Rachel Zuback

07:02 pm: Ham sandwiches in the rain
Sleeping outside has been one of my favorite parts of the lifestyle here in Mauritania. It can be so nice to feel a natural cool breeze on a warm night, to hear the sounds of the neighborhood going to sleep and waking back up, and to gaze up at the stars in the moments between turning off my itty-bitty reading light and dozing off. Yes, sleeping outside can be wonderful. It can also be near torture when the weather is as tumultous as it has been lately. Not that I'm complaining about the rain; I know that the land desperately needs every drop of rain that it can get and I know that in July the rains don't come without being preceeded by violent wind storms. Hooray for the rain (and by default hooray for the wind). Still though, its rough to be awakened from a deep sleep by a strong wind, to look outside your mosquito net to see a dark wall of sand speeding toward you and know that you have about 45 seconds to untie the net, collect everything you have outside with you including the earrings you took off and the book pages that aren't connected to the spine and to get it all inside to dry hot safety.

This last week was particularly frustrating because i wansn't at my home where my bed is one step away from my door and I have a whole big room all to myself. This last week I spent sleeping at the highschool in Kaédi as a helper at the Eco-Health Camp for young girls. So I set up my net out on the ground under the giant Neem trees and kept my stuff in a room that is not nearly big enough for the 30 or so volunteers sharing it. So the first night the winds came, (after losing half of Love in the Time of Cholera and my two earrings in the storm) I waited out the wind and chose not to even bother trying to sleep in the incredibly stuffy overcrowded room, where there were complaints of mouse poop falling out of the ceiling boards. I waited the 30 or so minutes it took for the winds and rain to stop and marched right back outside, found the soggy half of my novel, and sent my tent back up under the trees. Maybe 5 minutes later, the rains came back. No wind, just rain. I decided I could deal with it (more so than the tight quarters of the volunteer room) and stayed in the gentle rain for hours until it let up, getting completely soaked and smelling ham sandwiches all around me(apparently wet Neem trees smell like ham sandwiches, with mayonnaise, like the kind I used to get in a zip lock baggie for lunch in school).

The EcoHealth camp was a great thing to experience. Its an annual volunteer organized event but I missed out last year because I was in Ghana. We had 49 little girls (around 10-14 years old) and they were accompanied by about 22 Mauritanian women chaperones from all over the country. They learned about the environment, about malaria, AIDS, nutrition, and trash, they stood in a big circle at night and sang cute camp songs, and they had a couple of really cool art projects. It really reminded me of being in camp as a kid and I felt happy for these lucky girls to have such a fun and enriching opportunity as that chance to get away from their homes, have a break from cooking and cleaning, and to learn things they might not get taught in school and to play and be little kids. It was fun to watch them having fun.

EcoCamp meant I was in Kaédi but away from my host family for nearly a week. And unfortunately, due to my cell phone being lost, I've had no way to call my host mom at all all week either. For the first time in two years my cell phone got away from me, I think it must have slipped out of my bag once as I was walking, and the man who answered it when I called had no intention of returning it to me. I just hope that the friends who I don't see on a regular basis and who don't have any way of contacting me and whom I won't be able to call now won't think I've forgotten about them. I hope that our paths will magically cross sometime between now and August 2 so that I can have a goodbye. Its already time for goodbyes.

But first I need one last big Hello to my host family, the last hello from an extended seperation until our next bug Hello after a very very long seperation. And if it rains, then good because we need it and at home I'll be more comfortable in my own space and it shouldn't smell like ham sandwiches.

08:00 pm: 2 years
2 years, I've been here two years. Well, actually in three days I will have been in this country for 2 years, but close enough. I recently went back and reread some of my private journal entries from my first days/weeks in Mauritania, and I realize that I had forgotten what it felt like to be new here, and how far I've come in the last 2 years. Looking back, I remembered how dramatic and crazy everything used to seem, from hanging out in the salon with my host family to instructing a tailor on an outfit I was having made to sitting in the vaccination room amongst the screaming chaos. It was all so wierd and so incredibly over my head. I felt like my mind was being blown with every passing breath. I knew nothing, absolutely nothing, about anything in this country. I couldn't hardly speak, I couldn't eat right, didn't know where to brush my teeth, wasn't sure how to go about buying shoes in the market, and never had any idea what was going on around me. I still don't know much... but I know SO much more than when I came.

That's why I haven't written in so long, I think. My life has ceased to astonish me and therefore I have been having a hard time figuring out how to make it sound interesting in written monologue... I'm just so used to it all by now. Its not so hard, not so astonishing. As it turns out, I can ramble on and on in Pulaar, and I'll admit it, I'm pretty proud of myself for it. I can remember during my training hearing the seasoned volunteers chatter away in local language and not even knowing which language they were speaking, not to mention being convinced I would never be able to do the same in a mere 2 years. Turns out 2 years is a pretty long time...

I was talking to my Dad on the phone the other night about what it feels like anticipating my return to the States. I've been looking forward to moving on from this place and this life for some time now, and months ago I created a picture in my mind of what my world would look like when it came time for me to leave. The picture included me being 27, and finished with all of my projects. My host siblings would be around the house more because school would have been out for summer break and there would be the music of "soirées" and concerts floating through most nights. The picture included a whole new group of trainees being in country and Kaédi being well immersed in the hot humid rainy season. In the picture several of my friends who used to live in other parts of the country would be living in Kaédi to train the newbies, and several of my other friends will already be out of country, off on their COS trips. Slowly, over the last several weeks, these conditions have all been realized. I've finished my community English class at the end of May and my role in the Girls' Mentoring Center came to an end. I had my 27th birthday, school let out in June and my trainer friends arrived in Kaédi. The dry heat has been swallowed by the hot humidity and rains have come a couple of times already. I'm finishing up with mobile team and I'm finally letting go of my baby nutrition project to my friend/counterpart Madeleine. Yesterday the new trainees arrived in Kaédi and all that's really left to happen is for my English teacher friends to Close Service and leave Mauritania, for me to pack my bags, and try desperately to fill in the tan lines on my arms and legs before I leave this place for good and come home to get ready for Katy and Sarah's weddings. The picture is almost perfect, nearly all that's left is for me to walk out of it.

Woah.

I met the new group for the first time today, and had mixed feelings. I'm super impressed already by their enthusiasm, attitude, and energy. I feel a little possessive knowing that these are the people who are going to to take over our jobs and our lives and I feel particular about who I'm willing to entrust mine to... and I feel a little sad they they seem so cool and that I will not have time to bond with them and to get to know them like I've gotten to know the people in my group and the group after me. Above all, their arrival really reinforced the feeling that I'm letting this place go and that this place is also letting me go.

Soon, I'm going to have to take off all these ridiculous plastic bracelets I'm wearing, start wearing real shoes and not just flip-flops, purge these Franglais expressions and Muslim references from my vocabulary, and try to remember how to be a normal American again. People have asked me if I've changed.... I don't think I'll know that until I'm reclad and recontexted (you know what I mean) and I guess we soon shall see. I'm excited!

11:25 am: Acha and the GimmeGimme's
Yesterday I spent the day with my old host family from training. (Clarification: "Passer la journée", which literally means 'to spend the day' in English, really only means 'to eat lunch' in Africaspeak. When I "pass the day" with someone I usually show up around 12:30 or 1:00pm and leave by 4:00 at the latest.) For a long while I visited Wane and Habi and their kids twice a week, but now I've cut down to just once a week which seems to be sufficient because their house is far from mine and the visits are relaxing but not too stimulating. Playing with the kids is always fun, butHabi is always busy with housework and Wane is usually stretched out watching TV, and can barely be bothered to sit up and shake my hand when I come in. Its clear his 3 or 4 hours teaching English at the highschool have thoroughly exhausted him.

This last visit though, after I handed over the canned pineapple I brought as a gift, he managed to muster up enough energy to thrust his index finger up in the air with authority and to smilingly remind me of a conversation we had over a year and a half ago: "Don't forget to give me my mosquito net!" When I was still living in his house during training he told me I should give him my self-standing bug hut before I left Africa. At the time I was still so new and had no idea how to put someone off or politely tell someone 'no' and since training I had made other mental plans to give the tent to one of my brothers who needs it more and who I'm closer with. So, Wane and I had a brief discussion about how the tent doesn't work anymore, the zipper is broken, but that doesn't matter he can fix it I should just give it to him and it became clear that I can't give it to my brother like I hoped but have to give it to this man who can't even properly greet me when I go to his house.

Then I spat out a terse but irritated commentary on the inclination of all Mauritanians to constantly be asking for things. Whether they are poor or rich, friends or strangers, uneducated or educated, all Mauritanians want your stuff. As resistant as I try to be to this eternally and collectively outstretched, palm-up hand, it obviously rubs me the wrong way and I shared my views with Wane. Wane had no defense, no shame, and only seemed to wonder why I would make such an obvious observation in the first place. Of course, he retorted, if someone sees something he wants, he's going to ask for it. No harm in asking. Fair enough. But I'm trying to remember if I asked my friends and acquaintances for their stuff, or if they asked me for mine back home. Hey Aimee, that's a nice coffee maker. Can I have it? Hey stranger in the grocery store, buy me some milk. Hey neighbor thanks for the free carrots, give me your lettuce too, and some dressing while you're at it.

Wane's request in and of itself isn't what irked me so badly, but he did break the proverbial camel's back with his straw-like request for my used mosquito net. The hay has been piling on my camel since I got here. Give me your water bottle, give me money, give me a cell phone, give me more than my fair share of seeds, gimme your clothes, gimmeyour radio, gimmesomethread, gimmethatbook, gimme! Gimme!! GIMMME!! And they never say please. :)

This last weekend I went out to my friend Mary's village to help her paint a kindergarten she had had built. The construction was payed for by funds she acquired through a grant, but the labor for the painting was not factored in the budget and her villagers didn't agree to paint the building (their free building) for no pay. So several Peace Corps volunteers rolled up on a horse cart, brought out the battery operated stereo and i-pod, and set to work painting the little structure. We of course were happy to do it and enjoyed the physical activity and the chance to visit another village. It struck us as funny though that throughout the day local ladies would pop in to take a look, and to ask for a bucket. "Oh, you're painting? Are you tired? Give me one of those buckets." And again; fair enough to ask for something you need that someone else has, but at the same time we were continually baffled that they took what they're given with no hesitation and then asked for more.

At least Wane and those women ASK for our stuff. Recently, my little brother decided he could just take my money (also known as STEAL my money). This is my little 11 year old brother who has always been my buddy. We sing BINGO and Hokey Pokey together, I help him with his multiplication tables, he listens to my MiniDisc player and I payed for his karate outfit a couple months ago. The other night, he came home from karate and cheerfully greeted me and plopped down at my side with stories to tell and questions to ask. After dinner, sitting around chatting with Kumba and the other little kids, we all saw a light flash in my dark room. We sat their and stared at my door, which I hadn't closed all the way, and out popped Siré's sneaky shadow. Booooo Siré!!!

