Swear-In

       Hey all! Happy almost New Years! So today was the swearing-in ceremony; the time when Peace Corps trainees become official Peace Corps volunteers. We headed into Niamey this morning and drove to the home of the US Ambassador in Niger, Bisa Williams. It was very generous of her to open her home to us for the ceremony. We had a "cocktail" of sodas and snacks before the ceremony. The ceremony consisted of speeches by the following people: Tondi, our program director/Nigerien dad; Myself, Dan and Alma who talked about volunteers in Niger and thanking our host families in Hamdallye, the Peace Corps Niger country director Valerie Staats, the deputy officer of the US Embassy and a Nigerien government official. Giving the speech was great. It was funny because Tondi finished up his speech (which was in both French and English, he's kindof a big deal) in which he talked about the highlights of our stage and PST: singing for Thanksgiving, Christmas and birthdays, the impressive results from our final LPI Language Proficiency Interivew, losing packages and letters, and the comrodery of our group.Then he called me up to give the speech. I wasn't up there for five seconds before every radio and tv station personnel who came to the event swarmed around me to tape the speech. It caught me off guard and I must have made a funny face cause all my fellow volunteers started laughing. I guess it was a good icebreaker :) No it was fine though. I wasn't even a little nervous, I think public speaking is growing on me. After all the speeches, the volunteers stood up. We all held up our right-hands and said the Peace Corps Volunteer Oath in both English and French. Then, shikena (all finished/complete/done), we were volunteers YAA It feels great! We all came out to lunch after at Almadines, our fave restaurant in Niamey. Tonight we will have a special going-away dinner. I anticipate a lot of singing and a lot of tears. Tears of happiness that we made it through training and grew close as a stage but also tears of sadness because we are all going to our own regions and villages and will not see each other on a daily basis. Thank goodness for the float plan on our phones so that we will be able to stay in touch for free. Tomorrow, the volunteers going to Zinder/Maradi will leave at 4am to catch the 10-hour bus ride out east. Holler holler. Plenty of time for me to ponder about my new years resolution(s) and world peace. And sleep. And read (thank heavens I don't get car sick). And listen to my ipod (thanks again Sharah).

 

Ali, Ellie and Alison Gr in Hamdallye before leaving for Niamey

 Alison & Tondi after ceremony

Peace Corps Niger Country Director, Valerie Staats, giving speech during swear-in ceremony

Ambassador Williams' backyard, where ceremony happened

End Note: I've tried to upload the speech videos, but they are too long and the bandwidth in this country is unable to support it. Sorry :( Love ya'll, talk to ya soon

P.S. Here is my speech in Hausa, and then English:
Mai girma ma taimakiyar jakadiyar kasar Amerika a Niger, Mai girma wakilin gwamnatin Niger, Mai girma darektan Peace Corps Niger, Mai martaba sarkin Hamdallye, Abokaina volontaire, Jama'a mata da maza.
Salamu Aleykum, sannunku da zuwa!
Sunana Alison cikin Amerika amma sunana Zara cikin Niger. Daga Vermont nike, karamar jaha kusa da New York. Barka mu da sallar swear-in. Cikin volontaires da suka zo Niger mune na karshen shekara hamsin. Yau, muna da sati goma a Niger. Mun zamna cikin Hamdallye da iyalanmu na Niger. Mun yi sallar Layya da iyalanmu kuma mun koyi yadda ake dafa abincin Niger. Hausawa suka ce: shinhudar huska ta hi shinhudar tabarma.Iyalina, sun bamu sunan Niger, Zara da Leya. Lokacin abinci, mun zamna bisan tabarma taray. Da farko, ba mu magana dayawa. Amma, kadan kadan mun koyi Hausa. Sun tamakay mu cikin koyon kalmomin Hausa hada karin magana, kamar "dumiya takashi kaza, yau koy, gobe tutu". Mun da yara, mun yi wasan kos kuma mun d'auki ruwan pumpo. Na d'auki bido babba. Yanzu, muna magana dayawa lokacin da mu kay ci abinci bisa tabarma. Mun gode ma iyalanmu don alherinsu kuma da hankurinsu.
Cikin wadanga sati goma mun koyi hausa da zarbarmanci, al'adun mutanen Niger kuma harakar aiki. Mun ga yadda ake bikin salla kuma mun koyi yanayin cikin Niger. Zamu bada taimako afannin kiwon lahiya ko aikin garka. Zamu yi aiki tare da al'uma; don haka, muna bukata goyon bayan su. Muna son koyon abubuwa bisa Niger, mutanenta kuma da al'adunta. Muna jin dadin zama sosai cikin Niger saboda kasa ce mai mutane masu halin kiriki kuma da abukantaka. Hannu da hannu, muna iya kawo gudunmowar mu a Niger. 'Yan magana suka ce: Babu bako cikin duniya, sai wanda ba ka sani ba. Muna jin daddi sosai da ganinku. Mun gode.

