despite the cultural obligation to appear gracious, as somewhat earnest. Hospitality here in the highly Arabacized culture of the North feels more obligatory. They seem more suspicious of outsiders, their stares are cold. I suppose in this setting the word 'hospitality' comes to resemble the word 'tolerance'.
….But then there's the milk.
It's true, there are the people who won't rent to me because I'm a foreigner/non-Muslim/who knows?, the long bearded old men who won't greet me, the limp, half-hearted handshakes and the barely contained dislike, and the women who cover their entire faces when I come around (I hate this, but I'm getting used to it. Plus, it's like 'get over yourself, grandma!')
But many people aren't such bitches: they grip my hand and say 'ehlen' or 'marihaba' (expressions of welcome), and from their eyes, which glint with the berber-rimmed blue, I can tell they mean it. There is Ahmed, a mason who laughs at my language (he is stout and laughs loudly, he has a metal molar). I call him 'not nice', but not seriously; he can not pronounce my name. Ditto for everyone. Also, most people smile when I pick on them, and compare so-and-so to a monkey, and ask about the weather, and haggle: (" 500 Ougiyas is not a good price. Why 500? I thought you were my friend…..") Everyone gets a kick out of me pulling some arcane Hassaniya from the lexicon. They say I speak Hassaniya very well. (I do, btw).
Sometimes milk, too, in the morning from Hassan, the goofy 18 year old, barely mustachioed, son of the PTO president, or another. They bring them in bowls, like the plain, brushed metal ones of nesting sizes, which we used to use for cooking. Some of the bowls are enameled with pretty little flowers on them. They are all of poor quality. The milk I drink right away, gulping the foamy white freshness under the stars, in my white, dress-like nightgown (I feel like a baby) I return the bowl. The shniin or zriig (sweetened or unsweetened fermented milk with water) I pour from their bowl into one of mine, so that later I can dump it out inconspicuously. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate the stuff, and I'll drink anything down without flinching when I'm a guest at someone's house. There's just only so much curdled (in an old goatskin), sour (chunky), and basically rotten milk I can drink in 110 degree heat.
Anyway, I'm resisting the temptation to be frustrated with the silly and arrogant ignorance and tribal instincts that are common to all the peoples of the world (not just here), and to keep a vigilantly open mind, and constantly remember that no matter how much I think I know, I know nothing. The people here are possibly not less kind than those in the South, but their affections, perhaps, are more reserved and closed-off, they are slower to come. In fact, they are stoic, and might only come to foreigners with time.
But stoicism I can dig, and I've got nothing but time.
Les étoiles
Last night I saw Scorpio. He was amazing and bright, and dead centered in the sky like he had been strung up there on purpose. The stars here are 100% incredible. I know you knew that already. You can see the fuzzy glow of the Milky Way; you can see the waxing moon in crystal clarity, like a sharp shard of light burning up the sky. I saw Virgo, maybe. I saw Polaris, of course, the Big Dipper, Arcturus, and whatever the red heart of Scorpio is.
It seems strange to me though, that I have to wear my glasses to sharpen the view- the light has already travelled unimaginable distances in time and space to reach me. Apparently though, it still needs the help of a 2 for 1 pair of glasses from Sears optical to make the final leap.
It seems strange to me though, that I have to wear my glasses to sharpen the view- the light has already travelled unimaginable distances in time and space to reach me. Apparently though, it still needs the help of a 2 for 1 pair of glasses from Sears optical to make the final leap.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Les hors doêuvres
1 Septembre 2006
More potent potables:
People always ask me what time it is, though absolutely no on has a
watch or a clock, nor does anything in this village happen at a
specific time. (Why do you care what time it is?) My kids are always
trying to read the time from my watch, but they literally couldn't be
more wrong if they had rolled their guesses on dice.
When children are sleeping and you want them to move, you pick them up
by one arm and one leg, and plop them down in another place. They
never wake up.
All the boutiques sell the same ten things: Sugar, tea, rice,
cigarettes, camel biscuits (like animal crackers), oil, candy,
peanuts, sandals and batteries.
People here listen to awful music. Crappy tape mixes of rave-style
club grooves, dated American ballads or terrible Senagalese drivel.
Almost no one knows how old they are, and the ones that say they do
are either estimating or just lying. Very few people were born in
hospitals, and there is no other record of their birth. Even taking
into account the age distorting effects of malnutrition, their guesses
about this are also laughably wrong.
Our courtyard is made of dirt, (it's literally the ground)
and yet they sweep it off every day with a little broom. They sweep
the dirt off of the dirt.
You knew this already, but women, and sometimes men, carry incredibly
huge things on their heads, and they never fall off. I have a picture
I'd like to post sometime, and the caption will be, "Excuse me,
there's a tree on your head."
I can't use anything in public without being asked for it. I have
currently been asked for such things as: a band-aid, some duct tape, a
bandanna, my sunglasses, paper, some Kool-Aide, a pen and a Q tip.
You can burp (modestly) in public, afterward saying simply, "Sahe" (health).
Many of the young boys get their heads shaved periodically, and I'm
not sure why. I think it has something to do with a weird head
ailment, either from bugs or malnutrition, and related to this - my
nephews usually have gross, scabbed over sores on their heads. It's
fucked.
Another sign of malnutrition is reddish tinged hair, which at least 2
out of 4 children in my village have.
No one likes dogs, and the people who keep them only do so for
protection and such, and they never go near them. This might be
because all the dogs are either recently descended from jackals, or are
actually jackals.
Speaking of such, the place occupied by wolves in all of our
fairy-tales, is occupied by hyenas in all of theirs. Hyenas haven't
lived in this area for decades, and that's lucky, because those things
are assholes.
It's not cultural, but I hate goats. Simple as that.
You can get children here to do any sort of manual chore for you, and
they love it. Now, I will never go to the boutique myself, if there is
a child around. I don't even have to know them. They're like robots.
Have I talked about the greetings yet? Suffice it to say that the
greetings are ubiquitous, long, manifold and repetitive. It's the
equivalent of a giant "How are you?"
in which the answer is always "Not bad (lebess), thank-god"
The hours between 12 and 4 pm are dead time. It's too hot to do
anything, and no one does.
Humor translates. Sarcasm is widely understood, and people are
delighted when I tell little jokes poking fun at one's physical and/or
mental characteristics, and/or comparing someone to one or more forms
of comical animal life. I am hilarious here.
You can pick your nose in public. And we do.
More potent potables:
People always ask me what time it is, though absolutely no on has a
watch or a clock, nor does anything in this village happen at a
specific time. (Why do you care what time it is?) My kids are always
trying to read the time from my watch, but they literally couldn't be
more wrong if they had rolled their guesses on dice.
When children are sleeping and you want them to move, you pick them up
by one arm and one leg, and plop them down in another place. They
never wake up.
All the boutiques sell the same ten things: Sugar, tea, rice,
cigarettes, camel biscuits (like animal crackers), oil, candy,
peanuts, sandals and batteries.
People here listen to awful music. Crappy tape mixes of rave-style
club grooves, dated American ballads or terrible Senagalese drivel.
Almost no one knows how old they are, and the ones that say they do
are either estimating or just lying. Very few people were born in
hospitals, and there is no other record of their birth. Even taking
into account the age distorting effects of malnutrition, their guesses
about this are also laughably wrong.
Our courtyard is made of dirt, (it's literally the ground)
and yet they sweep it off every day with a little broom. They sweep
the dirt off of the dirt.
You knew this already, but women, and sometimes men, carry incredibly
huge things on their heads, and they never fall off. I have a picture
I'd like to post sometime, and the caption will be, "Excuse me,
there's a tree on your head."
I can't use anything in public without being asked for it. I have
currently been asked for such things as: a band-aid, some duct tape, a
bandanna, my sunglasses, paper, some Kool-Aide, a pen and a Q tip.
You can burp (modestly) in public, afterward saying simply, "Sahe" (health).
Many of the young boys get their heads shaved periodically, and I'm
not sure why. I think it has something to do with a weird head
ailment, either from bugs or malnutrition, and related to this - my
nephews usually have gross, scabbed over sores on their heads. It's
fucked.
Another sign of malnutrition is reddish tinged hair, which at least 2
out of 4 children in my village have.
No one likes dogs, and the people who keep them only do so for
protection and such, and they never go near them. This might be
because all the dogs are either recently descended from jackals, or are
actually jackals.
Speaking of such, the place occupied by wolves in all of our
fairy-tales, is occupied by hyenas in all of theirs. Hyenas haven't
lived in this area for decades, and that's lucky, because those things
are assholes.
It's not cultural, but I hate goats. Simple as that.
You can get children here to do any sort of manual chore for you, and
they love it. Now, I will never go to the boutique myself, if there is
a child around. I don't even have to know them. They're like robots.
Have I talked about the greetings yet? Suffice it to say that the
greetings are ubiquitous, long, manifold and repetitive. It's the
equivalent of a giant "How are you?"
in which the answer is always "Not bad (lebess), thank-god"
The hours between 12 and 4 pm are dead time. It's too hot to do
anything, and no one does.
Humor translates. Sarcasm is widely understood, and people are
delighted when I tell little jokes poking fun at one's physical and/or
mental characteristics, and/or comparing someone to one or more forms
of comical animal life. I am hilarious here.
You can pick your nose in public. And we do.
Les cadeaux
I haven’t posted recently because I've been in the middle of nowhere, in my village, trudging through the first few weeks of my actual service, in my actual site, and for the few days I've been in the regional city with internet, it doesn’t work. I'm leaving today, and it just started up again. Bastard.
Things are complicated and very different but fine. There aren't as many children here. I haven't been eaten. I'm supernaturally healthy, although I once again weigh about three pounds. I don't have time to type much of an entry, but maybe in two or three weeks when I return.
Requests:
Yellow legal pads of paper for writing. Not just one.
Staff paper (in a spiral bound notebook, preferably.) Tony, do you remember the kind I like?
Flash cards. Just the white index ones, with lines on one side, the other blank. Not the huge ones.
Sharpie markers. Both regular size, and the thin kind. Don't they make those?
Pencils (mechanical ones, unless you want to send a sharpener).
Pens Pens Pens. They have extremely short lives here- Pilot g2s, or other ones similar to that.
GOOD ziploc bags. Which is to say, actual Ziploc bags.
The individual servings of drink mixes. Lemonades (pink and otherwise) slay me.
Deodorant. (Old spice solids, are real troopers.)
Disposable razors.
LETTERS. What is wrong with you people? If you can't find time in your busy schedule to drop me a paper note, then send an email (coltonmackenzie@gmail.com)! If you haven't sent any yet, then shame on you. If I haven't gotten them because of the mail system, then - I love you, send more!
Mix tapes/CD's. I'm dying here with only two.
Spices for cooking. Save space by zip-loc bagging them, but cinnamon, basil, hot pepper flakes, cumin, Mrs. Dash-esque things, (they save time, though I feel they are below me), also seasoning mix packets like those for fajitas, chiles, lemon pepper chicken, and the like, which you see in big multicolored displays in the grocery aisles. You know the ones.
Again, these are only ideas intended for people who want to send things. I'm not begging, except about the letters.
Good will.
Things are complicated and very different but fine. There aren't as many children here. I haven't been eaten. I'm supernaturally healthy, although I once again weigh about three pounds. I don't have time to type much of an entry, but maybe in two or three weeks when I return.
Requests:
Yellow legal pads of paper for writing. Not just one.
Staff paper (in a spiral bound notebook, preferably.) Tony, do you remember the kind I like?
Flash cards. Just the white index ones, with lines on one side, the other blank. Not the huge ones.
Sharpie markers. Both regular size, and the thin kind. Don't they make those?
Pencils (mechanical ones, unless you want to send a sharpener).
Pens Pens Pens. They have extremely short lives here- Pilot g2s, or other ones similar to that.
GOOD ziploc bags. Which is to say, actual Ziploc bags.
The individual servings of drink mixes. Lemonades (pink and otherwise) slay me.
Deodorant. (Old spice solids, are real troopers.)
Disposable razors.
