our flight leaves tonight at like 1am. unbelievable. send good thoughts for safe travels, good plane movies, and lox and bagels once we arrive in nyc.

so close to home, i can taste it.

cambodia was aweseome. much updating to do. three nights in Phnom Penh, staying with Hayley's college contact, Mindy, who's living and teaching there. Did some really heavy sightseeing about the Khmer Rouge in the late 70's and the mass genocide that happened there. It was terrible. Absolutely necessary to see but something you never want to see again.

On to Siem Reap, which was almost completely under water in places due to the rain. Up to our knees walking in the streets at some points. Spent two full days at Angkor, seeing all the temples we could see. One rainy day, one sunny one. Absolutely breathtaking. Not to mention, one of the temples was where part of the first tomb raider movie was filmed, apparently (note to self, rent movies when you get home).

Our traveling over the Cambodia/Thailand border did not go as smoothly as planned, not by a long shot. Being sold the wrong ticket in Siem Reap, we were in a car to Bangkok when we realized something wasn't right. Hayley'd completely lost her voice because of a cold (not swine flu) that we both seem to have gotten. Everything got straightened out in the end, but we left Cambodia with a sour taste in our mouths. Beautiful place, would love to go back, but Siem Reap just seemed to be crawling with people willing to take the shirt off your back. Too bad.

Relaxing in our guesthouse that night we drank wine and watched a few movies we'd picked up at the market. And by the next day we were here, in Ko Samet, on the beach. The next few days look about the same. Couldn't be happier that this is how we are ending our trip. Then back to Bangkok for a few days, and then home. We can't believe it and now that our travels are coming to an end, it's great to be able to look forward to it with everything in us.

So a week from tomorrow we fly to JFK. A few days in NYC (still more new sights to see for me!) and then back home. Homehomehome. lovely.

We crossed over the Mekhong river, taking a fast boat. We'd heard a lot of stories about how scary this trip was, but our other option was a two day slow boat that would put us another day behind in travel. After talking to a bunch of people about it, it turned out no one had ACTUALLY taken the fast boat, or even knew someone directly who had done it. Travelers have a rumor mill that rivals PC, though not in personal info, stories get made bigger every day.

The trip took about 7 hours, with a little stop for lunch at a floating noodle place. Delish! We met a few Brits that were traveling together, Jemma and Ollie, and had a great time, though cramped on little "seats". Nonetheless we got to Luong Prabong safe and sound and found a hostel right away. The night market was beautiful, with lots of silk scarves, linen pants, figures, and even ornate opium pipes (the Golden Triangle used to be/is an Opium hot spot of the world market). The next day was chill, roaming around town, buying our next bus tickets, and catching up on some relaxing and journaling. The following day we went to a beautiful bear sanctuary and waterfall, just 30km outside of the city.

Opting out of the tubing experience, (which apparently equals drunk backpackers in tubes, drinking "buckets" of booze, jumping off rope swings into the Mekhong, often getting hurt and then remembering nothing the next day) we went right down to Vientiane, the current capitial of Laos. A cute little town on the Mekhong, we met Fred, a former RIM PCV. Renting motor bikes on a COMPLETELY rainy day, we set out to see the town. Apparently you have to bring your own gun to use at the shooting range, so that ended up out of the question. We did, however, go bowling. Hayley, strangely enough, ran into a girl she went to college with in Canada, who happens to be living in Phnom Phen (our next stop) teaching English and offered us a place to stay! Small small world it is.

Noodle bowls, street food, and temples, temples, temples. Tonight we have a night/sleeper bus all the way to Phnom Phen (24hours) where we have lots of siteseeing to do. Then up to Siem Reap and back to Thailand and a few beaches before heading home.

Also, if you need something to do and are feeling generous, check out this link for COPE, a local organization working with victims of unexploded cluster bombs from the Vietnam War. There are still hundreds of thousands of bombs sitting around the Lao countryside. It's a great organization and worth looking into.

more soon!

Sitting on our little porch at the hostel, overlooking the Mekhong river to Laos.

Tomorrow we cross for another part of our adventure.

Scoot scoots, temples, tubing, and a visit from Fred Lam, RIM PCV.

The visit with Renee was beautiful and wonderful, and we really had a great time chilling with her host fam (and her house full of kitties!) We still have about three weeks left of travel and can't believe that there's still so much to see and so much time to do it in.

As Hayley says, "every day is the coolest thing that's ever happened to me".

ho ly crap.

and, no. there is nothing between me and that tiger. nothing.

VACATION!!

don't worry mom, i'm still alive!!

this is the poohead that took hayley's wallet. we didn't see him, but i'm SURE this is what he looked like. if the font is too small, i'll recap. he says

i'm the jerk that stole hayley's wallet. too bad all i got was a little money and an expired peace corps ID

and then the pink lines are for karma smiting him down and the green squiggles show the loser suckface vibes that he eminates.

so there's that.

on another note, the street food continues! green papaya salad that had both of our jaws on the table. with little to no thai language abilities are p.r.e.t.t.y hilarious.

hayley: ~~pointing at a dish that someone's already eating~~ "we want 2" ~~making the number two on her fingers~~

thai lady: "sometinginthai"

hayley: ~~nodding~~ "yes, two. but one," ~~number one on her fingers~~ ~~she picks up a tiny hot pepper off the lady's cart~~ "no peppers, none" ~~sweeping X type gesture~~

thai lady: ~~laughs, nods~~

me: ~~nodding, smiling, points to hayley~~ "what she said" ~~smiling~~

and, turns out, that works pretty well here.

today we met a traveler named susan who was here for some business, but is now going to a monestary 250k outside bangkok to meditate for three weeks and do a major cleanse. she'd bought a buddhist nun's robes even. she said her life in germany was in all the wrong order, the priorities all mixed up. she just got a new job, so she said she'd have to go back after the three weeks. or maybe she won't, she said. only time will tell. we applauded her, congratulated her. and then laughed because as she left to search for enlightenment we were on our way to a mall to watch a movie.

...which was AWESOME. man, america's gotta get on this recliner in a movie theater thing. it's genius. we weren't the only ones there this time, but did enjoy a great showing of the movie "gamer" with gerard butler. did he become, like, uber-famous while i was in mauritania? that dude's got like 10 movies out right now.

anyway, tomorrow we're going to the pc office here to see if we can meet some staff, and hopefully i'll be able to talk to their medical officer and get some meds for my recently realized acquisition of shistosomiasis (yeah, thanks mauritania). then a night bus up to chiang mai to see elephants, tigers, and monkeys *oh my!*. and then, drumroll, we'll finally see renee at her site! and maybe ride an ostrich. so much more to come.

thanks for keeping up with all this! til next time!

our second day in bangkok hayley and i saw the grand palace in bangkok and then went to a HUGE mall (yes, we're getting better at this) to watch district 9, a new sci-fi flick, and sit in VIP seats (this means remote controlled leather reclining chairs where we were the only people in the whole theater and they give you complimentary pillows and fleece blankets (this only cost about $15US!). spoiled rotten, we were. and proud of it! back to our adorable little hostel where we have a room w/AC. hells yes.