US Deputy embassy officer in Niger, Niger Peace Corps director, Chief of Hamdallye, my fellow volunteers, ladies and gentlemen,
Greetings, thank you for coming!
My name is Alison in America but in Niger, my name is Zara. I am from Vermont, a small state near New York. Greetings on swear-in. Our group marks 50 years of volunteers coming to Niger. Today, we have been in Niger for ten weeks. We have been living in Hamdallye with host families. We celebrated Tabaski and learned how to cook Nigerien food. As the Hausa people say: to share your sell is better than sharing your stuff. My host family gave us Nigerien names, Zara and Leya. When we ate, we sat on the mat together. At the beginning, we didn't talk very much. But we slowly learned Hausa. They taught us Hausa vocabulary and proverbs, such as: Life is like a chicken. Today you get eggs, tomorrow you get poo. The children and us played games and fetched water from the well. I carried a large container. Now, we can talk a lot when we sit on the mat to eat together. We thank our families very much for their generosity and patience.
In ten weeks we have learned Hausa or Zarma, Nigerien culture and work-related information. We learned about celebrations and daily life in Niger. We will help in the sectors of health and agriculture. We will work together, so, we need your help. We want to learned things about Niger, her people and her customs. We are so happy to be in Niger for it is the land of kind people and friendship. Hand in hand, we will work to bring a change for Niger. One who speaks well says: There are no strangers in this world, just those you have not met. We are happy to meet all of you. Thank you.

Good News

Hello everyone! I hope you are all enjoying the winter weather! I have two exciting bits of news:
1. I have a phone. YAAAA all of the staff and volunteers are now on a float plan so that we can all text and call each other. Great for security purposes and to provide support to each other. Calling from the US, my number is: 227-987-000-71. Try calling me on Skype or GoogleVoice. I heard that GoogleVoice is a bit cheaper per minute but I'm not sure what service is better. We'll have to test it out.
2. This Thursday, we have a large ceremony called Swear-In where we become official Peace Corps Niger volunteers. At the ceremony, a lot of people talk, including three people from our stage. One to give a speech in French, one in Hausa and one in Zarma. Guess who was voted to be the Hausa speaker? THIS GAL! Ya I'm pumped. It'll be interesting. I've written most of it but it will be interesting to address people when I'm still working on pronouncing most of the words :) Ya I'm pumped though!
So ya I'm going to charge my phoney phone and will be waiting for all of your calls! Heart, Alison

 Christmas tree with secret santa presents under it. Please note the drawn tree + ornaments, Charlie Brown tree and recycled package boxes used to wrap the gifts. :)

"The Joys of Christmas" blackboard

Dec. 26. Host family fete, last night in Hamdallye before moving back to the training site.

Dec. 26. Host family after we gave them presents.

Dec. 26. Petite Razaac with soccer ball we gave him for the salla=celebration.

I will really miss that little guy.

Merry Christmas

26 Decembre 2010
Hello everyone! Merry belated Christmas! I hope you all are doing well and that the snow storm heading for New England doesn't hit too hard :) Here is what I've been up to for the holidays:
-Christmas Eve: I was part of the Christmas committee, so all afternoon a group of us worked in the kitchen on the training site in Hamdallye. With a lot of assistance from the cooks on site, we put together a feast of roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, cooked potatoes, green beans & carrots, zuccini & eggplant, bread with garlic & butter sauce, cake and orange 'n apple 'n watermelon salad. One of the Peace Corps staff generously made us Christmas cookies and the trainees shared treats and candies that were sent from home. Post din, we sang carols and watched Love Actually. Ate a whole huge bag of twizzlers with the assistance of some friends :) thanks mama for the care package. Ellie and I slept up at the training site so we would be there for the morning festivities.
-Christmas: Ran early in the morn, it felt great to get up when it was still cool. Had pancakes and eggs for brunch, watched movies, and then had pizza for lunch. Didn't really feel like Christmas. It was about 90 degrees, lots of sand and no snow. Sad to not be home but nice to have company of my fellow trainees that I've grown close with over the past two months. We did secret santa for a gift exchange. I had Carolyn and I bought her a budda filled with candies and a Cliff bar. Andrew gave me a zani (fabric that's been tailored into a skirt). We decorated the blackboards around the training site with holiday notes and we had a little Charlie Brown tree that Dan received in a care package.
-Upcoming events: We have a biiiiiiig week. Tonight we have the family fete/festival. We are making food with our host families and having a final celebration of living with them for the past two months. Ellie and I bought the kids a soccer ball, Hinda and Zanabu earrings, and a flashlight for Loyola. It will be sad to leave them (especially petite Razaac) but I think Ellie and I are both ready for the next step in our journey in Niger. Tomorrow, we have our final language assessment ahh nerve-racking but it will be fine, insha allah. Then we spend a couple of days in Niamey discussing logistics about our sites and banking while at post. We swear-in as volunteers on the 30th (YAAAAA almost made it) and then take the bus out to Maradi on the 31st to begin the Installation to Site process. A lot is going on this week but when I get to Maradi, I anticipate that I will have internet access for a few days before I move out to my site.
I hope everyone is doing well and eating tons of great food! I've been dreaming about Christmas food lately and decided to make a dream wishlist of the desserts I miss the most this season:
5. Peanut brittle crunchy, full of protein, sweet deliciousness
4. Chocolate oranges. Do ya'll know what I'm talking about? Chocolate ball, you crack it and it's slices of orangechocolate goodness. Thank the Lord, on Christmas Eve I have an orangechocolate slice from a very-generous trainee who was sharing treats.
3. Poppyseed bread = my existence
2. chocolate + sprinkle-covered pretzels . We always made these growing up around Christmastime. Salty and sweet = yum
1. Cheesecake with strawberries on top. I'm hungry just thinking about it. Hello calcium deficiency!