LETTERS. What is wrong with you people? If you can't find time in your busy schedule to drop me a paper note, then send an email (coltonmackenzie@gmail.com)! If you haven't sent any yet, then shame on you. If I haven't gotten them because of the mail system, then - I love you, send more!
Mix tapes/CD's. I'm dying here with only two.
Spices for cooking. Save space by zip-loc bagging them, but cinnamon, basil, hot pepper flakes, cumin, Mrs. Dash-esque things, (they save time, though I feel they are below me), also seasoning mix packets like those for fajitas, chiles, lemon pepper chicken, and the like, which you see in big multicolored displays in the grocery aisles. You know the ones.
Again, these are only ideas intended for people who want to send things. I'm not begging, except about the letters.
Good will.
Saturday, September 09, 2006
Baby Steps
Baby Steps, A New Post that was written but never posted, has been added under July 5th in the archives. Click on the title to read it, becuase it's a gem!
TLAs (Three Letter Acronyms)
Hello everyone! I hope you're all enjoying reading my posts, or that you at least feel like you're somewhat informed about what's happening in my life right now.
Also, because Peace Corps is a government agency, and as such, the language of its operation is riddled with acronyms and proprietary lingo, here's a little guide for any and all of you who have been confused by their use.
Bureaucracy--
PC: Obviously, Peace Corps.
CD: Country Director. The American head of Peace Corps in a specific country. Everyone's boss basically. Ours happens to be Obie Shaw, and he's just swell.
APCD: Assistant Program Country Director, (or something) Basically these are the heads of the particular programs of Peace Corps in a country, and ours are all Mauritanians. Mine happens to be Aw, and he's quite wonderful too.
Peace Corps Programs-
SED/ICT: Small Enterprise Development/Internet Something Technology
ED: Education
Health: Health
Agfo/EE: Agroforestry (that's what I am) and Environmental Education. EE works in the schools, and just for kicks, we call them Agfo-lite.
Regional Capitals-
Tijikja, Kaedi, Aleg, Atar, Nouadibou, Bogue, Rosso, Kiffa and others which no one cares about. These are the "big cities" in each of the regions of the country (aka territories), where there is usually a Peace Corps "office" (a room with a computer) and markets where you can buy the same crap you can in any other part of the country.
Languages--
Hassaniya (a dialect of Arabic), Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof. And French.
Language Facilitators: Our language teachers, who live in the village with us, and in whose house we have class each day.
Miscellaneous--
Sat Phones: Satellite phones, given to volunteers in places which don't have Reso. Don't ask me how they work.
Reso: from the French (and English) word Resolution, which is how they describe cell phone service. It's the bars on your phone.
Taxi Brousse: How everyone in the country gets from place to place. Its a car, into which they cram as many people as possible.
ET: Early Termination. When someone who is ill, disillusioned, or of a weak and inferior character quits Peace Corps before their service is over.
MedSep: Medical Separation. When you are terminated because you are really fucking sick. Or you broke your head.
AdminSep: Administrative Separation. When you are terminated because you did something very wrong.
HCN: Host Country Nationals, otherwise known as the people of Mauritania. But I find this phrase so robotic, I promise never to use it.
The Lycee: The Lycee is the place which is our home base during 'stage' (the training period which we've just completed). It's actually a school during the rest of the year, (hence the name, Lycee is (one of) the French words for school) for the students from the surrounding villages who are able to go. It's analogous to high-school.
Host villages/Families: the villages/families in whose beneficence we have lived the past few weeks, when not at center/lycee, and with whom we eat, speak language, and spend hours languishing in the heat.
PCMO: Peace Corps Medical Officer. The person who is paid to take care of us when we become sick, and who lives in this hell-hole of a country with us.
Well there's a lot more, but that's a start.
Also, because Peace Corps is a government agency, and as such, the language of its operation is riddled with acronyms and proprietary lingo, here's a little guide for any and all of you who have been confused by their use.
Bureaucracy--
PC: Obviously, Peace Corps.
CD: Country Director. The American head of Peace Corps in a specific country. Everyone's boss basically. Ours happens to be Obie Shaw, and he's just swell.
APCD: Assistant Program Country Director, (or something) Basically these are the heads of the particular programs of Peace Corps in a country, and ours are all Mauritanians. Mine happens to be Aw, and he's quite wonderful too.
Peace Corps Programs-
SED/ICT: Small Enterprise Development/Internet Something Technology
ED: Education
Health: Health
Agfo/EE: Agroforestry (that's what I am) and Environmental Education. EE works in the schools, and just for kicks, we call them Agfo-lite.
Regional Capitals-
Tijikja, Kaedi, Aleg, Atar, Nouadibou, Bogue, Rosso, Kiffa and others which no one cares about. These are the "big cities" in each of the regions of the country (aka territories), where there is usually a Peace Corps "office" (a room with a computer) and markets where you can buy the same crap you can in any other part of the country.
Languages--
Hassaniya (a dialect of Arabic), Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof. And French.
Language Facilitators: Our language teachers, who live in the village with us, and in whose house we have class each day.
Miscellaneous--
Sat Phones: Satellite phones, given to volunteers in places which don't have Reso. Don't ask me how they work.
Reso: from the French (and English) word Resolution, which is how they describe cell phone service. It's the bars on your phone.
Taxi Brousse: How everyone in the country gets from place to place. Its a car, into which they cram as many people as possible.
ET: Early Termination. When someone who is ill, disillusioned, or of a weak and inferior character quits Peace Corps before their service is over.
MedSep: Medical Separation. When you are terminated because you are really fucking sick. Or you broke your head.
AdminSep: Administrative Separation. When you are terminated because you did something very wrong.
HCN: Host Country Nationals, otherwise known as the people of Mauritania. But I find this phrase so robotic, I promise never to use it.
The Lycee: The Lycee is the place which is our home base during 'stage' (the training period which we've just completed). It's actually a school during the rest of the year, (hence the name, Lycee is (one of) the French words for school) for the students from the surrounding villages who are able to go. It's analogous to high-school.
Host villages/Families: the villages/families in whose beneficence we have lived the past few weeks, when not at center/lycee, and with whom we eat, speak language, and spend hours languishing in the heat.
PCMO: Peace Corps Medical Officer. The person who is paid to take care of us when we become sick, and who lives in this hell-hole of a country with us.
Well there's a lot more, but that's a start.
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
A Sermon and The Gift Of Green
30 Aout 2006
Our trees have all flown the coop.
Two nights ago, we gave them to the women of the garden cooperative,
and in fact anyone else who wanted one, to plant and take care of
themselves after we have left M'Beidia this coming Monday. The day
before, we had given demonstrations about different tree - related
topics. Mine was about live fencing (why and how). Sarah did a
demonstration about how to transplant the tree seedlings from the
cozy, cylindrical bags of black plastic in which we planted them as
seeds, into the cold, hard actual earth.
Anyway, the next day we set up station in the garden, or rather sat on
the ground by our tree nursery, garage-sale style, as the women
eventually, and inevitably, swung by.
It was strictly first come, first serve, as we had neither the time,
language ability, or foresight to find cozy homes for the trees before
then. This would have been the best chance for their survival -
because what inevitably happens when free things are being given away
here is the same thing that happens when free things are being given
away all over the world - people want them, regardless of whether or
not they really want them. And if they don't care enough
about the tree to keep it alive, it will die. This is the desert.
That's the thing about development work that people (including myself
before I came here) don't understand. If you come into a community,
plop down money, tools and supplies, maybe build a well or two, those
things will probably be broken, squandered, pilfered or just gone
inside of two years. Not because of any societal or other flaws, but
because of the flaws which everyone is prey to, and which are part of
the integral tapestry of humans everywhere.
I keep thinking that the only difference (really) between American
society and this one, is that Americans are richer. It sounds
simplistic, but if people from an über-society, like say, Sweden (or
Saturn) came to America and started telling us how we could make our
society better, how we could have 100% literacy, and sustainable
energy and a living minimum wage, some people would probably be all
gung-ho and work with them, but many would naturally be despondent,
and be all like "I've got a barbecue, central air, and B average kids.
I'm good."
The same thing here: people seem happy for the most part, they've got
plenty of soccer and rice, and all that tea... Change is hard, change
works against the laws of (physical and) social inertia. But free
things aren't change. (I'm almost done preaching). Free things are
this fantastic invention wherein one gets something for nothing. Which
brings me back to the trees.....
We actually heard this conversation:
First woman - (who had just taken a tree) "Hey, do you want a Moringa?"
Second woman - "Yeah!... What's a Moringa?"
Anyway, Moringa and Tedum (Baobob) turned out to be the sexiest of the
seedlings, with their lusty green leaves, and when they were gone (I
barely got to save one Baobob for the Imam) the women cannibalized the
rest - a few lonely Tamarind Indicus and Jujubes. These people go
crazy over free stuff.
All in all, it was both not as good and not as bad as it could have
been. And if nothing else, we got to repay a few people for their many
kindnesses over these weeks, and their patience, and their overall
goodness, with TREES. What better gift is there?
Plus, earlier that day, as I scrubbed my clothes near the garden well,
2 boys came over wanting a few seedlings.
"Do your mothers want trees?" I asked.
"Yes"
"Do you know how to plant them?"
"Yes."
But I'm not stupid - people here answer 'yes' no matter the question,
so we sat there for ten minutes in the mid-day sun as I struggled
through the instructions in Hassaniya, and they bobbed their heads
like little dolls. As I sent them on their way, I had second thoughts
about giving trees to children, but then I realized that they are just
as likely, if not more, to listen to me than the adults are.
And that's that.
Our trees have all flown the coop.
Two nights ago, we gave them to the women of the garden cooperative,
and in fact anyone else who wanted one, to plant and take care of
themselves after we have left M'Beidia this coming Monday. The day
before, we had given demonstrations about different tree - related
topics. Mine was about live fencing (why and how). Sarah did a
demonstration about how to transplant the tree seedlings from the
cozy, cylindrical bags of black plastic in which we planted them as
seeds, into the cold, hard actual earth.
Anyway, the next day we set up station in the garden, or rather sat on
the ground by our tree nursery, garage-sale style, as the women
eventually, and inevitably, swung by.
It was strictly first come, first serve, as we had neither the time,
language ability, or foresight to find cozy homes for the trees before
then. This would have been the best chance for their survival -
because what inevitably happens when free things are being given away
here is the same thing that happens when free things are being given
away all over the world - people want them, regardless of whether or
not they really want them. And if they don't care enough
about the tree to keep it alive, it will die. This is the desert.
That's the thing about development work that people (including myself
before I came here) don't understand. If you come into a community,
plop down money, tools and supplies, maybe build a well or two, those
things will probably be broken, squandered, pilfered or just gone
inside of two years. Not because of any societal or other flaws, but
because of the flaws which everyone is prey to, and which are part of
the integral tapestry of humans everywhere.
I keep thinking that the only difference (really) between American
society and this one, is that Americans are richer. It sounds
simplistic, but if people from an über-society, like say, Sweden (or
Saturn) came to America and started telling us how we could make our
society better, how we could have 100% literacy, and sustainable
energy and a living minimum wage, some people would probably be all
gung-ho and work with them, but many would naturally be despondent,
and be all like "I've got a barbecue, central air, and B average kids.
I'm good."
The same thing here: people seem happy for the most part, they've got
plenty of soccer and rice, and all that tea... Change is hard, change
works against the laws of (physical and) social inertia. But free
things aren't change. (I'm almost done preaching). Free things are
this fantastic invention wherein one gets something for nothing. Which
brings me back to the trees.....
We actually heard this conversation:
First woman - (who had just taken a tree) "Hey, do you want a Moringa?"
Second woman - "Yeah!... What's a Moringa?"
Anyway, Moringa and Tedum (Baobob) turned out to be the sexiest of the
seedlings, with their lusty green leaves, and when they were gone (I
barely got to save one Baobob for the Imam) the women cannibalized the
rest - a few lonely Tamarind Indicus and Jujubes. These people go
crazy over free stuff.
All in all, it was both not as good and not as bad as it could have
been. And if nothing else, we got to repay a few people for their many
kindnesses over these weeks, and their patience, and their overall
goodness, with TREES. What better gift is there?
Plus, earlier that day, as I scrubbed my clothes near the garden well,
2 boys came over wanting a few seedlings.