I was so disappointed and sad. Catching him in the act confirmed that the cash that had gone missing lately had gone to his pockets. I had suspected him when I noticed 2000 ouguiya here, 1000 there disappearing (Only about $10 or $12 total) and several weeks ago even asked him privately, to his face, if it was him taking money from my room. He denied it at the time, but we caught him red handed. Its not even the money that bothers me; its that my little brother somehow justified in his mind stealing from me(especially after I gave him the chance to knock it off!!). It's been several days and his punishment has consisted really only in one big bad beating, and that's it, aside from dirty looks from me. I tried to appeal to his parents for no beating, but rather a drawn out punishment including him doing chores for me and not being allowed to play or watch T.V. I was overruled and now, a week later, Siré has yet to say a word to me. And I feel that much more ill-at-ease in my house, because the unresolved issue hangs over my head and I don't know how to fix it at this moment.

Fortunately, I think Siré is the exception to the rule. Most Mauritanians won't steal your stuff, even though they want to have it. Seems that they will either bluntly ask for it, or try and weasel it out of you by over-charging or pressuring you into giving it. It makes sense that they have this mentality toward foreigners and their stuff. For several generations now foreigners have been coming in with money and resources and handing them out with no restriction or accountability, and people find that if they need something, someone else (a foreigner) will give it to them sooner or later. A large part of my hesitation about foreign aid is that it feeds the system of ask and receive; also of don't ask but still receive. Peace Corps, UNICEF, World Vision, World Lutheran Federation, World Food Program... that's what we're all here for: to give away stuff and cash. The current international aid system seems to satiate the West's craving for philanthropic opportunities, but does not satisfy the need for Africa to learn to help itself and legitimately develop. Sometimes I feel that our presence is inadvertently holding them back from their best-interest.

Its hard to think rationally about these situations while I'm buried in them, and I hope that when I take a step away I'll be able to justify my service and life here in a larger perspective. Can I really apply my own personal experience to a historical and global system of aid work? Is it really that bad of a thing to base your existence, or part of it, on what other people will give to you for free?

There are other days when I see Mauritanians benefit from what we've done and I know that its a very good thing. One of the traditional midwives we trained last June is now working in a real health clinic delivering babies! I was thrilled to find that out; its definitely a good thing and she's using the leg-up we gave her to help herself and her community.

It's a toss-up...

RZ :)

11:23 am: Things we KNOW
Last night when I got home from mobile team my family greeted me happily and exasperatedly, wanting to know where on earth I had been all day. They knew full well that I went out with the mobile maternal and pediatric health clinic to visit villages West of Kaédi but I guess they didn't realize that I might not be back until after dark (which was indeed the case). It had been a long day of bouncing around the country side; our team visited 7 villages and in addition to prenatal and medical consultations we vaccinated many women against tetanus and quite a few babies too. I imagined that since I was so tired from my intense Mauritanian day, after dinner I would go to my room to read Anna Karenina and relax, but instead found that I got caught up in a very engaging conversation with Kumba and her 17 year old son Amadou. Amadou, by the way, is a sweet typical teenage boy who in certain moods refuses to say 2 words to you and in other moods cannot be stopped from talking on and on. Often at home, he competes even with the little kids for my attention, wanting to tell me a story or a joke but then if I see him in public and say hi to him I barely get a head nod. Its like having a real little brother.

So after dinner when we were already deeply into a conversation about the difference of teaching/studying styles and systems between Mauritania and America, Amadou said to me "Acha, a teacher once told me that a boat went out far into the ocean until it became very dark and they could see nothing so they turned back because they had reached the place where the ocean ends, is that true?" I laughed and figured he must be joking, he is after all in his second year of high school and I couldn't believe that he might be serious, but after several probing questions on my part I realized that he had in fact been told by one of his school teachers that the ocean has a place where it ends and no one knows what's beyond the darkness where the ocean stops. I launched into an emergency geology lesson about the roundness of the earth and the finiteness of the ocean and hopefully was able to convince him... I still can't believe that he learned such a blatant myth in school. I told him either his teacher was kidding or he truly knows nothing; Kumba and Amadou were quick to insist that he knows nothing.

Students here have no textbooks, they only have notebooks in which they write down everything that their professors put on the board, and then try to memorize what they have written in their notebooks. I reflected on the hundreds of hours I spent reading material in my textbooks that was never even taught in class but that still turned up on the exams and am consequently confused how anyone can learn anything of substance in this country. No wonder you have 17 year olds in the 2nd year of high school and 24 year olds still trying to pass their senior year of high school... they're fighting a losing battle to learn. For all the faults our school system in America has, I still feel as though I have a broad base knowledge and critical analysis skills that I fear Mauritanian students will never have without a lot of luck and excessive effort.

I mentioned being out on mobile team yesterday; while we were out there getting ready to eat lunch, water and soap appeared for us to wash our hands. Remember, the way of eating in this country is with your hands; you scoop rice and sauce and break off pieces of vegetables or fish with your hands out of the same bowl that everyone else eats out of. It is disgusting to me that most people don't wash their hands with soap before diving into the communal bowl, and people I eat with know very well to always soap. However, the driver for our mobile team, who's name is Maama, declined soap and just sort of wiggled his fingers under the stream of water. I said something, of course, wanting to know why he wouldn't wash with soap, didn't he know that it killed germs. He simply shook his head and mumbled something about having washed with bleach earlier in the day(what?!), and one of the village women acknowledged that washing with soap will prevent a person from getting money. I can in no way stretch my fairly open mind to find the connection between soap and poverty but nonetheless couldn't convince him and just made sure not to touch parts of the bowl that he touched.

This is the same guy, Maama, who last week when we were making a preliminary visit to the villages to inform them that the mobile team would be coming, told me several other traditional Pulaar beliefs. One being, that if a pregnant woman looks at a monkey too much, she will give birth to a monkey, or at least to a baby resembling a monkey. Or if she "looks at anything that doesn't concern her" she could give birth to a baby that has the characteristics of the thing she shouldn't be looking at. His own wife gave birth to a baby who made head bobbing motions like a duck because she looked at the ducks in their house too much. According to him, that's why an expecting woman needs to just stay in her household and not look at things that aren't her business. Hmmm. Also, if a pregnant woman is in the presence of people eating meat and they don't offer her meat to eat, her baby will have a mark on it indicating the unsatisfied hunger of the mother. I was so fascinated by his utter conviction in these beliefs, I assumed the expressions of an interested student and didn't offer up my objections. How do you argue that kind of logic, anyway?

The things people believe here are really interesting. A lot of people think that America and Europe are the same. They think that there are 6 continents (even educated people) and that America has 52 states. I really second guessed myself after about the 5th person talked to me about America's 52 states, wondering maybe there are more than 50? They think that drinking a mix of vinegar and sugar is good for a cold or fever and that telling a mother her baby is beautiful or big will be the demise of a healthy child. There are certain kinds of jewelry that will protect you from jinxes or bad luck and if one of these pieces of jewelry breaks or gets lost, its a good sign. Traditional beliefs mix with modern knowledge and everything seems to have holes in the logic.

I get confused in myself how to feel about this system of beliefs that is so foreign to me; some of them are so wrong, like the ocean having a dark shadowy ending place, that I confidently insist that I know the truth. But what if looking at a monkey too much will somehow cause a pregnant woman's baby to look like a monkey and we Americans simply haven't realized it yet? (If you didn't pick up on my mild facetiousness, let me assure you of it.) But in all seriousness, how can I quietly shake my head that things that this whole country, if not continent, of people KNOW that they know, and convince myself that what I know is better and more correct? I've learned that things that are true and things that people perceive to be true are separated by a very fine line here. I will definitely be on the look out for a similar fine line when I go home to the states, because surely Mauritanians that come to America quietly shake their heads at us for the crazy things we think we know.

Speaking of going home to the states: We're looking at about 3.5 months before I leave this place. I'm getting so excited! I envision a long road-trip USA in my near future, and lots of fruit smoothies.

11:41 am: Perspective + senioritis
I'm officially a senior in Peace Corps. WAIST (West African Intermural Softball Tournament) and the end of training mark the two times of advancement through the grades of Peace Corps. When the new volunteers swore in in September, we 2nd years became Juniors and I've returned from WAIST and post-WAIST vacation as a bonafide senior. COS conference (Close of Service) happens at the beginning of April, and then just a few more months until I come home in August. Its all happening so fast!

It was so amazing and refreshing to get an extended break from life in Kaédi. WAIST was fun and our team, the RIM Pirates won the fun-league tournament for the 3rd year in a row. Several of our guys and even a couple of our girls sported mohawks to show team spirit, and the rest of us had braids in our hair, eye-patches, pirate hats, and giant skull and cross bone flags with messages for the other teams to Surrender the Booty. I was hosted by an American family, fed a home-cooked breakfast every morning and slept in a comfy bed in an air conditioned room. It was a good weekend.

Then Helena, a new volunteer who's from California and was among the girls that shaved their hair into mohawks, and I started a 18-day long adventure through south-eastern Senegal and to Guinea-Bissau. We traveled by car, bus, prison van (typical public transport in Africa), bicycle, motorized pirogue, and ferry. And foot. There was lots of walking. In Kedagou we stayed at a pretty little lodging on the bank of the river, soaked in all the beautiful green and sadly watched an uncontrolled brushfire ate up all the dried grass for miles on the opposite side of the river. We spoke Pulaar with some of the local staff and delighted to find that Pulaar in southern Senegal is not the same as in southern Mauritania, but we could mostly understand each other anyways.

We then visited a little village called Dindefellow in south-eastern Senegal just a few kilometers from the Guinean border and there we hiked to a beautiful tall FREEZING waterfall, hiked up a steep rocky hillside to the top of a wide plateau overlooking both Senegal and Guinea (did that twice in one day- How I LOVE exercise!), saw a whole pack of baboons hanging out by the creek shaking mangoes out of trees and screeching warnings at us to stay back. The big Alpha baboon was as big as a small man, with long orange hair on his back. I'd have hated to face him at super close proximity! The trip to this village and then back to the bigger town again was done on the worst road I've ever seen in Africa, in vehicles that are little more than welded sheet metal started up by sparking exposed wires on the dashboard. The 35k in 3 hours travel experience can be described as nothing other than frightening and I just kept assuring myself that these people make this trip on a daily basis and surely it must be safer than it feels. There were several times I felt convinced that the whole rusty vehicle and its 30 passengers would topple right over. Once, the the passengers got out so the driver could maneuver the "van" down a particularly precarious part of the road. I swear that the rear two wheels both lifted off the ground and the van bounced down the steep bumpy washed-out hill on its front two tires before crashing onto all fours at the bottom. Amazing, simply amazing. Its like a ride at Universal Studios, only its real and you can actually get hurt!