Enjoy the video of Christmas caroling. Ignore Dan on the left who clearly doesn't love Silent Night as much as I do!

`Site Announcement

Hey ya'll! Hope everyone is doing well and on holiday break (or close to it!) Us trainees are in Niamey today for Site Announcement. It has been a very exciting day. I AM GOING TO MARADI! Ya this is where I wanted to be. I love the city of Maradi and all the volunteers there that I've met so far. I am in a town that has both a health center and a primary school; all the things I asked for. My village has approximately 5,000 people. More details to come!! For now, safe travels homeeeee for the holidays everyone! Check out this awesome blog from a fellow trainee in the meantime:
http://jacobmbarela.wordpress.com/

Language Immersion :)

10 Decembre 2010
Happy Winter everyone! I hope that ya'll are doing well and getting into the holiday spirit. Christmas is approaching so quickly ahh where did this 2010 year go? For the past two weeks, I have been outside of Maradi, staying in the bush village of Ouban Djada. Myself, five other trainees and two language teachers have been staying there for Language Immersion. The goal of immersion was to expose us to Hausa as many hours of the day as humanly possible. Every day except for Sunday consisted of the following schedule: class in the morning from 8:00-12:30 (with a 30-minute breaky break in the middle) and activities in the afternoon. We were each given a Language Immersion Booklet with specific activities that we had to do in the village. Some of these afternoon activities included: visiting the local store (shago) and finding the names of prices of 10 different goods, talking to local gardeners about what crops they are planting and how the winter (sanyi) season is going, visiting the local health center (gidan likita) and asking questions about their services provided, going to the school and asking the director about the classes and students, and the activities went on and on. The only activity we weren't able to do was visiting the market (kasuwa), because Ouban Djada is such a small village that it doesn't have a market. It gets dark around 6:30 every evening so our nightly fun after dinner consisted of reading (thankfully we were allowed to read novels in English), listening to music and going to sleep early.
The gals in the group (four of us) stayed in the magori's (town mayor) concession in a home that a past Peace Corps volunteer stayed. It is clear that no volunteers or anyone else has lived in the home since then. Lots of cockroaches in the latrine. Lots of wildlife in the house: spiders, frogs and a mouse family. The four boys stay down the street in the tailor's concession. Our group was broken up into two classes, so in the mornings, Yaa and I had class in the tailor's concession while the others were here in the magori's concession. Language has been getting better day by day, it is still difficult for me to decipher when people speak quickly to me in Hausa. But I'm working on those auditory skills.
Although class has been long and the activities at times daunting and frustrating due to the language barrier, there have been quite a few personal highlights over the past two weeks. These are:
-Morning running. The sun (rana) rises around 7:00, but I get up around 6:30 and run out of the village. There are no paved areas in this town, just sand, so I run down the sand road outside of the magori's house. Fields surround the village on all sides but the sand path continues through the fields until the next village I'm assuming. That could be miles and miles away though. It is so beautiful to run in the morning, though, especially as the sun is rising. Over Ouban Djada in the morning, the sun just looks like a large red balloon floating above the land (kasa). No one else is on the sand roadway andit is still cool at this time of day. I have found that running puts me in a great mood for the rest of the day. I hope that whatever village I go to on January first will have a nice sand path for me to run.
-Watermelon=kankana and guess what? It's watermelon season right now in Niger! I have never tasted a better fruit. We were doing an afternoon activity in the garden (garka) and one of the gardeners picked up a watermelon, split it right there, and shared it with us. I'm pretty sure that was as close to heaven as I've ever come. The taste is so sweet and so natural. I kept some of the seeds so that I can plant watermelon at my site. I bought another watermelon in the village and people have been giving them to us, so for the last few days we have had watermelon with dinner.
-Getting water from the well. Two days ago, Yaa, Alison Gr and I were walking around town and we came upon one of the two wells. There are a few "pumpo" stations where people pay to get their water, but at the well, the women haul water up from gosh-knows how many feet down. They haul the water up in what looks like a bag of rubber attached to a rope. They throw the rubber container over the side and somehow move the bag around for it to collect water. Then they haul it on up. Sooooo we're walking past the well and admiring these women (it's always women, I feel like they do all the work all the time) and how strong they are, and a guy walking by asks if we can pull water. I'm like "I can get water" in Hausa, he's like "no you can't". Welllll I showed him and I pulled water all the way up the well. It was hard but I did it :) and now when I walk down the street random people yell out to me, calling me the girl who pulled the water up from the well.
People in this village are really nice and I can see why as a volunteer I definetly want to be in a bush village. Even after two weeks, people have become familar and we know many names of people in town. The magori told us that 2,500 people live in this village. I'm not sure how accurate that number is, it's most likely a few more, but I think that this is the ideal size for my post. It's a small enough village that I could become friends with many people and feel like I'm having an impact on their lives, but not so small that an outsider (like myself) coming in would cause a change in the village dynamic.
Now, we are headed back to Hamdy hamdy for a few more weeks of culture, language and health-training lessons. We will have another language exam when we get back to see how much our language improved during immersion (I still have studying to do before then, let's hope I moved up on the scale). Next Friday we have a big day: site announcement. We will all go to Niamey and find out where our site will be for the next two years. I anticipate it will be an emotional time. I think one of our 41 volunteers is coming back to Ouban Djada :) That's all for now, love ya and leave ya, Ali