cut to yesterday, roaming around the weekend market shopping for god-knows-what. browsing, eating delicious street food, trying to stay cool, and checking out the local tattoo shops (nothing new yet, mom, but it might be coming soon. don't worry!) grabbing bus tickets for our trip up to chiang mai the day after tomorrow and picking up tickets for the handsome furs. completely exhausted from our tromping around, we got more street food. street food, in thailand, apparently means the best padthai i've had in my entire life, by the way. unbelievable.

hayles bought us uber-adorable dresses at the market and we put makeup on for the first time in at least six months. okay, maybe not quite that long, but st. louis senegal doesn't count. dresses, mascara, lip gloss and model poses later, we flagged a cab to the culture club on si ayuttayha and got pronunciation lessons from our cabbie. by the way, silly difficult things to adjust to? cars driving on the left side of the street. not to mention how trippy it is to be in the passenger front seat that's on the left hand side of the car. stupid, but hilarious.

the show was great, with a few good opening acts. we met some americans living in thailand and danced til our legs were sore. the handsome furs put on a GREAT show, and it was a wonderful surprise for not really knowing that much of their stuff before the concert. sweet!

we're probably going to see another VIP movie tonight and the day after tomorrow we head up north. mashallah, vacation.

so much to say! we spent several days on the island of bohol, rented motorbikes, and scooted around the whole island. we saw tarsiers (those tiny monkeys i hold so close in my heart), the chocolate hills, and started a biker gang. spent the day with an irishman (alias: crippler mc kiernan) hayles (outlaw "watchout!" pete) and myself (the greasy licks ruffian). food stats: awesome museli with mango, banana, peanuts and raisins with yogurt and honey on top. then to the bee farm on the island of palagan for the afternoon. it was so beautiful sitting by the ocean, literally eating the best food we've had in more like 5 years, that hayley and i were both brought to tears. not that you're surprised. i think it took being in a context like that to reflect on our pc service, what we're doing right now, and realize that our lives are never going to be the same. WE are never going to be the same. and here we are, halfway around the world. still learning, still growing, and still on cloud nine. our lives are amazing right now, and it is not going unnoticed. so there's the dramatic part.

after bohol and palagan we continued on to the island of negros oriental where we stayed at a place called harold's in, a chill hostel with some cool travelers we ended up running into later. we went for live music at hay hay's, sets full of rocking alanis and cranberries songs. chilling w/ more pc philippines kids (what a beautiful network of people). the next day we went to apo island, known for its amazing snorkling and scuba diving. chilling in the sun, jerry-rigging a pair of my old glasses into a snorkle mask, we enjoyed the sun and sulu sea, sipping on san miguel beer when the salty water got to be too much for us. we met up with victor pano, a spanish dude who went to school in chicago for a while, and an avid soccer player. wandering around the island that's small enough to walk around, we trekked, swapped stories, and enjoyed some good off-tourist-season time passing.

back to dumguete, with a stop in dauin for a local fiesta and dance competition. one of those cultural events that mauritania was so lacking, that was so absent in our lives for the last two years. probably at least a thousand or so people show up for a parade and celebration where troops of kids from the local provinces put on ELABORATE dances with beautiful costumes, choreography, and drumming to the subject of environmental protection for local resources. ms. philippines was even there! :)

once we got in to dumguete we had a lovely dinner with dave, a pc philippines volunteer: homemade flour tortillas, panfried chicken, lettuce, cheese, and salsa, with beer and no-bake cookies for dessert. amazing. big shout outs for that one.

now we're back in manila, going to bangkok tomorrow. we'll see renee in just a few days! the adventure continues with night markets, malls with movie theaters, and maybe elephant and ostrich riding? more coming soon!

hayley bought a guitar. i bought a mocha frappacino from starbucks. we took photos with inmates that do choreographed dance.

let's let the photos speak for themselves.

next! chocolate hills monkeys apo island

after a few days in san fernando and readjusting to the time change, we continued on to the north to baguio. through the amazing networking of the pc, we were put in contact with a volunteer living just outside the city, in la trinidad. travis said he'd pick us up once we got a cab out of town, and mentioned carrot cake being served in his apartment. we were p r e t t y stoked. once he asked us up to his place we met two others, maylen- another pcv, and janet, an aussie working at the same university as travis. add cake and tea, and we were in heaven.

the next few days consisted of swapping a lot of stories, doing a lot of site seeing, and eating a lot of food (tofu stirfry, indian curry, and lentil burgers). we saw camp john hay, wandered around all of the downtown, saw a live reggae show, ate good food (did i mention that yet?)... all in all, just wonderful. travis let us stay at his apartment (a little different than my little mud shack at my site) and even gave us real cereal with milk for breakfast :)

we also took a short trip to sagada, a mountain town with some beautiful caving. spelunking was not something i ever thought i'd be able to claim to have done, but there we go. the bus ride out there was a little trecherous at times, the narrow mountain roads under construction and the chance to tumble down very high rice terraces always a threat. the town was chill, and our first night there we were the only people in our hostel. again, with the food, i know, but i ate the most amazing open-faced tuna sandwich i've had in years. and these cookies that HAD to have had something addictive in them. the caving was amazing, and every time we thought we knew where our guide was going he scooted down some little crevace and told us to follow. water, pools, bats, climbing up ropes, scooting down and through tiny little entrance ways. and four hours later we came out soaked and happy. we drank rice wine and ate those crack cookies all night.

at the present moment we are in manila, continuing on to the beautiful beaches and dancing prisoners of cebu in the next few days. then to the chocolate mountains where there are monkeys that fit in the palm of your hand and volcanoes in lakes in volcanoes that have restaurants that serve coconut pie.

big shout out thank yous to travis, maylen, janet, and dear person who ended up with our cookies on the bus: please enjoy them and know that that was our deposit to the karma travel bank. thank you.

if you want to imagine this scene correctly, picture me wearing alladdin-style pants (called chias), my swim suit top and a tank top over that. beach weary from all the sun and surf, wearing chockos and stupidly big sunglasses. after a cup of coffee we decided to check out the local mall in san fernando to see if we could find some little speakers for our travels.

the scene: busy mall. probably not even that big for people who are used to it. mcdonalds at the entrace, little cars for kids to ride. music, buttered popcorn, electronic stores, clothes stores. women wearing shorts and high heels, people buying cellphones and homegoods. escalators. tall ceilings. bright lights.

enter been-too-long-in-underdeveloped africa-becca.

i had heart palpitations. seriously. minor anxiety attack. slack-jawed and idiotic looking no doubt, i wandered behind hayley through aisles and aisles of shoes, shirts, pants, toys, computers, stereos and snack foods. remarking, outloud in a country where EVERYONE speaks english, how many colors there were. how bright the lights were. how close everything was and how i wanted to greet everyone i saw. we'll call it "little orphan annie syndrome".

guess that's what i get for spending two years in RIM.

and you want to know the funny part? i didn't realize that my eyesight had gotten worse during my service until i got here. why? because there are actually signs to read here.