We had to travel to Guinea-Bissau by going all the way around the Gambia (which is lodged smack in the middle of Senegal) which made for a lot of time of the road, but we also got to see the north-eastern part of Guinea-Bissau. The first town we visited was Gabu, which gave us our first taste of the decaying legacy that the Portuguese left behind. GB is one of the few countries the Portuguese colonized in West Africa and the feel of life is significantly different than in Senegal and Mauritania. The buildings all look like they could have been lifted straight out of Lisbon, the music has a bit of a Latin flare to it, and women are just as likely to wear pants or shorter skirts as they are to wear ankle lenght skirts. Which was refreshing and a created a pretty relaxed atmosphere for us as women travellers. Gabu was a cool but slightly freaky city with huge beautiful menacing trees that look like a botanical version of lightning striking out into the sky. The city is inhabited by vulchurs or buzzards of some kind that hover and haunt and make one feel as though their just waiting for something to die(shudder). Being in Guinea-Bissau was one of the first times in a long time that I couldn't speak with anyone! No one really spoke French, unless by chance they studied it as a 3rd of 4th language in school, no one spoke English, and no one spoke Pulaar. Helena has some experience with Spanish so she was able to help us communicate a little bit more. It reminded me of being in Portugal and communicating every question or comment with handsignals and facial expressions. It was nice not understanding what the kids were jeering at us. :)

Bissau, the capital, is a ghost town. Huge beautiful old buildings left empty or very run down. Looking around I got the impression that Bissau really used to be a special place, but it died and hasn't yet been rejuvenated. I think it was in the 90s they had a war, and somone bombed the Presidential House. It was a grand home built in the middle of town with traffic directed around all sides and a wide road heading from the house straight to the port. It still stands there, with a giant hole in the roof and the insides open and hollowed out for random girls like us to poke around in and gawk at. Its been at least 10 years and no one has repaired it or even knocked it down. It just stands as a ghostly reminder of the past. The whole city feels that way.

We wanted to go out to the island of Bubaque off the coast of Bissau, and found that the ferry service listed in the Lonely Planet travel guide was no longer existant (many things listed in Lonely Planet are no longer existant). So we went to the dock and found out the departure time for the boat that is currently running service from Bissau to Bubaque and showed up bright and early to find our motorized canoe being prepped for sea. Its a big, leaky canoe with a rubber band engine and its the only way to get out to this major island, unless you're a rich tourist and can charter a private speedboat. So we piled in with 2 local rival soccer teams traveling out for a game and several other dozen locals and visitors and spent a good 4-5 hours puttering out to this distant island. Every 20 minutes or so a crewman had to bale water that was filling the boat, but we made it safely, and spent 5 days on this beautiful tropical island. We soaked in the sun, swam in the ocean, rode bikes and did a lot of walking. It was a true vacation.

Coming back to Mauritania with a broadened perspective of Africa has been a bit of a downer. While I was/am absolutely thrilled to be back with my host family, especially Kumba, I am bitter about the lack of trees and beauty in this country. I've now seen 3 other countries in West Africa and they are all SO COOL! I can't wait to come back and visit more of the pretty, laid back, culturally dynamic places on this continent. I'm just so happy that I was able to take advantage of my time here to travel and see what else Africa has to offer and to realize that I LOVE it!

My trip was perfectly timed so that I missed all but one half of one day of the campaign for the presidential elections. Campaigning here means setting up giant tents all around town, blaring horrible music, and paying people off for their votes. At least that has been my impression. Its truly an obnoxious time, if my experiences during the local election campaign can offer any insight. So I missed the parties, speeches, and parades and the day of the vote I was in Nouakchott safely tucked away in my Country Director's house playing Risk and watching really bad American TV (Trading Spouses?! Come ON people!). There was one isolated incident in Kaédi where a soldier was shot, but Peace Corps is not at all worried about volunteers' security during this election period and we all feel very safe and secure. There were 19 candidates in the first round of elections, and that round narrowed the list down to the top 2, and a second round of elections will happen on March 25th to determine the next president of Mauritania. He will be the first new democratically elected president in 22 years. Can you imagine if an American president just announced that he would be staying in office another term, and then another? And if he had the whole military and police force behind him? Woah. Everyone here is really excited at the prospect of democracy, and I wish them all the best.

Oh and in one final bit of news from Kaédi. I got home from a month out of town to find 2 new animals living with us, in addition to the 3 goats we had before. The first was no suprise, Kumba told me over the phone she was born and she's named Acca, after me. She's a pretty little brown goat, born on February 23. I get a little thrown off hearing my name being called around the house but not in reference to me. After a loud clanging and the shout of "What was that?!", and a child's response 'Acca knocked over the dishes!" my inclination is still to yell back defensively that no, I did not knock over any dishes.

The second animal was a big surprise- shocker really. His name is Youma (which technically is a woman's name but no matter) and he is a monkey. He's tied to the tree in our yard by a 5' rope and hangs out (no pun intended), swings, looks at himself in a mirror, knocks his water bowl over, and threatens family members as we shimmy past him to the bathroom. And he's made friends with the baby goat. Youma the monkey. We all can sit and watch him for hours- endless entertainment. My goal is to have him sit on my shoulder before I leave. I want to make friends with the monkey.

Peace and health to everyone! More to come, inshallah.

11:49 am: Warming up to the heat
The heat is back, and I'm surprised to find myself admitting that I'm actually kind of happy about it. Granted, its not reached its typical level of scorching misery, but I can take a bucket bath and really enjoy it again; I can sleep outside again; I break a sweat if I walk around between the hours of 10am and 6pm. Its nice. Another added bonus is that now we can once again pass our evenings in the courtyard, far from the television and under the starry sky. For a while there, I was getting too comfortable in the family room watching TV every night. I worried I might really miss watching movies in English (even though the quality level of these movies is one that caters to Chuck Norris and Jean Claud Van Damm fans) But now that we're back outside I remember how much better it is; its less cramped, more conducive to interesting conversation, and feels much more like Africa with the sounds of all the animals, the music, and the chatter in the streets drifting through our warm thick night. After we eat dinner I like to lay out on the ground and watch the sky, count shooting stars and feel just a little closer to home. Everywhere I look in Mauritania, nothing at all resembles home. Not even a little bit. However, at night time when I look at the sky, it looks just the same as it does at home, except that its more spectacular. And that honestly feels kind of comforting and reminds me that while I may be far far away, its still the same world; even the same hemisphere.

I feel as though every day that goes by I become a little more excited about the prospect of going home and simultaneously become a little more apprehensive about the pain of saying goodbye. I try to imagine my friends here coming to visit me in the States and I just can't make it work in my mind. Madeleine, for example, my 2nd favorite person in this country (next to Kumba) would probably hate it in America and I don't know how America would react to her. She is infinitely more at ease sitting (or rather lounging) on the floor than in a chair. I doubt she's ever gone a day in her adult life not wearing her veil with a long-sleeved shirt underneath. She scrapes her teeth with a stick pulled off a tree at all hours of the day and in any situation, spits whenever and whenever she feels like it, sucks marrow out of goat bones with enthusiasm, and can't go more than maybe 4 or 5 hours without laying down for a little shut-eye. She's wonderful and I love her to death, and I just can't picture her in America. In a way, I almost feel as if our friendship is a little fabricated; there is so much about me she doesn't know, so many sides she hasn't seen. What would she think if she saw me, for example, wearing an outfit like those I wore in my early 20s, drinking a beer and holding hands with a guy in public? Would she still think I'm so great? Chances are she'll never see me like that and will always love me for the Peace Corps volunteer that she knows; and that's ok- I am partly that person. Maybe there's still lots I don't know about her either and I'll always just love her for the AMPF worker that she is.

Madeleine and I are each others' right hand-man for the nutrition program at our clinic AMPF. She's been named as the manager of the project at the clinic level and I am of course the one who started the whole thing and am still kind of running the show, trying to pass things off to her. I'm teaching Madeleine how to run the trainings about breastfeeding and the training/cooking demonstrations for mothers of weening-aged babies; I'm training her to assess the needs of the center; I'm training her to keep the books and handle the finances. Its a lot of new information for a woman who never advanced beyond junior high. She is literate though in both French and Arab and that is a major help. Plus she's interested in learning and she seems to really enjoy when she and I work together. I like it too. The second week of the program went much better than the first; many more women showed up and the trainings and demonstration went much smoother. There are still several wrinkles in our program that need to be ironed out, but as time passes we seem to be figuring things out together and meanwhile at least some mothers are learning and some babies are eating nutritiously. I feel good about it. We'll have a big test for the success of the program and Madeleine's competence as a program manager in a couple of weeks when I leave Kaédi for about a month. I'll leave February 14 and come back March 10 at the earliest- I'm going to Nouakchott for a Safety and Security session, then to Dakar for the annual softball tournament called WAIST, then heading down through southeastern Senegal and to Guinea-Bisseau for a vacation. I'm excited to go travel again, and nervous to let go of the nutritional center for so long. Hopefully the work we'll have done before that time will be enough to keep things running smoothly. We shall see!

On a totally different subject; I've had some interesting cultural experiences lately. First, I went to M'Bagne to visit my friend Virginia. She called me to come out because Paco Lenyol and RG, two famous Mauritania rappers, were having a concert. I went because I love M'Bagne and will take any excuse to go visit her friendly pretty village on the river, and also because when she called she was actually hanging out with these local celebrities at her friend's house where they were staying and said it was hilarious and I should come. So the next night when I went, we got to hang out with them before the concert. They were seemingly normal Mauritanian guys and we had a nice long chat about Pulaar, traveling, food, marriage etc, with everyone in normal clothes. I would never have known I was talking to celebrities if I hadn't been told. Then the guys left for a little while and reappeared in super fancy hip-hop getups, complete with enormous baggy pants, shiny medallions, and very chunky shoes. A few minutes later we sat front row watching these guys we were just hanging out with rap in Pulaar to hundreds of screaming fans. I've been bragging to all the young people I know that not only did I meet Paco Lenyol, but I have his number and he's called to greet me. Everyone is duly impressed.

Another cool recent cultural experience occurred at the French Alliance during a Woloof cultural night. One or two hundred spectators sat arranged in a big circle, and in the middle of the large circle a talented MC kept the crown excited, drummers banged out lively rhythmns, and various people who couldn't fight the boogie ran to the center to kick up their legs and fling their arms around in joyful dancing. I was there with some Americans watching and enjoying the dancing when the MC put down his microphone with a determined look, marched through the audience and grabbed my arm and said I had to come with him. Nonono I said, and the girl Allison next to me also shook her head. He wouldn't take no for an answer and neither she nor I are one to refuse dancing too staunchly so we got up and went to the middle of the crowd, which was screaming extra loudly now, and danced our hearts out for a good 2 or 3 minutes. It was heard to tell if people were cheering or laughing or both, but they made a lot of noise for us. That makes my second time dancing in front of a large group of Mauritanians. I look forward to the third :)

10:16 am: Trying to feed babies
Last night a teenager here in Kaédi called me out for being lame. He's one of my host brothers friends and was hanging out with our family for dinner and tea, and I announced through a couple of yawns and stretches that I was heading to my room to start getting ready for bed. I ran into this kid outside while I was pulling my freshly washed dry clothes off the clothesline and he was standing around smoking a cigarette asked me what time it was. It was about 9:35 pm. He said -9:35 and already people are going to bed? (in Pulaar) -Tomorrow people work, I said, people are tired. -Yeah people work, but 9:30? Going to bed at 9:30? -I mumbled that I was tired and slinked away in the shame of my lameness. He's totally right, what's up with going to bed before 10:00? It wasn't all that long ago (well, over 2 years) that I would stay up until 1 or 2am on any given weeknight, be at work bright-eyed and bushy-tailed by 8am the next morning, work energetically all day, go jogging after work, and then hang out with my friends or do something interesting until late-night again. These days, my schedule is not quite so rigorous. I wake up at 7, 7:20 at the latest, and am usually out the door by 8. Will work for a few hours, until noon or 1, then go home until 3 or 4pm for a long lunch/nap time (this is a nation-wide ritual, by the way. Its not just me) then back to some form of work. Whenever I get home again I sit around with the family before dinner and maybe for an hour or so after dinner chatting or quizzing the twelve year old on his multiplication tables, then I'm all tuckered out and have to turn in. Lame! I hope that when I get back to the States I can easily pick-up my former active lifestyle fully equipped with a social life, exercise regime, and energy that lasts all the live-long-day.

