The pendulum

Sometimes I am filled with the desire to be here, and sometimes it leaves, like a guest.

Sometimes it feels like I'm living a double-speed, doubly thick version of my previous life, becoming, by the moment, something both greater and better, and sometimes it feels as if I've merely transplanted myself like a dead vegetable into new soil.

I feel lonely and melancholy.

I feel odd and silly, like a naive wanderer.

The thing is though, this changes everyday in a revolving, exhausting fashion which is impossible to predict. Everytime I come to the point where my life here seems useless or pretentious and unwanted, something will happen (who knows what) and I'll fall back into the patterned fog of Mauritanian life and stay.

It's almost never because I come to some sort of epiphany about my 'importance' or a rush of feeling about 'making a difference' or some other such (sorry) nonsense. Most recently my mind changed because I started my tree nursery, and I understood every word Brahim said, and because the bread ladies smiled at me.

The difficulties themselves are ungovernable - always shifting, growing stonger here, letting up there, so that I never know when or where to look for them. By the way, I hope no one reading is (still) under any illusions that the 'hard part' of (Peace Corps) existence in the 3rd world is the lack of electricity, or running water, or plumbing (or toilet paper), or consumer goods, or easy transportation, or good food, or for that matter, the constancy of wind/heat/dirt/sand/flies. Good god. Most of those things I almost never think about, not since the first few 'trial by fire' weeks in Mauritania. Infinitely more difficult than not having electric light is the experience of living in a place where you can never fully understand anyone (nor be fully expressed) trying to do work which almost no one wants or cares about (and the value of which you are hardly sure of) in a place where everyone thinks you're both incredibly wealthy and that you're going to hell just for not praying (not to mention the treasure trove of other sins they could condemn you for, if only they knew) and where you exist merely in the thin space between everyone's graciousness and disaster.

It's hard to believe I've been here for eight months. It's hard to believe how brown my arms have become ......

But honestly though, how bad could it be? It's such an unnamed, though pervasive arrogance which causes us to be called 'volunteers' and to advertise 'the experience' with words like 'hardship' and 'sacrifice', as if we, as westerners were by our very nature entitled to be free of those things, and that by giving up that right we are allowed to be self-congratulating and the occasional objects of some sort of misguided admiration. What's a couple of years compared to a life-time lived in 5 square kilometers?

Isn't part of what makes this bearable for us (though we are all loathe to admit it) the knowledge that we will be leaving? That we will never, ever be stuck here, in the way that so many of them are stuck here? (Not to mention the thoughts of future resume lines, the influential connections, the book jacket bio filler) Plus, even if we lived their lives exactly for 2 years, every moment of lusterless boredom shared, every denied want, every disappointment, every symptom of poverty identical, it still wouldn't make us one of them. And even I don't do that, and (no offense) my situation is about as no-frills Peace Corps as it gets, so if I don't do it, probably no one does.

Having said that, I'll say this: if part of what makes this time bearable is the knowledge that it will end, then part of what makes if difficult is knowing what you're missing.

That's not to say, of course, that my 'stress' is significantly added to by thinking that I could, right now be watching the Food Network in my underwear (though I'd be the world's biggest liar if I said that telephone calls, the internet and bacon with toast aren't appealing). But there's no question I'd still trade all that dead and glossy American stuffing for any number of things here which I feel have quantitatively more life-mass - my friend, Cheikh for one, with his too-big smile, his heart-breaking politeness and serious eyes.

It's not anything very specific that I might miss, I guess if I had to put it briefly I would say that, as trite as it sounds, in America one feels like things are generally possible, and in the RIM one generally feels like they aren't.

I miss feeling like I'm part of the world, though if I'm being honest I'm probably much more so now, whatever that means, than I ever was in the US, being depressed, watching the West Wing.....