*phew*

just a quick post to let you all know that we arrived safely in manila, philippines, about two days ago. we're still adjusting to the time change, but the food is phenominal, and we have been staying with friends, so we are quite happy. i should hopefully be online again tonight to make a more detailed account of our goings on in morocco (shortened version: beach all day, chwarma, showers, partying til daylight. repeat).

today we're in san fernando, on the west coast of the northern island. about to wander into town and do some browsing, get ourselves lost, and hopefully end up back at another beach. it's a great life these days.

we are so thankful for the safe travel we have had thus far, and the annonymous people that have helped along the way. ie: that guy in casablanca who pointed us to a wonderfully cheap hotel just down the street where we crashed before we went to the airport, ticketing lady who gave us those front seats in coach with all the leg room, riza the random filipino lady who took our first photo in country. you all have good travel karma coming your way.

i'll try to get photos up soon!

miss you all, and thanks for reading!

what i did for the last two years.

thanks to cortney for posting this!!

so, as some of you are aware, there've been some bigbig, fast changes a'happenin' round here lately. the short of it all is that i was given a call last week from peace corps staff saying that i had to be in the capital, nouakchott, two days later. considering i still thought i had another three days in the village and five in kaedi, my regional capital, this took me as quite a shock. turns out pc washington needs to do a "security check" wherein the volunteers consolodate to the capital, then the first year volunteers will go to senegal for a ten day conference of sorts while pc tours the country. it was just bad timing with my plans to cos (close of service) on august 6hth. i went home, told the family, and bless their hearts, the goat was slaughtered and ready to be cooked within the hour.

i was pretty upset to have to hurry my goodbyes with my friends and family, the ones that i've lived and worked with for the last two years. but goodbyes aren't a huge deal here really. people know that God works in mysterious ways, and that, as hawa says "l'homme propose et dieu dispose" (man makes proposals, but God has the final say). sometimes things just happen that are out of our control. and this is one of those things.

so i gathered up my friends, they came to my house, and we spent one last night laying out on mats, chatting about this and that and work and friends. it was chill, and really nice. the food was delicious (picture banaf as like a really good potroast, minus the carrots. the meat melts in your mouth... and to think i used to be a vegetarian!) as they left around 11:30pm we said our goodbyes. when you're not sure the next time you're going to see someone, you say "ada yarlo, ada yafo" which pretty much translates to "forgive me and pardon me". since live is so unpredictable, anything can happen. you would never want to leave someone upset, or holding on to grudges. so when you say it, the other person says "amin" (=amen) like, "of course i forgive you" and then you say it to them. it has a way of dissolving any bad feelings between people. it's great.

we all said it and hugged, and they walked off. i brushed my teeth, set up my net like any other night. i went to my family and said, "goodnight everybody" and my three moms walked me to my net to put me to bed. "ndeysan," (goodness) they'd say, "you're leaving tomorrow morning? oh nouma if you leave us we will be lonely." "me more," i said.

i called hayley and cried. though the rush was so hard, i felt so good. what an amazing experience.

the next morning we loaded my bags onto the horse cart and the entire family walked me to the door. dad, mom (mariem), gogo (ramata), yaiy (maimouna), mama, djiby, abou, amadou, abdouleye, binta, fama, babalou, and of course amna. and when i went to shake my mom's hand, she put out her left hand. doing anything with the left hand is considered pretty wrong here, you would never do that. but in a case like this, it means "we know you're going away, probably for a long time. i'm going to shake your hand the wrong way so that you'll have to come back to rectify it."

the sunglasses were a good choice.

i hopped on the cart and turned back as we rode off, my whole family still at the door, waving. i left the village.

so allah jabbi, mi artat. so allah jabbi.

their uncovered heads heating in the glare of the

midday sun.

their uncovered braids making them feel more like children

than mothers with children

or grandmothers with grandchildren.

their uncovered shame rising through their crowns,

clear for anyone to see. pulsating through

their down turned eyes,

their heavy shoulders,

their wilted smiles.

the rocks of the gravel road pushing bruises

into their knees and shins,

anchoring humiliation into the tops of their feet,

bleeding scars into the palms of their hands and

the focus of their hearts.

A hand hits hard when you shift your weight

if you flex your rights

if you dare speak up.

In the center of town,

halfway through the day,

in the middle of the street,

the women are crying

Oumi holds the newborn child

cradling his weak frame in her field arms

gazing into his waterfall eyes

I imagine her singing.

a new younger brother,

a blessing.

she rocks him back

quiet now, she says.

rocks him forward

says don't cry.

she picks at the gravel sand in the corners of his eyes.

shh, she says, mommy'll be back soon.

calmed features, eyes closed. soon he rests.

she smiles.

but when the woman returns, she knows.

she holds the metalic taste of pain in her mouth

before swallowing it down.

she takes him from the girl,

pushes the bitter stab down into her gut

and forces and upturn in her lips.

go outside, she says, let him sleep.

lethimsleeplethimsleeplethimsleep

go on now, she says, leave him be.

and as her daughter leaves the room and breath leaves her son

the tears start to fall.

Casablanca-Manila: $838.29

Manila-Bankok: $343.01

Bankok-NYC: $736.49

NYC-CHI: $171.60

-----------------------------

Total: $2089.39

Cash in lieu ticket

Nouakchott-Madison, WI: $2131.55

$2131.55

-$2089.39

-----------

$ 42.16

I am being paid $42.16 to travel all the way around the world. Hells yeah.

just a litte hint to keep you interested... the premiere of a peace corps commercial written and directed by myself and cortney donnally will be at the kiffa wine festival june 16-17. we will post it on youtube shortly after. get ready...

in case anybody misplaced it, here's the link to my most recent uploaded pictures. enjoy!

once we got out of the city of chinguetti the dunes stretched so far there was nothing else to see. we mounted our camels, our two guides leading two separate lines. for three hours we rode up and down dune after dune. nothing but sand and the beating down of the saharan sun.

then one particularly tall one and we saw, as we descended, a grouping of trees in the crevice of two hills. an oasis. slowly our lines clopped towards the solitary greenness, the only living thing, besides a few shepherds and their flocks, we'd seen all morning. arriving near the trees we got off our camels then, to let them drink for a while. we drank some water and ate a pasta salad we had made the night before. lounging on the ground in the shade of the palms, we spent the rest of the afternoon napping, daydreaming, shooting the shit and drinking tea.

around 5pm, when it finally wasn't so ungodly hot, our guides went to find the camels that had been left to graze on the sparse grasses that grew in the sand. we were off again, heading back towards the city. an hour of riding and we stopped to set up camp. in what time was left the boys played wiffle ball as the sun set.

our guide made a heavy flatbread that he cooked in the sane under the fire he built, and dinner was vegetable sandwiches.

then we laid together on the ege of a dune, listening to 'explosions in the sky' on sam's little speakers.

we talked until the music ended.

and when it did the silence was incredible. no wind. no trees or bushes rustling. no animals, no babies, no people. no radios, no cars, even no bugs. if you held your breath the silence was so invasive it seemed to push on your eardrums. it was such a severe lack of sound, something i had never experienced before and probably never will again. the sound of nothing is shocking. a full moon above, bright enough to read by. the air becoming so cold that i shivered wearing a sweatshirt. and the silence, deafening. we went to bed, in sleeping bags and warm socks under the moon, blanketed in the quiet of the sahara desert.

found this crumpled in my trunk form a while ago:

lucky to be born in a country rich enough for complexity.

glad to crave the subtleties of language, the levels of emotion

the layers of feeling whether that feeling is pain, anger, sadness, or otherwise.