Believe it or not, my productivity level and personal exertion level far exceeds that of the national average: at least I can assume as much based on my own personal exposure to the local work ethic. I'm currently working on my latest big health development project, and getting the ladies who are my supposed partners in this endeavor to put forth any effort beyond the barest minimum is like getting a 17 year old to do her homework on a Friday night. The difference is, these are not 17-year olds, they are grown adult working women, and its not Friday night its Tuesday at 10am! The project is a nutrition training center for breast-feeding mothers and cooking demonstrations for women with weaning-aged babies. We want to teach these mom's how to properly nourish their kids so as to avoid malnutrition, because the period between 6months and 3 years is critical for the healthy development of a growing child. Lots of moms don't know the proper technique and practices for breast-feeding and for weaning, and their ignorance results in dangerous loss of weight and weakness in their children. The idea for the project, which theoretically is a good one, isn't wholly mine. I coaxed it out of the head midwife, Astu, of the Maternal and Child clinic where I help out. We want to spend Mondays helping mom's understand the mechanics and benefits of exclusive breastfeeding and to counsel them on any troubles they might have, and Tuesdays we will demonstrate how to cook various baby-meals, train mothers on how to start the weaning process and how to maintain a gradual transition to protect the health of their babies. That's the big idea.

As far as how this big idea is playing out: well, to make a long story a little shorter- the mentality toward working here is not aligned with my notions toward what it means to really work and that reality is hampering the progress of our project. Every step of this process has to be forced and hardly any initiative has come from my project partners aside from the original request for support. The last few weeks have been filled with me pleading with the women who work at the clinic to focus just for a few minutes and think about this project. Frankly, they seem to prefer chatting and sleeping on-the-job to hammering out details for a project that is already underway. I've been running around town doing the grunt work because no one else will do it, and am becoming ever-so-slightly discouraged. We're off to a rocky start; only 2 mom's came with their babies for the cooking demo, which shocked me because for the last 3 weeks we've been collecting a small financial contribution from women who claimed they wanted to participate. I figured they would show up at least to get their money's worth. Perhaps they will come soon. The start is rocky, but at least it is started and there is a lot of potential for it provided that I can get the workers at the clinic to wake up, stop talking about the weather and the market, focus for just a bit and make this thing work. If it can become their habit, their weekly ritual, it could last a long time and really make a difference. But if we continue in this pattern where Acca is doing everything, then the project will never be more than a fleeting failure. I'm counting on things working out though, eventually, inshallah.

Reading what I just wrote, I realize how negative and bitter it sounds. I don't want to give the wrong impression, and would like to clarify that I believe my time spent working here is truly worthwhile and that there is the potential for positive change in this community. However, I have definitely lost the idealistic glazed look in my eye and approach projects with more skepticism and these days. Its incredible what a year here can do to a girl's perspective and attitude. Many of us in our second year have noticed we've gone from thinking "I can really help people and make significant changes for the better and save lives!" to "well, if they want to improve their lives, I'll help them, and it may or may not work but we'll try together". I wonder if my attitude will change anymore between now and the time that I go home...

I have less than seven months until I leave Mauritania. I am still very invested in my work here, and have a lot of things going on. Between the nutrition project, Girls Center activities, teaching English, teaching computers, various mini side projects, not to mention my host family, I have a full life and am still very much here in Kaédi. However, I'm starting to catch PC senioritis just a little bit and my head is starting to wander more and more to the future. I'm looking at the job market back in the states, investigating potential education opportunities, and starting to imagine what it will be like to be back in western civilization again. For a while I thought I would really feel ill-at-ease back in the developed world with all the over consumption, marketing ploys and upsetting politics, but on the other hand I think I'll feel very comfortable with cleanliness, health, access to my family and friends, and a more normal social life. Anyways, I'm trying to enjoy the remaining time that I have here, prepare for what's next. First things first: feed the babies!

12:59 pm: A cold wind blows.
There's been this crazy wind blowing through Kaédi ever since December 31. Not just consistent breezes, but violent gusts that whip my wrap right off my shoulders and blow my wrap skirt into precariously reveiling positions (knees!). And this wind is cold and filled with lots and lots of dust. All the locals down here are calling it "Saddam's Wind" because it picked up the day after he was executed and hasn't quit. All the black Mauritanians down here: Pulaars, Soninkés, Wolofs, and Bombaras,and some of the Maures, hate Saddam because they associate his cruelty towards his own countrymen with the cruelty of their former President Maaouya towards black Mauritanians during the events of 1989 (that's a long sad story). So ever since this wind has come and hurtled sand at their Tabaski celebrations, they've chalked it up to Saddam. Guess they figure he's giving humanity one final blow (pun intended) of cruelty before he leaves this world for good. Enough already!

Apparently its a global wind, tracing all the way from Mauritania to America. That's according to my host parents, anyways. They asked for news of my family and I relayed that apparently mom, dad, sis, and grandma have all come down with a cold this last week or so. They gasped in horror and Kumba got all excited and said "The radio said this dust is bad for health! Its all this dust making them sick!" and Baaba said "This wind is blowing even in America? Skee!" as he shook his head in empathy and belief. I tried to explain that it was perhaps another wind making my family's noses run, but it wasn't really worth it when its so clearly the fault of Saddam's wind and all this damn dust.

I don't even want to go outside in it, and bathing is the most dreaded moment of my week! (haha just kidding). I'm literally freezing every day, wrapped up in an Ecuadorian poncho which is really the only moderately warm thing I own. I'm about to resort to wearing socks with my flipflops, which is virtually unthinkable for a girl from southern California. We're all convinced that this is about as cold as it gets, and on the radio they announced that Kaédi has gotten as low as 27°C!! We all oooh'ed and nodded our heads at the obvious lowness of that temperature, but I had no idea what it meant since I only speak Fahrenheit. So I calculated 27°C on the computer and found that our Fa-REEZing cold temperature is, I kid you not, 80.6 degrees Fahrenheit. I knew I'd climatized but that is RIDICULOUS! The truth is I simply don't believe it. I think the radio reporters and the online weather websites are full of it and have no idea how cold it really is here. I mean, its got to be at least as low as 70! Seriously!

Because the weather is driving us all inside, I'm finding myself more and more in my room, escaping the cramped quarters filled with screaming Mauritanians at my house. Its different when its hot and people spend time outside, the children run around in the vast space of the great outdoors and aren't all up in the adult's faces. But with everyone in the same room, together as one big happy family, the volume level tends to rise. There are many shining moments of joy spent with my family that make me love them so much and be really happy to be in their home. Kumba and Baaba have some real Amos and Andy moments; its like they're putting on a dramatic comedy sketch for my entertainment. They banter back and forth about who is crazier, and who talks too much, who doesn't understand anything, and who is the REAL African and who can pass for a French African. They'll yell and gesticulate, about... whether their neighbor's daughter was ever really married or if her marraige was annulled or if she counts as divorced or did this supposed fiancé/would-be-husband ever even exist, for example. 30 good minutes spent shouting at each other, to be ended in laughing and Baaba looking at me and saying "Acca, one day you'll be in America and you'll start laughing and your friends will ask if you're crazy and you'll tell them 'no, I'm just thinking of my mom and dad in Africa'" and he is totally right. So I hang out and catch a few live episodes of this Pulaar version of "Married with Children", and when its just too much I retreat to my room where I play Sudoko, or read, but mostly freeze and try to remember that in a mere 2 or 3 months I'll be escaping the rising temperatures of that same room, sweltering and wishing for this chill to come back.

12:39 pm: YEAR IN AFRICA... gussi (finished)
So my YEAR IN AFRICA is over. That's not to say I'm coming home quite yet, but this time one year ago I was looking to the imminent future with wonder, excitement, and anxiety imagining that 2006 would be my solid YEAR IN AFRICA. And now its over. 2006 was the year when I accomplished several relatively major projects in my Peace Corps Service, I finally got a good grasp on Pulaar, my best friend came to visit and we traveled to Ghana, I moved in with my new adopted host family, my parents came to visit and we rode camels, and I didn't leave Africa one single time all year(among other things of course). 2007 will be the year I once again find myself in America(for a little while at least), I find a new way to spend my time aside from hanging out in Mauritania, my sister and other best friend get married, and I'll have to wean myself off of head scarves. Also, this year I will take a hiking trip through the Pulaar parts of Guinea, my sister will come visit me, I'll turn 27, and have however many unforeseen adventures and misadventures in Mauritania before August. Inshallah.

Last night I rung in the New Year with my site-mate Kristi who was also in Kaédi to celebrate Tabaski with her host family. We rendez-vous'ed at Nick's empty house and ate pudding pie, played a very exciting game of scrabble, listened to Michael Jackson and Lenny Kravitz on cassette tape, and enjoyed one Kahlua cocktail each. Then passed out around 12:25am, January 1, 2007. I think a mellow entry into this year of transition will do me some good.

Not only was yesterday New Year's Eve, it was also Tabaski, which I've mentioned is the biggest religious fete in the Muslim world. Everyone has been so hustle-bustle the last couple of weeks getting ready for the big day. I, along with every other woman in Mauritania, had a new outfit tailored especially for the fete. Kumba (host mom) and I henna'd ourselves and I now have bright orange/red/black hands and feet. Its so "pretty". And Kumba assured me that it was really good henna, so these obnoxious-I mean vibrant- designs will last for weeks! Great!

Yesterday I watched behind my hands over my eyes as my host dad slaughtered the sheep who's been living with us for the past couple of weeks. They moved the sheep to the other side of the courtyard, away from the other animals and away from any food early in the morning when dad went to the mosque to pray. He was pacing and crying out, he knew something was up. Poor guy. The actual moment of slaughter isn't so bad to watch, it is pretty brutal though because he has to apply a sawing motion to cut through the neck (sorry, graphic) and blood flows out really fast. Just when you think- whew that wasn't too awful, he's dead, the thing starts moaning and kicking and that is really quite sad. He was fighting for his life to the bitter end. I hope it didn't hurt too badly. And then within an hour, where there once was a sheep there then was none. Just a head and his spine dangling from the tree where Moussa the brother had butchered him. Its pretty fascinating watching the whole sheep, complete with fur and tongue lolling out of its mouth, become meat in a bowl. What does it mean that a year ago I was completely uncomfortable to be in the presence of the killing of an animal, and now I am ok enough to actually opt to watch? Is this an improvement in my character or the opposite? I still don't eat it though. No siree.

