Doukum Doukum

Took a little bike trip about 20km into the bush last weekend and visited first my friend Tiger who is about to finish his service, and second my friend Haboubacar. Habou from the huge family that lives across from me and is also in the picture of the fada I posted some time back. Great guy. Cool seeing what he’s doing and interesting hearing a Nigerien’s perspective on bush as opposed to town (or city) life. Anyways, these pictures are just of the two of us monkeying around in his health hut out in Doukum Doukum. And yes, I give him hell for the silly sounding name of his village.

PS. These are the last pictures of me with hair for a while. Just shaved it all off again last night as it's getting hot hot hot again... And I am scared scared scared.

PPS. Internet working well this morning, so here's another picture of Habou and his friend out in front of his health hut (that's what they call em).

In Case You're Not Tired of Hearing about Them

So, since a controlling share of my happiness revolves around those wonderful treasures (and pains in my rear) the girls soccer team, figure I’ve gotta say something about them while I’m in Zinder. Things have been a little disorganized lately. A series of strikes at school, them doing their mid-term exams, and me needing to travel a couple weekends threw a little monkey wrench in our teams practicing consistency. Anyways, we were gonna have a practice on Wednesday. Only one of the girls showed up at 3 when we usually meet. So, while I almost always insist that the guys stay the hell away and don’t play, I asked the her if she wanted me to invite them and for me and her to play with the guys.

She is one of the very best players on the team so I knew she could handle it, but being able to physically play with them and being able to mentally get over the cultural barrier of playing with guys… Well I wasn’t sure if she’d do it. Its not a totally outrageous proposal, but generally speaking that type of thing just doesn’t happen.

But with only very minor prodding she agreed. She started timidly and only played in goal. But little by little she got more and more confident. As time progressed she was just awesome, taking on the guys and beating them, and conversely getting beat from time to time by the guys as well. It was awesome, it pushed her to play better and to work harder than she normally has to to be among the best. And the guys warmed up to it to, at first not sure how she’d do and then realizing that if they played lightly or didn’t take her seriously she’d stomp all over them.

And finally, after about 45 minutes, three other girls from the team showed up and (certainly inspired by her example) jumped into the game as well. We more or less played guys against girls (I played with my ladies and we had one other guy) and every one of them did great. It’s hard to make clear how big a deal this is to me, and you’re all probably tired of hearing about them, but really to have a big pick up soccer game with a mix of guys and girls is more or less unheard of. I know it must have done worlds of good for my ladies’ confidence and I’m sure it turned a number of these guys heads as well. Really, it was everything that sports could and should be…. OK…. On to other things…

More Ladies Soccer

This is one of my favorite pictures in the world. For the trip to Zinder with the team (see post below, i think i mentioned that), we had to prefare a song or small sketch about HIV/AIDS. After each session/practice or whatever, we went to my house and played soccer in my concession.

This picture is of Ramatou on the left, Dije with the ball, Nouria on the right, and Zeinabou in the background. They are so happy and so damn wonderful... I'm gushing... OK. Enough of that.

The picture below is of the ladies who came that day. In the back is Ramatou, Memouna, some white guy who stopped by, and Mami. In the front is Dije, Nouria, and Zeinabou...

Young Lady's Soccer

Each year in the Zinder region the volunteers organize a small soccer season and tournament for Middle/High School girls (ages 13-16). When I first heard about this project I’ll be honest and admit I thought it sounded a little lame. Fun, and probably easy, but ultimately, sort of a silly project. I couldn’t have been more wrong about nearly every single pre-judgement I made.

I love this project. And I hate this project. (But really I love it.)

I’m gonna skip the technical details of how different things have gone wrong and who has annoyed me. I don’t feel like this is necessarily the space for venting or for airing out dirty laundry. Even if the likelihood is next to nothing that anyone from Matameye would somehow find my blog and then find someone who could translate it from English to Hausa or French, the point is I’ll save that for another venue and just say that sometimes more support would be nice and being responsible for a band of 10-15 16-year-old, sometimes flakey and sometimes rowdy girls is stressful, frustrating, and tiring.

So, I’m glossing over the hard side of things and presenting the reasons why I love it, and I’ll just say that in sum, its one of the things that has made me happiest since I’ve arrived here.

When I first got to Matameye I picked up with the team of girls that the volunteer before me had started. Many bumps in that road, but the bottom line is that I became their coach. I can not even come close to explaining how much these girls love to play soccer and how happy it makes them, how badly they need that outlet, and how much it means to them to finally have an opportunity to be kids, take a moment away from studying and away from house work. For these girls it’s huge.

Beyond that, I love that I get to be an advocate for them. When the hordes of obnoxious young guys come to the field, try and push us to the corner, or steal our ball, as angry as I get, I like that I can stand up for these girls. I don’t want to make it sound like these are meek girls to be pitied. Far far from it. These girls are tough as hell. But a group of 10 girls trying to play a soccer game can only do so much against a crowd of 30 guys who like nothing more than interfering and just generally being grand pains in the ass. Furthermore, girls in Niger are often unaccustomed to being told that they are a priority, that their experiences, or just even their FUN, is important and worth someone getting angry about. I hope that makes sense, its something I probably wouldn’t have fully understood until seeing it first hand.

The team impacts the other girls at the school as well. Even those who don’t themselves play often come to watch our practices. I’m sure it has a positive effect on their self-esteem, through watching and supporting their classmates. It affects others in the community as well. Every time someone asks me why I do a girls team and not a guys team its an opportunity to discuss with someone that girls here in Niger almost never ever get a chance to just play. And in contrast, that boys here do almost nothing else. Gender divisions here are mind boggling, very deeply rooted in culture, and sometimes religion. And further, there seems to me a lack of appreciation for how different those two worlds between men and women can be. Of course that’s a tiring and often frustrating conversation to have over and over and over and over again. But I have it a lot. And while everyone certainly doesn’t agree with me or even get what I’m talking about, sometimes people do.