the blandness of the everyday here- is this just what becoming a grown up is like?

is it the losing of passion? the tempering of extremities?

because i am a being that survives through feeling. one that loves to live passionately,

no matter how much it can hurt. and it is an attention- holding dull ache I feel

here with that lack. i am underdone. underwhelmed. a life this simple is a

silence too deafening, a cold too biting, and a conversation to bland to pay

attention to but too important to leave.

and i want to write, i do. the pull still sits unhappily in my stomach or behind my ribs.

and i know that there are things here. but i i am too afraid that it will come out

too romanticized (the simple life usually does) and i owe this place and these

people more than that. this is not article in national geographic, no commercial

for children international. it's not exotic any more for me and i couldn't live

with myself if i painted it that way.

another side pulls too strongly too-- the jaded, angry volunteer who knows too much,

understands every marriage proposal, tries to make too many people happy and

still gets talked down to because of her gender and, therefore, assumed stupidity,

unimportance, and of course, promiscuity.

but how do i get this out, then? because my time is running out and once i leave, i'll surely

over-romanticize. with your ticket home they give you rosy-colored glasses.

very lady mcbeth-esque, but i just want to say "get out, damned spot/art! get out poetry!"

instead it pools in the spirit and mind of mine. sitting, fermenting. making bad poetry

wine that smells a little like bissap.

Almost every day when I go to Sala's house I take the same road. A gravel/sand path wide enough for a horse cart that breaks off from the main street. It cuts behind the rows and rows of shops selling tea, sugar, flashlights, and other basics. Winding back to run parallel to the wall that marks Lexeiba's cemetery. I've never been inside. Death is usually something that falls in the men's responsibility here and women often have little to do with the "funeral"-type arrangements. But if you stand on your tiptoes or glance through the breaks in the stones you can see piles of small rocks, sometimes actual signs, to indicate the graves of loved ones who have passed.

Walking along this wall you are heading towards the center of town. Piles of burned trash leave ashen scar marks in the sand and little kids sometimes run with homemade pull-cars or iron circles they keep upright by pushing them with a stick (think Williamsburg, Virginia, and you'll get the idea). It's here that, every day, I pass by the same tree. Caught between the main road and the graveyard, it stands almost barren. The branches twist, reaching desperately outward. If you catch it around noon when the shadows fall straight down it outlines the shapes of three different trees joined at the trunk. At the base, where the roots almost protrude, the soil is a dark brown red, brick colored from the daily slaughter by the nearby butcher.

He washes each sheep or goat deliberately the day before, letting it dry in the sun. Then early in the morning he brings them here, to the foreboding trunk of this dying tree, faces them east towards Mecca, says "Bismillah"- in the name of Allah, and quickly and without hesitation or suffering, kills them. Their blood stains the ground, their bodies will feed the people. He hangs the animal from a low hanging branch to skin it and when he is done, leaves the pelt to dry during the day. He will sell it to a leather worker later. As he takes the animal to his shop to sell, the tree hangs back. Who knows why the tree is dying-- or was, anyway.

For the last few months every time I walk by this tree I think to myself- I have to take a picture of this. Beauty in barrenness. The simplicity of the thick branches tapering into thin limbs without the confusion of leaves to cover things up. The implicit urgency of how they reach out like arm stretching after a cramped sleep or a lazy Saturday. The quietness of it all the loneliness of it all. It is my favorite tree in the village.

But just last week on my near-daily walk by one of my constants, there it was lying flat on the ground. Branches broken, torn from their sockets, the trunk cut cleanly near the russet sand. Every day when i walked by that tree I knew there was a chance it would not be there the next. But I still missed my picture. I still didn't appreciate what I had when it was there, and how much it brought to my habitual, monotonous routine. And it happened. Sooner than I thought for sure That part of my brain that knew it wasn't forever mumbled an "I told you so" to my lazy consciousness.

In lieu of this event, I am officially opening my eyes. Instead of waiting the short three months until I leave, I am consciously starting to miss this place while I am still here. I am taking pictures, I am writing more. I am trying to let the hard, frustrating, difficult and angering things roll off my back more easily than I usually allow them to. Because there's so little time left. Out of my near 26 month service, only about 10% remains. In this time I've watched my students at the Girls' Mentoring Center finish two grades. I've taught 100+ lessons and facilitated many others. I've seen the raod to my site be built. Two rainy seasons (almost three), two cold seasons, two hot seasons. I have, thanks to funding from the Gender and Development Committee, brought solar panels, a generator, and brand new computers to our center. I have been so happy I've cried, and certainly just as sad. I've been sick, homesick, tired, hot, and just vaguely uncomfortable for the better part of two years. And there is nothing about this experience that I would give up.

Looking at my service through a different lens helps me to see my impact, however small, on the lives of my family, friends, and students. If I ever doubted it, the good experiences I've had here have absolutely outweighed the bad. If I can do this, I can do anything.

So expect more in these next few months. I'm opening my eyes wider because I know I will miss this, even if it's difficult to see while I'm here.

my younger host sister just got married about a month ago. she's 16 or 17, it's hard to say for sure as birthdays aren't really that remarkable or remembered here. the guy she married is a mechanic in kaedi, and i heard he's about 26. that's actually a markedly small age difference for these parts, where most girls get married before they're out of their teens and most men are in their thirties for the occasion. but that's beside the point.

about every other day i get a proposal. no, not a down-on-one-knee type of thing. more of a "hey, white girl, marry me and take me to america" kind of thing. or right after someone meets me, asking me if i already have a husband. except in my village, i often lie at this juncture. "yes," i say, "he is waiting for me in america while i work here." the very determined say either that i should leave him or that i should just have a husband there and a husband here in mauritania. i kindly explain that that's not how it works with americans and try to change the subject.

but after two years of conversations like this with virtually every man i meet, i've started to get nervous. though in my conscious mind i realize this is just silly, i'm worried that i'll get back and everyone i know will already be married or in a serious relationship while i am starting from square one. or that no one will "get me" (sounds dramatic, right?) after this experience.

then the other day sala and i were on our way to the college and she turned to me and said, "you know, spending practically every day of this two years with you has really revived my faith in the institution of marriage. if we can stand each other this well and still be this happy, then it's gotta be possible in america." we joked about it a lot then. things'll work out, we decided. they always have, they always do. but still, how funny: when sala and i return to america and jump back into the dating scene we'll essentially be looking for each other, except in male form.

she sat on the moonlit concrete oustide of her restaurant, making gumbo for the next day's lunch. she saw me approach, and she called me by my endearing nickname:

"Noumice," she asked, "how are you?"her hands moved methodically over the grain and water, making little cous cous bits as she worked

"just less than four months," i said, "it's so strange."she says before i knew you there was no problem. before you came here and i didn't know you i was fine. but now you'll go, she says, now you're my friend and you come here every day and now you'll go and my heart will hurt. if you go, she says, i'll miss you. it wouldn't be hard if i didn't know you. but now i do and now it will be hard. if you just stayed in mauritania then i could come visit you, greet you. but america is so far away and i don't have money or a visa or a ticket. but if i did i would come visit you. noumice, she says, my heart hurts.

and i say you are my best friend here. you understand when i can't say what i feel in pulaar. you understand volunteers. you know it's hard here, and sometimes i miss home. you're my best friend and my heart will hurt more.

it's quiet.

