Flowers….Water…..Malaria

[Flowers in the Bush, near Gaya]

I snapped the pictures above in macro mode during my recent trip to Gaya. The flowers were a welcomed site, some of the first I’ve seen in Niger besides those on tress. My friend Kim has some Marigolds in her concession garden. Although they do offer some insect repelling benefits, her villagers don’t really understand the idea of having them. In Niger caring for a garden typically requires pulling water from a well and carrying it on your head back to your garden. I can understand Nigeriens’ lack of enthusiasm to carry water for anything that doesn’t fulfill the basic needs of survival. In some villages women have to walk several miles just to reach water.

The last few days have been fairly laid back. I caught up on the news, worked on my radio database, sent a few emails and assisted people with their computer class homework. I also submitted a radio show in Hausa to DW online for a local journalist which was cool. Soon it will be making its way from Germany by satellite back to a few radio stations in Niger. Yesterday I also caught the president’s (of Niger) wife’s car caravan going through Dosso. She was promoting the distribution of 3 million mosquito nets throughout Niger. No one has been able to tell me how locals can get them though.
Yesterday day evening I visited my friend Aziz. While I was in Gaya his 25 year-old brother died suddenly. Stomach pains one day and death the next. While his illness did not seem to be related to malaria. Worldwide, malaria kills more than one million people annually. In Africa, it kills a child every 30 seconds. I’ve been surprised by the number of people I know that have already caught Malaria at least once this year. These people have a little more money than the average Nigerien so they can afford the three day supply of medication, but poorer families, especially in rural area often do not have that luxury. Even more surprising is the number of people I know who don’t use mosquito nets. Some don’t want to spend the $5 others think they don’t need one. I keep telling them otherwise. Use your computer’s unused resources to help fight malaria.

On a lighter note, I’ve been rediscovering the magic of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with some strawberry jelly I got in Niamey. mmmm I’ve also been thinking about what I’m going to do after PC. My 2 years here is going to be over fast! Last night and today were cloudy and rainy so I didn’t get to enjoy the peak of the Perseids meteor shower. Maybe tonight.

Technorati Tags: Niger, Peace Corps, Malaria, water

Gaya: A Very Green Adventure in Niger

[A large Baobab on the road to Albarkaize]

Thursday morning I woke just before sunrise to pack my single bag: mosquito net, binoculars, bird book, 1L water, camera, notepad and a few other small items for my trip to Gaya. I arrived at the bus station and caught the 8:30 bus to the city of Gaya. Due to rainy season the road was in horrible shape. A trip that is typically 2-3hrs took closer to 4. Despite the uncomfortable and long ride, the scenery was beautiful. About half way there the scenery became greener with lots of palm trees and significantly taller millet. In many villages people planted millet in their concession, leaving only small paths to their huts and houses. I arrived in Gaya after noon and went to the reported location of the radio station to discover that it had moved. I decided to stop for lunch at a restaurant which reportedly served delicious beef with a mushroom cream sauce and bread. It was great and to my surprise they even had satellite tv. I watched the end of Mission Impossible with subtitles in Arabic. After lunch I walked to the radio station. Their new location was on top of a small mesa on the edge of town. Their setup was impressive by Niger standards and to supplement their income they also opened a cybercafe and a bar/restaurant. Although a little less accessible, the location offers reasonably priced services and great views. I worked with one staff member to evaluate their setup and problems and assisted with a few computer issues. I spent several hours at the radio station and then left to catch a ride to Albarkaize.

The road to Albarkaize is always in bad shape since it’s an all dirt road. As a result the quality of transport is also reduced. I got lucky and only had to wait about 15 minutes to catch a ride in the back of an small, over crowded, truck. I was the next to last person to get on, so I got stuck in the very center sitting mostly on people’s feet. The ride was somewhat painful and probably a tie for the worst ride yet, in-country. The ride took about 1.5 hours. I was dropped off on the side of the road surrounded by palms, baobabs, and tree covered mesas. I began the walk to my friend Kim’s, mostly Fulani, village. The Fulans are a mostly nomadic and very vibrant ethnic group scattered throughout Africa. The women typically wear bright clothing and put coins in their braided hair. The men also wear unique clothing and accessories. One of the most unusual being blue rubber shoes. I was met by many friendly Fulans throughout my stay.
I arrived at a village and people immediately noticed my camera so I had to stop and take a few pictures. It’s a good idea to put your camera away before you enter a village if you want to avoid a potentially overwhelming amount of attention. Luckily this time wasn’t so bad and it turned out to be Kim’s village. I arrived a little before sunset, watched Kim carry water from the well, and relaxed for a while before eating a delicious meal of cheesy pasta.