The fete itself was spent (aside from following my morbid curiosity to watch the slaughter) cutting potatoes and onions, taking photos, greeting people, and eating. The same activities continue on for today and tomorrow. Its a 3-day event, if you don't count all the activities that have to happen prior to the holiday.

Before Tabaski, I was back in my old neighborhood to water Nick's trees. I saw a guy named Sow who lives near Nick's house, and upon spotting me from afar he exclaimed, yet again, how he never sees me around any more. I explained, yet again, that I had moved away. He came closer for a more lengthy greeting, spread his arms with a big grin on his face and swore that Mashallah I was in form now! (in shape) I smiled back and asked what that meant, basking in an unexpected compliment. He pumped his fists next to his chest and puffed out his cheeks a bit and said, its good, you're bigger now! I was shocked and made my best offended face possible to clue him in on stopping this train of conversation told him that I was quite sure I was the same size I'd always been. But he persisted, saying no no, I had definitely put on some wait (followed by a big congratulatory smile). I proceeded to lecture him on how a man is never EVER to tell an American woman that she'd gained weight. He said, but I didn't call you obese! That's different! I still though, gave him a good talking to about dealing with Western females and huffed off to Nick's house to sulk in some Gouda cheese. I relayed the same story to a volunteer's family as they passed through Kaedi that night. Mike's mom laughed and assured me that I'm far from fat, and you know how strangers will ALWAYS tell the truth about such things :) So I feel better.

Another small story about being on a different wave-length than a Mauritanian, only this time the story involves my wonderful host mom Kumba. She takes such good care of me, or she really tries to anyways. A few nights ago I woke up in the middle of the night with a screaming pain in the tip of my left pinkie. This was extremely random and seemingly uncalled for as I don't have any recollection of hurting my finger. Anyways, the pain persisted for several days and I followed Kumba's advise to continually suck on my finger to draw the badness out, and then to soak it in hot bleachy salty water to draw out the badness further. These things weren't producing a positive result yet, but then she may have found the solution. She looked at the puss pocket that had formed where the painful spot was and shouted an order to a kid, who promptly appeared with a glass sauirt bottle filled with a dark liquid. Kumba armed herself with the bottle in a ready-to-spray position and looked at me like "well, give me your finger". I asked what it was, and upon inspection saw that it was a bottle of men's cologne. I informed her of such and she nodded, apparently fully aware of what it was and told me simply that "Its good". I asked, but why? She said it will kill the badness inside my finger. She patiently sat and waited for me to succumb to her motherly ways as I dried to think about any bad reactions I might experience from spraying cologne on a mysterious infection. I could think of none, so I submissively held out my finger and she gave me a solemn squirt of perfume. It smelled nice. We sat there a moment looking at my finger together and I did everything I could not to laugh. It was a serious moment and I thought it was completely ridiculous, but what do you know? My finger healed up that night just in time for me to get henna'd! So if you need a new home remedy for random puss-filled infections: try cheap men's eau de parfin. Worked for me!

So I'm bringing in the New Year all gussied up, moderately healthy, and apparently a bit too well fed. MASHALLAH!

07:11 pm: Tis the season
For the first time in a while, I'm alone in Kaédi. Well, I'm alone with the 50somethousand residents of Kaédi. I'm the lone American. Maybe even the lone toubab as I believe the Frenchies are all reasonably out of town for the full length of this holiday season. I went to Nouakchott for 2 days (count 'em, one and two and back to Kaédi again) and will spend the 31st of December here. If this sounds a bit ridiculous, well maybe it is. Most of my other fellow PCVs stayed at least 4 or 5 or even more nights in Nouakchott for Christmas and are herding themselves down to our nearest fun-mecca; St. Louis Senegal. I went last year and had an absolute blast, but this year thought- why should I go spend several days on a beautiful beach in a funky little wet African town for a major party holiday when I could instead go back to my dry and less-aesthetically pleasing Mauritanian site? Actually, I made a conscious choice to celebrate the Tabaski festival with my host family rather over going big for New Years.

So, I cut my holiday fun short to come home to be with my host family, but found that I was running to escape them almost right away. I love them, and I'm really happy living with in their home, but MAN it takes some readjustment to get used to "family life" here. Pulaar family life, read: screaming, insulting, hollering, difficult to finish a sentence due to your conversation partner's spontaneous and sporadic need to shout at a child or respond to a beckoning adult or yell for someone to pull the plastic bag out of the goats mouth. When Baaba, host dad, needs to hollar at a kid for something, he does so in such a shrill way that you'd think the kid was laying down on a train track or had just been busted for punching his teacher in class. His voice sounds as gravely urgent as that, where as really he just wants to get the kid's attention to bring his some water, or to inquire the where-abouts of his wife who is only in the bathroom. After a week or so of constant immersion with the family, I quasi get used to it.

However, after about 56 hours of intensely American time, coming home to intense Pulaar time was a bit too much. Kumba does it too (the raging screaming thing). She is nothing but incredibly sweet and patient and understanding with me and any mistakes I might make, but if her little 10 year old granddaughter puts too much water in the pot or isn't fanning the charcoals fast enough, she hurtles insults in a sadistic voice that I'm not always in the mood to deal with, even if its not directed at me. But, "c'est l'Afrique", its like that here. Moments after the screaming matches, and sometimes even amid the screaming matches, there is laughing and joking and smiling. Its a bit bipolar around here actually, and that works for them but sometimes, especially if I still am nursing a residual headache from my American-style-fun, I have to just get the heck out of there.

And fortunately, I had the peaceful, fly-less, childless sanctuary of my absent site-mate's house to go to. Coincidentally, his current empty house is my former house. The family seemed a bit thrown off at my rapid exit after lunch: "but don't you want tea? hang out with us and watch music videos, why are you leaving?", but I really needed to slip away. I love them a lot, but WOW its a madhouse over there. Even brief separations require a minimal readjustment period.

Christmas in Nouakchott was a nice 2 day bender with 80 or so of my closest friends. Just like last year, our amazingly generous country director invited our grubby rambunctious selves to his beautiful, classy, well-stocked home to spend the holidays. A team of culinary geniuses whipped up (over 3 or so days of preparation) a most excellent meal complete with vegetarian sushi, ambrosia salad, pasta salad, homemade bread, meat-for all those carnivores, amazing deserts, and a Spinach and Artichoke dip I wanted to go swimming in, it was so good. Mom, it was better than haako. Christmas day was spent laying around watching movies for hours on end. If I couldn't be home with my family and state-side friends, there was no better place to be for Christmas than with the amazing PCVs of Mauritania at Obie's house.

Now that I'm back home in Kaedi, the holiday season is only getting started, for Mauritanians anyways. Tabaski is their greatest religious holiday of the year, marking when Abraham was supposed to sacrifice his son but God sent him a sheep to slaughter instead. The Fete will happen on December 31st and all of the Muslim world is busily preparing for the festivities. A new sheep moved to our house about a week ago. He's a very tame creature, lets the baby goat butt heads with him and doesn't make a big fuss about being tied up all day every day. And on Sunday morning, my host dad will cut his throat and the family will eat him over the course of a week or so. Every family is religiously obligated, provided they can afford it, to slaughter something; be it a goat or a sheep. All part of the holiday fun! Everyone is busy having new clothes made, getting their hair braided, painting henna on their hands and feet, and buying plenty of rice, potatoes, and couscous to eat with the meat. The market is overflowing with merchandise and the town is a-buzz.

My idea, and genuine hope, is that after the 3 days of Tabaski are over that I'll be able to get some real work done in Kaédi. For a long time, it was the month of Ramadan and that kept much progress from happening. Then Ramadan ended but nope- no chance of work because the election campaign began and everybody was "preoccupied" with that. Then lately people have been putting my off until after the Tabaski fete because, well you know they just have so much to do to get ready. SO, HOPEFULLY, after the sheep have all be slaughtered and eaten and after all the family and friends have been amply greeted, I'll find myself busy working once again.

Happy Holidays!

10:42 am: You're not going to believe this, but I have a new complaint which I am very happy to file. Thrilled, actually. It's COLD! My fingers are icey as I type this entry, and so are my toes and my nose as a matter of fact. Its gotta be in the low 60s or even 50s and I am frigid! It was funny, when mom and dad were with me in Nouakchott, during the day they were uncomfortable in the "heat" and I sassed off that they were not in fact experiencing anything resembling the heat. Then in the evenings I'd be bundled up in my fleece and chattering my teeth and my parent's cooly reminded me that I was not actually experiencing anything resembling cold. My personal temperature perspective was backed up by my entire host family when I took mom down to Kaédi and she sat around with us outside in a short sleeved shirt, refusing to put on the sweater I brought out for her and the rest of us were shivering under our wraps and blankets looking at her like she was nuts. As it turns out, according to my host family, my mom is American and is not afraid of the cold, but I have become African and am thus afraid of the cold. So there you have it.

So yes, mom and dad made the long journey out to find me in my desert/sahalien country. It was a joyous reunion followed immediately by a screaming match between me and the guy who was carrying my mom's bags out of the airport with a 1000 ouguiya bill in his hand. 1000 ouguiyas can buy 5 lunches in Kaédi, 5 taxi trips around Nouakchott, over 3 kilos of oranges, or a whole beer! It is not meant to pay for a sneaky pushy guy to carry my poor taken-advantage-of-mother's bag 100 feet to an overpriced taxi. I've become a bit more frugal and a bit more aggressive since I've been in this country (I like to think I've been molded by my environment) and my parents got to see a very dramatic demonstration of my Africanized self as we disengaged from our hug and I verbally raged on the guy (in two languages) who had taken mom's money. Alas, he won and kept his tip and I turned back to my parents with a big unfazed grin and said "well lets get a taxi". Which embarked us (ie me) on another battle trying to get a 5 minute ride to something resembling a reasonable and fair price. I never realized how much I'd "adapted" to the local mentality until I saw my parent's eyes wide with shock and amazement. Dad said he thought it was pretty cool! He's pushing me towards sales more than ever.

To avoid more encounters such as the ones we had at the airport, I hired us a 4wheel drive toyota with a private driver to take us on our journey up north. We breezed through most of the dozen or so police check points with relative ease when I busted out my Peace Corps ID card, which made me feel much more important than I actually am. Occasionally the officers would gesture toward my parents and want to know who these other white people were, and their faces would light up as soon as I explained they were my mother and father. "That's your father?!" they'd happily exclaim, "you're father came all this way to see you? Wow that's somethin!" And we'd pass on through with a wave and a smile. I felt bad that the locals (at least the white moor officials) seemed to prefer dad to mom until we were eating at a restaurant run by a Pulaar women and occupied by Pulaar and Woloof customers. Upon explination that these were my mother and father, this crowd (that hails from the south, where I live) disregarded dad and went on an on about how wonderful mothers are, and how I've become a tiny little child again to be with my mother. In any event, Mauritanians from the north and the south LOVED that my parents came to visit.