"Four months?" she asks.

"four months." i say.

we sigh.

"so, becca, after being here for 18 months, what can you say is the hardest part about your service?""hands down: being a woman."several times recently i have been having a conversation with a mauritanian man, someone i've known through the majority, if not all, of my service. and i think to myself, he's just not like the others. maybe this is the one mauritanian man that is not going to bring it up. and then immediately, like he can hear my thoughts, he asks me why i don't marry him and take him to america with me. get him a visa. give him money. i am american after all, aren't i? and there goes one more.

i politely explain that it's not nice to ask americans about their marital status or that i don't know anything about visas, or that, by the way, we marry for love in the states and that if you ever want to marry an american woman you don't tell her that. some apologize, some continue to try their charms, some make some backhanded comment about how they thought we were friends. this happens several times a week.

or i go to see my mayor. he tells me, without greeting me first, that i need to fix the solar panels at the girls' center because he needs to charge his phone. for the record: greeting is the most basic thing that people do here. it's the first thing you do when you see someone, and the more you greet, the more respectful you're being to someone. most greetings last at least a few minutes before anyone says why they're paying a specific visit. and i don't even deserve a simple "bonjour." this from a man that i am at least 6-7 years more educated than. this from a man who has a position because his family has had power in the village since it started. this from a scrawny pulaar man that i could probably pick up and throw at least a few meters. i don't even get the respect of a small child. not even that.

the gens d'arms essentially act as the police here. they rotate through different villages on a weekly basis. i hadn't seen this one guy for a few months, so i was saying hi to him in the streets. one day sala and i were sitting in our friend djeinaba's restaurant, and he was there. he started the whole marriage talk, his approach being that he was "very interested" in marrying us, and not seeming to understand that that doesn't matter for an american woman if they're not interested. getting really annoying, almost harassing. and then djeinaba was getting our plate ready.

djeinaba is a pulaar woman, and my best friend in town. a really stellar human being and one of the few people who i think has any kind of gist of how hard it is for us to be volunteers here. she only speaks pulaar. she asked the man in pulaar, when the plate was ready, if he would come and sit to eat with us (this is very common. when food is served anyone within earshot is asked to sit and eat. she was being polite). he said, in pulaar, that he didn't eat with women. fine, no big deal. a lot of men don't eat with women. but then he switched to french, so that only sala and i could understand, and said

"i don't eat with women, i sleep with women."i wanted to throw up. and this was a police officer in a public place and nobody else even batted an eye. his language switch meant he intended the message for us. maybe a dig because he had been so rejected by us. maybe a sick attempt at an offer, since we ARE american women, so clearly we must sleep around.

i wanted to hit him. i wanted to get up and yell. but there is no officer above him who wouldn't just think that was funny. there's no one to answer to that would see something wrong with it. and yes, these are things that local women have to deal with, but it's to a different extent. everyday i stand out because i am white (a refreshing experience at first, a frustrating and tiring one after about a month), because i am american, and because i am a woman. and for some reason that gives people license to harass me more than other women, and with no fear of consequence.

the single thing that i miss the most about america is my right to demand respect. and i am reminded of it's absence here every day.

it is now only four days until my mom and step dad arrive in the airport of nouakchott, mauritania. we'll do two days in the capital, two days in kaedi, and two days in the village (no eletricity, no toilets, no beds). then fly out through tunis where we'll all get a few days to relax and do some site seeing before they go have dinner with meara in rome.

and it's something like this that makes me think more about how thankful i am for all the support i regularly receive from the states (or italy, now). obviously i would never expect most people to visit me here, so this is a wonderful opportunity. and with meara and jessie planning on a christmas visit, i feel luckier than ever.

but s0 many of the little things are what keep me going on a daily basis. the packages, letters, phone calls, and facebook messages. and even finding out that someone reads my blog or looks at my pictures can turn a week around.

i am, physically and in experience, very far away from a lot of important people in my life right now. and sometimes that is really difficult. but most of the time i know that the people i'm thinking about are thinking about me, even if the pace of american life or the economic recession doesn't allow for the amount of communication we'd prefer.

it's the moral support that keeps me here. it's you that keeps me here doing the work i've always known i wanted to do.

so this is a thank you. to all of you.

love.

sala and i, the pulaar women and their toddlers and infants lie around after the late afternoon lunch. full of rice, vegetables, fish, and sweet, minty tea we fan ourselves with our books, our hands. they bring out a radio, wire tied where the antenna used to be. tuning, the 20-something mother of two turns up the volume. a male voice come on speaking rapid pulaar.

i brush a fly from my arm.

left over pieces of rice scatter the plastic mat, sticking to the bottoms of our calloused feet.

the voice speaks louder, with purpose. just faster than i can catch. but we listen anyway. the women coo to their children, quieting the tiring kids. one stares at the speakers as if to push the words back inside. stop the flow of sentences and phrases. statements, proclamations.

sala scratches a scabbing mosquito bite on her ankle.

the breeze, cooler than before, but still carrying the dregs of humidity from the rainy season, blows through the branches over head. it wisps our bangs from our ponytails, evaporates the sweat from our forearms and shoulders. drying leaves, some of them yellowed, drop casually from lower branches.

the woman lies on her side, holding her child close to her breast. her head scarf, haphazardly tied just minutes before, falls onto her shoulders. the toddler toys with the edges of her boubou, twisting it genty around her fingers. she pats the little girl's back. separated, somewhere else. she looks at the radio.

everyone is silent. only the nearby mosque call and crowing of roosters disrupts the silence that sits among us.

she looks up, the yellow leaves sparsely dropping, and when she glances back at the origin of the man's voice there are tears running down her cheeks. as the little girl snuggles close to her chest she grabs the corner of the shiny fabric resting across the back of her neck with her worn, coarse fingers and wipes them away.

the sound of the voice curls sharply through the air, foreign smoke polluting the still humid breeze, burrowing in so that even when she covered her pierced, stretched out ears with her salty scarf, the words leaked in.

"he died," the 10 year-old boy said to me.

"when?"