But one doesn't miss what one never had. For the most part, the people in my village have little idea of( and less curiousity about) what goes on outside of EQ, and therefore no good reason to temper their general contentment (because they are, in fact, content. And why not? Even with the insidious memory of previous conveniences and liberties, I'm still much happier here, and have been so for longer, than I ever was at almost any point during my life before now). I don't pity them, because there's nothing to pity. Pity is a reverse arrogance, anyway. Pity is a smug frown. No matter what your intentions, if you feel sorry for someone who laughs more than you, and who has never thought about 'ending it', because you live in college educated air conditioning, and they're without plumbing, then you're a fool. And fools never did anyone any good. Of course ignorance is bliss, but so be it - bliss is bliss.

(Is there hunger and death and stilted longing that I don't see, even living as close as I do? Surely....but what do you want from me?)

In the end, (here's the thesis coming), maybe everything comes out just about even. I don't think our lives, (meaning 'us', meaning humans in general) are lived on some sort of sliding scale between 1 and 10 where ten wins, but maybe instead on something closer to a series of parallel paths in which everyone lives at basically the same standard deviations of fulfillment, regardless of, I don't know, everything. It's crossing over from one to the other that's a pickle.

So god help those who transition.

Camera Obscura # 2

Jiddou trying out a pose with attitude.

A lackluster photo of St Louis's crumbling elegance.

Rachel doing a nerdy pose near the beach in St Louis, and my dearly departed Lee and Christine. We miss you!!

Bobbo covers his eyes.

Take me out

I love Dakar. Did you expect any less?

If you don't know what WAIST is, you're probably not in Peace Corps. And if you don't win it, you're from somewhere besides Mauritania (Yay! We won! It must be all the sand and ruthless heat that make of our intrepid softballers unstoppable machines).

Anyway, WAIST stands for West African Invitational Softball Tournament, and the rest is whatever you make of it. Even after months in the vacuum of desert, many drunk Americans, hot-dogs and baseball aren't quite what I would refer to as the highlights of Dakar. Not to mention the queasily compoundish and 'Passage to India' -like nature of the 'American Club' where we played. Still there was beer, there was dancing and there was English, so there was fun to be had.

Anyway, Senegal is like Mauritania cubed. So you have to bring it.

Dakar is notoriously crime-ridden and teeming with pick-pocketers, muggers and -who knows.. vampires?- a fact which I can't seriously doubt, but which I found nothing to support. I feel like the people who allow themselves to be closed off because of this reputation are weak and flawed (excepting women - women probably have a legitimate right to feel scared all the time in Africa). Am I naive? Insufferably. Am I preachy? Sickeningly. Are there untold volumes of things I don't understand about Africa? Unquestionably. But listen to this....

In most interactions with African's, it is necessary to immediately establish that you are not a western imperialist, a tourist, or someone who has no interest in understanding them. And ironically, the best way to do this is to also immediately establish a sort of dominance. Because of course, as in any culture in which you are an Alien, your ignorance and consequent fear make you subject and suspicious, though your manners may be those of disinterested aloofness, or disdain, or of practiced (though maybe unconcious) superiority. So you need to make them see you as a person, and then you need to see them as one too.

You need to be impeccably earnest, kind and honest. Your lack of fear, your guilelessness (sp?) will disarm them. If you are guarded, there are plenty of people who will give you something to be guarded about. If you are confrontational, you will lose all confrontations. You have other weapons: smiles help, a lot, your tone of voice is important. You need to be funny, you need to be quick. If you are neither, then god help you, they will eat you alive.

You need to find a way to exist in their physical space. I get right up close and stare into their eyes like a puppy dog and smile big (not like a nutter). My hand always finds its way to their shoulder and squeezes or rests there while my grinning mouth talks about the heat or asks for directions. I scold those whose prices are too high with a wag of my finger, I pout my lips and scrunch up my brows and ask them why they are so mean to me. And then when they get too serious or start shouting, I poke them in the chin, and ask why they aren't smiling, or put my arm around their waist and my hand on their stomach. In America this would be highly unusual, inappropriate and antagonizing, but here it just works. I do not know why.