Everytime my parents come to visit me where-ever I happen to be living, I tend to take them on physically challenging adventures. I figure its my job to keep them movin and help them maintain their youthful glow. So, once we were in the north (about a 6 hour drive north-east of Nouakchott through vast nothingness) I took them to a very beautiful peaceful oasis called Tirdgit where we lounged by the naturally flowing streams of water (in the middle of the desert!) eating dates and egg sandwhiches and moroccain mandarin oranges and then climbed up very high rocky hills, seeking out the best view. Then we traveled several an extra 3 or 4 hours further to the north east, to a town called Chinghetti that is surrounded by nothing but huge rolling sand dunes, as far as your little eye can see. We hired 3 camels and one guide who lead us on a 3 hour walk out into the Sahara as the sun was beginning to dip and the long shadows made depth perception an unfathomable notion. I have to say that my parents were incredibly good sports, letting me take them on this mini adventure. Its not exactly comfortable riding on a camel, and I don't think the camels were really all that thrilled to have us perched on their humps, either. One time, about 30 minutes into our trek, dad decided to turn on his digital camera and it made a funky little digital beep as it powered up. The camel he was on did NOT like this unnatural sound at all and proceeded to FREAK out. It started crying or baying or barking or whatever it is that camels do, and layed down and stood back up TWICE, all while poor dad was hanging on for dear life and swearing like a sailor. I was on my camel right behind him hanging on tight and laughing my arse off. I continued to laugh so hard I was almost crying even after dad had dismounted the camel and resumed the long walk to the oasis on foot. Seeing as how he didn't fall and didn't get hurt, it was freaking hilarous. But he never got back on that camel again except to pose for a photo with my mom with their Santa hats on. The guide thought that was pretty wierd but he obliged us and let us take the photo. We spent the night out in the desert with a camp of nomads who run a palm tree nursery and accept tourist to stay in tents for a very small fee. Our guide baked us bread in the sand using hot coals and we cooked up a tasty pasta dinner over an open fire. It was very cold, very beautiful, and an excellent experience to have shared with mom and dad as we fell asleep to the not so distant sounds of their hypnotic drumming and singing.

Dad had to leave after just 6 days but mom was very brave and came with me to my town, Kaédi, where all of my family and friends were anxiously awaiting her arrival. She got to wear the African outfit I had tailored for her and get several other ones made as well. She sat with us all on the floor everwhere we went and played card games with the kids and ate with her hand like a champ. She met all of the people who are most important to me and they really rolled out the welcome mat for her too, making their finest dishes and lots of tea and showing her their photos and working hard to communicate despite the language barriers.

Speaking of language barriers: I obviously had to play translator the whole time which was no problem and really quite fun. But it did get confusing sometimes and all the languages got quite mixed up in my brain and I'd forget which language I needed to speak in. For example, mom and i were visiting my old host family from training and it was after lunch and we were playing cards with the kids and waiting for our cups of tea. Someone handed mom her "cass" of tea and Habi, the mom, said "Acca, wii neene maa atay maako ine wuuli" which means, Acca tell your mom her tea is hot. I nodded and looked at my mom and said "atay maa ine wuuli" and went back to concentrating on my cards. Habi called me, "Acca?" I looked at her inquisitively. She said "O famaani pulaar, haal mo anglais!" which means, she doesn's understand pulaar, talk to her in English! Oops! So many times I found my self rammering on about something or another to my mom in French or even Pulaar and only several sentences in would I realize I was using the wrong language! It made me laugh really hard every time.

It was good for me to have dad and (especially) mom see me in my environment, to meet the people I care so much about and to understand what my life is like. It was good for them to see me speaking the languages and living the life and it helped me to re-realize how amazing my experience really is.

10:46 am: On the move
Last year I didn't travel around too much. I mean, I definitely saw my fair share of this part of Africa; Aioun to the east of Mauritania for a conference, Atar in the north for a marathon/trash clean-up, Boghé just west of Kaédi for a conference, and a few essential fun spots in northern Senegal. But I've always had this long list of "I want to go there before I leave" places and I realized lately that the time before I leave is rapidly getting shorter. So, I've been seizing the moments and checking a few new places out lately, visiting my friends, and its been fun!

The weekend before Halloween, a few of us brave dedicated travelers decided it would be worth it to make the trip to a little Senegalese town called Richard Toll to commemorate our beloved holiday. To start the trip, I went to my friend Virginia's village, M'Bagne which is maybe 50 or so kilometers down the river from Kaédi. I'd always wanted to go spend the night there, and since she and Jess were traveling to Richard Toll I went along. M'Bagne is a really pretty little village with scandalous activity (men and women can hang out in the streets in public at night time!) and strange traditions. Historically, one is not allowed to arrive to M'Bagne and ask "this is M'Bagne?". Its a wierd little quirk of the village and traditionally, people get offended by that question to the point of brutally beating the offending inquirer, but in these modern times most progressive locals can simply laugh it off. Fortunately for me, because as our prison van (public transport vehicle) puttered up to a village, I wasn't sure so I turned to the lady next to me and asked "Do ko M'bagne?" and immediately bit my tongue, realizing my error. But, she must be one of the more modern typed because she let it slide.

After a peaceful night in an electricity-less village, we left early in the morning on a big motorized canoe and cruised down the river to a Senegalese village that is both on the river and on the road, a mecca for those of us crossing the border with more distant destinations in mind. Richard Toll isn't really anything special, but they do have cold beers, greasy omelet sandwiches, and a fancy river-side hotel with a swimming pool. We stayed in a cheap little auberge but spent the day pool-side, and spent the evenings out at the local bar/brothel. We only partook in the services the bar had to offer, and observed with something akin to morbid curiosity the sketchy activities of the brothel (shudder). Jess, Virginia, and I were the only ones to bring Halloween costumes (LAME!) but we got dressed up as geisha, "the Gorgol Geisha" for long enough to take pictures, laugh at ourselves, and change again before heading out to public for dinner. It was a brief, bizarre weekend but man was it nice to swim in a cold pool and lounge next to it with a nice cold tasty beverage. The journey home almost made the whole thing not worth the effort (almost, but not quite), as it took 13.5 hours and 5 vehicles plus a canoe to arrive in Kaédi. At one point of frustration, I found myself furrowing my eyebrows and shouting inside my head "I HATE TRAVELING!", but almost immediately bit my tongue and scolded myself, reminding myself that I do in fact LOVE traveling. I do... I really do...

So I came back to Kaedi, to the happy environment of my family, and spent just 2 nights before taking off again. I tell ya, these days I'm on the move! There is a region east of Gorgol (which is my region) called Guidimakha, and its PCVs claim its by far the best region, but there is no paved road going there and it can be a real pain in the back to get to, bumping along poorly maintained dirt roads in extremely cramped crappy vehicles for hours and hours. But, I wanted to go see my friends there and check out the baobabs, so I went. It really looks like just about anywhere else in southern Mauritania except for those huge crazy awesome baobab trees. I spent a couple days in the capital city, Selibaby, enjoying the company and hospitality of the local volunteers and their host families, and then climbed into the back of a pick-up truck with about 15 other bush-bound travelers. There were literally 16 of us (at least) stuffed in the little bed of this truck. And there is no road after a certain point, just some dirt tracks. And the driver doesn't seem to realize how many people are hanging on for dear life and he just flies along at what feels like top speed. There was a moment when I was grasping the rope netting they lay under us as a safety feature, and looking at the ground darting by that I realized... Hm. If we crash, in any way, its all over. But, there is really no choice in the matter if one wants to go to Ajar, which I did, so I just plugged in my headphones and enjoyed the thrill of the ride... wind in my headwrap, and tried to absorb the shock of the bumps with my feet rather than my spine. It was fun!

I arrived in my friends' village in one piece. Ariana and Ben, 2 volunteers from my year, live in Ajar. A jar. they live in a jar. hahaha. They are really tired of that joke. Ajar is a pretty little village with mostly Soninke people. I said it before and I might as well quote myself because its so true, that I got my "quintessential Peace Corps experience in 5 days in Ajar". This village has no electricity, no running water, and no cell phone reception what-so-ever. I carried water on my head (in a bucket, it is as hard as it looks), I went out to the fields and "helped" with the peanut harvest. Have you ever tasted a peanut pulled straight from the ground? YUM! I really liked going to the fields, we did it twice. Its quite a long walk outside of the village and its amazing how much they have growing out there. Everyday of harvest is a constant battle between Man and Bird, I think the birds are winning. They are little millet eaters. One of these little suckers is cute to look at, but thouuuuusands of them flock together and descend upon the fields that these people depend on for sustenance. So, to deter the birds, people wander around the fields whooping and hollering at random. Dozens and dozens of voices can be heard throughout the fields yelling "WOO WOO WOO!" "Haaaaa! EEEEwoyeeee!" Its awesome. I don't think it works, but when else can you just wanted around shouting?

I also helped Ari sketch on a health themed mural in their local school, which she will paint soon. I kinda helped put up a fence around her new garden. She taught me to sew Soninke stlye, and its NOT an easy stitch at all! I saw the thousands of batteries Ben collected from the streets of the village and deposited in a bit cement vat outside of town. We hung out with the local religious leader, speaking in Soninke, Pulaar, French, and English and every time we went he treated us to the creamiest sweetest milk I've ever had. What else... I learned a little Soninke in my few days there, I got to witness politics at a very small scale level as there is currently a political campaign all throughout the country for the elections coming up on November 19th, and it was interesting to see how important it is to even such a small village. I even got to sit on a camel. We were about to head out to the fields and passed a house at which a Pulaar man and his camel had just arrived. The Soninke woman we were with marched into the courtyard of this house and insisted that we each get a picture on his camel. As a side note, the camel traveler was the most beautiful man I've ever seen in this country! Incredibly striking, and he rode in on this regal looking camel and he had on very beautiful traditional clothes and a biiiig headwrap. I wanted to stay and hang out with him, but the peanuts weren't going to pick themselves. :)
The final "typical Peace corps" experience was the full day of clueless waiting for the Peace Corps car to come. Our bosses had scheduled a visit to Ari and Ben's village and I timed my trip to get a ride back to Kaédi with them. They were due in on the 6th, but on the 7th we were still wondering where they were. Being completely detached from any and all forms of outside communication for days is not something I've had a chance to get used to, but we just had to sit tight and assume they were coming, even if 24 hours late.

So, pretty much everything I imagined my Peace Corps experience would be came to fruition in Ajar. I accept my own experience in Kaédi and I like it and I don't think i would change it, but I really appreciate the chance to have, if only for 5 days, lived that village life.

I'm hanging out in Kaédi for the next couple weeks, but then I'm off to pick up MOM AND DAD AT THE AIRPORT! I can't even express how excited I am. I've been here 16.5 months... that's so long to go without seeing my parents. Too long. I'm taking them to an oasis and on a camel trek. The adventure continues...

04:45 pm: I love food
Well, it was a close call. Last night, we didn't see the moon. And by 9:30 at night all the radio stations seemed to be saying that no one, all throughout Mauritania, had seen the moon. I hung my head and took a breath in anticipation of another day of fasting. My host mom, Kumba, the ever positive good-attitude Kumba, perked up and said, "Well, fette is good, but if its not tomorrow but the day after-tomorrow that is also good." I didn't agree and was glad it was dark so she couldn't see my jaw drop in dissidence before pulling myself together and saying, that's true its good.

BUT!!!! Suddenly, around 10:00pm, the blessed announcement came that someone somewhere saw the moon and HOORAY the fette would be tomorrow. So, here I sit with my brand new boubou on (Kumba dyed and sewed the fabric for me), henna on my hands and feet, and a full belly in broad day light. I'm on my way to visit other families and wish them a happy fette.