Look, I can go off now and dork-out, diving into macro-level reasons why girls empowerment is one of, if not the most crucial variable in a country’s development. But I know that that doesn’t get everyone as hot and bothered as it gets me. So I’ll give as concise a sliver as I possibly can. An empowered girl, whether through education, sports or anything, is better able to advocate for herself and participate in decisions relating to the family once she is married. Increasing female empowerment is thus very highly correlated with decreasing fertility rates. Niger has the highest fertility rate in the world at 7.5 children per woman. Development, I’ve heard, is nearly impossible until a country can lower the fertility rate to below 5 if not lower. It’s simply not possible for state infrastructure to keep up with population growth and population pressure. In a country like Niger with very bare natural resources, that number should probably be even lower before the country can turn the corner. There is a long way to go here.

For those who skimmed that last paragraph. Here’s the summary of my summary: Girls empowerment is really really important.

Finally, on the personal side of things, I’ve always been surrounded by ladies in my life. By that I mean my sister, my four step-sisters (no guys in that mix), and a tendency for the ladies to outnumber the gents in my circle of friends. I don’t know why, but its been like that all my life. That simply does not happen in the same way here as it does in the U.S. and that has been an unforeseen challenge for me. This team has given me a chance to develop relationships with some of the most wonderful young ladies I’ve ever met, and through this team many of them have become some of my very best friends in Niger. So here’s a huge shout-out/thank you to them and if I can get a picture loaded you’ll catch a glimpse of em as well.

Just a Picture (or Two)

This is just a picture that I liked without too much significance. A couple friends of mine came to visit me in Matameye and one of them took this picture when the wind was blowing like crazy. Actually, I’d like to give her a shout out because she’s a volunteer out on the other side of the country near Niamey and took the trek out here. Basically the equivalent of coming out to visit Bar Harbor, Maine from Washington, DC. Booya Shamrock!

Anyways…

Wow, and since the internet is awesome today, here's a picture of me and Shamrock also.

Dear Guy Who Rips Me Off

Hi Guy! I feel like its time we had a little talk. Yes we did just “talk” yesterday I suppose, but what I mean is its time we got on the same page. You know, cut out the formalities and just lay it all out on the table. I’ll start.

I think first, it’s important to establish that although you like to continually refer to me as your “friend” and to the two of us together as “friends”, let’s be honest, you started with that the first week I got here, when I didn’t know you at all, and you certainly didn’t know me. So, if you count your friends by those with whom you insistently use the word “friend”, then yes, you are one of my best friends in all of Niger. But if by friend, you instead mean someone you like, and maybe have some string of common and friendly experiences with, well, I’m not sure we pass the test.

Perhaps you think that with us it runs deeper. After all, you are almost always smiling whenever you are in my concession and discussing our next collaboration. It’s funny though, you almost always seem happy when you bring up the subject of my money and how much of it you intend to take from me. And then when it comes time to do the work, I see you doing very little. Or in fact you look quite sad when you give me your reasons why it is still not finished and why it’s necessary I give you a little more money and a little more time for it to finish. Of course the moment I agree, everything brightens and that crisis that was clearly weighing on your conscience just moments before is washed away by the rush of excitement which I assume you only get from putting your hands on someone else’s money.

When it comes to the work itself, I’m not totally clear if you yourself have done any of it, though I can appreciate that you’ve done a truly superior job of positioning yourself as the middle-man for a number of things. After all, as his “friend” you certainly have better access to the local anasara then most others. In the end, it’s probably more accurate to describe you, not as a friend to me, but instead as a suitor, of my money. More than most others you have embraced the perception that in my house I use rolled up bills for toilet paper, and others for fire kindling. But the weight of my wallet is ultimately tangential to our current topic: the status of our relationship, friendship and business.

Let me get to the point by saying this. I’m done with your false pretenses. For the current project, I’ve taken the liberty to ask some of my real friends about prices, and it doesn’t seem to me that doubling a job’s normal price is such a friendly gesture. Nor is taking a full three months to start a project you promised would be finished in November particularly professional. The last few times you’ve come by I’ve seen you scouring around my house, certainly trying to scout out and conjure up the next project you will then try to sell me on. Let me save you the trouble. There will be no next project.

I’ve already advanced you payment for this current task, something I regretted the moment I placed the money in your palm and saw your eyes light up, as if to say “got that sucker”. Well, you are right on that point. I was a sucker. But we agreed on the price. I’ve already given it to you. And I’m not going to ask for it back. As they say here in Niger, “shikenan”, it’s over. Of course when it comes to our “friendship” or any other form of relationship between us, the same phrase applies: “shikenan” it’s over.

NOTE: Ok, I think I unintentionally made a lot of people nervous with this post. I was thinking about just deleting it, but I'm not going to. The reason is because you can find people you don't like anywhere in the world. In fact there are lots of people spread to all corners of this globe deserving of my dislike. And to drive a point home, I probably met more people that I dislike in my favorite city in the world (New York) than anywhere else I've ever been. So don't worry, this guy is a super small part of my experience. The post was more an exercise of aggravation release than anything else. Painting a picture of my service as always smooth and chipper wouldn't be honest or doing justice to the actual experience. Even with the frustration and the occassional person I'd just as soon do without, I love Matameye and am thrilled to be here. See post above on my wonderful lady soccer players for evidence of that claim.