Again, speaking through the language of gestures I say, 'My brother, I love you. Now, these oranges are shit, please lower your price'. But no matter how harmless, or careless, or playful you seem to be, the little intelligent flame in the back of your brain must never go out. You can not be stupid, or you will deserve what comes to you. This is Africa, after all, the color of your skin is unfortunately always talking, and you do not get to choose who listens in. So while my mouth is chatting, the hand on their tummy always whispers 'If you repay my kindness with deception, I will destroy you'.

I met a nice young man working at a pizza shop who I think will be the next something-or- other important of Senegal. He was brilliant, and wistful, and talked with me about Michael Owens, and how American's don't care about soccer.

I met a security guard and explained to him the rules of baseball, halfway through realizing both that I did not know said rules and that he actually did, though had proclaimed not to out of politeness. Then I gave him some candy and he tried on my sunglasses.

I met so many cab drivers I can't count them. It sometimes feels too easy - I'll greet them in Wolof a little (all I know), then ask them how they are, ask them if they've had lunch, if they're tired, if they like dogs, if they're married, why they drive so fast, or whatever comes to mind. It's not quite a science, but it's definitely an art.

Unfortunately, a thorn (a nail? a hypodermic needle? a chicken bone?) on the ground (and later in my foot) put me out of commission for a few days, so instead of wandering Dakar I mostly just limped around like a scary, homeless ghost between my bed and the club.

I did get to see a few things though...

Traffic, traffic. The big commuter busses, the color-splashed cartier transports, crammed full with people, weaving through lanes.

A cool scrap metal horse sculpture, rearing its head.

Fruit. Oh my god, there is nothing more beautiful than an overflowing fruit stand, glowing like lit-up jewels at night on the side of the road.

I saw the stifling grip of religion (in this case, Islam) fall away a little like a dark veil, and for some of the rhythmic variety of natural human lives begin to return.

I saw a really big ram.

I ate absolutely perfect pastries for breakfast, each as elegantly fashioned and unique as snowflakes.

Horse carts, moving through traffic along side sleek mopeds and shiny new nissans.

I saw what appears to be the disturbingly insular nature of the American ex-pat community.

I saw an uncountable number of unfathomably beautiful people, in clothes the colors of everything, with intelligent eyes, laughing, or sad, or busy, or heedless, or loving, walking through their lives -those made from the constant, palpable richness of an only partially tamed wilderness.

Road Notes # 2

A few thoughts while traveling to Tijikja...

1 This time out of my village I caught a ride with one of the big, Italian-donated green supply trucks that come here occasionally bearing all sorts of necessary, and unnecessary junk.

2 The truck had a crew of 4 (very dirty) men who sat off to the side as the villagers unloaded the truck and flared their egos.

3 When I approached them to ask for a ride they were on a small mat, eating a lunch/dinner of white rice, which had been cooked on a little gas burner in the cab of the truck.

4 I bet it was the first time they were ever asked by some random whitey, living in the middle of nowhere and speaking their language, if he could catch a ride on top of their motored leviathan.

5 Cheikh, the driver, wouldn't let me ride on top because he said I would fall. So I rode in the cab. (By the way, I totally would not have fallen).

6 Hours later (around ten pm) after eating cous cous with a strange family, served by a Buddha-like woman who hid her face, we left.

7 Ironically big trucks get stuck in the sand much more frequently than little ones (sand is basically like snow) and so on about twenty separate occasions we stopped and put down giant metal plates on the ground for traction.

8. They expressed surprise when I proved willing and able to give unsolicited help getting unstuck, much the same way everyone else expresses surprise whenever I do almost anything at all.

