I'm paralyzed. That's how I feel at least. Let me explain.

Post Peace Corps, and now with a year of life back in the states under my belt, I have an extremely wide angle world view. The world is freaking huge, and it contains a lot of people from a lot of different cultures. A lot (and I mean a whole effing lot) of those people are suffering from an enormously wide range of difficulties. This includes the child dying of malaria in west africa, to the poppy farmer in Afghanistan whose crops we just crushed with supplies for our soldiers, to the CEO who's trying not to let his corporation collapse under economic downfall, to the mom down the street who is just trying to get her kids to school on time when her car fails. All of these problems are of utmost concern to those people at that moment. Empirically, yes, some may be more life or death than others, but relative to the person, they are all equally important.

I have a small, finite, amount of time to spend on this planet. For whatever reason, I have a deep desire to help, to do good, and to connect with people. It is what gets me out of bed in the morning. Whether I am carrying school books and supplies to a girl in a rural African village, or just helping someone find the right computer and avoid buying more than they need, I perform these duties with the same sincerity, empathy, and honesty. The expression of genuine gratitude I receive in payment is the same from all these people. It creates in me the same wonderful feeling of connectedness, no matter how profound or mundane the help I just offered may seem. It's all wonderful, all these problems are important, and all these people just want honest help.

This is where I become paralyzed. Where do I even begin? How do I decide what small portion of this world receives the time I have to give? And, how much of that time should I be keeping for myself? I can't even default to the selfish "what makes me happy" answer as I genuinely get the same satisfaction from helping an old man make his email work as I did helping a child carry water back to his family from the well.

The result, because I am pulled in all these directions is that I am just standing still. I cannot make myself look for employment or volunteer opportunities. I can barely even work on my own little creative personal projects. There is so much out there that I can do that I am rendered incapable of action at the thought of closing off one part to pursue another.

Only in America can we elevate retail to the level that it has it's own holiday. Let's face it, if it isn't already, that's what "Black Friday" is becoming. Wow. Just, wow.

There's no denying that things are different here in the states now compared to when I left. Turns out two years is a decent chunk of time. Especially here in Vermont, the push for local sustainability and social responsibility is impressive, if not inspiring. The eagerness with which the people around me discuss major topics surprises me, and the intelligence with which they discuss them excites me.

The icing on the cake, though, is our new President Elect, Barack Obama. I intentionally did not follow the spectator sport that was our election coverage. When I did, it only served to stress me out, regardless of who it was leaning toward. On November 4th I stayed at home and played video games as I decided that watching the coverage in no way enriched my evening. I figured I'd find out who won in the morning and would be able to handle the news with a few degrees more sanity for having gotten a good night's sleep.

So 11 o'clock rolls around and I turn off Resident Evil 4 for a brief moment and there it is! The election has been called for Obama. I breathed a sigh of relief and resumed greeting my friend Djimi who had just showed up for a visit.

Now that all of this is over I can say, with no uncertainty, that I have never felt more inspired, more confident, more optimistic, and more proud to be an American than watching Obama's victory speach. Obama is thoughtful, intelligent, and eloquent. When he explains the current state of things, and how he hopes to improve them, I can actually follow him instead of getting lost in rhetoric and vague statements of ideals. With Obama, he tells you flatly what steps he will take. You feel informed, as if he cares about whether or not you feel involved. Other candidates never made me feel like I knew what their plan was. A decision between something clear yet mutable and something unknown but "unwavering" is not a decision.

I think I can best sum up how I feel about the election with this: Obama makes me want to become involved with the Peace Corps again. Not from a sense of "I need to show the world Americans are not all evil" this time, but from a genuine desire to represent my country.

So an interesting thing happened to me the other day. I found myself at a pub surrounded by newly graduated veterinarians. Now the reason this is interesting to me is because for as long as I can remember, my plan was to go to vet school. Somewhere along the way I got sick of school and decided I'd rather join the peace corps after college instead. I don't really know how it happened but it did. Meanwhile, my best friend went on to vet school and was one of these new doctors.

It was very strange to sit there and listen to people who were discussing all the trials and tribulations of vet school, and finding a job afterward, and paying student loans, etc. Basically they were exactly where I would be today (well okay a year from today) if I had stuck to the plan. It's kind of like life was giving me a glimpse of an alternate timeline where I had not joined the peace corps. You know what my conclusion was? No thanks.

I'm saying that the modern American lifestyle is bad per se (especially since these are all quite open minded world aware people) (well ok there are lots of problems with it but I'll bite my tongue for now), but it's not for me. I find myself thinking, as I listen to their stories, "where's the adventure, the excitement of the unknown?" There are no tales of harrowing public transportation, or bargaining for a half an hour over fifty cents on some trinket. There's no spontaneous trips to the next big city, let alone a spur of the moment border hopping (Canada doesn't count). It baffles me that people not only aren't curious about that left fork they never take, but actively try to pretend it's not even there.

The other baffling part is that I would think this lack of adventure signifies a desire for calm. And that's what people will tell you. They just want a moment to themselves. But here's the catch...give them a moment to themselves and see what happens. Now, I don't just mean a moment free of obligations. They weasel enough of those into the day as it is. I mean a moment where all they have is themselves. We westerners have gotten so good at always staying just busy enough that we never have to just stop and reflect. And even if we run out of little things we can think of that we have to do, we fill our leisure time with any number of activities that more or less passively occupy our brains.

I've found that it really takes a concerted effort for me to just reflect these days. For one thing, I've definitely gotten sucked into the "must occupy every moment" mentality a bit myself. For another, two years in Africa has left me with strong cravings for a large number of activities that I missed (video games, board games, tv, movies, restaurants). It's hard, but now I can at least see myself doing it.

Maybe that's one of the biggest changes I feel I've had since coming back. As a result of my peace corps time, I can now feel like an outside observer to most situations. While the things this reveals are interesting and useful to me, this can also be very lonely. As I found when sitting with the vet school graduates, I felt distinctly separate from them. The path my life is on has come in sight of all of my friends, but it's still a distinct road...

It's snowing outside. I'm wearing several layers of clothing. I had 3 cups of good coffee this morning...and wasn't afraid of running out and not having any for months. I drank a beer last night that was not Biere Niger. If I want to go somewhere...I can just borrow one of the two cars my family owns. I have no worries that I will be able to post this entry as soon as I finish it.

I haven't conversed in Zarma in weeks. I am bombarded by sensationalist news stories. If I plan to meet with someone and something comes up, I am expected to inform them immediately, even though I don't have a cell phone. I have no idea how much water I have used in the last 24 hours. Though I am constantly reminded how glad people are to have me home, I don't feel like I quite fit in anymore. I am cold.

I don't really know how to explain the way I feel about being home. It's home. It's definitely comfortable in many ways. But it's awkward in others. It's not the same as it was and I don't really know if it's changed, or I've changed, or both. I still don't really know what I'm going to do. I can't really motivate myself to commit to anything right now: job, phone plan, car, anything. It's as if by doing that I'm officially tethered here. I know that's not true. I know that if something came up that could send me back to Africa, I could find a way if that's what I really wanted.