"last night," he said.

i turn my gaze back to the woman. another twin pair of tears fall gracefully from her eyes, down, dripping onto the mat. again, deliberately, silently, she wipes them away.

the voice stops, music plays and she closes her eyes.

august 6, 2008 marked the day of a coup d'état in mauritania, west africa. non-violent, much like the one in 2005, the first democratically elected president (Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi) and his prime minister were taken from their homes and are now in the custody of General Muhammad Ould 'Abd Al-'Aziz and his military supporters.

when we heard news of the coup, i was already in nouakchott, the capital. i came in a few days early for what was supposed to be our mid-service training (one of the few opportunities we have in such a large, sparsely populated country to see everyone in our training class in the same place at the same time (and it ended up being cancelled)). sala, my site mate, got a text from one of our friends who works for the UN that essentially said, "lie low, there's been a coup."

we called our safety and security officer to confirm or deny and were told to stay in our hotels until further notified. a half bag of skittles and a quarter of a bad elijah wood movie later (Try Seventeen, also starring Mandy Moore and that chick from Run Lola Run) we got an update that we could leave to get food if we stayed within a few blocks of the hotels.

we, naturally, went for hamburgers.

our opportunities for iron and protein intake are generally few and far between, so without a second's hesitation, we each ordered a "menu burger": miscellaneous meat patty, ketchup, mayo, cheese, mystery sauce, and fries (at least the colonization of west africa by the french paid off somehow) on a soggy-ish bun. oh, and i almost forgot-- the egg. god, i love the europeans.

hunkered down in a restaurant, scarfing down burgers --i used to be a vegetarian-- we felt no sense of urgency, no threat. even moments before, walking down the street in broad daylight, occasional truckloads of Sidi supporters or otherwise yelling and honking to display their discontent or excitement, we felt very much at ease.

post-burger we stopped at a mini-mart/ corner store to buy supplies in case we got stuck in the hotel: cokes, juice, snacks, Smacks breakfast cereal, milk, bananas, crackers, and water. we were set.

back to the hotel, a mere three blocks from the bank we saw earlier on tv with all the military and their guns guarding outside it. and what the first thing we did when we got to hayley's room?

we made smores.

marshmallows she brought back from her vacation home to america on the ends of bobby pins, cooked over a black cherry- scented candle and melded with hershey's (and mauritanian) chocolate on a graham cracker-ish cookie. i think my standards of taste have definitely been lowered after being here for a while, but that legitimately might've been the best smore i've ever eaten. Al humdililah.

fast forward through a nap, shower, music, drinks, and general goofing off until nighttime. any place you can get alcohol here is generally closed by around 11:30 pm, so most evening need to be started pretty early by american standards. by the time we got to shenker's, a bar reserved solely for ex-pats, it was maybe only 9:00.

a beer here, even bottom of the line, costs 1,500 ouguiya (=$6 US), which is roughly my daily salary on a peace corps budget. so i was at a one beer max, nursing the same leff for an hour and a half. i had struck up a conversation with a twentysomething scotsman i had spoken with the night before. he was working on an oil rig off the west coast of mauritania, and would be in nouakchott for just a few weeks. a good red beard and a good conversationalist, we chatted until they started to shut down the bar.

he walked me to the door (the gentleman!) and when we got to the door he gave me a sweet, very nice, very respectful, goodnight kiss (don't worry mom).

the other pc volunteers and i caught cabs back to the hotels, got into beds with real mattresses and amazing pillows in air conditioned, quiet rooms and we let our minor beer buzzes lull us into a fitful sleep.

if there's one thing mauritania does well, it's a relaxed, non-violent overthrowing of the government. and if every coup d'état includes a burger, smores, a warm shower, beer, and a goodnight kiss, well then, i think that's pretty alright.

and of course, welcome to all the new folks that we'll be hanging out with for the next year. in gorgol we have:

Aaron in Mbagne

Brian & Kristy and Matt in Kaedi

Sara Cate in Ganki

John and Courtney in Mbout

Michele in Tokamaaji

Nick in Sive

Sarah in Garly (terminated service early)

so good to have new excitement and enthusiasm. just one month til they're here for good!

so what do i write about when it all starts to feel normal?

when the daily trips to the market become daily?

shaking old pulaar women's hands

buying okra, tomatoes, onions, green peppers (if you're lucky).

greeting in 3-4 languages.

telling off little kids that shout at me.

avoiding cow/ goat/ camel waste in the sandy streets.

buying little tiny bags full of juice,

biting off the corner,

and sucking out the sweet, red bissap

to toss the plastic on the street.

arriving home (a mud brick building)

to a dad, his three wives, and more than 12 children.

playing soccer, washing dishes, washing clothes, making lunch on a coal stove,

carrying the baby on their backs.

drinking hot, minty, over-sweet shot glass sized caisses of tea

until rice and fish for lunch with veggies and hot pepper and lemon (if you're lucky).

then more tea, a nap, writing letters and reading.

and they take breaks for praying.

afternoon walk to the bridge over the flooding gorgol river.

men waded in, using hand nets to catch cousins of catfish.

cars backed in, men washing.

women standing or squatting in long skirts

scrubbing baby clothes.

donkey carts waiting for filled bottles of water.

herds of sheep and goats crossing the bridge

and long-horned cows.

as soon as the sun sets the temperature drops (if you're lucky).

the frogs come out to hunt flies, mosquitoes, grasshoppers.

or if the rain is coming the air stays thick, no hint of a breeze.

the clouds roll in after the sand in and the land is so flat

you see the lightening for miles before it hits

threatening in the east.

and when it hits it floods,

dripping from the thatched roof ceilings

seeping in poorly made door frames and window cracks.

and when i wake up it's instantly green.

or the water blocks the entrance and i have to wade through

ankle deep rain runoff.

i wake up, drink sugary coffee and eat bread.

listen to bbc, day dream.

so what can i write when this is the everyday?

or do i just write it and hope for the best?

here is just a little look at the kids i spend most of my time with.

hope you get a good laugh.

Home to

two weeks in a real bed and taking real showers.

two weeks eating flavorful food and drinking wine and --thanks joe-- home-brewed beer.

seeing the people who know me best and the relief that, throughout all of the growth and change in my life, i still fit with the people who matter most.

the wonderful surprise in unexpected supports, people i didn't expect, the ones who strive to understand my life now, if even just by reading or looking at pictures.

seeing my sister graduate high school.

hearing her sing.

music.

air conditioning.

jeans.

cuddling.

my family.

public transportation.

coffee.

phone calls with no delay.

turning a faucet one way for hot, the other for cold.

eggs over easy, hashbrowns, and pre-buttered toast.

glass windows, shades, and ceiling fans.

my cat.

to dancing

and sleeping in

and being hit on at a bar.

to not being proposed to

or having sand in my eyebrows

or wearing long skirts.

home to

dancing in the dark before dinner.

roosters at 6 am.

middle school girls who look up to me.

being goofy, gross, smelly, raunchy, and sweaty with no one to judge.

haako.

prayer call.

baby sheep.

the fields.

washing clothes.

books.

letters.

knitting.

my family.

nescafe.

bean jokes.

taking pictures.

the power of a greeting.

a bucket bath on a windy day.

banaf: sheep meat cooked like pot roast, potatoes, salty-sweet gravy.

the relief of a breeze.

kelby.

to napping

and bargaining

and three caisses of tea.

to not being self conscious

or feeling busy

or not realizing what i have.

to being H/home.

thank you so much to everyone who has been sending me good thoughts, wishes, and amazing packages! it's amazing to be so far away and to feel such wonderful support from my family and friends. due to an excessive amount of Q-tips, i'm changing my request list a bit for those of you who would like to send something. in general, these are things i can ALWAYS use:

protein bars.US stamps.add-water cake and sauce mixes.peanut butter.candy. (now that the hot season is coming, non-chocolate candies travel best)books. used, new, re-gifted, loved. all of it. we can ALWAYS use new reading material.i have enough q-tips, sudoku books, crossword puzzles and drink mixes to last me the rest of my service :)

again thank you thank you thank you. much love from mauritania.

funny how, when people say "there are starving children in africa, finish your dinner," they are probably picturing what they imagine to be mauritania. they are picturing large families with pants-less kids with flies on their snot-nosed faces and calloused, shoe-less feet. they picture babies with thin limbs and protruding, malnourished bellies. it's the kids on the children international commercials that it only takes 12 cents a day to save. it is for this youth that countless americans clean their plates. day after day, mothers across the states reference this population in hopes that their offspring find some appreciation for their mashed potatoes and meatloaf.

so i was thoroughly confused when my host family started telling me one morning that that day was "Haraani." translated from pulaar, that means "to not be full." i kept thinking i misheard until i saw the meat my family bought for dinner. meat here, goat or sheep usually, is easily one of the most expensive things you can buy to eat. so i started paying attention.

one of the second year volunteers told me that they say everyone has to eat a lot on this day or they'll die in the next year. at my house it seemed to be nothing quite so dramatic. but, sure enough, the kids, who usually fall asleep long before the 930 pm dinner were, for the first and only time since i've been here, roused for the meal. ornery, tired, and literally pulled to a sitting position in front of the large bowl of pasta and goat, marietta, the 5 year old, blinked in angry confusion.