9. The crew of men (none over 30) were each like something perfectly sketched by a short storyist's pen. Cheikh, slightly pudgy yet solid with a highish, nasal voice, a little imperious, a chain smoker. Ali, side-kick-esque, thin, and with one lame leg causing him to limp heavily, sober-voiced and quiet, the rice-cooker, the tea-maker. And the two Mohameds, both young, both sporting spectacularly oil-stained clothes, one short with thick, aggressive features, a happy persona and loud, bad (yet fluid) French, the other tall and thin and broad-shouldered, with an elegant, finely drawn face, austere eyebrows; the countenance of a wise child.

10 From sucking on a rubber hose earlier to induce gasoline to travel from a spare barrel to the fuel tank, tall Mohamed had become ill, and afterward merely lay in the truck bed while we dug out the tires. More importantly I knew what was happening because I know the verb 'to vomit' (which is Yigdhev).

11 We finally reached the gudrone about six hours later (4 am) and collapsed on dirty mats under a hangar on the side of the road, me sharing the blankets of this strange collection of men I didn't know a few hours ago. Sometimes Mauritania is wild.

12 Also, not for nothing, but could you imagine for a second that I would ever be allowed to find myself in a similar situation with the approximate counterparts of these people (whoever those might be) in America? No sir. Being foreign in the third world is like having a backstage pass to all sorts of crazy perks. Although I guess perks is relative.

13 The next morning I woke up to the sound of names being called. One of the inscrutable, and, I happen to think, endearing things that Mauritanians do is to call the name of the person they want over and over and over again, with out ceasing, and without the change of inflection or exasperated shouting that would certainly seem reasonable after a while. They just evenly call over and over, as if they're certain you will answer and haven't a thing to do in the meantime.

14 Spread on the pavement we breakfasted on peanuts and camel biscuits. Ali made tea on the gas burner and served it from a dirty, blue-plastic oil jug, turned on its side, with holes cut out for two kesses (shot glasses) and a baraad (the dainty little tea pot).

15 One of the new companions I had acquired overnight (we had slept in a place with several more of their truck-driving companions, waiting for a wheel to their hobbled vehicle) was named Yahya and had such exaggerated African features (prodigious lips; wide, flat nose; almond shaped eyes ) that it was hard to believe he was real. He chatted with me about his wish to learn karate while Cheikh scrubbed his feet on the pavement with a sliver of soap and a stone.

16 The late morning found me waiting in the searing heat for a car, in one of the many places in Mauritania where no one should ever have settled down. (But they did).

17 At the gendarme stop, where Yahye and his newly be-wheeled comanions bade me their farewell, I finally snagged a car for the second leg of my journey. The driver was nice, conversational but just enough for politeness, his speech intelligible, the window was down (it was just the two of us) the fare was free, and he gave me an orange from the pile on the floor. That's what's known as a holiday.

Je les ne veux pas

Hello Valentines

This post is to void all the previous posts I have put up asking for lovely American mass produced gifts to be sent in the mail. I have received an embarrassment of riches from many friendly people and no longer need anything. Except perhaps inner clarity and infinite wisdom, but those don't ship well.

If you still want to send things, please send the following:

Ziploc bags.

Pens I will continue to receive with joy, but I'm changing my preference from the uncapped pilot G2, which are my favorites, to the capped, and therefore sand-resistant uniball something or others. Just something with liquid ink.


Everything else I can either find on occasion in the capital, or is no longer important to me. As one might imagine, my living requirements are ridiculously reduced.

Plus, it's not like any of you are Rockefellers, to be perfectly honest....

So that's all. Plus good wishes to you all, so far away.

-Colton


PS Happy Birthday Mom. I love you.

How to avoid the subjunctive

Now is the time of Jujubees and millet. Now is the time of cold, of windy skies and hazes.

The greenery is being picked clean, the remaining shoots of desert peanuts, the brush-like weeds, the green skin of the poisonous turga. So it follows that the milk has begun to dry up as well; we don't drink it anymore, in big, plentiful gulps from metal bowls. Sometimes we have it with our nightly cous-cous, (poured and mixed with the hand, into a soupy glob that you slurp from your palm - it is incredibly good) And sometimes not.