One of the things I think I'm having the hardest time with is reconciling the existence of both here and Niger. I realize now that when I was over there, the United States kind of stopped being a real place. I knew it was there, I remembered that it was a cool place to live with lots of stuff. I heard about it on the news. I talked to people there regularly, but it didn't really exist. Time over there was on hold while I was gone. Now that I'm back I realize that that's not the case. Things have changed. And, I'm faced with the fact that it really is a place. And people really do live like this completely oblivious to the rest of the world. And they're quite happy that way. It's like my head isn't big enough to hold a world view that contains both extremes. I can't bring myself to not expand the picture to still contain Niger, but juxtaposed in my mind, Niger and the US coexisting makes no sense.

So I guess I'm wrestling with that dilemma. At the same time, I'm trying to figure out how to readjust my life here to account for the various things I've learned or habits I've picked up in Niger. I have come to the conclusion that I have entirely too much crap. I have so much stuff in my room that I don't need. At all. In any way. Most of it doesn't even really have any sentimental value.

One of the things that's disturbed me the most is that when I was hanging out in Burlington, just walking down the main shopping drag in Church St., I was amazed at how tangible this deep seated urge to buy was. I could feel it like I feel the force of gravity. Somewhere deep in my unconcious I was driven. I had money in my wallet and it needed to get spent! Where is this coming from? I didn't even really want anything, except to spend money on shit I didn't need. I don't need to buy a Wii, I can play the one at my friends' apartment. But because I really did want one, I was compelled to drift into game store after game store. I resisted, but still had this nagging desire to spend money.

Is the subliminal advertising demon so thoroughly pervasive and effective? Or was I just caught up in the collective unconscious flock? I don't know but it was really frightening. Watching the news is a similarly unsettling experience. I was never aware, I mean really consciously aware, of how sensationalist the news here really is. Now that I've spent 2 yrs completely unexposed to it, it's amazing. The way they put together stories, and choose their words, even the presidential campaigns sound like sporting events. They make every little story seem like a life or death struggle. It's something I hardly ever saw in international news.

I keep saying that the peace corps is the best deprogramming machine the government doesn't realize it's paying for. I think it's very true. Don't get me wrong, I still very much love America. But there are some frightening undercurrents at work that were just not visible until I spent time completely free of them. It is really amazing how much the media influences, if not outright controls, us.

Well...that's it I guess. I've been in America for about an hour and a half now. I've cried atleast half a dozen times during that. It started when Alex, Djimi, and I parted ways from Alison in Dublin. I don't like this slow peeling away of people. First Kurt in Niger, then Alison. Atleast when the three of us landed here in JFK we said a quick good bye and then quickly left for our respective continuations. None of this drawn out good bye nonsense.

I got half way to the air train that links the terminals and the tears started coming. In saying goodbye to those last traveling companions it really felt like the final connections back to my service had passed. While we were traveling we still felt like PCV's in a way. Well, I did atleast. It could have been any vacation taken during service. But now we've hit stateside and parted ways to go home. And knowing that even if I do see all of them again, it will be in a completely different context with completely different experiences behind us, that chapter of my life is really closed now. There's no more pretending.

Sure I might find my way back to Niger, or atleast West Africa. But it won't be the same. It's time to move on...to life after Peace Corps. Bittersweet as it may be.

(regains his composure and wipes away another wave of tears)(Deep Breath)

By the way, this is not the last post. I have many many back posts that I want to eventually get typed up and posted. Also I still have to fill you in on the rest of my vacation, not to mention my adjustments back to the states. So you can probably expect atleast another month or two of posts. After that...who knows.

Sometimes it doesn't matter what plans you try to make. It seems like every time we try to make plans on this journey, we get shunted in another direction entirely. You'll see in a moment.

England has been fantastic so far. I've been here several times before, but the last was about 9 years ago, so this is really my first trip as a conscious being. There's lots of images and places and things in my head, but I'm finally sorting them out to make a real concept of the place. I fully intend to not let nearly so much time pass before I return here. I may even look for jobs here once I get back to the states.

After our mad dash out of Africa our arrival in England was fairly low key. Though we did encounter, within the Underground, and out of nowhere, a woman who had attempted to come visit me in Niger, though we had never really got it worked out. Turns out she is friends with another Australian who had been on our plane out of Ghana and had come to meet him at the airport. After a little brief chat in the tube she asked if I was indeed Seabass who she'd been emailing. After that I remembered her emails and the fact that I had kind of dropped the ball on arranging a meet. Luckily she felt the same way about her role in things and we've been hanging out off and on all week. Miranda is a hoot. Small world.

Keeping ourselves busy in London hasn't been terribly hard. On Monday we went and visited Parliament courtesy of my cousin Lizzie. We watched the entrance of the Speaker of the House of Commons. Talk about pomp and circumstance. As Djimi put it so eloquently "It's a good thing I went and watched [the parliamentary debates] because otherwise I would have had no respect for your government." It was actually quite interesting to see the style of discussion. Very different from our own, though not entirely dissimilar. After parliament my aunt Tam took us to Tea at Fortnum and Mason's, the queens grocers. We kept waiting for them to kick us out as we sat there in our hoodies and things. All very posh, but very fun too. The waiter even set the napkin in my lap for me. Kind of awkward.

We've spent several days walking around and seeing the sights too. London Tower Bridge, Trafalgar Square, Buckingham Palace. The galleries are all free which is nice too. We explored the Tate Modern with the A team on Thursday which was neat, but slightly overwhelming. After having been deprived of art for so long, absorbing that much in a day was a little staggering.

Upon arrival we had sort of decided to spend the week in London and head up North to visit my aunt Sue in Yorkshire on the weekend, before heading back down to London for our last several days. Well, as the weekend rolled around we kept finding things in London we wanted to do, so we decided to stick around. We had already announced our previous plans to Lizzie, our host, however. So come Friday, we were suddenly without a place to stay as she had other friends coming in to stay from out of town. Luckily Helen, the girlfriend of a friend of ours from Niger, put us and the A team up for the night, though she had been worried that her lack of heating and hot water would make us suffer. She forgot we are RPCVs and didn't need luxurious accommodations. Just give us the floor and a blanket and we'll survive. She took us out to a pub for pizza and things too which was delicious.

Sadly, she was heading out of town yesterday so we couldn't stay there more than the one night. So I spent most of yesterday calling around various friends and contacts trying to find a place to stay. The result of this was that all our London contacts were exhausted for the weekend, but my aunts out of town were more than eager for us to come visit. So...London basically kicked us out and made us stick to our original plan.

I collected Djimi and we hopped on a train around 7 o'clock to Darlington in Yorkshire and are now being pampered and over fed by my aunt Sue. It's wonderful. We went on a nice walk this morning and saw some of the English countryside. Even more reasons to come back. The pace of life here is a little closer to what we're used to than London, also, which is comforting. So we're taking the chance to relax a bit and figure out where to go next.