"Marietta, ñaam (eat). Marietta, hey Marietta," mom #2 accented the 'hey' with a little smack to my host sister's back. "Marietta. ummu do (get up), fin (wake up), ñaam (eat)."

I watched from the sidelines, leaning up against the mud brick wall of our communal room.

"Marietta," she said, and this is where i was surprised, "ñaam. ine waddi yimbe ñaamataa (there are people who don't eat)"

and all this time i was picturing them.

but come to think of it, don't know if i've seen a hungry person here. i won't say they don't exist by any means - i've only been here seven months after all. and sure, malnourishment is a present struggle here, but i just don't think people are starving. or an extension of that, homeless. i have yet to see someone - in lexeiba or kaedi or nouakchott or anywhere between - that is actually living or sleeping on the streets as we see so commonly in the good ol' US of A.

so why? close to no one here is rich by any standards, and everyone seems to be just making ends meet, day to day. how are they doing it? how does everyone, gender irrelevant, no matter the existence of physical or mental disability or illness have food to eat and a place to sleep?

i cannot tell you exactly or certainly why, but i can relay my inkling to at least some of the cause, and that is family.

if you introduce yourself to anyone here, they immediately ask you family name (thiam for me, pronounced "cham"). there are only about 10-15 last names total in pulaar culture, it seems, and this, really, is only a very slight exaggeration. so the odds that are pretty good that if the person you're meeting doesn't have the same last name, then their family is cousins with you*.

the family connection allows for immense support in so many facets. sala's host dad, for example, is diabetic and cannot earn money for them any more because of some minor paralysis. without hesitation, as the expected thing to do, the sons- who do not live in our town- send money and other things the family needs. there is no sense of burden or weight or resentment involved. this is just what is done.

on a smaller scale, every family cooks a lot of food all the time. granted the nuclear family here is, on average, about 6-8 people (just counting father, wife/wives, and their kids until they marry), but that does not account for th amount of rice at a meal. before every lunch or dinner, the person cooking (wife or daughter) portions out the meal. one bowl for the men, one for the women and young children, and then others. after everyone is done eating, several of the kids will be sent off carrying the other bowls of rice and fish or rice and peanut sauce on their heads. where are they going? other families' houses.

this could be due to family ties, but could also indicate the deep influence of islam here. i recently picked up an 'islam for dummies'-type book that we had in our regional library. author ruqaiyyah waris maqsood sites the Qur'an in the 'teach yourself' series entitled 'islam' that "muslims have a duty to look after themselves and their families and dependents, but after that is taken care of, Allah requires that they should look at their surplus money, capital, or goods and give...to God's service asking neither recompense nor thanks" (Surah 26:109). Additionally, he quotes the prophet muhammad as saying "he is not a believer who eats his fill while his neighbor remains hungry by his side."

in this way, not only are people of all physical and mental abilities kept within households despite what we would see or feel as monetary "burdens," but the community, as a whole, supports those families that are struggling more than others. with just enough for them and their children, any excess is given to those in more dire circumstances.

so the next time someone says "finish your green bean casserole, there are starving children in africa," eat it with a grain of salt. starvation is a desperate problem for many people throughout the world, no doubt. but know that most mauritanian mom's are saying the same thing.

*side note: being cousins usually leads to a teasing tangent in conversation where the person lovingly harasses you in one or more of the following categories: having a bad last name or no last name at all, the fact that your family is always hungry, the statement that you have no father and are a bastard child, or the ever-present accusation that you are, indeed, a bean-eater. nice, eh? :)

so a majority of the year, this country is unbearably hot. like, consistent sweating, you don't pee more than once a day because your body is trying so hard to cool off, sticky, gross hot. now the weather is cooling down considerably, so much so that at the beginning of december i started sleeping inside. just in time for the holiday season, all of the volunteers are reconvening in nouakchott, the capital, for a little christmas celebration at our country director's house. what does that mean? that means christmas eve on the beach.

soft, light sand. beach as far as you can see, and deep blue ocean. hundreds of beautifully colored fishing boats lined on the shore. hundreds of thousands of shells washed up. sun. water so shockingly cold and waves taller than most of us. salt sticking on the corners of your lips, and drying little patterns on your skin when you return to lie in the sun. skipping rocks over the surface of the troughs. listening to music, playing frisbee, napping.

most of the time this experience is hard, challenging, frustrating and rewarding. and then sometimes it's just beautiful. just amazingly breathtaking and wonderful.

so while this is, for me and many of my fellow volunteers, the first christmas away from home, it is also unlike anything i've ever done. when you are opening up presents or singing carols know that i am missing you, and that i am laying on the beach thinking of you.

so we were sitting around the rice bowl, my moms (Ramata and Mariam), my sisters (Mariam, Habi, and Marietta), the baby (Aminata), and i, and i needed to tell my host mom something, so i said her name (this is big mom-mariam). and she turns to me with this forceful, straightforward tone and says

"listen, nouma: everyone here calls me mom, except you. and since your sister's name is mariam too, that's just confusing. call me mom, and her mariam. do you understand?"

and there, an oily ball of rice and fish and okra in my hand, i got teared up. i have lived with this family for just over three months, and this woman is demanding to be called my mother.