"Do your mothers want trees?" I asked.
"Yes"
"Do you know how to plant them?"
"Yes."
But I'm not stupid - people here answer 'yes' no matter the question,
so we sat there for ten minutes in the mid-day sun as I struggled
through the instructions in Hassaniya, and they bobbed their heads
like little dolls. As I sent them on their way, I had second thoughts
about giving trees to children, but then I realized that they are just
as likely, if not more, to listen to me than the adults are.
And that's that.
L-I-F-E
28 Aout 2006
...And then, a wedding.
We had three days of celebrating recently, because of a wedding which
took place in a house next to ours. In fact, where the actual
'ceremony' happened, or even if there was such a thing, are questions
I can't answer. All I know is that the bride lives in the hut which
sits with its back to me whenever I'm out on my little porch, and the
people streamed through our streets each night, and ate mountains of
food under a tent during the day. Abu came back periodically with his
hand covered in rice. "What did you eat?" I asked him. He said, "Rice
and meat. And also milk."
I must be psychic, because somehow I knew that ......
The first night was the biggest (these things seem to slowly fizzle
out over time). There were big pots bubbling over glowing coals, and
smoke. There was singing and clapping, there were limbs and faces
glistening with sweat as the men danced in a circle by flashlight. I
abstained this time and only clapped, and tried to weave in and out of
the bodies without incident. At times like this one, it feels so
surreal here, as if its only a loud, smoky and impenetrable illusion,
and I am only a ghost.
Yet no matter what I feel about life here, which spans the range of
emotions from adulation to repulsion, I can always take joy in the
fact that children everywhere are basically the same. Two nights ago,
we sat on the hsera together and made faces at each other, by putting
our fingers in the various orifices of our heads and pulling. They
didn't do so bad, but I do a pretty decent saggy-eyed, snarling pig
snout if I do say so myself.
...And then, a wedding.
We had three days of celebrating recently, because of a wedding which
took place in a house next to ours. In fact, where the actual
'ceremony' happened, or even if there was such a thing, are questions
I can't answer. All I know is that the bride lives in the hut which
sits with its back to me whenever I'm out on my little porch, and the
people streamed through our streets each night, and ate mountains of
food under a tent during the day. Abu came back periodically with his
hand covered in rice. "What did you eat?" I asked him. He said, "Rice
and meat. And also milk."
I must be psychic, because somehow I knew that ......
The first night was the biggest (these things seem to slowly fizzle
out over time). There were big pots bubbling over glowing coals, and
smoke. There was singing and clapping, there were limbs and faces
glistening with sweat as the men danced in a circle by flashlight. I
abstained this time and only clapped, and tried to weave in and out of
the bodies without incident. At times like this one, it feels so
surreal here, as if its only a loud, smoky and impenetrable illusion,
and I am only a ghost.
Yet no matter what I feel about life here, which spans the range of
emotions from adulation to repulsion, I can always take joy in the
fact that children everywhere are basically the same. Two nights ago,
we sat on the hsera together and made faces at each other, by putting
our fingers in the various orifices of our heads and pulling. They
didn't do so bad, but I do a pretty decent saggy-eyed, snarling pig
snout if I do say so myself.
D-E-A-T-H
24 Aout 2006
We went to a funeral.
One of the old women who we interviewed recently, died the night
before last. I'm not sure why, I'm guessing old age, but she seemed
very healthy at the time. Still, the occurrence of any kind of medical
emergency here, like stroke, heart attack or knife-wound (it could
happen...) pretty much spells d-e-a-t-h. 'Cause whaddya gonna do?
Anyway, we glorious three, (no longer 4, now that Nene msheyt (left)
shewr Amerik and hamburgers) went over to the house to offer our
condolences. Nevermind that I didn't know the right Hassaniyan phrases
to use in such a situation. I never know what to say at funerals in
America (who does?) so there's no way I'm going to attempt something
like that in a language I've spoken all of a month and a half. So
instead I just sat there on the hsera beside Haddou, and tried to look
pensive in a melancholy way as he said a few things here and there. I
realized he's not much better at this that I.
Some of the men I knew (this was gender segregated grieving) from
sight, some I had never seen before. One had a big silver pinkie ring.
One had a giant goiter, self consciously covered, and spoke with
slurred speech. No one seemed that sad - there were no tears at all, at
least while I was there, yet neither was anyone overly exuberant (of
course not). All the emotions seemed somehow capped, or muffled. In
fact, it was exactly what I would have expected to see when someone of
a certain age dies for a certain reason in a society that sees all
events as the inevitable and inimitable will of God.
It's worth noting that I felt almost entirely comfortable, though
naturally somewhat out of place. Granted, I had Haddou as a buffer
against any unintelligible questions, (Poor Sarah - over there alone,
thrown to the wolves with all those chatty women) but still there was
something undeniably soothing about sitting on the mat under the Neem
tree, in the late afternoon, with a warm, easy breeze blowing, knowing
that it should feel so alien, and rejoicing that I think I could stay
here forever.
We went to a funeral.
One of the old women who we interviewed recently, died the night
before last. I'm not sure why, I'm guessing old age, but she seemed
very healthy at the time. Still, the occurrence of any kind of medical
emergency here, like stroke, heart attack or knife-wound (it could
happen...) pretty much spells d-e-a-t-h. 'Cause whaddya gonna do?
Anyway, we glorious three, (no longer 4, now that Nene msheyt (left)
shewr Amerik and hamburgers) went over to the house to offer our
condolences. Nevermind that I didn't know the right Hassaniyan phrases
to use in such a situation. I never know what to say at funerals in
America (who does?) so there's no way I'm going to attempt something
like that in a language I've spoken all of a month and a half. So
instead I just sat there on the hsera beside Haddou, and tried to look
pensive in a melancholy way as he said a few things here and there. I
realized he's not much better at this that I.
Some of the men I knew (this was gender segregated grieving) from
sight, some I had never seen before. One had a big silver pinkie ring.
One had a giant goiter, self consciously covered, and spoke with
slurred speech. No one seemed that sad - there were no tears at all, at
least while I was there, yet neither was anyone overly exuberant (of
course not). All the emotions seemed somehow capped, or muffled. In
fact, it was exactly what I would have expected to see when someone of
a certain age dies for a certain reason in a society that sees all
events as the inevitable and inimitable will of God.
It's worth noting that I felt almost entirely comfortable, though
naturally somewhat out of place. Granted, I had Haddou as a buffer
against any unintelligible questions, (Poor Sarah - over there alone,
thrown to the wolves with all those chatty women) but still there was
something undeniably soothing about sitting on the mat under the Neem
tree, in the late afternoon, with a warm, easy breeze blowing, knowing
that it should feel so alien, and rejoicing that I think I could stay
here forever.
Home economics
21 Aout 2006
Yesterday, I learned how to make tea. Or rather, at Sahaba's urging
(but gladly) I watched Fatimatou closely as she made it in a
demonstrative way, and helped a bit with the pouring. I think that's
the hardest part, it being necessary to mix, cool, and make-foamy the
tea, and to dignify its ceremonial aspect. Otherwise you're just
making tea all the damn time.
Sahaba is right though, I do need to learn how to make it for when I
go off on my own (what weird parallels are forming) so that I can have
guests and visitors, and all that good stuff. Tea drinking/making is
like THE lubricant of social intercourse in this country. It is
simultaneously the dinner by candlelight and the power lunch.
This being the case, it's a good thing I don't hate it, as do some of
my unfortunate counterparts, and in fact I've become slightly
addicted. The only bad thing about this is that tea has a way of never
being around when you want it, and then coming into existence when you
least expect it. As I'm walking out the door tea is being served. Tea
is being served at ten o clock at night. Tea by starlight.
At least 45 minutes is needed for all three rounds (usually much longer) and if you drink one, you may refuse the rest, but if you drink 2 you must have all 3 to avoid being rude. I say 'must' like I know, though I don't, because these are customs, and in the fashion of customs they fluctuate with circumstance and by region. And I say 'rude' by what is 'rude' when you, as a foreigner are running around being inadvertently rude all over the place. Let my respect for you shine through in other places. I am not going to miss class for your damn tea. I have it the same time every day - buy a watch bitches!
The newest amusement adopted by the kids on the path outside our hut
is the act of pushing giant, plastic yellow water jugs called bdewns
across the dirt. There was a whole line of them yesterday, first going
one way and then the other. At least one of the kids had no clothes
on. It makes a terrible racket. I think they're supposed to be cars.
Other things they play with include, but are not limited to: dirt,
dung, trash of various kinds, scrap metal, cans rolled on the ground
with a stick, dental floss, metal hoops, and live birds, swung by a
string tied at their leg (this last one, though incredible, is not
made up)
Halima came back from Kaedi with a bag full of goodies including
squeaky sandals and fried bread. The bread we chowed down on, in no
time it was gone, but the sandals started a bit of a circus. Joka
pranced around with them for a while, each step making a noise like a
dog toy, yet inevitably there ensued a circuit of fighting over the
sandals, throwing the sandals, beating others with the sandals, and
generally contributing to their immediate demise.
Meanwhile, I was trying to get Abu to buy me some chewing gum from the
boutique, but accidentally confused it with the adjacent word in our
make-shift, badly printed dictionary. There I was, saying " I want a
gun, do you understand? Here's 20 ougiyas, go buy me a gun! (Idiot)"
In other news, when the gum was finally, and without violence
attained, Abu wanted me to teach him how to blow bubbles. On his first
attempt, he ended up forcefully spitting his gum on the ground.
No worries baby, just brush it off and try again.
Yesterday, I learned how to make tea. Or rather, at Sahaba's urging
(but gladly) I watched Fatimatou closely as she made it in a
demonstrative way, and helped a bit with the pouring. I think that's
the hardest part, it being necessary to mix, cool, and make-foamy the
tea, and to dignify its ceremonial aspect. Otherwise you're just
making tea all the damn time.
Sahaba is right though, I do need to learn how to make it for when I
go off on my own (what weird parallels are forming) so that I can have
guests and visitors, and all that good stuff. Tea drinking/making is
like THE lubricant of social intercourse in this country. It is
simultaneously the dinner by candlelight and the power lunch.
This being the case, it's a good thing I don't hate it, as do some of
my unfortunate counterparts, and in fact I've become slightly
addicted. The only bad thing about this is that tea has a way of never
being around when you want it, and then coming into existence when you
least expect it. As I'm walking out the door tea is being served. Tea
is being served at ten o clock at night. Tea by starlight.
At least 45 minutes is needed for all three rounds (usually much longer) and if you drink one, you may refuse the rest, but if you drink 2 you must have all 3 to avoid being rude. I say 'must' like I know, though I don't, because these are customs, and in the fashion of customs they fluctuate with circumstance and by region. And I say 'rude' by what is 'rude' when you, as a foreigner are running around being inadvertently rude all over the place. Let my respect for you shine through in other places. I am not going to miss class for your damn tea. I have it the same time every day - buy a watch bitches!
The newest amusement adopted by the kids on the path outside our hut
is the act of pushing giant, plastic yellow water jugs called bdewns
across the dirt. There was a whole line of them yesterday, first going
one way and then the other. At least one of the kids had no clothes
on. It makes a terrible racket. I think they're supposed to be cars.
Other things they play with include, but are not limited to: dirt,
dung, trash of various kinds, scrap metal, cans rolled on the ground
with a stick, dental floss, metal hoops, and live birds, swung by a
string tied at their leg (this last one, though incredible, is not
made up)
Halima came back from Kaedi with a bag full of goodies including
squeaky sandals and fried bread. The bread we chowed down on, in no
time it was gone, but the sandals started a bit of a circus. Joka
pranced around with them for a while, each step making a noise like a
dog toy, yet inevitably there ensued a circuit of fighting over the
sandals, throwing the sandals, beating others with the sandals, and
generally contributing to their immediate demise.
Meanwhile, I was trying to get Abu to buy me some chewing gum from the
boutique, but accidentally confused it with the adjacent word in our
make-shift, badly printed dictionary. There I was, saying " I want a
gun, do you understand? Here's 20 ougiyas, go buy me a gun! (Idiot)"
In other news, when the gum was finally, and without violence
attained, Abu wanted me to teach him how to blow bubbles. On his first
attempt, he ended up forcefully spitting his gum on the ground.