The next morning the real adventure began. Kim’s friend Zara came over and we went on a bush walk to visit some of her friends, one of which had a baby one week prior. One week after birth, children are officially given a name. The day long social event begins with prayers in the morning followed by food and socializing. We just stopped by briefly. The journey was long, probably covered more than 10 miles round trip . I saw lots of birds including Senegal Parrots and a yellow-crowned bishop. The landscape ranged from towering millet to rice patties to grass covered flood plains leading to the edge of the Niger River. By the end of rainy season, much of the area is covered with water creating the perfect environment for thousands of migrating birds that come during winter. The fishing village of Albarkaize sits on the edge of these waters and is home to a bird sanctuary. The village apparently also hosts an incredible fish festival. I plan to return next winter when large flocks of birds have returned. The day’s adventure came to a close as the sun set on one of the area’s largest Baobabs. Easily over 500 years old, its slightly, shiny bark reflected the sunset beautifully. Back at Kim’s village, I enjoyed another delicious meal with pounded cassava root and tuna while listening to a summary of the opening ceremony of the olympic games on BBC. At the end of the day I was exhausted, but deeply appreciative of my uniquely African day!

Yesterday we slept a little late and enjoyed homemade crepes just before the monthly shuttle to the area picked us up and headed back to Dosso. We stopped in Gaya and I picked up some items not available in Dosso including oranges and grapefruit. I could not believe that the large grapefruits were the equivalent of about 12 cents and they’re delicious. Interestingly, almost all of the cirtus fruit sold here has green skin. On the car ride back we also grabbed some locally made bread and fried cheese! I’ll be staying put in Dosso for the next several weeks! Kala Tonton!

Saying Good-Bye to Dosso’s Oldest Baobab

[Local Kids & Remains of the Dosso Baobab]

Sunday, I went to go pay my final respects to the ancient Baobab that welcomed visitors to the city of Dosso. A few weeks ago the tree fell, probably due to winds and rains of the season. A little more than a month a ago I stood next to the tree for more than an hour as I waiting for an early morning ride to Niamey. (see left) Baobab’s can live for 2000 years or more. While this was a large one, it was far from the largest in the region. Thursday I plan to go to Gaya, an area of Dosso that supposedly still has some Baobab forests.

The last couple of days have been low key. I stopped by an international fair here in Dosso and picked up some beautiful, hand-died fabrics. I plan to get a few shirts made from them. (see photo below) One of them is especially bright, but bright colors go over well in Africa. Last night the rains started around midnight. The sun is only just starting to come out now. I still don’t have power.

Thanks to Google Reader I can now read the latest news from a variety of publication and website while offline (using Google Gears). You can check out some of the more interesting articles I’ve read using the Links to Links section to the right.

The National Geographic Photo Contest is going on. What photos should I submit? You can check them all out (almost) on my flickr site.

[hand died fabrics from local festival]

Technorati Tags: Niger, Dosso, Baobab, Peace Corps

Happy Independence Day, Niger!!!

[Near the village of Harikanassou]

Today is Nigérien Independence Day. It’s also Journée de l’arbre (Tree Day). The day doesn’t seem to hold a lot of importance for Nigeriens, but the President does call on everyone to plant a tree! This morning I visited the village of Harikanassou to check out some of the festivities organized by an ONG. Skits were performed and songs were sung all promoting the importance of planting trees. The radio station organized an emission publique. 20 volunteers from the community were selected to explain the meaning of a proverb. 8 were selected to explain how it’s related today’s theme, planting trees. 5 people were selected to sing a song about the theme and then the top 3 participants got prizes. Today’s top prize was 10 bars of soap and a plastic bucket. The best thing to come out of the day was that at least 100 trees were planted in the village. The ride out to the bush was a very green one. In some areas fields of millet are as tall as I am and have already produced heads of seed. In others though, the plants have grown very little. It’s amazing how localized rains can be here.