"i understand." i said, and finished my handful.

just to let you all know things are well but internet is slow. keep letters emails coming, i'll write more once i have a faster connection.

love.

waking up one morning, dipping my half baguette into my sugary black nescafe, the older and recently returned mom, mariam, says the whole family is going to the fields. she wonders if i'll come. i run to my room, call sala and cancel our home brewing plans for the day, and quickly run out of the compound. hopping on the horse cart with the two moms, father (hamidou), and nine kids, we set out for our fields. they are far, i've been told.

we start to approach where the flooding from the rainy season is just receding and my little brother, jibbi, turns and says "there's water. can you do it?" "sure," i say, "alaa cadelle (no problem)." a small portion of the gorgol river has risen to cover the path. my moms, the older of the girls and i hop from the cart as it pulls ahead through the water. the women pull off their tops, holding their boubous above their heads and begin to wade in. i follow closely behind, wearing the wrap skirt of habi, my younger sis. the water gets deeper and deeper until it is covering all of my legs, nearly up to my hips. thick, sludgy mud threatens my invincible sandals. we emerge.

walking through the toothpick trees we approach the wide open field. the men are already there, using heavy picks to break through the dry, tough ground. others follow behind with shoulder-height, thick, pointed posts to create pockets for the seeds. i am soon given a big, cleaned out tomato paste can full of corn and beans. three of each in each pocket, they say.

the sun beats down and i think of the one liter of clean water i brought with, laying in my bag. when we break for sugary, minty tea, i drink all that i have brought. looking into the bucket retrieved probably from the same river i just crossed, i see murky, mud colored liquid. thirsty enough, i pour it through my bandana into my nalgene, hopefully filtering out the worst of the worst. sunburned, fatigued, i nap with the family under the shade of a large prickly tree.

they work for the majority of the day and it isn't until 430 after the hottest of the sun that we start to head back. hundreds, thousands of seeds were sown that day, and they returned the next day, and the day after, to finish

so we walk back through the scratchy bushes to the river where we had first met 30 or so long-horned cows going in the other direction. and again, we wade in. cool in spots, refreshing. exhausted, sore, burned, i feel cleaned by this muddy water. and here we are, where we started.

so just before the juulde fete at the end of ramadan, one of my other moms came home. she had been in nouakchott for a few months with "a stomach ache." the interaction between the two women at the house is remarkably civil and complimentary, one very quiet and funny, the other in much more of a disciplinarian role. strangely, most of the kids call their mother "aunt" and the older woman "mom."

so ramadan is finally over, mashalllah. what did we do? wear hideously huge bou bous that were vaguely barney colored and eat a lot of food. all day long. most people go to their friends' houses and say something that roughly translates to "forgive me for the last year," which i thought was pretty rad. hopefully i'll get up some more pictures in the next few days of these amazing pieces of clothing we wore. indescribable.

finally getting things started, hopefully opening our gmc (girls' mentoring center) sometime in november. in kaedi for a halloween party this weekend (costume still confidential right now, pictures to follow). sala and i have been brewing homemade brousse wine, which is surprisingly and effective and doesn't taste bad either.

more soon, inshallah.

statistics show that although not all moussa's are pants-less, most pants-less kids are named moussa. completely naked kids do not count.

officially at site for a month now, as of yesterday. ramadan, mashallah, ends this thursday or friday and everyone can start eating and drinking during the day again. not only that, but i might actually be able to get some work done since everyone won't be so tired during the day any more. i'm in kaedi for the weekend, heading back to site this afternoon, inshallah. i have mixed feelings about a lot right now, as i realize more and more the work that i'm going to be doing.

there is an extremely involved and amazing mentor at my center named kadjah. she has been living in lexeiba for about 10 years now, but is not originally from the town. she is an english and french teacher at the college (middle school). she extremely well educated, progressive, and active in the gmc (girls mentoring center). she can see the frustrations and possible conflicts at the gmc before they happen and takes a very objective look at situations. so what's the problem? she hates it there.

she has put in a request for transfer out of lexeiba to another city. i get her for a year, but then after that she's as good as gone. i am hoping that in the next year or so i can get some recommendations from her for new mentors or women who would like to help. because one of the problems, as she sees it, is that there are several people who help at the center just because they want computer lessons. right now our solar power isn't working, so the computers aren't even an option. that being said, there appear to be a number of people who help just because they have other interests. so yeah.

i'm hoping, with ramadan coming to an end, i will get a chance to really get things started here. maybe even have the gmc up and running by the end of october. it will come, no doubt.

so i'm not usually up front about just asking for things, but i figure this may be a little different situation than normal. if you feel like sending a small package my way, here are some things i would love:

pictures. of you, of people you know, of people i know, of family. of justin timberlake.q-tips. this is on the list of things that could really make my day.gatorade/propel single serving packs. it's really hot. i spend most of my day sweating. anything that could replenish a little bit of that is very welcome.protein bars. not a whole lot of intake here.spiral notebooks. the notebooks here are not the highest quality.facewash.incense. keeps bugs away and prolongs needing to hand wash clothes.anything you think i would appreciate. newspaper clippings, books, music (on tape), sudoku, add-water cake mixes.send it here:

rebecca lorentzen, pcv

corps de la paix

b.p. 66

kaedi, mauritania

west africa

thank you thank you thank you. it also means so much to me to get a hand written letter, so don't shy away from that. these first few months are going to be hard, and i'll take all the support i can get.

tanya (here after referred to as her mauritanian name, sala) and i have officially been at site for just over a week and a half now. we each found a room with a family to stay in. my family lives on the "outskirts" of town and is really big. the father, hamidou, has three wives, only one of which i've met. there are upwards of nine children ranging from a nursing child to a 17-year-old. hamidou speaks french, but he is often not at the house all day and so application of my language skills is starting right away.

and now it's ramadan. which means that no adults are eating or drinking anything during the day. i'm trying to be respectful of this religious holiday and so am eating only a little during the day in my room and trying to at least stay hydrated. sala and i have broken fast at several different households, which really is a neat experience. water, obviously, is the first thing at dusk prayer call. then tofam, a yogurt/water drink. often followed by gosi, a thick porridge and at my house (because of our large garden) watermelon. then banaf, a personal favorite of mine: meat and potatoes with sauce and bread. there's usually a dish after this too, rice and fish if it's available.

ramadan also means that everyone is tired and doesn't want to do anything during the day, which is definitely a challenge. we just got done with training and everyone is so excited to get started and now it's almost like we have to wait another month.

so my usual day starts with a bucket bath and some chilling with the fam. then i usually go to either sala's house or she comes over to mine. we take a walk to the jeere (market) and greet people there, whether or not we are buying anything. greeting is the most important thing here. and that's not an exaggeration. an old lady chewed me out my second day in town because i greeted the whole family but not her individually. cultural differences, to say the least. sala and i usually spend the day at one another's house, reading, napping, trying to keep the flies away. around 4 or 5 we've taken a walk out to the bridge a few times where the "river" has almost flooded some homes because of the amount of rainfall this year. around 630 or 7 we head to someone's house to break fast. then back in the mosquito net to the end of another day.

i've been to the gmc (girls' mentoring center) and there's a lot of work to do. the solar panels need to be fixed, the computers assessed, there needs to be a meeting with the mentors, and the girls need to be chosen for this year. it's going to be interesting to pick up where the last volunteer left off. she left early, at about the year mark of her service, for a number of reasons, the final one being a misunderstanding that turned ugly in mid-june. i'm just starting to understand the circumstances of what happened there, and it will definitely be a challenge to pick up some pieces and repair some people's sense of pride.

that being said, i will do my best to keep things updated. hopefully tomorrowish i'll put up the link to sala's blog so you can get another description of our "adventures" there.

as for today, we are in kaedi. took a taxi brousse ride into town this morning, stopped at the market to get some veggies, and immediately made the most delicious spaghetti i have ever had. or maybe i've just been almost-fasting for a week.

miss everyone. love.

arabic words are used within all four languages spoken in mauritania: sonike, hassaniya, wolof, and pulaar. bismillah, roughly translated, means welcome.

so we'll see how this goes. i hope this can be a place where those of you who would like to can get information on what i'm up to and how this whole peace corps thing is working out.

in the mean time, check out some pictures.