The universe tends to unfold as it should. That's kind of been our running slogan for our last couple of weeks in Africa. It's like we've been given one last crash course in African patience and fatalism. You know...just to make sure we got it.

The original plan was something along the lines of getting to Cotonou, Benin on Wednesday night (the 19th of March), go to the Ghanaian Embassy on Thursday and apply for visas hoping to get them either that day or Friday. We were then going to spend a day or two in Grand Popo, Benin before zooming on to Ghana to relax on the beach and eat good food and drink good beer until we fly out of Accra on the 28th. There were also some waterfalls and hikes we wanted to go see on the way. That was the original plan.

So we get on the bus at about 2:30am Wednesday morning and of course it was not the air conditioned one with good shocks but rather a refugee from the seventies. Needless to say the ride was less than enjoyable. There were several roads that were so bad that we were literally tossed out of our seats. Atleast we didn't have to watch the same awful Hausa videos the whole way down. Eventually we made it to Benin, got our hotel, and started to feel better about the trip as we planned to go get our visas for Ghana the next day.

Cue the first SNAFU. Yeah, we kind of forgot about the fact that Ghana is a Christian nation. They actually care about that whole Easter holiday thing. They care about it to the tune of a 4.5 day weekend starting thursday afternoon in fact. So there was no way we could collect our visas until the following Tuesday. This essentially killed Ghana as a site seeing excursion, as our flight was on Friday morning. At best we could get maybe one full day that we could either go to the beach and feel rushed, or just chill in Accra. We were not pleased.

But, when life hands you lemons. We suddenly found ourselves with 4 days to spend in Grand Popo where we could not be productive even if we wanted to. We couldn't do anything until Tuesday. It was like enforced relaxation and I think it was exactly what we needed. Those four days with the A-team and Djimi were probably some of the most enjoyable days I've had in Peace Corps. We celebrated Easter by going to the Lion Bar, which is run by this big happy rasta guy. We showed up and ordered a round of sodabi (distilled palm wine) shots to toast our completed service. When the rasta saw us do our toast he gave us the rest of the sodabi bottle for free. Djimi and I proceeded to get absolutely wrecked. We're convinced the rasta was trying to kill us with sodabi. Luckily we met some friendly Benin volunteers who helped us carry Djimi back to the hotel. I was at-least capable of carrying myself...barely.

Fast forward to Tuesday. The girls left us on Monday to go to Lome, Togo to try to get their Ghana visas. Djimi and I returned to Cotonou on Tues morning hoping to collect our visas and then go to the SNTV bus station and take that night's bus to Accra, getting there sometime the following morning. Well...we get our visas, no problem. But there's no bus on Tuesday night. Learning this, we went and got lunch while we weighed our options.

Here was our situation: It was Tuesday and we were in Cotonou, Benin. We had to be in Accra, Ghana by 4am Friday. The next bus would leave around 11pm wednesday night and get to Accra by around 10am Thursday. Do we wait? Do we ditch the bus and go find bush taxis? We knew the bus line was relatively reliable and it had the advantage of getting us to the SNTV station in Accra where we had some bags waiting for us that we had shipped ahead. If we took the public transportation we would have to find the station once in Accra. Also, when we thought of public transport, the Nigerien bush taxis are what came to mind, which are not at all reliable and it seemed like that would just be a very stressful way to travel. Once on the bus we just let it go and hope it doesn't break down. Even if it did, we still had over 12 hrs worth of delay time before we would miss our flight. So...we chose to wait in Cotonou until Wednesday night and take the bus.

We showed up at the SNTV station in the afternoon after checking out of our hotel, and killed the day doing some laundry and hanging out speaking Zarma with all the Nigeriens there. Around 9:45 the bus shows up from Niamey. Sure enough it's the shitty seventies bus again. Oh well, we can cope with that. Oh yeah, and it's broken. Won't go until the morning. Argh! Well, we were still hopeful that maybe it would be fixed quickly in the morning. Being the hard core PCV's we were we said screw it and just slept at the station. They atleast had mattresses for that purpose. However, it wasn't much of a sleep as there were lights, and people milling about, and we were just sleeping exposed on the ground. So that's where the lack of sleep began.

The next morning, we awoke around 7. The mechanic didn't show up until about 7:45. Now, we thought about going and taking bush taxis...but all of our CFA was tied up in the bus tickets, cause we had changed all our money to pounds and cedis the day before. So we hung around waiting to see if they could get the bus fixed. Around 9am they got it started and told everyone to get on the bus. Excitedly we did so and felt so relieved, knowing we were going to catch our flight.

Ten minutes later everyone is getting off the bus. Something went wrong and now they needed to wait for the mechanic to go buy a new part or something. What made the whole morning really hard was that at no point did it not seem like they were on the verge of fixing the bus. So we were never able to convince ourselves to go ask for a refund and run to the bush taxis. Also, the bus had inevitability on it's side. We had no clue really about the bush taxis in this country, but if we waited long enough, the bus would get us there.

So we waited, and waited, and waited. Finally, after some cheap lunch across the street, someone finally told us that the bus was not going to run that day, but that we could wait until the next one came from Niamey that night. Sorry, that just wasn't going to work, we had a flight to catch. But we were already pretty sure it was too late to catch a car that would get us to Accra in time. At this point we were resigned to the fact that we would miss our flight have to eat the cost of another ticket. Or so I thought, until I'm coming out of the toilet and Djimi flags me over. Apparently this big Nigerien guy who lives in Ghana is going to go get a bush taxi, cause he doesn't want to wait either. Turns out if we left right then (aobut 2pm) we would get to Accra around 8 or 9. Brilliant! Let's go!

So we follow our new friends to the bush taxi post, and they hire a car for only 4 of us (yes! extra comfort!) that will take us to the Togo, Ghana border. On the other side we'd have to find another car to get us to Accra. Suddenly we went from absolutely missing our flight to having a comfortable ride, and a guide to get us through the borders and hopefully find the bus station at the other end. The universe...

So began our mad dash through 3 countries to catch our flight. The ride through Benin and Togo was actually quite nice and largely uneventful. Almost relaxing even. The Ghanaian border, however was less nice. It was easily the most complex, bureaucratically to get through. Also, the Ghanaian side was awful. It was like the worst market in Niger, except that we were not familiar with it. We lost our friend going through, and so had to find a car on our own, loaded with all our stuff, while people constantly came up to us and harassed us about their car, or grabbed at us. Mostly it sucked because it was impossible to stop and collect ourselves and figure out what we needed to do.