No worries baby, just brush it off and try again.
Friday, August 25, 2006
El Qidiya
16 Aout 2006
Much to tell, much to tell.
Today is the first day back at center, after we journeyed wide and far over the country-side for a site visit. My village is called El Qidiya (the 'Q' is actually a sound that doesn't exist in English, and only ever appears when one is swallowing or gagging). It's very secluded - 58K off the gudrone (paved road), over terrain both rocky and barren, and it's an oasis in the desert, nestled at the foot of a mountainous ridge, lush and green with date palms, a seasonal lake and waterfalls. Wow. It takes forever to get to, even the place where one turns off the gudrone is a barren wasteland. One would never imagine that people could live that far out, but that's just one of the many things people do in this country which make them seem like Aliens.
We got stuck in the mud, about 3 or 4 times in fact, the first time going in as the sun was setting, the other times trying to get the hell out. Another thing Mauritanians (our driver) don't do well is get unstuck from the mud, and so we ended up staying the first night with some man, randomly found as we wandered around from place to place in the dark. He gave us mattelas and tea, noodles, and water to drink. This is not in fact uncommon: hospitality is (supposed to be) a thing around here.
In the morning, he gave us porridge and tea, we bought bread, cobbled together a meeting with the mayor (don't let that word fool you) and toured the town a bit, mostly by car - it's strange how and why they drive these enormous landrovers through even tiny village walkways.
Then we were put up by the president of the "PTO" (I couldn't get a more accurate translation of his position from anyone), who fed us zriig (fermented, sweetened milk), and more zriig, and milk, and dates with butter, and tea, a sheep (not the good parts) and rice.
One thing though: this man has 3 black moors in his household, about my age, though he is white-moor (Arabic-looking), and thinking about their actual status in the family makes me queasy. Maybe they are paid laborers, and maybe I'm just jumpy, but they could be slaves. Slavery exists here, and though it's been officially illegal for many years, it still happens. It doesn't look like what we think slavery looks like, hence my hesitancy to identify it. It's social and mental, it's societal slavery, and therefore much harder to stop. So I'm really hoping that this isn't the case, and that slavery in general doesn't exist in my village.
The next day, after we had seen all the boutiques, the lake, the waterfalls, climbed the mountains, and seen the cave paintings (for real!), we tried to leave and spent another 5 hours getting unstuck from the muddy river dividing the two sections of town. Then, having run out of options, we decided to follow some other intrepid travellers (The chief of some village - a hideous, fat white moor with walrus teeth and an almost comically villainous look, his short little director of schools, and their beautiful young black-moor driver) who knew another way out of town. We dodged a few puddles and mudtraps, and after 40K (2hrs) over the rocks, we ran into a gigantic dam that had flooded all over the adjoining planes, and which they had somehow forgotten to mention. Mauritanians don't think ahead, ever. Since the sun was setting fast, and we were running out of options, we all piled into our white chariot, me squished in the rear (a night-mare) and headed for a (mythical) village 20K back, which the cheif knew of, allegedly. The paths, which are never more than simple tracks in the dirt, wind and twist and run together with others, and generally tend to get lost, especially at night. Inevitably of course, we ended up driving around in circles at night, through mud-fields and turga scrub-forests, in a vehicle now somewhat commandeered by the pushy village chief (even minor authority figures get big egos). Eventually we found the village of '5 Baobobs', (whether through skill or providence I'm not sure), a windy little collection of houses in the middle of nowhere. We didn't know the people, they didn't know us, but we slept and ate with them, because that's what you do. Part of the thing about living here is getting used to almost never knowing what's going on.
Anyway, the next day we made it back to El Qidiya, then left it again by our original route (it was now dry enough to pass) and made good time to the gudrone. I will never look at a paved road the same way again. As a bonus when we were approaching the road, I saw a man riding a galloping black horse over the desert, with his blue bou-bou billowing out behind him. It was epic.
This post brings me up to date, I suppose, but I go back to M'Beidia tomorrow which means no updates for a few more weeks, After that comes Swear In! where I officially become a Peace Corps volunteer, we have a big party to celebrate (alcohol has been rumored to make an appearance) and I start doubting my effectiveness as a human-being again. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted.
I hope you all write me soon. I love you. Be good.
Ma'selaam.
Much to tell, much to tell.
Today is the first day back at center, after we journeyed wide and far over the country-side for a site visit. My village is called El Qidiya (the 'Q' is actually a sound that doesn't exist in English, and only ever appears when one is swallowing or gagging). It's very secluded - 58K off the gudrone (paved road), over terrain both rocky and barren, and it's an oasis in the desert, nestled at the foot of a mountainous ridge, lush and green with date palms, a seasonal lake and waterfalls. Wow. It takes forever to get to, even the place where one turns off the gudrone is a barren wasteland. One would never imagine that people could live that far out, but that's just one of the many things people do in this country which make them seem like Aliens.
We got stuck in the mud, about 3 or 4 times in fact, the first time going in as the sun was setting, the other times trying to get the hell out. Another thing Mauritanians (our driver) don't do well is get unstuck from the mud, and so we ended up staying the first night with some man, randomly found as we wandered around from place to place in the dark. He gave us mattelas and tea, noodles, and water to drink. This is not in fact uncommon: hospitality is (supposed to be) a thing around here.
In the morning, he gave us porridge and tea, we bought bread, cobbled together a meeting with the mayor (don't let that word fool you) and toured the town a bit, mostly by car - it's strange how and why they drive these enormous landrovers through even tiny village walkways.
Then we were put up by the president of the "PTO" (I couldn't get a more accurate translation of his position from anyone), who fed us zriig (fermented, sweetened milk), and more zriig, and milk, and dates with butter, and tea, a sheep (not the good parts) and rice.
One thing though: this man has 3 black moors in his household, about my age, though he is white-moor (Arabic-looking), and thinking about their actual status in the family makes me queasy. Maybe they are paid laborers, and maybe I'm just jumpy, but they could be slaves. Slavery exists here, and though it's been officially illegal for many years, it still happens. It doesn't look like what we think slavery looks like, hence my hesitancy to identify it. It's social and mental, it's societal slavery, and therefore much harder to stop. So I'm really hoping that this isn't the case, and that slavery in general doesn't exist in my village.
The next day, after we had seen all the boutiques, the lake, the waterfalls, climbed the mountains, and seen the cave paintings (for real!), we tried to leave and spent another 5 hours getting unstuck from the muddy river dividing the two sections of town. Then, having run out of options, we decided to follow some other intrepid travellers (The chief of some village - a hideous, fat white moor with walrus teeth and an almost comically villainous look, his short little director of schools, and their beautiful young black-moor driver) who knew another way out of town. We dodged a few puddles and mudtraps, and after 40K (2hrs) over the rocks, we ran into a gigantic dam that had flooded all over the adjoining planes, and which they had somehow forgotten to mention. Mauritanians don't think ahead, ever. Since the sun was setting fast, and we were running out of options, we all piled into our white chariot, me squished in the rear (a night-mare) and headed for a (mythical) village 20K back, which the cheif knew of, allegedly. The paths, which are never more than simple tracks in the dirt, wind and twist and run together with others, and generally tend to get lost, especially at night. Inevitably of course, we ended up driving around in circles at night, through mud-fields and turga scrub-forests, in a vehicle now somewhat commandeered by the pushy village chief (even minor authority figures get big egos). Eventually we found the village of '5 Baobobs', (whether through skill or providence I'm not sure), a windy little collection of houses in the middle of nowhere. We didn't know the people, they didn't know us, but we slept and ate with them, because that's what you do. Part of the thing about living here is getting used to almost never knowing what's going on.
Anyway, the next day we made it back to El Qidiya, then left it again by our original route (it was now dry enough to pass) and made good time to the gudrone. I will never look at a paved road the same way again. As a bonus when we were approaching the road, I saw a man riding a galloping black horse over the desert, with his blue bou-bou billowing out behind him. It was epic.
This post brings me up to date, I suppose, but I go back to M'Beidia tomorrow which means no updates for a few more weeks, After that comes Swear In! where I officially become a Peace Corps volunteer, we have a big party to celebrate (alcohol has been rumored to make an appearance) and I start doubting my effectiveness as a human-being again. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted.
I hope you all write me soon. I love you. Be good.
Ma'selaam.
Noble Savagery
5 Aout 2006
Yesterday we went to visit some more old folks, in order that we might practice our language and sample some of their tea - it all tastes pretty much the same to me, and even the differences between rounds (more bitter, more minty and sweeter) usually go over my head. Nevertheless, we stopped under the tent of a nice old couple, along with various other neighbors, relatives and such characters as that. I think the old man and woman are the parents of my maternal aunt's daughter's husband, but I could be wrong - familial attachments around here are about as entangled as my little niece Amtee's hair. And that stuff's a bitch.
Anyway we sat and talked as well as we could, we answered questions, laughed at Haddou and told stories. I told the one about when Meghann and I were little and Bud Trumble chased us with a snapping turtle (slightly embellished for dramatic effect of course). They seemed to like it, and were the friendly sort to meet us halfway when our language failed. I guess also that the experience of having the nasrani say the words for head, ear, house, tent and big stick never gets old. In fact, the first few days here, and now whenever I meet someone new, I feel like the best toy ever. Although, this has its merits.
I don't know how to explain the old couple (Khadaisia and Abdelai). They're just like everyone else here, so strange and foreign, yet so familiar, well worn and comforting, kind, earthbound, wise (or unwise) and so colorful that I'm continually wondering why it doesn't feel stranger to be here. I suppose such is our ability to adapt.
Khadaisia had the largest, most pendulous breast I had ever seen (a glimpse of). Some women don't wear anything under their mullefas, which are nebulous, breezy and open articles of clothing. Still, breasts aren't scandalous here; they're seen as about as sexually charged as a couple half-gallons of 2%. An ankle though, a calf or god forbid a thigh, could send someone over the edge. Go figure.
Anyway, she was a large woman with old and strong hands, dyed with henna, an active face and voice (when she sung it was like a woman half her age), she danced a little from her seat and used her mulaffa like a tool, or an appendage as she told stories about animals who used to live here, like lions.
Abdelai wore a wrinkled black gendura with white sirwaal. He had out-of-control cheekbones - the key to looking youthful forever. He had fuzzy white close-cut scrub on his head, and a tiny white patch of hair jutting out from his chin. He had most of his teeth, but those that were absent were conspicuously so.
{By the by, I'm actually surprised that anyone around here has any teeth at all. No one brushes them, except with their finger and water, or with the twigs of a tooth-brush tree, which they chew on and scrape against. On top of that, they drink sugary tea all day long and eat white rice with everything. Plus no dentistry (or medical care for that matter). But considering everything, they have amazingly in-tact teeth, and many might even have nice ones, if I could only hold them down long enough to scrape that brown shit off the surface.}
Anyway, back to Abdelai: He said his father once rode a lion into town, and steered it by the ear from his perch on its back. He couldn't hear very well, and told me the names for local trees twice. Everyone was lovely, and we had a nice, if mutually unintelligible time until Ismaila's father broke up the party by beating him and chasing him into our midst with a knotted rope. Oh well. Time to go folks.
I've been watching the ballon team practice each night in the field outside the garden after I've finished watering, and the air is cool. It's strictly a male arena - the girls can't even come to watch, lest scandal ensue, so I'm trying to take advantage of my position in this society as, unquestionably, a man. During practice, the younger boys sit in front on the sand; the babies and the brothers. Last night one of them got hit in the face with the ball, and cried to the amusement of all. Many of the young ones tend to watch me, instead of the game, or only watch the game until I've looked away, and they can resume staring. This behavior usually decreases with age, as the older ones of certain years are often too cool to pay me much attention at all. It's fine though, it really only ever takes one clever remark from the soft-voiced nasrani, and they're laughing too, repeating it to everyone. In short, I don't feel unwelcome - just largely, as of yet, unknown. And that's 100% true.