I ended up coming back from Niamey on Friday. I had time to visit the market and grocery store for a few items. I ended up bringing home a watermelon, lentils, garbonzo beans, a box of skim powdered milk, and lots of processed cheese. You can get real cheese in Niamey, but it’s prohibitively expensive. I got back just in time to meet with my computer class. It turns out that the first class was really too much to handle. Nobody had done their “homework” and everyone was somewhat lost. So we reviewed the hw, and the content of the previous class. I set office hours for people to come to me with questions and scheduled the next class two weeks out. A few people have already completed the assignment.

In other news: My power has been out for the past 4 days. They’re having some problem that only affects my housing complex. The beautiful Baobab at the entrance to the city fell a few weeks ago. I noticed it on the way back from Niamey. I’m going to try to bike over there later this afternoon to take a few pictures. It’s been a great week for letters; I got two letters from unexpected people and also found out that a couple got lost in the mail. I read a new magazine that someone brought from the US yesterday, Science Illustrated. It was overflowing with lots of interesting info. Kala Tonton!

Another Nice link: BBC: Week in Pictures – Africa.

What’s The Word(in zarma)

Hayni
Translation: millet; mil
Ay ga ba ga nwa hayni hawru nda ko foy; I like to eat pounded millet with baobab leaf sauce;
J’aime manger mil pilé avec la sauce de feuilles de baobab

Technorati Tags: Niger, Peace Corps, Trees, Independence Day

Niamey=Pizza

I’m in Niamey right now.  I came in yesterday afternoon to grab some money.  I did some travel research for my first vacation coming up in November.  It will probably be Mali or Ghana.  I also had an incredible dinner at le Pilier. 
Menu:
Bread & Butter
Pizza- mushrooms, ham, olives, and most importantly, CHEESE!
I also had a coke and an espresso.  Of course it wasn’t cheep, but that will be my one splurge for the month. Now I’m headed to buy some groceries and then head back to Dosso.
One of my friends wasn’t too sure about what traveling by Bush Taxi really involved.  Just check out these search results from Flickr.

Reading Rainbow
Read: Kafka On  The Shore; Haruki Murakami

” Time weighs down on you like an old, ambiguous dream.  You keep on moving, trying to slip through it.  But even if you go to the ends of the earth, you won’t be able to escape it.  Still, you have to go there – to the edge of the world.  There’s something you can’t do unless you get there”

Notes:  Good book! The story often escapes the limits of reality as we know it, reminding me a little of Miyazaki films like Princess Mononoke or Spirited Away.

D is for………

[Wall to wall mosquito nets at my place during demyst]

Demyst turned out to be a really great weekend of discovery for my three guests (soon to be volunteers) I did my best to spoil them with good food and Niger just seemed to do the rest. On friday I was initially in charge of 7 hungry trainees while we waited for the car to arrive to take some of them further south. Several of us went to market and purchased supplies for lunch: Mashed potatoes and scambled eggs. I took a very brief nap and once transport arrived I got settled in with my demysters, Alex, Ryan, & Mariam. I had a little follow up work to do for my recent computer class so we headed over to the radio station. Two of my demysters already spoke French so they were able to easily communicate with my counterpart and a few other staff members. Next, we walked down to see a large Baobab tree (the symbol of Dosso) just outside of town.

Side note: Baobab’s are incredibly unique trees. I have always wanted to see one since I read The Little Prince. One species exists on the African and Australian Continents, 7 species exist on the island of madagascar. My mom called on Sunday and filled me in on some additional facts that she learned from this website. They are actually succulents, can regenerate their bark, and are hollow inside. Animals almost always live inside giving it its 2nd name: the tree of life. I’m looking forward to October or November when they’ll be in full bloom. The fruit, called Monkey Bread, is delicious!

Alright back to demyst. For dinner friday, we went out to Dosso’s only semi-restaurant, The Palace, for beef brochettes and fries. As with most places in Niger the level of service was non-existant. The food took a couple of hours to arrive. Afterwards we stumbled upon an international festival with live music and dancing next door. It was the first time I had ever seen such an event in Dosso. People were selling lots goods from neighboring countries and a surprising number of people were dancing and enjoying themselves. We also enjoyed an egg sandwich and a strawberry Solani (drinkable yogurt in a plastic bag). It was an enjoyable day for me, but a very exciting and eye-opening day for my three guests who had only seen the training site and its surrounding villages since their arrival in Niger.