There was one guy who we sort of ended up following. One of the unpleasant side effects of being a PCV in Niger is that it makes you, by default, untrusting of anyone trying to help you. Or at least that's what it's done to me and Djimi. Invariably, once they finish helping you they will demand compensation. It doesn't matter that you didn't ask for their help. So we were loath to actually commit to letting this guy lead us around. But after turning down several offers for bush taxis at prices we knew to be inflated (Genghis had warned us of what it should cost), the guy asked us how much we wanted to pay and then he found us a car for that price. He even asked us where in Accra we wanted to go and seemed to be setting us up to end up near the SNTV station. Once he turned out to be trust worthy we gave him some of our remaining CFA (we needed our cedis now that we were in Ghana) and felt bad for not trusting him.

Ghanaian bush taxis, way nicer than Nigerien ones. For one, they actually enforce the 4 person per seat standard. They are also in much better repair than the ones we were used to. The roads however, were about on par with Niger. So it was not the most relaxing ride, but it was going to get us there. We didn't get to see much of the Ghanaian country side as at this point we were traveling after dark (something we were not supposed to do as a PCV, heh). Though we did get stopped many times by police. At one stop they actually pulled us out and checked our passports. Turned out they just wanted to document us passing through. The guy was also very friendly and nice. Again...the universe tends to unfold...so I figured I'd give something a try. I asked the guy if he knew where in Accra we could find the SNTV bus station. He told us that if we just stayed on our bush taxi until the last stop we would be in the neighborhood and should be able to ask the locals. Fantastic! I knew we had been pulled out at that stop for a reason.

Accra is rediculous. As we road through we could not help but look with dropped jaws. It is a real city. I can't even really begin to describe how much it is not like Niamey. It had highways, and overpasses, and pizza places, and a mall! We saw an add for an honest to god shopping mall! Irikoy Bere!

Anyway, eventually we go through all the nice built up districts and end up in a quarter that looks a little more like what we were expecting. Still nicer than Niger, but looking more like an African town with street sellers and people carrying stuff on their heads and lots of taxis trying to get us to take them. We oddly felt more comfortable. But...it was also 10:30 at night and we had to find a Nigerien bus line in a town we didn't know. So we started asking. Eventually, despite our best efforts we picked up a guide who wanted us to follow him.

Now, we knew full well that we were blatant targets. Two white guys with lots of bags, clearly not knowledgeable about the area. Totally dependent on someone helping us. But we didn't really have any other option. It was in Allah's hands at this point. And we started to get worried when our guide started leading us into what was clearly a market that was closed up for the night. As a rule, a market after dark is probably one of the least safe places you can go in an African capital city. But...again we were out of options and running out of time. So we swallowed the lumps in our throats and carried on.

Our guide stopped to ask a bunch of guys sitting around eating dinner if they knew where the SNTV station was. What was that greeting I heard? Was that a fofo? Ha! They were Zarmas! As soon as Djimi and I were speaking Zarma with these guys we felt one hundred percent safe. We had instant friends and they would take care of us. I love that about West Africa. Even though the station would be closed for the night they knew the guy who could open it. When we got to the station, it turned out they were actually open cause they were waiting for the same bus that we had been waiting for that morning (was that really the same day, insane). We told them our situation, that we needed our bags that night, and they called the boss with the key to the office and he came and let us in. There was a brief moment off panic as our bags were not in the office, but then they took us to another room and we found them. Alhumdulilahi!

After further chatting with the Zarmas they asked us how we were getting to the airport. We said by taxi. They told us we should not do that because a lot of the taxis on the road at that hour would just take us to their friends and clean us out. So they found one of their friends with a car and arranged to take us and our bags to the airport for 10 cedis (about 10 dollars). Done and done! We made it to the airport by around 11pm. We were gold. So we sat in the airport cafe and had an the best sandwiches ever and beer and fries. We had made it.

We spent the next couple hours washing the road off ourselves in the bathroom and changing some clothes and just relaxing. We had intended to sleep, but it didn't happen. But we got our flight to Morocco and that's all that mattered. We were getting off the continent and now it was just up to the airlines to not screw us up.

Now, we're in London, staying with my cousins and generally being overwhelmed, but in a good way. We've pretty much spent the weekend just recovering from our mad dash out of Africa. It's been nice, and now we're ready to go really explore the city.

5 countries in 27 hours.

7 hours of sleep in the last 72.

Finally in London. About to get the best sleep of my life. Details to come.

Djimi and I are leaving tonight around 2am. We'll be heading through Benin, Togo, and Ghana for the first leg of our journey. Not quite two weeks. We'll then fly out of Accra, Ghana to London and mooch off some of my relatives and friends we've met for two weeks. After that, a brief sojourn in Dublin before flying back stateside.

I'll try and make some posts along the way when I find internet access. But if all goes well we should be stateside again by April 15. The A-team will also be traveling on a parallel itinerary so we'll probably meet up with them here and there.

Catch you on the flip side.

I'm done! I just finished my COS interview and am now officially a Returned PCV, though I haven't returned to anywhere but the hostel yet. It feels good to no longer be a volunteer actually. I wasn't sure at first but yeah... it's a good feeling. I no longer have to answer to the bureau! It's like suddenly I feel like an adult again.

The exit interview went really well. It was nice to be able to air some of my grievances and offer some constructive suggestions and actually feel like my opinion was being respected. Even still, I don't know that I'm ready to leave. I suddenly feel so free...and I'm just going to go back home?

Limbo. That's where I'm at. Though it's easily the busiest, noisiest, most frenetic limbo I've ever conceived of.

I'm out of the village. Leaving was kind of a non-event. I guess I've spent so much time preparing to leave, and with my villagers knowing it was coming, that when it happened it was like, ok bye. The morning the car was coming I just kind of sat there waiting. Everyone else had stuff to do, so there wasn't really anyone around, until the car actually showed up. Then there was lots of goodbyes with the villagers closest to me and a few gifts to hand out. Otherwise, not terribly exciting or emotionally jarring. Also we gave my school director and village chief a lift into Niamey, which made the whole thing seem that much less final.

That said, as our passengers were getting out in Niamey, Boubacar (the school director) was reluctant to shake my hand, as if that declared our parting final. There's been a few times in the last month that he seemed like he would cry when we talked about my leaving. That's a huge thing for a Nigerien. They don't do public crying. If he had cried, I would have lost it. But knowing that I'm just hanging out in Niamey for a while makes it hard to really feel the finality of it all. I suspect when I'm crossing the bridge into Benin I'll finally break down.

In the mean time, I'm here in Niamey, along with probably 80% of PC Niger. Swear-In is coming up on Friday so it's pretty much party party party until then. It's an odd situation in that there are so many demands on my attention, since I'm leaving and all, and yet I'm having a really hard time feeling keen on getting into all the large crowds and parties. I'd kinda rather just spend some quiet nights with my closer friends until it's time to leave. Unfortunately, that's hard to do when all of your possible places to go are full of PCV's in celebration mode.

Still, I've found a couple of escapes. Last week I went and visited Brittany's village. It's funny that even though I hadn't been there in a year (when I did Brittany's live-in) a large number of them remembered me. I guess they had been clamoring for me to come visit for quite some time. I'm sure visiting the village for three days means Boo and I are married now, in their eyes. Still, it was a nice last bush experience where it wasn't all overshadowed with my imminent departure. It was just a nice visit.