About a week ago a new individual appeared in our courtyard, a medium-sized sheep with black rings around his eyes. This morning he was lead away from the other goats and tied to a tree. I sang the song of doom in my head. Then, when Baaba got back from the mosque, he killed lunch. And then I had a bit of an anatomy lesson as I sat cutting about 30 onions watching my hostbrothers butcher the carcass. Fette days here aren't ideally suited for me as they are all about meat, but I loooove Moroccan couscous and have gotten more than my fill of it today.

Happy end of Ramadan everybody! May we fette next year, may we fette many more times, please forgive my wrongdoings as I forgive yours (that's a summation of fette greetings)

08:08 am: The thing that falls from thunder
Last night I went to visit my original host family for the fast breaking/dinner eating. Its nice to go see those kids and chat with the parents, but its hard to pry myself away from my new family and all the goodies we drink/eat there and make the 30 minute walk in the thirsty heat to Wane's house.

I brought over the ingredients to make homemade "mayonnaise" which is DELICIOUS! You take some cilia, which is cheap powdered milk, and add a little water so its quite thick. Then you a good pour oil, then finely sliced onion, a little pepper, a little crushed bouillon cube, and a splash or 2 of vinegar. Then you smear it on bread. Its like a French onion dip, deeeelish! If anyone has success whipping it up at home, let me know. :)

Last night, my little bro, Baaba, was trying to have a chat with me and I was trying my hardest to follow. Its tricky understanding a 5 year old's Pulaar, like it can be tricky following certain 5 year olds' English. I was doing fine, we were talking about watermelons and fruit trees, when he asked me if I'd ever __________?. This morning after I've forgotten exactly how to say it, but its something to the effect of 'jumbdon laydi' (Tarn, maybe you can correct me here). But its something like that. I didn't understand what he was saying so I referred to Mustapha, the dad, to ask what it meant. He sat up and explained that jumbdon laydi is the thing that falls when there is thunder. (???!!!) I pressed for more info... "you mean lightening?" He laughed, "no no not lightening; when there is thunder, it is usually because the clouds hit each other (yes, yes i know that) and then there is lightening (right...) and then there is something that falls." He said it so matter of factly, I almost excepcted him to say "duh!" He said that this something that falls leaves a big hole in the ground and it can cause houses or trees to burn. That's lightening, right??? He even said that people with tall houses put a rod on their roof to avoid their houses catching on fire. I said, "right- to catch the lightening so that it hits the rod and not the house." His opinion was that the rod would deter the thunder from coming near the house at all, thus deterring the thing that falls from the thunder from falling onto the house. Hmmmmmmm...

This was an interesting conversation because Wane is an intellectual type by local standards and I was surprised to hear him talking about this mysterious thing that falls out of the sky when there is thunder. I couldn't convince him that what I head learned in 5th grade natural science class was more accurate than his traditional perspective, so I just smiled and nodded and repeated the Pulaar word for the "thing" back to him.

Turns out this word has double meaning though and Baaba wasn't asking me if I'd ever seen the thing that falls from thunder, he was asking if I'd ever put a cricket on a hook to go fishing. (The connection between the two meanings, I don't know)

10:24 am: Anyone by chance noticed the Mauritanian weather lately? I don't have a thermometer to check but if I had to guess, using the gushing outpour of sweat from every pour of my body from 9am to 7pm, the emptiness of the streets in the middle of the day, and the dark long lasting spots I see when i stand up too quickly from lounging on the ground, I'd guess its HOT!!! It doesn't help that we're 2 and a half legs into Ramadan and I've been fasting for most of it. Apparently Ramadan stands on 3 legs, each 10 days, and we've broken 2 legs and now we're wearing the last leg down. I haven't converted to Islam, and I'm not really trying to reach some higher plain of Self... so why fast, you ask? Why put myself through such torturous agony in this hellish heat?

Meh... seemed like a good idea and I've just stuck with it. Actually, its kind of fun to flounder around all day, sharing in the communal misery of the whole town. People greet me "How are you? how are you and the tiredness? How are you and heat?" and when I throw back "how are you and the fasting?" people get looks of weary delight: "are you fasting? no way! can you? fasting hurts!" and we make faces and exchange complaints and shake our heads and it just feels good to suffer together... in a really awful sort of way.

Breaking fast is really good though, I really like it. You start really waiting for it around 6:40pm... it could come at any moment then, as late as 6:53or so. The cold drinks are ready, the dates are ready, the porridge is ready... all you need is that prayer call! You yell at the kids to shut up their racket so you can listen, you stop talking, you wait. Then it comes, that sweet sweet sound, and you all break fast together. First, cold water. Then some dates. Then a cold juicy type drink, either made from dried hibiscus flowers or dried baoubab fruits. Then porridge. I've consumed so much liquid in a 30 minute period I've had to run off to get sick. That is NOT the right way to break a fast. Fasting isn't so much about self control as it is about purging and then BINGING. Then we lay around making contented groaning noises, moving as little as possible, and refilling the belly as soon as there is room for more liquid. Then we eat dinner around 9 or 10pm (apparently I'm lucky, some families wait to eat the main meal after 1am!) and crash out soon their after. THEN, between 4 or 5 am my host mom wakes me, host dad, and oldest host brother up and we all groggily congregate together to swallow down some cold left over porridge before the sun comes up and we are forbidden to eat until it goes back down. Its like this for the full cycle of a moon.

Did you catch that little reference? "My host mom wakes me up"? Its referring to a change I made this last week. For the last year I've lived in a nice house that I inherited from PCVs gone before me, that has a real shower, a kitchen with a sink in it, a screened off room with a fan in it, lots of books, and other comforts that I felt very attached to. It was a good year and I really enjoyed living on my own, I still visited families on a regular basis and my Pulaar was improving steadily enough that I didn't feel I was missing out on too much. But, I did that for the whole last year and now I am ready for something else. There is a family, not my host family from training but anther family I've known this entire last year, that I've been spending a lot of time with. They used to have another volunteer, my pal Jenny, living with them and they are wonderful. I got to thinking how nice it would be to live there, and ended up offering the new Kaedi volunteer Chierno to take over my place. So he did, and I left, and I am SO happy with the new fam.

So mom, Kumba Ba, works aalllll day non stop, even during Ramadan. She supports the family, financially, bye dying and selling fabrics, and by cleaning patrons' houses. She manages the 7 kids that are there, ranging in age from 4 to 19, cooks, cleans, does laundry... and she's always in such a good mood! I don't know how she does it. She's really good at teaching me Pulaar, she'll explain new vocab using other Pulaar words I know, but she also can speak French too. Some nights we lay around under the stars and she'll tell Pulaar folk tales to me and the kids, or funny jokes, or we'll just chat about life in general. I teach her stuff, she teaches me stuff, its a good system.

The dad, Salif Kaita, is a retired I-don't-know-what, and at least during the days of Ramadan he spends his time laying about in the shadiest part of the courtyard. He's next to the house in the morning, then he relocated to the wall around 3pm, then out to the middle around 6pm. And he bosses people around, but often says please. He's a cute little grumpy old man who likes to tell and retell the same stories over and over, but he cracks me up. I call him Baaba which means dad in Pulaar.

There's the oldest daughter who's probably pushing 30, her name is Mancha. Some of the kids at the house are hers, but she's often away working. She's a single divorced mom and while she's lucky to have her mom to help take care of her kids, she's still got it pretty tough trying to make her contributions to feed her family.

There's lots of youngsters running around laughing, screaming crying, working, and getting yelled at; in descending order: Moussa, Amadou, Siré, Mama, Little Mancha, Omar, and Salif. Ever since I moved in, when i come back in the afternoons from being out all morning, the youngest 4 kids drop whatever they're doing and come sprinting at me. The first time they did this I almost ran away, I wasn't sure what this flock of children was going to do to me. But they hug me, and I love it. They run up, get in line, and take turns wrapping their little arms around my legs. (cue collective awwwwwwwww)

The food is delicious, the company is wonderful, and I can go visit the Americans when I want but get to go home to Mauritanians. Its better this way. Ooh and we don't have running water, we have a well! The absolute best part of my day (aside from the first moment that cold cold water touches my parched dehydrated throat) is when I carry my bucket to the well in our courtyard, pull my own water(somewhat akwardly still), and go behind the house to our open-air bathroom to take my bucket bath. The wall is about 5feet tall or so, and looking around I can see all the neighbors, the hills in the distance, the donkey carts rattling by, and I often must do a duck-and-cover when someone near by pops up. I don't THINK they can see things they shouldn't see... but still, a naked girl can feel vulnerable standing in the open like that. Anyways, the bestest part of my day is when I dip my cup in my bucket and pour the cool refreshing water down my back. Oh man its good! SO much better than the hot shower in the stuffy little room in my old house. Mom, wait till you try it! Of course, I imagine some of the goodness will fade when the temperature drops down around 60 and the water is even colder... but I'll figure that out when the time comes.

So that's my latest adventure; moving in with a family during Ramadan. I'm looking forward to spending the Ramadan feast day with them. Kumba is going to henna my hands and feet, I have 2 new outfits being made, and I might even braid my hair. I still visit my host family from training, still looove those kids. But home is at Kumba's (like Kumba-ya).

On a completely different brain wave... I close service in 302 days. EEEEEE!

12:31 pm: How are you and your hunger?
I know its been a while, and all apologies, but lately I've felt like I've got a lot less to report about. The last really exciting thing that happened was my trip to Ghana. But I'm sure there must be SOMEthing worth mentioning so i'm hoping that if I just start writing, ideas will flow through my fingertips.

Well for starters, last time I wrote I mentioned somewhat enthusiastically that I was seriously considering a third year and that honestly couldn't predict what sort of decision I would make. Its strange to think I was so uncertain at the time because shortly there-after I became convinced of the answer to the question I put to myself: will I stay or will I go? And the answer, the unwavering and undoubted answer is, I WILL GO!!! I definitely will not be extending a third year, I will leave the earliest moment possible which will be August 15(to make it home for Kate's wedding), and I will not come back.

I'll explain. Part of the reason I've gone the past month or so without writing is that I didn't want spew negativity in a public forum, and I knew that I didn't really have anything nice to say. Now that I'm coming out of the bad-attitude fog, I can talk about it a bit. The odd thing is, I was the ultimate happy volunteer for a whole year. I didn't get burnt out during training; nor during the 10 months that followed. Even though I had uncomfortable or frustrating moments, I never went through a period of "ugh I can't stand this place" like so many of my fellow volunteers did. And that unhappy phase is a total typical and natural part of culture shock and adjustment and I thought I just thoroughly lucked out at not having experienced it for a whole year. But now, I finally get what everyone has been complaining so much about!

Or at least for about a month or 2 I did, but now I'm starting to like it here again. I just grew tired of being so foreign, of the dirtiness, the constant state of confusion, the uncomfortable transport, the heat... and it hit me all at once and I thought, "Screw this!" And I swore off a third year and had to really bear down and remind myself it was only a bad phase and I'd be happy again so as to not consider cutting out early. And a phase it was, thankfully. I've started going out and spending time with my families more, and enjoying it more. I've started going out with mobile team again and have gotten to see many of the traditional midwives I trained in June and hear what they've been up to (awesome!) and I've started to reclaim my life in RIM, finally.