I don't know too much about soccer, but the players seem pretty good - at least they're organized and there's a man with a whistle, so that's got to count for something. They play shirts and skins, old-school style, and true to form they're all tightly muscled despite the lack of good protein here, and thin with broad shoulders. It's hard not to feel my own inferior make while watching them, so thank god for the lack of mirrors, and that the only reflection I ever see is in the dull, rippled tin of my latrine door.
It's tempting too, to let one's mind follow the psychology of 'noble savagery', and to assume that because some people are poor or disadvantaged, they are somehow better, by default, than those of us who take privilege and riches for granted. It's not true of course, people are the same everywhere, regardless of economics, but when you watch these tall, skinny young men playing soccer in their makeshift shoes, the socks with strappy sandals, maybe taped together or paired with ratty cleats on one foot, and showing their painfully clear earnestness; their regal chins, their brotherhood - it's tempting to feel ashamed of one's birth, in a way. They've had to earn everything they've gotten, much more than me. Still, cynicism, hopelessness and self-pity are all indulgences, and therefore a complete waste of time. Mashallah.
Yesterday we went to visit some more old folks, in order that we might practice our language and sample some of their tea - it all tastes pretty much the same to me, and even the differences between rounds (more bitter, more minty and sweeter) usually go over my head. Nevertheless, we stopped under the tent of a nice old couple, along with various other neighbors, relatives and such characters as that. I think the old man and woman are the parents of my maternal aunt's daughter's husband, but I could be wrong - familial attachments around here are about as entangled as my little niece Amtee's hair. And that stuff's a bitch.
Anyway we sat and talked as well as we could, we answered questions, laughed at Haddou and told stories. I told the one about when Meghann and I were little and Bud Trumble chased us with a snapping turtle (slightly embellished for dramatic effect of course). They seemed to like it, and were the friendly sort to meet us halfway when our language failed. I guess also that the experience of having the nasrani say the words for head, ear, house, tent and big stick never gets old. In fact, the first few days here, and now whenever I meet someone new, I feel like the best toy ever. Although, this has its merits.
I don't know how to explain the old couple (Khadaisia and Abdelai). They're just like everyone else here, so strange and foreign, yet so familiar, well worn and comforting, kind, earthbound, wise (or unwise) and so colorful that I'm continually wondering why it doesn't feel stranger to be here. I suppose such is our ability to adapt.
Khadaisia had the largest, most pendulous breast I had ever seen (a glimpse of). Some women don't wear anything under their mullefas, which are nebulous, breezy and open articles of clothing. Still, breasts aren't scandalous here; they're seen as about as sexually charged as a couple half-gallons of 2%. An ankle though, a calf or god forbid a thigh, could send someone over the edge. Go figure.
Anyway, she was a large woman with old and strong hands, dyed with henna, an active face and voice (when she sung it was like a woman half her age), she danced a little from her seat and used her mulaffa like a tool, or an appendage as she told stories about animals who used to live here, like lions.
Abdelai wore a wrinkled black gendura with white sirwaal. He had out-of-control cheekbones - the key to looking youthful forever. He had fuzzy white close-cut scrub on his head, and a tiny white patch of hair jutting out from his chin. He had most of his teeth, but those that were absent were conspicuously so.
{By the by, I'm actually surprised that anyone around here has any teeth at all. No one brushes them, except with their finger and water, or with the twigs of a tooth-brush tree, which they chew on and scrape against. On top of that, they drink sugary tea all day long and eat white rice with everything. Plus no dentistry (or medical care for that matter). But considering everything, they have amazingly in-tact teeth, and many might even have nice ones, if I could only hold them down long enough to scrape that brown shit off the surface.}
Anyway, back to Abdelai: He said his father once rode a lion into town, and steered it by the ear from his perch on its back. He couldn't hear very well, and told me the names for local trees twice. Everyone was lovely, and we had a nice, if mutually unintelligible time until Ismaila's father broke up the party by beating him and chasing him into our midst with a knotted rope. Oh well. Time to go folks.
I've been watching the ballon team practice each night in the field outside the garden after I've finished watering, and the air is cool. It's strictly a male arena - the girls can't even come to watch, lest scandal ensue, so I'm trying to take advantage of my position in this society as, unquestionably, a man. During practice, the younger boys sit in front on the sand; the babies and the brothers. Last night one of them got hit in the face with the ball, and cried to the amusement of all. Many of the young ones tend to watch me, instead of the game, or only watch the game until I've looked away, and they can resume staring. This behavior usually decreases with age, as the older ones of certain years are often too cool to pay me much attention at all. It's fine though, it really only ever takes one clever remark from the soft-voiced nasrani, and they're laughing too, repeating it to everyone. In short, I don't feel unwelcome - just largely, as of yet, unknown. And that's 100% true.
I don't know too much about soccer, but the players seem pretty good - at least they're organized and there's a man with a whistle, so that's got to count for something. They play shirts and skins, old-school style, and true to form they're all tightly muscled despite the lack of good protein here, and thin with broad shoulders. It's hard not to feel my own inferior make while watching them, so thank god for the lack of mirrors, and that the only reflection I ever see is in the dull, rippled tin of my latrine door.
It's tempting too, to let one's mind follow the psychology of 'noble savagery', and to assume that because some people are poor or disadvantaged, they are somehow better, by default, than those of us who take privilege and riches for granted. It's not true of course, people are the same everywhere, regardless of economics, but when you watch these tall, skinny young men playing soccer in their makeshift shoes, the socks with strappy sandals, maybe taped together or paired with ratty cleats on one foot, and showing their painfully clear earnestness; their regal chins, their brotherhood - it's tempting to feel ashamed of one's birth, in a way. They've had to earn everything they've gotten, much more than me. Still, cynicism, hopelessness and self-pity are all indulgences, and therefore a complete waste of time. Mashallah.
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Iyaak Il-Khayr
2 Aout 2006
Lots of interesting things have been happening in the past few days:
for starters - yesterday the ballon (ballon meaning 'ball' and
therefore soccer) team left for Kaedi to play in a tournament there,
what exactly is meant by the word tournament in this case is, as of
yet, unclear to me and my fellow nasrani. In fact, until yesterday we
didn't even know that they had a team in the normal sense of the word,
rather than that of a random sometimes conglomeration of disaffected
youth (I kid). Nevertheless, yesterday two vans pulled out of M'Beidia
(one filled with the team, clad in actual numbered uniforms, and
topped by an assortment of teenaged supporting stars - water-boy types
and the like - and one packed full of fans going to cheer on the good
fellows. At around 3 pm we went to see what all the commotion was
about, and with practically the remaining populace of M'Beidia, saw
off the team with clapping and singing and that weird trilling call
they make with their tongues (I did not partake of this).
In class, for the second day in a row, we went to see and interview
some of the most elderly inhabitants of the village, to get a history
of M'Beidia. Part of the difficulty in speaking neither the language
of the interviewee, nor the language of your TRANSLATOR (thanks
Haddou), is that responses tend to be boiled down to an
un-illuminating few. In general, "life used to be better", "the young
don't respect the elderly" and "we never used to have the problems with soil/water/rain/crops that we have now" came back again
and again. No kidding folks. I could have gotten that response with a
few substitutions, from any crotchety old person on any street in
America. Nevertheless, we did get a few intriguing facts about a
long-ago drought, deforestation, the killing-off of animal species,
and horse-racing (for real).
Later in the evening, after tea at Maimouna's and my mini-makaresh
bath (it was lovely), a growing ruckus of a crowd signaled the return
of the team. Did they win? Did they not? Well, I would later find out
that it was only the fan-van come-back so far, and not the footballers
proper. Regardless, still wet from my shower, I followed the children
(it was twilight) and a wildly galloping loosed horse (this happens
strangely often) to the place where the action was.
After a few minutes of crowd wandering and clapping and hand-holding,
a man took my hand and led me back to his porch in a very 'you
shouldn't be standing amongst the children' sort of way, and we spread
out a hsera on his porch and sat in the (now) moonlight. His is one of
the nicer houses in town; we walk by it everyday on our way to water
the garden. His name is Mohamed I-can't-remember (last names are
tricky here) He's thirty, lives with his family, owns a shop in
Senegal and likes soccer. Big surprise there. He's very stern looking,
like many of the men here, but he was very nice and we had a good
little chat, such as my language would provide.
It's strange that I'm almost never afraid of anyone here, (meaning
afraid of talking-to) like I was in America. I thought that the
foreignness, and the language barrier would make it worse, but so far
it's only made it better. Maybe it's just that everything is so new
and different here that I can't afford to be afraid.
After our chat, Abu came and got me and we ate dinner (couscous and
cow-peas) with Habiba, and when I was finished, all the kids pounced
on the bowl to eat before the (now) gathering sandstorm. You can see
it on the horizon; it blocks out the stars like a dark gas. After we
put away everything inside, we sat out in the wind and dust. Habiba
and crazy-eyed, afro-ed Joka were still eating couscous from the bowl
by the glow of a flashlight, even with the sand flying everywhere. How
fucked-up is that?
Anyway, when the dirt and wind got too bad, I hid Abu's and Habiba's
faces in my chest, protecting them from the sand with my shirt. When
we finally went inside and Sahaba put me in my little house, and
stuffed up the windows, the last thing she said was "Rgid Mohamed"
(sleep Mohamed), "Iyaak il-khayr" (I hope there is peace) That last
one they use to meaningless extinction in their greetings 500 times a
day, but this time it actually seemed to fit.
Of course, it turns out that the rain totaled 6 drops and all the
soccer rowdiness was for a tie score (1 to 1). But oh well. Let the
people have there fun. Mashallah.
Lots of interesting things have been happening in the past few days:
for starters - yesterday the ballon (ballon meaning 'ball' and
therefore soccer) team left for Kaedi to play in a tournament there,
what exactly is meant by the word tournament in this case is, as of
yet, unclear to me and my fellow nasrani. In fact, until yesterday we
didn't even know that they had a team in the normal sense of the word,
rather than that of a random sometimes conglomeration of disaffected
youth (I kid). Nevertheless, yesterday two vans pulled out of M'Beidia
(one filled with the team, clad in actual numbered uniforms, and
topped by an assortment of teenaged supporting stars - water-boy types
and the like - and one packed full of fans going to cheer on the good
fellows. At around 3 pm we went to see what all the commotion was
about, and with practically the remaining populace of M'Beidia, saw
off the team with clapping and singing and that weird trilling call
they make with their tongues (I did not partake of this).
In class, for the second day in a row, we went to see and interview
some of the most elderly inhabitants of the village, to get a history
of M'Beidia. Part of the difficulty in speaking neither the language
of the interviewee, nor the language of your TRANSLATOR (thanks
Haddou), is that responses tend to be boiled down to an
un-illuminating few. In general, "life used to be better", "the young
don't respect the elderly" and "we never used to have the problems with soil/water/rain/crops that we have now" came back again
and again. No kidding folks. I could have gotten that response with a
few substitutions, from any crotchety old person on any street in
America. Nevertheless, we did get a few intriguing facts about a
long-ago drought, deforestation, the killing-off of animal species,
and horse-racing (for real).
Later in the evening, after tea at Maimouna's and my mini-makaresh
bath (it was lovely), a growing ruckus of a crowd signaled the return
of the team. Did they win? Did they not? Well, I would later find out
that it was only the fan-van come-back so far, and not the footballers
proper. Regardless, still wet from my shower, I followed the children
(it was twilight) and a wildly galloping loosed horse (this happens
strangely often) to the place where the action was.
After a few minutes of crowd wandering and clapping and hand-holding,
a man took my hand and led me back to his porch in a very 'you
shouldn't be standing amongst the children' sort of way, and we spread
out a hsera on his porch and sat in the (now) moonlight. His is one of
the nicer houses in town; we walk by it everyday on our way to water
the garden. His name is Mohamed I-can't-remember (last names are
tricky here) He's thirty, lives with his family, owns a shop in
Senegal and likes soccer. Big surprise there. He's very stern looking,
like many of the men here, but he was very nice and we had a good
little chat, such as my language would provide.
It's strange that I'm almost never afraid of anyone here, (meaning
afraid of talking-to) like I was in America. I thought that the
foreignness, and the language barrier would make it worse, but so far
it's only made it better. Maybe it's just that everything is so new
and different here that I can't afford to be afraid.