During that visit, I also went and saw a Xima (sorcerer) in Gotheye. Alison is pretty good friends with him apparently and so took Boo and I to see his stuff. He immediately took us into his little shrine(?) and showed us all the garments and props used in possession dances. He also had a large assortment of perfumes, animal parts, and plant powders used to make various traditional medicines. He actually showed us the preparation of a love potion which involved taking various powders (all different plants and colors) and floating them carefully on the surface of water in a calabash. He made a really beautiful pattern on the surface with the powders. Apparently you are then supposed to drink 4 times from the clear center and then bath with the water. It blows my mind that I was almost in this country for over two years and never saw that!

So yeah, I'm mostly just killing time and spending time with those dearest to me before I get to get on the bus to Benin. Also wrapping up the various bureaucratic loose ends needed to actually close my service. But come Friday, I will finally be an RPCV!

Whelp, here we go. I'm about to head back to the village for, in theory, the last time. Tomorrow my move out car will come to get me and my stuff. I feel strangely calm at the moment. I'm sure that'll pass.

This past week was live in, when all the current trainees go out to their villages for a week before going back to Hamdy to wrap up their training. A current volunteer usually spends the first night with them in the village just to make sure everything is ok before abandoning the newbie. I've done a few of these live in things over the last couple years, but doing one in my own village with Liz (my replacement) was very strange. One of the major differences is that in another village, I'm just as out of place as the new volunteer, so I can share in their apprehension and excitement. The only difference is that I have more language and comfort in the culture. In my village, on the other hand, I'm so comfortable and confident that it's hard to think of all the questions and fears the new volunteer might have, but be too overwhelmed to be worrying about just yet. I know where the well, or the best families to eat with, or the nicest villagers all are, but it doesn't always occur to me to show them to the newbie. Though it is also kind of fun to watch Liz and be reminded of what it was like when the village was new to me.

Also, because it's my house and my life for the past two years, and I'm handing it over to her, I can't help but be afraid of how everything reflects on me. Is my house to messy? Do I treat my cats poorly? Is it bad that I can't remember every villagers name (they often go by five different names)? I know she has other things on her mind, but I get really self conscious about things like that. Djimi put it really well when he pointed out that it's kind of like if, in the states, when someone was moving into your old apartment, you not only handed them the keys and maybe a couple pieces of furniture you don't want anymore, you also give them your job, your pets, your friends, your life. I know everyone does things differently but I just can't help but thinking of it as "this is my life and now she's gonna do everything differently and mess it all up!" I know it's not true, but it's hard.

I know Liz will be a great fit in my village. That doesn't make handing over the keys, so to speak, any easier. Most of the time I was there with her, the villagers all just wanted to talk about how awesome I am and how their going to miss me. While this was flattering, and makes me realize how much tomorrow is really going to hurt, it was not good for Liz. So I made a more dedicated than usual effort to only stay the one night. I knew she and the village would get adjusted to eachother much better/faster if I wasn't there. Part of that is that being a female volunteer, she will form some completely different relationships with everyone, and I can't even begin to know how to help her integrate that way. I don't hang out with the women much, so I really don't have and friendships to hand over to her. Meanwhile, I know that my male friends will not all see her as a new me, but rather as a potential girlfriend, which is not ok.

After talking to Liz yesterday, when she passed through on her way back to Hamdy, I know she will be happy there. It already sounds like she's more outgoing than I was, which makes me feel some regret that I wasn't the best volunteer I could have been. Hearing all the little things that she found intimidating, or hilarious, or just amusing really makes me sad that I'm leaving. I don't know what I'm gonna do. But I'll let you all know how it goes.

Kurt is gone. He left Sunday night. We gave him an awesome send off (it involved Tenacious D, Particle, and Dragonforce!). I've seen other people leave. I remember last year saying good bye to our sister stage and realizing that most of the people I would be meeting over the next year would have no idea who these people were. Now it's our turn, and it's sadder than I ever imagined.

It could be that with Kurt I've lost my best friend in country, but I really feel like we're at the end now. When we were leaving stage to go to post after swear in, it was me, Alex, Alison, Djimi, Kurt, and Cathy in the car together. Someone (I think it might have been Alex) said something along the lines of "And so ends that chapter." At the time it felt really appropriate. I imagined our car drving away from the training site as being the last shot at the end of an episode of the tv show of our lives or something. You know, really cheesy bullshit like that. But it felt impressive.

If my life consisted of a series of books, I feel like I'm in the last chapter before it's time for the next book. All that's left is to wrap up my work, introduce my replacement in my village, and then there's my travels to get back home. Okay, there might be some other recent developments too. My point is, one of the things that is really scary right now is that I don't really have any inkling of what lies beyond that next title page. There's lots of little plot threads, but none of them show any indication of where they are going. Not to mention the major setting change! This has been my favorite book so far (I see my life as having been 4 books up till), what if the next one totally blows.

Tech trip was awesome. Exhausting, at times slightly frustrating, but mostly it went really well. In spite of my supervisor, rather than making me feel like a failure, it instead became an awesome cap to my service.

When I came into town on Sunday right before the trip, I learned that I had been played even worse than I thought. Apparently while I was in Senegal, everyone at training (this includes volunteers, training coordinators, and some admin folk) had decided to cancel my trip and just send all the AG trainees to Gotheye for one tech trip. My boss however did not agree and kept working as if there was a tech trip. When I showed up in Niamey talking about the tech trip, it was apparently news to everyone else that it was still going there. My boss basically defeated them all by keeping me in the dark about this alternate plan, because if i had caught wind of it I would have won it for them hands down by just saying no. I hate finding out that I was used in such a fashion. Especially when it put so much stress on me and had me freaking out.

But anyway, I put on the best tech trip I could muster, and feel like I pretty much defeated him. Despite his best efforts to mess up my schedule and add or remove programs left and right at the last minute, I was ready for him. My schedule was flexible and padded enough that I was always able to keep it going smoothly, even if it did mean there was a lot of down time and I was running around like a madman the whole time. But I think that was exactly what the trainees needed. They are pushed so hard up at site that I figured they deserved a more leasurely couple of days. They all seemed to have had a good time. It just annoys me that the only one who really knows what I had to go through to pull this off is the my boss.

Site announcements are also today, and I got to pick my replacement out of the two Zarma girls that visited my post. Both of them I think will be a great fit so it was kind of an arbitrary decision. They also both loved my cats and spoiled them rotten, so I don't have to worry about them anymore.

With all this over, I really feel like I'm done now. The only work I have left to do is to wrap up all my COS paperwork and figure out what I'm doing next. I already have my plane ticket off this continent (Accra, Ghana to London, England) so there's no denying it anymore. I'm leaving. Which was bittersweet to begin with, but has become even more saddening for other reasons. Khala suuru I guess.

Life is messy.

Yes I'm back in Niamey already. And i go back to post today. And I'll be back in Niamey tomorrow. And I'll be back to post on Monday. Why all the running back and forth you ask? Well I'll tell you.

