19 November 2005 - 22:40
I've been really busy lately, but I had to come to Nouakchott to change money so that I can go to Mali next week after Thanksgiving, so here's a recap of my last few months with pictures...
I was at the new volunteers' swearing in ceremony in September. It felt a little weird, mainly because I feel so far removed from where they are right now, and it was only a year ago that I was in their shoes. I guess I understand now why the older volunteers I talked to when I first came in didn't seem all that excited about what they were doing - no matter how bizarre life in this country is, it all eventually starts becoming routine because we deal with these situations, which are strange and exotic to outsiders and new volunteers, every day.
It rained a lot, all at once, in the end of September. The seasonal river filled up and overflowed, flooding parts of town, but amidst all the craziness, Amanda and I had a little fun, floating down the river on an inflatable chair.
Ramadan came and went. This year, with me being in Tidjikja instead of Lehweitat, was much better, despite the difficulty of fasting. I fasted for the whole month, but I drank water during the day for health reasons (note: Muslim fasting means fasting only during daylight hours - people aren't supposed to drink or eat while the sun's up, but they can eat and drink all night if they wish). Ramadan was a special time for me this year - I made a lot of new friends by being invited over to families' houses to break fast with them at sunset, and I strengthened many old friendships as well. It amazed me how people opened up to me when they found out that I was joining them in their struggle by fasting, and how friendly they could be. Id El-Fitr, the feast day at the end of Ramadan, was a looooong day filled with greeting my many friends around town (while looking ridiculous in a boubou), handing out coins to children, and eating delicious meaty meals.
I moved into a new house in the beginning of November. It's really nice (by Mauritanian standards), and it costs 2/3rds of what my old house did. I've been doing a lot of minor repairs on it and setting my garden up lately.
I had my third adventure with the UNICEF polio vaccination campaign last weekend. Nothing too exciting happened this year, but the countryside was absolutely beautiful because of the abundance of rain we've had this year. We vaccinated a total of 759 children, but I hope to cover more than that by correcting procedures with the next phase in December.
I somehow ended up with three new desert tortoises in November, so now my house has turned into quite a menagerie with Rockus and her puppy, Porkmuscle, still hanging around too.
So now I'm getting ready to go on vacation to Mali (the PC security officer called me into his office a few days ago to tell me to change my travel route because of terrorist activity in the area we were planning on passing through - life here is pretty surreal sometimes!), but when I get back I go straight back to work arranging transportation of materials to the community garden I applied for funding for, teaching people how to plant in that garden, setting up an after-school mentoring program for girls in Tidjikja, helping the Tagant regional health director arrange a trash clean-up program and find funding for it, and participate in the second phase of the polio vaccination campaign, all before I head back to Nouakchott for Christmas and a meeting with my director about the health education curriculum we are working on for the public school system and logistics of switching the PC Water Sanitation Program over to a Health Education program here, hopefully without using too many run-on sentences to tell people what I'm up to!
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