After our chat, Abu came and got me and we ate dinner (couscous and
cow-peas) with Habiba, and when I was finished, all the kids pounced
on the bowl to eat before the (now) gathering sandstorm. You can see
it on the horizon; it blocks out the stars like a dark gas. After we
put away everything inside, we sat out in the wind and dust. Habiba
and crazy-eyed, afro-ed Joka were still eating couscous from the bowl
by the glow of a flashlight, even with the sand flying everywhere. How
fucked-up is that?
Anyway, when the dirt and wind got too bad, I hid Abu's and Habiba's
faces in my chest, protecting them from the sand with my shirt. When
we finally went inside and Sahaba put me in my little house, and
stuffed up the windows, the last thing she said was "Rgid Mohamed"
(sleep Mohamed), "Iyaak il-khayr" (I hope there is peace) That last
one they use to meaningless extinction in their greetings 500 times a
day, but this time it actually seemed to fit.
Of course, it turns out that the rain totaled 6 drops and all the
soccer rowdiness was for a tie score (1 to 1). But oh well. Let the
people have there fun. Mashallah.
Thursday, August 17, 2006
Dear Santa
29 Juilliet 2006
I want a bou-bou like its my job.
I want a flowing white chunk of fabric to wear and wrap around me, to
fidget with and constantly adjust, and to make me look like something
out of ancient history, as so happens when they're worn by the native
people here. I want a bou-bou. I want a man-dress (a gendura). The
trouble is, somewhere in the garbled, tangled puzzle that is the
genetic line of us white-European descended peoples there is a nasty
little stowaway whose ultimate effect is this: we cannot wear these
clothes. We cannot wear them. We look comical at best, and more often
than not, totally grotesque. Such is one of the great sadnesses of my
life now. I want one so badly! Consider this: with a bou-bou, shirt
and pants are optional (you must wear a knickers-like garment called
sirwaal lest your bare-ass be exposed through the wide-open sides)
With a gendura, all other garments appear to be optional! Including
underwear! Do you know how much easier it is to do one's business in a
hole when you're not wearing underwear? Pray you never find out. (Just
kidding, just kidding)
For real though: I'm asking Santa for the ability to passably wear a
man-dress, 'cause I'm totally getting one.
Sometimes I have a few young pals who come to visit me at night,
practice English, and speak at me in their (exceedingly) bad French.
The other night, in an attempt to keep the conversation going, I,
needful of verbs, pointed out qmaar (moon) and dilegaan (cowpeas) in
English. My friend Moussa leaned back on the mat, looked up at the
sky, and tried to memorize: "Cowpeas-moon, cowpeas-moon" he repeated.
Also in his and his sidekick Hassan's repertoire are 'stomach, chest,
cheek, nose and mouth' in addition to most of the numbers from 1 to
20, excepting 12, which is perpetually pronounced 'twelven'. You're
ready for America buddy!
Last night, the subject in which they seemed most interested was what
went on when I went to Kaedi for Center Days.
-'Did you listen to music?'
Yes
-'Was any of it Michael Jackson, and/or Fifty-Cent and/or Ja-Rule?'
(Well...no. But) sure, why not.
-'Did you dance while there?'
(Again, no. But) sure, why not.
-'Boys and girls?'
Mmmhmm.
-Together?
(sensing their interest) Yes.
- Let me get this straight, les garcons AVEC les filles??!
Of course!
Therein ensued the equivalent of 'wow', and a long low whistle. Yes, I
have officially become cool in the eyes of the teenage boys of
M'Beidia.
Today, after the rain, I took advantage of the coolness to take a nap
inside (for once), and listen to my iPod a bit. When Habiba came to
investigate with her quizzical look, we dance a little together - me
lying on my mattella, she looking puzzled in the doorway. Good times.
I want a bou-bou like its my job.
I want a flowing white chunk of fabric to wear and wrap around me, to
fidget with and constantly adjust, and to make me look like something
out of ancient history, as so happens when they're worn by the native
people here. I want a bou-bou. I want a man-dress (a gendura). The
trouble is, somewhere in the garbled, tangled puzzle that is the
genetic line of us white-European descended peoples there is a nasty
little stowaway whose ultimate effect is this: we cannot wear these
clothes. We cannot wear them. We look comical at best, and more often
than not, totally grotesque. Such is one of the great sadnesses of my
life now. I want one so badly! Consider this: with a bou-bou, shirt
and pants are optional (you must wear a knickers-like garment called
sirwaal lest your bare-ass be exposed through the wide-open sides)
With a gendura, all other garments appear to be optional! Including
underwear! Do you know how much easier it is to do one's business in a
hole when you're not wearing underwear? Pray you never find out. (Just
kidding, just kidding)
For real though: I'm asking Santa for the ability to passably wear a
man-dress, 'cause I'm totally getting one.
Sometimes I have a few young pals who come to visit me at night,
practice English, and speak at me in their (exceedingly) bad French.
The other night, in an attempt to keep the conversation going, I,
needful of verbs, pointed out qmaar (moon) and dilegaan (cowpeas) in
English. My friend Moussa leaned back on the mat, looked up at the
sky, and tried to memorize: "Cowpeas-moon, cowpeas-moon" he repeated.
Also in his and his sidekick Hassan's repertoire are 'stomach, chest,
cheek, nose and mouth' in addition to most of the numbers from 1 to
20, excepting 12, which is perpetually pronounced 'twelven'. You're
ready for America buddy!
Last night, the subject in which they seemed most interested was what
went on when I went to Kaedi for Center Days.
-'Did you listen to music?'
Yes
-'Was any of it Michael Jackson, and/or Fifty-Cent and/or Ja-Rule?'
(Well...no. But) sure, why not.
-'Did you dance while there?'
(Again, no. But) sure, why not.
-'Boys and girls?'
Mmmhmm.
-Together?
(sensing their interest) Yes.
- Let me get this straight, les garcons AVEC les filles??!
Of course!
Therein ensued the equivalent of 'wow', and a long low whistle. Yes, I
have officially become cool in the eyes of the teenage boys of
M'Beidia.
Today, after the rain, I took advantage of the coolness to take a nap
inside (for once), and listen to my iPod a bit. When Habiba came to
investigate with her quizzical look, we dance a little together - me
lying on my mattella, she looking puzzled in the doorway. Good times.
Scoot-Butt
27 Juilliet 2006
Right next to the shady chi-lih (porch) outside my house, a group of
older ladies regularly gather on a mat under a Neem Tree to discuss
god knows what. They're chatty and loud, they make tea, and an
indeterminate number of them may or may not be fictionally related to
me. The one that permanently resides next door we call
'scoot-butt': I've seen her scoot slowly across the ground with her hands
rather than getting up (though I know she can walk). Once, I took a
picture of them all sitting there with my digicam and they got a good
twenty minutes of fun out of pointing out each other on the tiny
screen. -Yes that IS Minetou on the camera, and here she is in real
life! (It's a miracle!) I know I'm purely stroking my own western ego
with delighting my family and friends with American wonders like (no
joke) duct tape, and clip on metal beaners, but I do it anyway. It has
no positive effect whatsoever other than a few minutes of comedy, but
sometimes when you're sitting there being stared at for hours on end,
you can begin to feel a need to entertain.
Today is pretty haami hatte (very hot), and a good majority of last
night's clouds have burned off already. This (only barely) sub-Saharan
sun is a wicked bitch.
Strangely enough, I've barely gotten a tan, excepting my spectacularly
farmer-tanned arms, because only fools and those who have no choice
spend time in the mid-day sun.
Last night, as I was getting ready for bed and brushing my teeth in
the dark street, I walked over to the troupe of young men who were
gathered around a thumping, Usher-pumping boombox 10 meters away. We
were talking, dancing a little and laughing for no more than two
minutes, when Sahab walked over to collect me, and pointed to my
mosquito net as if to say "Go to bed, young man." Well, nevermind that
I'm twenty four and American: "Yes ma'am"
Right next to the shady chi-lih (porch) outside my house, a group of
older ladies regularly gather on a mat under a Neem Tree to discuss
god knows what. They're chatty and loud, they make tea, and an
indeterminate number of them may or may not be fictionally related to
me. The one that permanently resides next door we call
'scoot-butt': I've seen her scoot slowly across the ground with her hands
rather than getting up (though I know she can walk). Once, I took a
picture of them all sitting there with my digicam and they got a good
twenty minutes of fun out of pointing out each other on the tiny
screen. -Yes that IS Minetou on the camera, and here she is in real
life! (It's a miracle!) I know I'm purely stroking my own western ego
with delighting my family and friends with American wonders like (no
joke) duct tape, and clip on metal beaners, but I do it anyway. It has
no positive effect whatsoever other than a few minutes of comedy, but
sometimes when you're sitting there being stared at for hours on end,
you can begin to feel a need to entertain.
Today is pretty haami hatte (very hot), and a good majority of last
night's clouds have burned off already. This (only barely) sub-Saharan
sun is a wicked bitch.
Strangely enough, I've barely gotten a tan, excepting my spectacularly
farmer-tanned arms, because only fools and those who have no choice
spend time in the mid-day sun.
Last night, as I was getting ready for bed and brushing my teeth in
the dark street, I walked over to the troupe of young men who were
gathered around a thumping, Usher-pumping boombox 10 meters away. We
were talking, dancing a little and laughing for no more than two
minutes, when Sahab walked over to collect me, and pointed to my
mosquito net as if to say "Go to bed, young man." Well, nevermind that
I'm twenty four and American: "Yes ma'am"
My Finest Hour
26 Juilliet 2006
I want guacamole with chips and Mexican beer.
I want seven kinds of pie with French vanilla ice cream.
I want anything that is not rice, cous cous, fish or meat.
I want fat sandwiches of lunchmeat with good bread and cheese. I want
soup.
I want candy.
Last night my toothless Abu took a bath for the first time since I've
been in the village. At least he pranced around naked in the dark, was
led away by his mother, and then returned 3 minutes later, wet. You do
the math.
Speaking of children, the babies here are all tied with a scarf to
their mothers' backs, poking out bobble-headed like tiny monkeys from
atop their mothers' huge rumps. Its sort of amazing that they never
topple out, but they're perfectly content, and never cry.
We've been bringing out my wind-up shortwave radio at night and
listening to local stations, or the BBC or some Reggae on its tinny
speakers under the stars. It makes me miss all my geeky NPR
programming which I love so much.
Yesterday afternoon I came home from class to find that my mother
Sahaba had locked a chicken in my house.
I haven't been locking my door, except that Sahaba told me to give her
a key so that she could lock it whenever necessary. Giving someone
else a key sort of defeats the purpose of having a key, but she seemed
to think it was a grand idea, so no biggee. Anyway, as soon as she
unlocked the door, out comes the squawking chicken, which upon further
inspection of my room, had shat in it several times (of course).
Luckily, as of now, I have yet to come upon any other specimens
unexpectedly. Inshallah.
All the women in the garden seem to get a kick out of me hauling
water - I think its probably considered women's work. At least in the
garden it is, where I am the only man who's ever there. That's
excepting my 18 year old friend Amida who's only ever there
specifically to see me and hang out a little, while trying to look
cool in the decidedly un-cool garden.
And lastly, because the bread that Caleb brought us from Kaedi seemed
about to expire, leaving its canned-tuna partner without a mate, and
because sharing is all but mandatory here, and because I didn't want to
share, yesterday night found me huddled in a dark corner of my room,
flashlight in armpit, shoving bread-scooped tuna into my mouth as fast
as I could chew. Needless to say, it wasn't my finest hour, but such
is life here in the RIM.
I want guacamole with chips and Mexican beer.
I want seven kinds of pie with French vanilla ice cream.
I want anything that is not rice, cous cous, fish or meat.
I want fat sandwiches of lunchmeat with good bread and cheese. I want
soup.
I want candy.
Last night my toothless Abu took a bath for the first time since I've
been in the village. At least he pranced around naked in the dark, was
led away by his mother, and then returned 3 minutes later, wet. You do
the math.