One of the major events of training here in Peace Corps Niger is the tech trip. This is where a group of trainees travel out to a volunteer's post and spend a couple days learning about various projects that are going on there and observing things like gardening techniques or animal care methods in a village setting. Well this year they've decided that one of the Agriculture tech trips should take place in my village.

The other half of the Ags will travel up to Gotheye for their trip. Haoua (one of our supervisors) and the Gotheye team have been planning and working hard to pull together what I hear will be an awesome tech trip. The other half, come to me, where my supervisor has not done anything and it's just me, not a team of volunteers. Needless to say I've been a little stressed.

I think my biggest problem has been that this feels like the final exam I was always told we didn't have. My school garden is pretty much a wash this year, through no bodies fault. Since that was the big project I had to show the trainees, it's really disheartening that it's a "failure." I know I shouldn't think of this as presenting my projects, but I do. And the result is there's been a couple moments where it's made me feel like my entire service is a failure. I know that's silly and I'm doing a little better now.

Because I'm the only volunteer working on this, and my boss has done little to nothing to support/assist me in this (hell, just getting information from him is like pulling teeth), I feel like if it is a disappointment then it only reflects badly on me. It's a lot of stress on my head coming at a time where I'm already emotionally agitated. Atleast it'll all be over soon and then I'm done with work.

In other news, Djimi and I went and purchased tickets for the first leg of our COS trip yesterday. We now have tickets to get off this continent on March 28th: Accra to London. w00t

I have returned to Niger to find it a different place. Or rather it is the same, but I can't see it the way I used to. I have no motivation desire to spend time in my village, as it seems like that is just waiting around to say goodbye. I hate dragged out good byes. On the other hand I don't really enjoy Niamey as the hostel is full of new volunteers whom I don't really know, nor do I have much incentive to get to know them. I also have a distinct lack of my own private space that is very frustrating. That was the nice thing about Dakar, I had my own room. I was not always forced to be social. I guess it feels like I'm not really in Niger anymore, but I am also not yet in America beginning the transition back there.

News as regards my teeth: I now have a shiny new crown where I once had a horribly twisted tooth. It's very nice and my lips have finally gotten used to feeling it there (they had gotten used to the gap that was there while the crown was being made). Apparently the bone in my jaw that was eaten away by the infection will heal itself, much like a broken arm. I've noticed a little bit of pain in that part of my gums when I smile a lot or if i poke at it, but I attribute that to the healing as no one seems to be concerned.

I also just want to say that Dakar was awesome. Brittany joined me for my second week and we had a wonderful time together. It was very nice to have another Niger volunteer to share the experience with and I'm glad it was her. I think we both have plans to find a way to get back there someday. If for no other reason than all the wonderful art that we want to buy.

But that's over now and so I find myself just sort of biding my time until I leave, which i do with mixed feelings. I head out to my post in a few minutes, where I'll be preparing stuff for the current stage's tech trip next week. I'm kind of annoyed at how little my boss has done to help me plan this but that's really just become par for the course. Atleast once this is done I'll be done with projects.

Just a heads up, do to the obscenely fast internet and the joys of iphoto and picasa working so well together, I have just uploaded not one, not two, but three! albums of photos. Some are repeats and some are not. But this is just to remind you to head on over to http://picasaweb.google.com/tastyfishcreature and check 'em out. Enjoy!

Update: I am not currently in Niger. I've been med-evaced to Dakar, Senegal. Fear not, dear readers, it is nothing dire. However about a month ago I noticed an abscess in my gums. Long story short, it was decided I should be sent to Dakar for a second opinion and maybe a root canal. Yesterday the dentist here took some x rays and poked around and determined that one of my teeth (the front one that sticks out) got infected, and that infection traveled into my gums and abscessed. That particular tooth is dead and it's neighbors were in danger of having their roots infected as well. So immediate action was taken.

****Warning, the following description is not for the squeamish****

A small hole was drilled into one of the fillings of that tooth. Next thing I know pressurized puss is squirting at high speed into my mouth through the tooth! It might be one of the most disgusting things ever to happen in my mouth without warning. The dentist also made a small incision in my gum to really clean it out. Even numbed up it was a little painful. I swear he was scraping the bone...and maybe he was. He also stuck a little file up and scraped out all the rotten core of the tooth.

So now I'm sitting here with a hollow tooth acting like a drain for this abscess. So every now and then I get a bit of a salty taste as a little more fluid exudes into my mouth. Gross. Atleast I'm not in any pain. Though when I went to the dentist today to have more stuff squeezed out, he would occaisionally blow air on the tooth to dry it. Man is it a weird feeling to air squirted through a tooth into a pocket in your gums. So weird.

***end grossness***

So the long and short of the situation is that I'm gonna be here in Dakar for atleast two weeks. They have to do a bone graft (artificial composite goo) to fill in the bits of my jaw that the infection dissolved. Then they'll go and fill in the tooth and crown it. But before they can do that I have 8 days of antibiotics to clear up the infection and everything.

The bonus is they've put me up in a decent hotel which features, among other amenities, free fast internet. So I'm catching up on all my downloading, webcomics, and yes...even a little bit of World of Warcraft (I was clean for 2 yrs and 4 days). I feel kind of bad that I'm not getting out and seeing the city more, but a)It's really expensive and they don't give me much per diem and b) it's really nice to have my own room where I can just chill and do my own thing and use the internet. Really this is what I would have wanted out of any vacation I would have taken at this point in my service. Also, there's a volunteer from the Gambia in for stuff, so I have someone to hang out with.

They have, however, threatened to move us to the new med bureau instead. So I might loose internet soon. So I'm going to milk it for all it's worth while I've got it. I think I've got most of my generic web surfing out of the way now and can move on to actual productive things instead of just catching up on websites.

So that's where I'm at. I'll try and get some more posts up while I'm here. Also, btw, I uploaded an album full of giraffe photos to my picasa site, so check em out.

There are very few times of year when PCV's can gather in large numbers and not make me want to hurt puppies at some point. Thanksgiving is one of those times. Maybe it's the holiday that makes us get along, or the fact that it's now cold season, or perhaps the joint effort to produce lots of good american food. I'm gonna go with the food. Thanks to some very nice folks working with the US Embassy, the Niamey PCV's were given a turkey this year. An honest to God Butterball flown in from the states. Irikoy Bere. The same folks also provided us with a ham, which made Djimi cry when he ate it. Yeah, we miss good food that much. (As an aside, when I was home for vacation I cried at the first beer I drank stateside. It was a Magic Hat Fat Angel). So this year we were able to have true thanksgiving feast.

On top of those two important and tasty critters, Kurt and I killed a Rabbit that Djimi cooked up, there was a pumpkin pie, mashed potatoes, stuffing, someone found or made cranberry sauce, cheesecake, guacamole (on Thanksgiving?!), delicious fresh-baked rolls (Djimi knows bread), and fudge a la Ghengis. It was amazing. I heard that one person did in fact eat so much they ended up throwing it all up. I say it was almost a necessity if you wanted to actually try everything.