The next day was at a slightly slower pace. In the morning we grabbed more egg sandwiches and headed to the market for food supplies. We walked through the entire market purchasing a giant bag of couli couli for my cat and the hostel cat, about 3kg of onions for 300cfa, 5 poivrons for 800cfa, 1kg potatoes for 400cfa, and 11 eggs for 1100cfa. Besides onions and couli couli, the other items are considered expensive. We stopped by my place and then headed over to my friend Seyni’s house. His wife, Hadiza is an excellent cook. We had rice with a vegetable sauce and chicken. It was the first time my guests had eaten poultry in country. I worked with them on their computer for a bit and headed back home to talk to my parents for a while. All is well on the home front. My dad is busy preparing for his upcoming journey to Niger in December. Closer to sunset we walked across down, stopped to greet a few of my acquaintances and eventually make it to the main road where traffic passes between Niamey, Benin and the east. We bought 2 apples 400cfa, 1 mango 200cfa, and a nice pineapple 400cfa to make fruit salad the next day. On the way back I ran into Ibrahim. He is an imam who does a radio show every week at the radio station, he also owns a shop near the Tessam (like a bus station, but instead of finding buses their you find bush taxis). He bought us to his shop gave us drinks and something like a Madeline. He also offered us bagged water, ice, and a dozen eggs. I was surprised by his generosity. Of course I turned down the eggs and ice but was very thankful. It was a cool random experience for my guests. We headed back to make flour tortillas, veggies fajitas and lima beans. The tortilla making process was time consuming and we ended up eating a little past 11pm.
At this point the 2nd D of the weekend entered- dysentery. At some point during the the previous day I ingested some evil bacteria. As far as GI problems are concerned I’ve been fairly lucky. Bacteria never gives me a fever, like most people, and the symptoms with other issues like ameobas are very mild. However, there is one type of Bacteria that gives me major problems. I’ve only had this once before. Interestingly, the first time I got it was on the 2nd day of my Demyst back in February. This time it was worse though, so needless to say I spent a good portion of the night in my latrine. When it comes to combatting GI problems, PC Niger has great resources. First thing Sunday morning I went to the hostel, prepared a sample, a lab tech arrived within 30 minutes, and I called my Dr. with the results. I started medication immediately and an hour later I was already feeling better. Today I’m virtually 100%.
Luckily it was the last day of Demyst that I got sick. My guests spent some time at the cyber cafe and then at the hostel with the rest of the trainnees that came into the city with their hosts. This morning I got up early and made pancakes and fruit salad before sending them off. Mr. D asside, my first experience hosting Demysters was a grand success.
Once they left I went home and slept for 5 hours :)
Well I think that’s all for now. Tomorrow I’m headed to Niamey for money and then back to Dosso the following day.
Kala TonTon!

What’s The Word(in zarma)
yaw
Translation: guest, foreigner, stranger; etranger, invité, hote
Yawey hinza ka neo han beri kan bisa; Three guests came here last friday ; Trois invités sont venus ici vendredi dernier.

[First catterpilar I've seen, the butterflies are really starting to come out too]

Niger Can’t Get Any Less Green

The Least Green Country On Earth |
Newsweek International Edition | Newsweek.com
I just stumbled upon this great, recent article on Newsweek that nicely sums up many of the problems that Niger races today. There is certainly no shortage of work to be done here, especially in the area of natural resource management. Although I think this article probably makes the situation seem a little worse than it actually is. For now, Niger does have one of the lowest Aids infection rates on the continent (about twice that of the US) and there are more trees now than 5 years ago (but not nearly as many as 20 years ago). So please give it a read..

So what am I still doing up? It’s past midnight! Well it poring outside, my roof is leaking and a wedding party next door is blaring bad music. I’ve also been incrementally cleaning my place while browsing the internet on a borrowed cellular internet connection. It’s been raining since a little after 5pm so I did not get to go to the market. Otherwise I’m ready for my guests tomorrow morning.
OK, time for bed. I’ll leave you with this interesting view of the sky taken at sunset today. The scene reminded me of this Rene Magritte painting. A few minutes later the clouds changed to oranges, reds and purples, but I thought the white against dark was cool, especially the area in the top left corner of the photo.

OK, Here’s one more informative, but more technical link on the region of Africa where Niger is found:
The Greening of The Sahel

mmm, I swear I just ate half a cup of fresh, delicious red apples.  Thanks for sending me that Brooke!
Good Night. Iri ma kani Bani!