As the green goes further and further away, the Tagant comes to resemble ever more the surface of a distant planet. No kidding - it's just plains and plains of rocks and reddish sand and mountainous, impassive cliffs. The inhabitants are, at times, just as alien to me as the scenery.

And then, many times, and without warning, they simply aren't.

In fact, it's surprisingly easy to forget that all my interactions with people, and therefore all the relationships and events that make up my days, are in another language, as if they happen in a place a few inches in front of my nose, instead of behind it. That fact is simultaneously unremarkable and continously astonishing. I remember how, months ago, landing in Casablanca, -a stopover on the way here- I felt mildly terrified at the loss of my language. It was my first time out of the country (Oh! dear, sweet bumpkin) and suddenly, something that I had always taken for granted, something that I had always been blessed to have in easy abundance (English) was no longer available. Just like that.

Now, I have to try hard to hear the constant jibbering around me as exotic, to hear it like I used to, as an unintelligable collection of foreign syllables.

Which is not to say that I'm no longer confused. I'm always at least somewhat out of the loop, and more often than not, I'm left staring off into space, with a wrinkled brow, thinking about hamburgers...

Nevertheless, the clueless westerner does have at his disposal a few tools. One that has served me especially well is the classic, non-commital utterance 'Mmmm', which straddles the boundary between 'yes' and 'no', and accordingly takes on whatever meaning the questioner secretly wants to hear. It's outrageously successful, and works like this:

Q- Cheikh-Akhmedou (that's me), do you want me to bring you some cous-cous?

Me: Mmmmm....

Q- Okay, I'll be right back.

(Actually, this example is misleading, because no one ever offers to bring me anything)


Another option is of course ignoring the question altogether, or changing the subject with some left-field non-sequitor like:

'Your shirt is dirty'

or

'My head hurts'

or

'Get that chicken out of my house!'


One which sometimes works better than others is the stock answer I'm not a muslim. Surprisingly, it applies to more situations than one might hope, though not always.

'But I'm not a muslim!' I'll answer a bit frantically to some perceived question.

'Ok-aay,' they'll say, 'but I was just telling you that you have rice on your nose'


The point is, one gets by. One rediscovers day after day what lives at the place where words end, and how to push forward through it like a new neighborhood. It helps to be clever, honestly. It helps to be fearless, or at least to tell yourself that you are. It helps to recognize value in the language of gestures - an icy stare, or a well-timed poke in the ribs, or an impromptu bout of arm wrestling can speak volumes. I like to think that good will can be exchanged through the skin of the fingertips. What mine says is something like 'I can't understand you because we are worlds of words apart. But lets hold hands'.

Some things though, need no translation. The other day I was helping my friends Bobo and Taleb make bricks from sand and cement in a square near the market. We had stopped for tea and biscuits when across the way we saw a little wandering donkey poking his oversized head and mangy ears through the entrance of their family's boutique. Donkeys almost always behave so much like nervously maladjusted people that its impossible not to personify them. This one seemed to be running low on sugar for tea, and had popped out to re-up. None of us mentioned it and only smiled, though it was nice to be sure that for once we were all on the same page.

The body electric

Request:

Can someone send me a battery (or four) for my retro rangefinder camera Yashica Electro 35 GSN. You can get them at Radio Shack or maybe Wallgreens for about 4 bucks. Look for the 4LR44 1.5 V or the 6V (PX)28A. They weigh about nothing, and they're cheap. Don't you want me to be happy?

Camera Obscura

This is my friend Abdelai, who I'm teaching the basics in English and who follows me around like a lost puppy. I didn't even take this picture, my friend Moustapha was fooling with my electronic gadgets. It's cool though, yes?

This is my family in M'Beidia. I don't have time to tell you all of their names. Still, I'll say that Moussa, the baby in Tutu's arms (girl on end) once pooped on me. Aren't they cute?

These are some miniature M'Beidian's playing soccer with the miniature basket ball I gave them.