Surprisingly enough, Thursday night was actually a big deal for Niger as well. All week they've been hosting this years FIMA event. I'm not sure what the acronym actually stands for but basically it is a week long festival of sorts celebrating African diversity, mostly fashion. Thursday night was the main event: a fashion show featuring world renowned designers from five continents.

It was an incredible event, once it started (all the posters say 8pm, it started at 10:15). There were various musical performances scattered throughout, including Les Nubiennes whom I was very excited to see. But the real feature was the clothing. The designers ranged from practical to purely concept in nature. One of the early displays was from a very interesting African fellow (Cameroon) who uses almost entirely natural materials (i.e. grasses, calabashes, etc.). Apparently his motivation comes from trying to reconnect man and nature. Very tribal in appearance, though the designs were almost like something off a stage show in Vegas. Lots of peacock feathers, elaborate head dresses, and revealing calabash bras.

Some of the other designers were much more conservative, and you could actually see someone wearing one of there designs to a formal event or party. There were some absolutely stunning gowns in particular. There was also one designer from Canada who's designs reminded me very much of the interior of my mom's fiber arts shop. Her designs featured gorgeous felted mittens, scarves, and fluffy hats. Good thing it's cold season.

Altogether it was fantastic. This was the first real fashion show I had attended. I don't think I ever realized how much it is really just another art form than it is really about designing clothes to be worn. The designers play around with all sorts of ideas about how to garb the human form, and practicality is not necessarily a priority at all. But it's not just any human form. Their canvas, in a way, is the hyper idealized form of the model. Super slender, tall, with well defined features. Yes the results are absolutely stunning and a pleasure to look at. But it's not real life. What's unfortunate is how this art has spilled into the pages of magazines telling us how to live our lives and what we should look like. That's like populating a travel guide with, in the place of location photos, impressionist paintings of the destination, but treating them as though they were photos. The travel guide will be gorgeous, but when you actually get to the place you will be disappointed. What you took for real and thus expect to see is not reality.

In keeping with the current topic, it's worth mentioning that I myself was a model in a fashion show a few weeks ago. Kadi is a Nigerien designer here in Niamey who receives great acclaim from the PCV and ex-pat communities. I got roped into being a model as I showed up in town two days prior to the show and Natalie said she was looking for more guys of my build (skinny but not too tall). So I went over and picked out my three outfits (mostly it was just whatever fit and hadn't been taken yet). The theme of the show was pretty much American 1960's. So think Hippy.

My first outfit was all white and I was a little nervous about it as not many people can pull off all white, let alone white guys. But you know what, I was hot! Damn Hot! And that's not my opinion, that's just reiterating all the things I heard that night (hell I still catch people talking about it). I have to say, Kurt and my heads definitely got a bit swollen that night. But who's wouldn't when you spend an entire evening wearing beautiful clothes while people keep telling you how awesome you look. It was a blast and I ended up buying one pair of pants straight off of Kurt's ass. I'll try and track down some pictures from folk. If for no other reason than to give myself the odd self esteem boost.

Well, here I am. exactly 4 months to the day until my COS (Close of Service). Tomorrow our COS conference starts and they'll start giving us the run down on all the forms we have to fill out before we can leave, how to say good bye to our villages, and what to do next. So basically, I'm staring down the home stretch. Scary.

People keep asking me if I'm excited to be almost done. Apprehensive would be a better word i think. I'm absolutely ready to go home, but absolutely not ready to leave Niger.

Think of it this way: I've spent the last two years learning a completely foreign language, integrating into a completely different culture, and I'm going to leave now that I'm just getting the hang of it all?! How does that make sense. Especially when the upshot of my competence is that I finally feel like I could actually do some projects that might stick.

But I really do miss home. Yes I may sound like my priorities are skewed but I miss playing video games, and Magic the Gathering. I miss going to pubs and discussing micro brew beers with my friends. I spent a whole car ride yesterday day dreaming about snowboarding. I want to go home.

Some of you know that I was thinking about extending for a little while. The more I think about it though, the only way it makes sense with the reasons behind it, I would have to extend in my village. And if I did that I would have to stay for a whole year ( My village needs me to be replaced if my projects aren't to just collapse). And I'm just not willing to stay for another hot season. After a 2 yr long summer, I need fall and winter!

So I guess come tomorrow I will officially be "on the way out." I've tried to ignore the looming COS date but I think after tomorrow it will be even harder.

Well, it's been forever since I've posted. It's certainly not cause nothing has happened. Quite the contrary. I could say I've been too busy to post...but that's not really true. I could try and pass off some psycho-babble nonsense about how I'm so well adjusted here now that I don't have a need to share my thoughts and experiences...but that wouldn't really be accurate either. Mostly I think I've just been lazy. I have also found myself less and less inclined to spend lots of time on the intarweb if I can avoid it. Maybe I've actually kicked my need to feel constantly wired into the rest of the world. That's a fun thought.

Anyway, I suppose I should fill you in. I'm not actually looking at my blog while I type this so I'm not really sure when my last post was. I'll just give a rundown in reverse chronology of some of the most significat events of the past few months.

Just finished swear in week. It's been a madhouse. The PC director was in town for that and the combined PC Niger 45th anniversary celebration. This means that everything had to be perfect. It also meant that everyone was running their asses off trying to make sure we presented the ideal face for the director. So much for objective observation. I was seriously contemplating not coming into Niamey this week, but I got roped into doing a musical performance for the 45th with little to no prep time to get it organized. Kurt and Josh and I found a couple of our musical buddies and basically just had a 10 minute jam session. It was what it was. I think it was awful...people keep telling us otherwise.

I've also been horribly sick all week. Worst case of amoebas ever. I've been finished with the main meds for two days now and I still have diarhea. They say you're not a true Peace Corps volunteer until you've crapped your pants. Well you can count me in those ranks now.

Last week I went to a training session at the ICRISAT research center with my school teacher and several other volunteers and their counterparts. It was very interesting and will hopefully help my teacher and I when we try and set up a school market garden in the comming months. Kudos to Danielle for all the work and effort she put into it.

Let's see...what else... OH YEAH! I went to that magical place: America! I went home for about 3 weeks in August for a couple of weddings. The trip really deserves its own post as it was very interesting to go back into that society after my time here. Suffice to say for now that I did have reverse culture shock (first three days home were in Manhattan) and that it was wonderful to be back visiting with friends and family. America is also freezing. Even in August. It was glorious.

Prior to my trip to America I'm not sure what I have or have not talked about. If I find any gaps I'll be sure and fill you in. In the meantime I'll try and type out some discussions of what it was like to be home and what it's like to be back here now. Bizzare and perfectly normal are both apt descriptors. I'm sure it'll make more sense later.