Some good things came out of that bad spell... namely 1. that I made a definite decision to not stay. I'll be much better off in the long run ending service in 2007 rather than staying longer; and 2. I did some serious personal reflection and decided what I want to be when I grow up (also decided its about time to grow up when i get home). I want to be a Nurse Practitioner (I'll get a joint Masters: MSN and MS Public Health). Working here in a health capacity has really turned me on to health work for my career, and if I become an NP with a PH degree, I could easily come back to work in Health Care development in Africa, or I could easily stay in America and help to fulfill the increasing demand for trained nurses. So if anyone has any info about NPs or PH... I'm all ears!

Restarting with the mobile team really helped me to plant my feet and my heart back in Mauritanian soil. I love getting out of Kaédi a few times a week, bouncing around the country side (which is currently green and beautiful because its rainy season) in a pickup truck, visiting the villages and working with underprivileged people who need and want our help. Plus its been really amazing getting feedback from the women we trained. And once I got to see the birthing materials being used! We showed up to a village and asked that traditional midwife we trained come see us. She showed up with her little birthing kit bag on her shoulder and I thought, how cute she wants to make a good impression! But turns out it wasn't just that; she had literally walked to us from just assisting a woman give birth. So we jetted over to the new mother's hut and turns out she still had... wait I'm going to spare the gory details. BUT, the trained midwife with us on mobile team had to perform a procedudr, and she had me be there to watch and learn (she knows I want to be a nurse). Turns out that this woman had a serious enough complication, that if we didn't happen to show up on mobile team that day, the new mother would have very likely eventually bled to death. It was amazing. They laid this woman down on the plastic mat that we provided in the training, otherwise she would have been on the dirt floor. They had cut the cord with the clamps and sterile razor we provided, otherwise it would have been dirty knives and strips of cloth. They wore plastic protective gloves we provided, otherwise their hands would have been bare. The conditions in this country for something as basic and daily as giving birth are UNREAL! It feels good to know that my project had at least some benefit for the communities involved.

And I was happy to discover that seeing so much blood and birthing matter didn't gross me out or make me woozy. It was a good intro to birth, i think. I hope to witness at least one or two births before I leave Africa. I'm in training mode now, I want to learn as much as I can in the "field" before I go back to school.

On other non-work related news: the locusts are back. Ew! They are big and tenacious and everywhere! They are in my garden eating my plants and they're flying into my salon and clinging to my skirts. Plus they're quite difficult to kill. They're like mini flying Hummers... can't smash 'em! Be gone locusts!

Other news: today is the start of Ramadan. I looked for the moon last night (you're supposed to see the sliver of moon after the new moon to trigger the start of Ramadan) but I didn't see it. People still began fasting today, so I have too. Which is already getting to be a bit painful, its only 1:25pm. I woke up hungry. Bad sign. But I want to truly fast because I want to honestly break fast with families in the evening. Don't know if I'll make it the whole solid month, but I'm going to give it a shot. Plus, to be honest, I could stand to lose a few pounds... It's unfortunate this month is falling so early in the year, its still WAY too hot. gonna be a looong hungry month.

The new volunteers are all sworn in and are settling nicely into their sites. My friends who came the year ahead of me have finally all vacated the country, except those nutters who are staying on for a third year. Those who have left will be greatly missed, but already things feel normal without them. In a year from now people will recuperate quickly from my absence, inshallah.

That's all for now, I'll try to be more communicative now that I actually like it here again.

Oh... just to throw out there. Of course I'm not expecting anything, I've already been showered with so many goodies. But if by chance anyone was thinking of sending anything but needed ideas; pudding. I LOVE pudding (and no bake jello desserts) and miss it. Also peanut butter, recent magazines, cardamom (the ground spice) and there is something called Texturized protein flakes, or something like that. Like I said, I expect nothing, but if ideas were needed... :-)

Ok, much love to all and Peace!

07:22 pm: growing up in RIM
Ready? This hit me like a ton of bricks yesterday…One year from today, I will be home in the US of A to be there for my friend Katy’s wedding. One year from yesterday I will have left Mauritania. One year. That sounds like it might be a long time, but using the last 12 months as a gague, I may as well be going home tomorrow because it almost feels like I got here yesterday. The question of course now is, will I be going home to stay, or will I be going home for a month and a half and bee-lining back to the land of tea and donkeys as soon as my little sis leaves for her honeymoon? See, there is the option of extending for a third year. And I am seriously considering it. Usually when I have a big decision in my head, I debate it on the forefront of my mind. I go through the motions of ‘should I or shouldn’t I’ but the truth is, one thin layer into my consciousness already totally knows the answer as soon as I’ve asked myself the question. When the decision comes to surface its never much of a surprise. But this question actually has me stumped and I don’t have that deeper down feeling of ready-made resolution. Do I stay or do I go? Thank goodness I have a year to decide.

I’m currently readjusting to the feeling of my own skin here as a Peace Corps volunteer. I don’t just mean that my allergies from the weather changes have me itching and fidgiting too much (though they do)or that the bites from mosquitos and other miscellaneous creepy-crawlies that thrive in the rainy season have me scratching too much (though they do) but that I’m no longer a new girl in town. I’m a big kid and I’m supposed to help show the new ones around. There are 9 new ones in my region, and alhumdullilah they all seem really cool and motivated and ready to do it. There are 50 some new faces coming in and out of the training facility that is located here in my town. (Last year, I got affectated to my training site. This year, new people are being trained in my town. Perspective does wonders). I’m not even a trainer but I’ve been asked SO many questions. How do you think of projects? How long did it take you to learn Pulaar? Does it matter I never gardened before? Does it suck living in Kaedi? Where can we find veggies in the market? Did I pay too much for this outfit? And here’s the crazy thing… I have answers, and my answers are based on experience. And that’s what is taking some getting used to. I have learned SO MUCH in the last year and I never really realized the sum of the products of all my observations, efforts, mistakes and inquiries until I started spelling them out to nervous new people who fear they aren’t learning fast enough. Its gone by like a blink yet I’ve taken in and learned more than I’ve ever learned in such a limited amount of time. Can I do it again? Can I learn as much language and culture and logistical tricks and coping mechanisms this upcoming year as I did in the last year? I sure hope so.

In Pulaar there is something called a tokara. Tokara means your ‘same name person’ and its considered a special thing (or person). For example, my Pulaar name is Acca and anyone else who’s name is Acca or Aisatta (because it’s the formal version of acca) is my tokara. Tokara am. And we’re supposed to like each other extra well because we share the same name. It’s a weird connection that they imagine, but its fun to play along. Well I have an American-name tokara in this new group. She will be living in my region and she is also a vegetarian… quel coincidence! It was also a pleasant coincidence that I got to take my same-name person out on her site visit. You may remember that last year at this time, I had the anticlimactic experience of site visit in Kaédi; my training town. I went nowhere new, I had no shocking great break-out adventure. I did eat some good food and watch some movies in blessed luxury. But no adventure. Well, I got it a year later.

I took Rachel out to her site that’s maybe 30k outside of Kaédi, down a wide gravel road. Her site is to be Ganki, which is actually one of the 2 villages where I held my midwives training. So it worked out perfectly that I got to go with her as I already knew the place a bit and knew some people there. As a matter of fact and further same-name coincidence, the person who is to be her counterpart, her community contact/work helper, is none other than my tokara Aisatta, who I was already friends with. It’s a weird same-name triangle and Mauritanias think its just great. So do I. So off we went to Ganki for 5 DAYS. Now, I’ve spent a night in a village here, a night in a village there, but I’ve never been stuck en brousse for 5 WHOLE DAYS- or shall I say, had the pleasure of spending so much time in the middle of nowhere.

But I’m kidding around. It is absolutely beautiful out there and the first 2 or 3 days felt like another vacation for me. It’s the peak of rainy season right now and the grass is growing and sparkling like the electric-green grass in England in November. The cows and donkeys and goats are all so happy getting bellyfulls of fresh weeds and there’s so much milk and when the rains come the following 12 hours are usually heaven, cool and calm, shining and wonderful. Its nice to spend those moments en brousse. I drank more milk in those 5 days than I did in months. And I think I had some milk straight out the teat. I mean- the milk was warm. Not heated-on-a-fire warm but more like cow’s body temperature warm. And I thought I saw the sillouett of a woman crouching under the sow just moments before my dinner was presented to me. But it was good. I drank lots of local water out of “clean enough” wells, and am waiting to see what the next few days bring me in terms of gastrointenstinal surprises. Its so easy to take for granted the clean water we have to drink, and so unnerving to peer nervously and suspiciously into every cup of village water offered to my dehydrated self. Tokara am and I took a few nice leisurly strolls and many naps and had lots of time on the matelas.

I mean LOTS of time laying around on matelas. After a couple of days we were DONE with sitting around but there wasn’t much else to do so we kept sitting. I think if I had been put in a village straight away I would have spent the last year adjusting and learning to love brusse live like I now love Kaédi life. But I wasn’t put in a village, and as such, I was relieved to come back to Kaédi. However, among the lenghty hours of nothingness, there were moments of intense somethingness. For example; a villager started construction on a new fancy cement house. For the ground breaking, all the young men turned up with shovels to dig the foundations while the women cooked a massive village-wide freshly slaughtered goat meal and the old men sat around smoking their pipes and watching the youth do their thing. And we were there with the community and tokara am started to really open up and talk to the people… in Pulaar! Also, they had a meeting where every woman in the village showed up. My other tokara, Aisatta, hosted the meeting to explain the presence of their new PCV to the village and make sure they understood what her roll would be and how the village was to help her. Then, after many rousing rounds of bismillas, another women stood up and gave an entire presentation that she had recently learned on Women’s health. Then another woman stood up and explained what she leared at a Midwives training Seminar she had attended a couple months ago in Ganki (yes, my training).

So that was something new and cool for me to see… village life. Its like a commune really, they make decisions all together, they build houses all together, if one learns something she teaches it to all the others. Everyday when we had lunch at least 2 other bowls showed up and we had to eat 3 lunches because of the generosity and eagerness of other families to welcome us. The whole village is related either by blood or by spirit and they support each other in ways I don’t think that we city folk would begin to know how to do. I don’t imagine that even our tiniest towns in the states have the level of kinship that exists in this one village I spent five days in. So there you go, I’m still learning.

Now the thing I’m waiting on is for Kaédi to cool down. Not just in terms of temperature but in terms of Peace Corps activity… because right now it is smokin hot! When Peace Corps finally packs up their shiny 4-wheel drives, and when all the new PCVs ship out to site, and all training and visiting PCVs go back where they belong, my life will finally regain some normalcy. But first, we have our “midterm reconnect” meeting for which every single member of my training class comes to Kaédi for a “how are you feeling about life as a PCV now that its been a year” sort of seminar. Then I go to Nouakchott to help review our health program’s mission and goals. Then the newbies swear in, and then they leave and Kaédi becomes mine again. I will miss my friends I’ve gotten to see so much of over the summer, but I will welcome the re