Me and Hamid-Daa eating lunch the other day at my house. Notice the fork (that's mine). I feel it is my right when eating with children. In the cup is yummy crystal lite raspberry something or other.

Yaqob and Cheikh. Yaqob has a freakily good American accent when I get him to say my real name, and things like 'hello' . Cheikh has a really dirty face.

You could be in pictures

Hi gang!

I think I was just finally able to post some pictures. I'm an awful photographer, and there aren't many, but its something. More when I can get it.

The photo site is this: http://flickr.com/photos/desertletters

Still, I'm going to try to transfer them to the blog. We'll see how that goes.

X's and O's

The day after Christmas I came to Nouakchott, and it was good. At 10:30 in the evening everything was lit-up and loud, all the cars zooming and racing. They honk with such perfect art, it's as though it were orchestrated. This (the honking) and the flashing of headlights occur at seemingly random and irregular times, the pattern is inscrutable, at least to me.

No one remembers this -the relative 'citi-ness', the aliveness of Nouakchott- from our first hurried pass through six long months ago. We remember a long patch of road, and dirt, and chaos. It's as though we all had been sharing some waking dream.

Since then I've been exploring a bit, eating a lot and generally having a grand old time. Me and my American pals have been catching up in the brief snitches of time in which we are in each other's presence, in which we pass by hurriedly, trying to relate 4 months of divergent experiences and knowing that it doesn't really matter it we do. I think Nouakchott makes things fit, I think it's like a piece of the puzzle. But even as it answers some questions, it asks many others. Let me explain.

In my village I eat cous-cous and rice, and we do not have chairs. We do not have streets. In Nouakchott there are restaurants, there are a million taxi-cabs, there are women with their heads uncovered, there are women wearing pants. There are real hotels and there are omelets with ham. There is everything.

I'm trying to figure out the divide between the two worlds (it is, in fact, a quantum leap). I'm thinking about the middle ground, and where it exists. Why can I get breakfast in Nouakchott, in a chrome-trimmed, olive-green cafe, served on elegant white plates with tiny cups of cafe au lait, and fresh orange juice? In my village we don't eat on plates, and everything is the same color - brown, like the sand.

What I'm trying to get across is not how awful village life is (it's not) or what I have to do without. I'm not even talking about the difference between upper class and lower, or rural and urban, because that much is obvious and it's results are predictable. No, it's about the fact that what exists in Nouakchott seems to come from nowhere, it has no other precedent, that I've seen, in the rest of the country. As such, it's like an alien outgrowth, it's like an island.

I ate in a little cafe for lunch today, with shiny tables, flat screen televisions and a waiter. I had an incredible hamburger and stylish frites and a glass-bottled coke poured over lemon and ice. Where did they learn to place the forks just so? How can I be drinking a strawberry milkshake from a straw, when last week I was chasing goats from my house? I feel dizzy, like a skipped a few steps in coming here, I feel like the whole country did.

Plus, not to get overly sentimental about nothing, but how sweet and heartbreaking and melancholy and hopeful to eat a personal pizza with olives and an orange fanta, served by a uniformed young man, in a country where almost everywhere else, life is like the 12th century. I feel as though Nouakchott is growing, like an awkward teenager, with its often (ironically) pretentious mannerisms and hidden graces. I think it has something to prove. And that makes me have a kind of un-earned pride, and smile to myself.

What's more, for all its incongruity, this city also makes Mauritania make sense. When you've been living your life in the aforementioned ancient past, you begin to wonder how a country like this, so unconnected and lethargic and aloof, doesn't collapse under the weight of its own apathy and sink back into the desert. But Nouakchott is like Mauritania's respectable brother, who you never knew about before, and who presents a suit and tie and an attentive face to the rest of the world. Granted, the face is a little dirty, and the thrift store-ish suit is mothbitten and smudged... But still, what cheeky optimism! What precious earnestness! I want to bottle it up. I want to make it a cake. I want to give it a big kiss.

Mwah.