Just a quick post now as I'm about to head back to the bush (I really should start posting when I get in rather than just before I leave). Things are actually going pretty well. My Windi Bundu trees all came up and will soon be ready for planting, though none of my namari or acacia senegal trees worked out. Back to the books to figure out what we did wrong. Atleast, for the most part, my school teacher and I are looking at this as a learning experience so that either later this year or even after I leave, they'll have a better idea of how to pull off this type of project.

Otherwise, I'm actually feeling pretty good. Knowing that I'm going home for 3 weeks on Aug 15th really helps, though it is making me a little antsy at post. However, the other night I went over to my teacher's house and hung out for like 4 hours drinking tea and chatting. We had an awsome conversation that included religion, government, the US election, the state of the world, how developement works in Niger (or doesn't), and lots of other fairly heavy topics. It was actually really awsome. It was one of those conversations where I saw that he had so much kokari and I am only just now really comfortable living here that it almost makes me want to extend as I feel I could really impliment some good projects now. Almost.

Anyway, I have to head out now but as one final note I have to do a favor for a friend of mine. Those of you who played World of Warcraft with me back home and were in the guild Nightmare Company, this message is for you. Last week Harkhana's 17 yr old daughter died, supposedly she had a seizure in the night and suffocated. I can't imagine how hard things must be for Hark right now. She asked me if I could use my blog to spread the word to all the former NC folk and I said I would. If you would like to send her your condolences I have her email address and will give it at request (don't want to post it here so she won't get spammed). No matter how much I start to think it sucks being here, Hark... my heart goes out to you.

Seems like it's been forever since I made a post. Oh right. It has. Well I suppose I should start with a few updates on what I'm doing then.

The grain bank is funded, filled, and running! What's more, the villagers are actually doing a good job on the book keeping and have even taken some of the income so far and restocked the bank once. And they pretty much did all this without me telling them to. Color me impressed.

I've also started a tree nursery with the school teacher. We've planted about 350 trees, mostly Meringa along with some gum arabic and namari. School isn't in session anymore though so it's just me and him doing all the work. But if we are successful here we're going to look for funding to expand into a full garden/nursery for the school in cold season. My goal is to get a solid meringa plantation running as a)meringa leaves are delicious and b) it's a good source of income for the school kids.

Other than that life continues as usual. Though I have managed to start pulling longer stints in the bush. Though in a way, it kinda feels like the first few months of service all over again. I once again find myself counting down hours until I can go to bed and taking long naps just to kill part of the day. While I'm glad I'm able to stay out for a week at time again, that much time also feels like eternity.

Part of it I think is just due to the fact that I'm going home for a visit in a month and half. I plan on bringing back several things like my computer movies that I know will make my last few months that much more bearable, even if they are only things I'll use in Niamey. I'm also excited to see my friends and family and once again be able to participate in my old hobbies with other people who are just as enthusiastic as I am. Even when I do get doses of gaming here, it's not with other gamers and so it's just not the same.

Also, getting the grain bank up and running was a shift. All of a sudden one of the major things that kept me from giving in to frustrations and just going home was finished. Now I'm just kind of apathetic. Niger stopped being exciting a long time ago. Now I just get by as I would anywhere else...except that even just getting by is way less convenient or pleasurable than it would be if I was home.

Being in Niamey isn't really any better. Hanging out with other volunteers is fun, but it's mostly all the same conversations complaining about Niger or musing about life lessons we've learned. There's not much to do in Niamey aside from eat, drink, and chat.

Back home I was part of so many different communities. I had my family, my friends from school, my guild in World of Warcraft, and the crew I played Magic with. There was some overlap but most importantly I had variety in the groups I hung out with and had conversations with. I almost never talked about the same things with my family that I would get so heated about with my Magic group. It kept things fresh and enjoyable.

Here I basically have two groups. Other PCV's are nice because we're all going through the same thing...but I'm kind of tired of the bitterness and apathy or alternative enthusiasm and idealism. Same conversations over and over and over, and most of them aren't terribly uplifting or distracting.

On the other hand, it doesn't matter how integrated I get, I am just not going to be able to relate to Nigeriens the way I do to other Westerners. And frankly arguing over how long it takes to ride a bike to the next town, or joking about marrying the chief's 5yr old daughter and taking his baby son to America got old about 15 months ago. This I think goes a long way toward my feeling of just biding my time. For the most part, Peace Corps just isn't terribly exciting anymore...plus the climate sucks.

Oh well. I get by. I get through the days. Hopefully my visit to America will refresh me. Then my friend Kat is going to come visit. After that is my COS conference and then there's only like 3 months left. Who knows, maybe something exciting will happen in the mean time and I'll have renewed enthusiasm for this whole endeavor.

In America we are all about ideals. Everyone should be treated equally. Teenagers should practice abstinence. Every country should have a shot at democratic government. This is fine, without ideals like this, where would we find the drive to change things, to improve. Visions of how we think things should be drive progress. It can be dangerous, however, when one becomes so focused on ideals and how things should be that you become unable to function in reality.

One of the many reasons I think people join Peace Corps is to see the real world. It's a chance to get a taste of how things are outside of the US. When we leave for our respective host countries we have to accept that while it's important to hold to our ideals...we will be disappointed, again and again and again. Nothing out here is the way it should be, according to my western values. Even aside from the big things like human rights, or corruption, there are many simple concepts of business or communication that just aren't here and make life more inconvenient.

One such problem is that of change. No body here ever has any change. More than once I have gotten out of a taxi and tried to pay my 200 fcfa fair with a 1000 bill or even just a 500 coin and the cab driver simply has no change. This is not his problem. It is my problem. If I want change back, I have to now wander up to random vendors (if there are any nearby) and get change, or else just eat the difference. Some taxi drivers will accept the loss of 50 fcfa or something if you don't have enough small change, but most will make you break a large bill.

This would not fly in America. But that's the way it is here and so I accept it. I don't like it, but I move on. On the other hand, I observe people who are too locked into the mindset of how things should be. Most of the time their ideas are perfectly logical and reasonable, such as having enough change before your start your day as a cab driver. But when it doesn't work that way it just drives them up a wall. And little things like this add up until they just break down and can't deal with anything anymore.

This is just one example of not seeing the way things really are for being hung up on ideals. Another prime example i think is our president, George W. Bush. He is so focused on his mission of establishing democracy in Iraq (because democracy is the ideal government and so everyone should want and have it), that he blinds himself to the real situation. He doesn't want to hear about another list of casualties, or another platoon forced to retreat, let alone the idea that maybe the people don't want our form of government. Inconceivable!

It's the same thing with the restrictions on sex ed. Yes we should preach abstinence, but we should also be aware of how the world is and what teens are doing and address that as well. My point is that while it is good to have an idea of how things should work, you still have to work within the structure of how things really are. You cannot change the system by ignoring it. You cannot win a game by completely ignoring the rules. If you do that you are no longer playing the game and thus cannot affect it's results. Your just playing with yourself.

Always hope for the best but be prepared for the worst. Dream of an ideal world, but still live in the real world.