Speaking of children, the babies here are all tied with a scarf to
their mothers' backs, poking out bobble-headed like tiny monkeys from
atop their mothers' huge rumps. Its sort of amazing that they never
topple out, but they're perfectly content, and never cry.
We've been bringing out my wind-up shortwave radio at night and
listening to local stations, or the BBC or some Reggae on its tinny
speakers under the stars. It makes me miss all my geeky NPR
programming which I love so much.
Yesterday afternoon I came home from class to find that my mother
Sahaba had locked a chicken in my house.
I haven't been locking my door, except that Sahaba told me to give her
a key so that she could lock it whenever necessary. Giving someone
else a key sort of defeats the purpose of having a key, but she seemed
to think it was a grand idea, so no biggee. Anyway, as soon as she
unlocked the door, out comes the squawking chicken, which upon further
inspection of my room, had shat in it several times (of course).
Luckily, as of now, I have yet to come upon any other specimens
unexpectedly. Inshallah.
All the women in the garden seem to get a kick out of me hauling
water - I think its probably considered women's work. At least in the
garden it is, where I am the only man who's ever there. That's
excepting my 18 year old friend Amida who's only ever there
specifically to see me and hang out a little, while trying to look
cool in the decidedly un-cool garden.
And lastly, because the bread that Caleb brought us from Kaedi seemed
about to expire, leaving its canned-tuna partner without a mate, and
because sharing is all but mandatory here, and because I didn't want to
share, yesterday night found me huddled in a dark corner of my room,
flashlight in armpit, shoving bread-scooped tuna into my mouth as fast
as I could chew. Needless to say, it wasn't my finest hour, but such
is life here in the RIM.
Beaner Clips N' Telly
My cell phone number is actually 011 222 458 7862 (don't call the one
I previously posted or you'll get my friend Preston. Or hell, give him
a call if you want)
Anyway, since my permanent site, (where I'll be for two years starting
three weeks from now) has no Reso (cellphone coverage) you won't be
able to call me on it except when I'm travelling periodically. So,
there's that.
Also, an addition to my wish list: little beaner clips. They're really
cheap at sporting goods stores.
I previously posted or you'll get my friend Preston. Or hell, give him
a call if you want)
Anyway, since my permanent site, (where I'll be for two years starting
three weeks from now) has no Reso (cellphone coverage) you won't be
able to call me on it except when I'm travelling periodically. So,
there's that.
Also, an addition to my wish list: little beaner clips. They're really
cheap at sporting goods stores.
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
Kulturschock
25 Juilliet 2006
NOTES
A few cultural notes today.
--The mosque is the most hooked-up place in town, in every town in
fact, and has battery powered electricity at night, large gatherings
of men at varying hours, and is ten times more beautiful than any
other 'building' in town. In fact, it is beautiful.
--Everyone drinks everything out of little plastic bags, which are
tied at the top and bitten at one corner to suck out of. They are the
equivalent of plastic or paper cups in the US. They sell oil in them.
They sell water in them. They sell juice, and at the lycee, one of the
cooks sold frozen peach yogurts out of a bucket- 1 plastic bag of
goodness for 100 ougiyas.
All the children here have rhythm that American Symphonic
percussionists would kill for. An overturned plastic drum and their
hands and feet are enough to create impromptu concerts, yet they're
unable to master a simple patty-cake. What gives?
They have different words to mean 'shoo' depending on the animal being
'shooed'. Chickens are 'kss, kss', goats are 'tkk,tkk', and donkeys
are 'errr! errr!'. It's unreal.
Everyone here does a back-of-the-throat tounge click to signify an
affirmative answer (yes, right, okay, etc), and its counterpart, the
tooth-sucking 'No' sound. I love them, and because I think they are
slightly stigmatized as 'provincial', hearing some of the more
educated people (our teachers) slip them in once in a while is
adorable. These aren't the clicks like the language of the Bushmen,
nor is it part of their language in this way. It's like a head nod.
I've been practicing.
Everyone has to take their shoes off to walk on the mats which they
place on the ground for eating and sleeping. However, if you haven't
been wearing shoes and the bottoms of your feet have trodden all over
the shit filled ground, you're golden; you can go from one to the
other with no trouble.
Everyone EVERYWHERE drinks tea all the time. My family, at least, buys
it daily in little tiny packets from the boutique, and though larger
amounts would obviously be more economical, it isn't available. It is
made in little tiny pots and poured in little tiny glasses, from which
it is poured, one to the other from great heights, to cool it and make
foam.
There is sand in all the food.
All the food, besides bread and peanuts, is fried to within an inch of
its life.
Mauritanians go crazy for having their picture taken, and don't smile.
They make stupid poses. It is impossible to get candid shots.
They don't understand the concept of personal property, and will
borrow your things without asking.
Men hold hands with men and women with women. They lie on mattelas
together, and sit very close and stroke each others' hands and arms. It
has no sexual connotation and signifies close friendship and
brotherhood.
They talk very very fast all day long. My family repeats a lot of
things in the course of one sentence.
No one saves anything. My family can fit their belongings in a net
attached below the roof of their house. One does not acquire money
with age, and the only social insurance is an abundance of children.
Even the rich can be poor if their families are big enough to suck
them dry.
They are sufficiently content to pass the time staring at me, no
matter what I'm doing.
NOTES
A few cultural notes today.
--The mosque is the most hooked-up place in town, in every town in
fact, and has battery powered electricity at night, large gatherings
of men at varying hours, and is ten times more beautiful than any
other 'building' in town. In fact, it is beautiful.
--Everyone drinks everything out of little plastic bags, which are
tied at the top and bitten at one corner to suck out of. They are the
equivalent of plastic or paper cups in the US. They sell oil in them.
They sell water in them. They sell juice, and at the lycee, one of the
cooks sold frozen peach yogurts out of a bucket- 1 plastic bag of
goodness for 100 ougiyas.
All the children here have rhythm that American Symphonic
percussionists would kill for. An overturned plastic drum and their
hands and feet are enough to create impromptu concerts, yet they're
unable to master a simple patty-cake. What gives?
They have different words to mean 'shoo' depending on the animal being
'shooed'. Chickens are 'kss, kss', goats are 'tkk,tkk', and donkeys
are 'errr! errr!'. It's unreal.
Everyone here does a back-of-the-throat tounge click to signify an
affirmative answer (yes, right, okay, etc), and its counterpart, the
tooth-sucking 'No' sound. I love them, and because I think they are
slightly stigmatized as 'provincial', hearing some of the more
educated people (our teachers) slip them in once in a while is
adorable. These aren't the clicks like the language of the Bushmen,
nor is it part of their language in this way. It's like a head nod.
I've been practicing.
Everyone has to take their shoes off to walk on the mats which they
place on the ground for eating and sleeping. However, if you haven't
been wearing shoes and the bottoms of your feet have trodden all over
the shit filled ground, you're golden; you can go from one to the
other with no trouble.
Everyone EVERYWHERE drinks tea all the time. My family, at least, buys
it daily in little tiny packets from the boutique, and though larger
amounts would obviously be more economical, it isn't available. It is
made in little tiny pots and poured in little tiny glasses, from which
it is poured, one to the other from great heights, to cool it and make
foam.
There is sand in all the food.
All the food, besides bread and peanuts, is fried to within an inch of
its life.
Mauritanians go crazy for having their picture taken, and don't smile.
They make stupid poses. It is impossible to get candid shots.
They don't understand the concept of personal property, and will
borrow your things without asking.
Men hold hands with men and women with women. They lie on mattelas
together, and sit very close and stroke each others' hands and arms. It
has no sexual connotation and signifies close friendship and
brotherhood.
They talk very very fast all day long. My family repeats a lot of
things in the course of one sentence.
No one saves anything. My family can fit their belongings in a net
attached below the roof of their house. One does not acquire money
with age, and the only social insurance is an abundance of children.
Even the rich can be poor if their families are big enough to suck
them dry.
They are sufficiently content to pass the time staring at me, no
matter what I'm doing.
Shopping List
Everyone who wants to send me things, here are ideas:
Double A batteries
Ziploc bags (good ones, don't cheap out. There are sandstorms here)
Beef or other Jerkies. Protein intake is low here.
Individual dose KoolAide, Gatoraide or crystal light packets (to put
in my 1 liter nalgenes)
Excedrin
LETTERS
Neat paper games, or things I can teach my kids (cats cradle, magic
tricks, card games, other fun diversions)
Pens (the pilot G-2 is my absolute fave)
Mix tapes, and or CD's (CD's can go in my walkman, tapes I can share
with others on boomboxes)
That's all for now. Love you.
(and remember, no boxes, only padded envelopes. The address from the first post is:
Colton Hubbard
Corps de la Paix Americain
B.P 222 Nouakchott, Mauritania, West Africa)
Double A batteries
Ziploc bags (good ones, don't cheap out. There are sandstorms here)
Beef or other Jerkies. Protein intake is low here.
Individual dose KoolAide, Gatoraide or crystal light packets (to put
in my 1 liter nalgenes)
Excedrin
LETTERS
Neat paper games, or things I can teach my kids (cats cradle, magic
tricks, card games, other fun diversions)
Pens (the pilot G-2 is my absolute fave)
Mix tapes, and or CD's (CD's can go in my walkman, tapes I can share
with others on boomboxes)
That's all for now. Love you.
(and remember, no boxes, only padded envelopes. The address from the first post is:
Colton Hubbard
Corps de la Paix Americain
B.P 222 Nouakchott, Mauritania, West Africa)
Milk And Honey
24 Juilliet 2006
The night before last, we returned to M'Beidia from Center Days at the
lycee, at little behind schedule, and in the windy dark. We had spent
Saturday in the gardens of Rinjiao (us blessed Agfo and EE peeps), a
large government preserve with every kind of tree in evidence and
verdant greenness everywhere. Its hard to believe that this actually
is Mauritania, but the bacteria ridden waters of the Senegalese River
are only twenty meters away, so just barely. Its funny, the green life
that IS Senegal starts even before the water reaches shore - 3/4 of
the way across, it starts to bloom and grow on any little scrap of
land floating in the water. It like it just can't wait to get to get
there. Senegal, if you haven't noticed, has the reputation of being
the land of milk and honey (and beer) among us Mauritanians.
The night before we left for Rinjiao it rained again. Actually, the
night before that too- along with awesomely weird displays of
horizontal lightning. But this night was the first real storm- it came
down in torrents, and the sand almost instantly flooded, forming huge
lakes in the lycees courtyard. Some of us, the sillier ones, deigned
to sand-mud wrestle, but I declined. I had gotten thoroughly wet and
was FREEZING. As soon as the rain starts around here, the temperature
drops precipitously about ten degrees. I'm not sure what my cold
threshold is now, but since I've adjusted somewhat to the heat, I
probably get the goosebumps somewhere around 80 degrees. Brrrrr....
Anyway, we're at rain number three of the season, and counting.
After Rinjiao, we of M'Beidia-is and Sebwalla-ic origin waited around
for the car at the home of Rinjiao's Pulaar facilitator
'I-can't-remember-his-name'. The children, though Pulaar speaking,
were pretty much the same, by turns shy, curious and brazen. We
patty-caked for a while, and then retired to the house, which compared
to Haddou's dump of a mud hut, is a palatial villa, with it's actual
walls with color, cement floors and greater than TWO rooms. By
American standards, I guess its still a barren, dusty furniture-less
shack, but whatever.
Later me mingled on the roof, the seven of us and the facilitator's pals,
amidst the great breeze, and views of donkeys and Senegal. One of the
friends was an English teacher and spoke it Excellently, so we chatted
for a bit. He was very handsome, kind, and smelled great. So that's
fun.
By the time Mohamed came in the car to pick us up, it was dark and we
ended up turning randomly off the road into the desert to (purposely
or not) enter M'Beidia from another way. I had a small escort home of
tween boys, a good thing too, considering I lack their apparent
ability to see in the dark. Sahaba was joyed to see me again after my
absence, smiling in the firelight and patting my hand. Abu was so
happy he could hardly speak, and just came to sit in my lap instead.
The night before last, we returned to M'Beidia from Center Days at the
lycee, at little behind schedule, and in the windy dark. We had spent
Saturday in the gardens of Rinjiao (us blessed Agfo and EE peeps), a
large government preserve with every kind of tree in evidence and
verdant greenness everywhere. Its hard to believe that this actually
is Mauritania, but the bacteria ridden waters of the Senegalese River
are only twenty meters away, so just barely. Its funny, the green life
that IS Senegal starts even before the water reaches shore - 3/4 of
the way across, it starts to bloom and grow on any little scrap of
land floating in the water. It like it just can't wait to get to get
there. Senegal, if you haven't noticed, has the reputation of being
the land of milk and honey (and beer) among us Mauritanians.
The night before we left for Rinjiao it rained again. Actually, the
night before that too- along with awesomely weird displays of
horizontal lightning. But this night was the first real storm- it came
down in torrents, and the sand almost instantly flooded, forming huge
lakes in the lycees courtyard. Some of us, the sillier ones, deigned
to sand-mud wrestle, but I declined. I had gotten thoroughly wet and
was FREEZING. As soon as the rain starts around here, the temperature
drops precipitously about ten degrees. I'm not sure what my cold
threshold is now, but since I've adjusted somewhat to the heat, I
probably get the goosebumps somewhere around 80 degrees. Brrrrr....
Anyway, we're at rain number three of the season, and counting.
After Rinjiao, we of M'Beidia-is and Sebwalla-ic origin waited around
for the car at the home of Rinjiao's Pulaar facilitator
'I-can't-remember-his-name'. The children, though Pulaar speaking,
were pretty much the same, by turns shy, curious and brazen. We
patty-caked for a while, and then retired to the house, which compared
to Haddou's dump of a mud hut, is a palatial villa, with it's actual
walls with color, cement floors and greater than TWO rooms. By
American standards, I guess its still a barren, dusty furniture-less
shack, but whatever.
Later me mingled on the roof, the seven of us and the facilitator's pals,
amidst the great breeze, and views of donkeys and Senegal. One of the
friends was an English teacher and spoke it Excellently, so we chatted
for a bit. He was very handsome, kind, and smelled great. So that's
fun.
By the time Mohamed came in the car to pick us up, it was dark and we
ended up turning randomly off the road into the desert to (purposely
or not) enter M'Beidia from another way. I had a small escort home of
tween boys, a good thing too, considering I lack their apparent
ability to see in the dark. Sahaba was joyed to see me again after my
absence, smiling in the firelight and patting my hand. Abu was so
happy he could hardly speak, and just came to sit in my lap instead.
Just Another Day
14 Juilliet 2006
Schedule
So what is a typical day in M'Beidia like? Well since the calendar of
events for most of the native inhabitants is so light as to be almost
nonexistent (breathe, drink tea, eat, nap in the shade, repeat) I'll
tell you about mine, which is only marginally different.
At about six or six thirty in the morning, I'll wake up in my (now
usually sand filled) mosquito net, to the sound of roosters crowing (a
noise which, forgive me, possesses no redeeming qualities) and/or the
braying of donkeys (a sound whose redeeming qualities stem only from
the animal's beatific, sad eyes, and its childhood associations with
Eyore, of Winnie the Pooh fame). Then I'll lay in my tent for another
few minutes, the only place in the country I can (somewhat)
respectably lounge in my fruit of the looms (its fucking HOT people)
Then my mother Sahaba will beckon to me to get up, so I can put away
my tent and mattela, and sit on the ground for a few more minutes of
nothing at all
Then I'll eat breakfast (mburro/bread and gerte/peanuts) and tea, study
a bit and practice my verbs, until the kids start to rally round for
some sitting in my lap, or staring at me, or speaking at me
unintelligibly, or some being tickled, or fake growled at, or some
trying on my glasses. Repeat, repeat.
At quarter to eight or normally later, I'll head out to Haddou's house
for class, but no longer am I trailed behind by an escorting army of
children, Pied Piper fashion. Some of the novelty appears to have worn
off, but what could have stolen the spotlight from three crazy white
people in this village, I'm not yet sure. Still the catcalls continue
everywhere: "Hamed, Mohamed, Mohamed!!" That's my name folks, don't
wear it out.
At class we have four hours of language in the heat and sand of
Haddou's crumbling house, a little English chatter in the breaks (a
relief), a lot of confusion as we struggle to elucidate concepts
through a melange of English, bad French (on my part) and Hassaniya.
My smattering of French, and Haddou's sprinkle of oddly pronounced
English do not a complete match make. Still, we get by.
At noon, we break for our houses and families, eat maaro we il huut
(fish and rice, every day), play with my kids, drink some tea,
practice stringing together phrases such as "Do you have a donkey? Is
your donkey dirty? Does it make tea? (pause for laughs) Do you like
cats? Why?", and have a siesta if I can, but usually it's too hot, or
too sandy or too dirty or crowded to have much of a sleep.
Our afternoon class from four to six is usually pretty loopy,
afterwhich we repair to the garden until seven or eight, when it
starts to get darker, breezy, and lovely. Then dinner in the dark by
flashlight, a rest, a look at the stars, and then sleep. Enough about
my day, how about yours?
Schedule
So what is a typical day in M'Beidia like? Well since the calendar of
events for most of the native inhabitants is so light as to be almost
nonexistent (breathe, drink tea, eat, nap in the shade, repeat) I'll
tell you about mine, which is only marginally different.
At about six or six thirty in the morning, I'll wake up in my (now
usually sand filled) mosquito net, to the sound of roosters crowing (a
noise which, forgive me, possesses no redeeming qualities) and/or the
braying of donkeys (a sound whose redeeming qualities stem only from
the animal's beatific, sad eyes, and its childhood associations with
Eyore, of Winnie the Pooh fame). Then I'll lay in my tent for another
few minutes, the only place in the country I can (somewhat)
respectably lounge in my fruit of the looms (its fucking HOT people)
Then my mother Sahaba will beckon to me to get up, so I can put away
my tent and mattela, and sit on the ground for a few more minutes of
nothing at all
Then I'll eat breakfast (mburro/bread and gerte/peanuts) and tea, study
a bit and practice my verbs, until the kids start to rally round for
some sitting in my lap, or staring at me, or speaking at me
unintelligibly, or some being tickled, or fake growled at, or some
trying on my glasses. Repeat, repeat.
At quarter to eight or normally later, I'll head out to Haddou's house
for class, but no longer am I trailed behind by an escorting army of
children, Pied Piper fashion. Some of the novelty appears to have worn
off, but what could have stolen the spotlight from three crazy white
people in this village, I'm not yet sure. Still the catcalls continue
everywhere: "Hamed, Mohamed, Mohamed!!" That's my name folks, don't
wear it out.
At class we have four hours of language in the heat and sand of
Haddou's crumbling house, a little English chatter in the breaks (a
relief), a lot of confusion as we struggle to elucidate concepts
through a melange of English, bad French (on my part) and Hassaniya.
My smattering of French, and Haddou's sprinkle of oddly pronounced
English do not a complete match make. Still, we get by.
At noon, we break for our houses and families, eat maaro we il huut
(fish and rice, every day), play with my kids, drink some tea,
practice stringing together phrases such as "Do you have a donkey? Is
your donkey dirty? Does it make tea? (pause for laughs) Do you like
cats? Why?", and have a siesta if I can, but usually it's too hot, or
too sandy or too dirty or crowded to have much of a sleep.
Our afternoon class from four to six is usually pretty loopy,
afterwhich we repair to the garden until seven or eight, when it
starts to get darker, breezy, and lovely. Then dinner in the dark by
flashlight, a rest, a look at the stars, and then sleep. Enough about
my day, how about yours?
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
Village Life
11 Juilliet 2006
Let me tell you how in love I am with some of the children here. My
two favorites are my little niece Amtee and my nephew Abu who are both
not possibly older than 7, and cuter than any two beings have a right
to be. Bursting with personality they are: Amtee with her half and
half hair (one side in braids, the other left to its defenses in a
wild Fro) and Abu with his missing front teeth (four on top, four on
bottom) with which he constantly self-consciously fidgets. Also
Crystal's Abu (they are standard issue here) who is silent and
morosely un-smiling, and then shy and lisping Damaak of the giant buck
teeth, beautiful teen Halima, spunky Habiba- all of them. These people
are GORGEOUS, they won the genetic lottery, like some sort of
consolation prize for living in a 100 % shithole (J/K, J/K.......)
The houses: the houses are made of mud, or rather a mixture of mud and
something else which makes them rather strong-ish. Some are made of
cement like blocks, but regardless they are all the color of the
ground, which is dun or light tan. Truly, there is very little color
here, save for the pastel yellow and blue windows of the madrasa, or
the green of a few trees (Neem, and Balinides Egyptica mostly). There
seems to be no planning involved in the village's structure- in fact
even the word village conjures images in the American mind which are
much more centralized than this will ever be. There are some places
with many huts clustered together, and some huge empty spaces with
nothing but trash for meters and meters. Nothing is parallel: the
paths, such as they are, are all winding and jagged. Geometry of
buildings is limited: minimalist rectangles, and/or asymmetrically
chic shapes seem to be the in- thing. I personally think it is so
last-season, but whatevs.
Last night, Caleb and Saman and Bolol came to visit and check up on us
in a big Peace Corps white cariot. We met in the garden, where our
plots were almost dug (beautiful, beautiful) and where we had just
lost our water hauling bladder down to well's dark abyss. Then on to
my house's front porch for a little chat, some cookies and cold cokes
(a thing of beauty) and a little ubiquitous etaay (tea) Then a storm
started to move in on the horizon, in dazzling swirls of dust and
filtered light which darkened the sky; it was bitchin'! My family
laughed because I wanted to sit out amidst the dust and watch it.
I was totally willing to be blown all around with dust because the
rain was supposed to follow the storm, and I, accordingly would frolic
nekked in it. But no rain. Motherfucker. And no one seems to know why
"Maa narav" (don't know) they say. Well, thanks for nothing.
Let me tell you how in love I am with some of the children here. My
two favorites are my little niece Amtee and my nephew Abu who are both
not possibly older than 7, and cuter than any two beings have a right
to be. Bursting with personality they are: Amtee with her half and
half hair (one side in braids, the other left to its defenses in a
wild Fro) and Abu with his missing front teeth (four on top, four on
bottom) with which he constantly self-consciously fidgets. Also
Crystal's Abu (they are standard issue here) who is silent and
morosely un-smiling, and then shy and lisping Damaak of the giant buck
teeth, beautiful teen Halima, spunky Habiba- all of them. These people
are GORGEOUS, they won the genetic lottery, like some sort of
consolation prize for living in a 100 % shithole (J/K, J/K.......)
The houses: the houses are made of mud, or rather a mixture of mud and
something else which makes them rather strong-ish. Some are made of
cement like blocks, but regardless they are all the color of the
ground, which is dun or light tan. Truly, there is very little color
here, save for the pastel yellow and blue windows of the madrasa, or
the green of a few trees (Neem, and Balinides Egyptica mostly). There
seems to be no planning involved in the village's structure- in fact
even the word village conjures images in the American mind which are
much more centralized than this will ever be. There are some places
with many huts clustered together, and some huge empty spaces with
nothing but trash for meters and meters. Nothing is parallel: the
paths, such as they are, are all winding and jagged. Geometry of
buildings is limited: minimalist rectangles, and/or asymmetrically
chic shapes seem to be the in- thing. I personally think it is so
last-season, but whatevs.
Last night, Caleb and Saman and Bolol came to visit and check up on us
in a big Peace Corps white cariot. We met in the garden, where our
plots were almost dug (beautiful, beautiful) and where we had just
lost our water hauling bladder down to well's dark abyss. Then on to
my house's front porch for a little chat, some cookies and cold cokes
(a thing of beauty) and a little ubiquitous etaay (tea) Then a storm
started to move in on the horizon, in dazzling swirls of dust and
filtered light which darkened the sky; it was bitchin'! My family
laughed because I wanted to sit out amidst the dust and watch it.
I was totally willing to be blown all around with dust because the
rain was supposed to follow the storm, and I, accordingly would frolic
nekked in it. But no rain. Motherfucker. And no one seems to know why
"Maa narav" (don't know) they say. Well, thanks for nothing.
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