Hausa vocabulary from this blog for Berlin Elementary School kiddos:
store - shago
winter - sanyi (also means cold)
health center - gidan likita (home of the doctor)
kasuwa - market
magori - mayor
rana - sun
kasa - land
watermelon - kankana
garka - garden

kankana

sunrise in ouban djada

zara son kankana: alison loves watermelon

sand street in ouban djada

Happy Thanksgiving

26 Novembre 2010
Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope that you all had a wonderful Turkey day! I have a great one myself! It was a core day so we were at the training site all day. We had a learning session in the morning about HIV/AIDS awareness and Women's Association groups in Niger that are working to educate people about the disease. In a study done by CDA in 2002, less than 1% of people in Niger were HIV positive. The current percentage is not exactly known, but there isn't a great push to conduct another survey. I don't know if this lack of intent for another survey is due to financial constraints or that HIV/AIDS is not as big of an issue here in Niger as compared to other countries. The session was interesting and important, especially since many of us intend to educate people in our villages about HIV, how it's spread and ways to prevent it. Some project ideas that were discussed included:
-Skits in schools or youth groups
-Having a representative from the Women's Association group come to our village and lead an informational discussion
-Education with specific groups (young women, men, elders, etc.) at the health hut/health clinic in our village
Then we had a Safety and Security session. We learned about the Emergency Action Plan (EAP) for Peace Corps Volunteers in Niger. This is a protocol that we will follow if something happens when we are serving here. This could be anything from a natural disaster to political problems (in Niger or even America). Very critical info to know :)
The afternoon was a ton of fun. In light of the "Salla", holiday in Hausa, we were all given traditional outfits from our host families. We changed into our extravagant outfits and had a fashion show. It was cool to see everyone dressed up in their host mom or dad's best clothes. The fabrics used to make the clothes are all so unique and colorful. For the fashion show, everyone paired up (some men have two wives, when in Niger...) and we walked out and danced for everyone. After, we learned the names for the traditional clothing and what the different models and outfits are called. Certain people then changed into costumes from the various ethnic groups in Niger: Hausa, Zarma, Fulani, Tuareg, and others that I can't remember. Each othese ethnic groups, with exceptions of course, speaks their own language, lives in a certain region of the country and has their own set of customs. The Tuareg for instance are a nomadic group of people and are concentrated mostly in the desert in the north of the country. Tuareg men always cover their heads and carry swords (just in case they come across an animal in the desert we were told). The Tuareg people are nomads so they usually have camels or an assortment of other animals with them.
In the evening, we had a Thanksgiving feast. I was on the Thanksgiving committee and in the afternoon we helped to prepare the food. I didn't do very much, the kitchen staff here is amazing, but it was nice to help with the vegetables for awhile. We had chicken (I don't think there are turkeys in Niger), stuffing, pesto green beans, mixed vegetables, mashed potatoes, and cornbread-style cake. We all ate outside under the stars and it was wonderful to all be together. Our stage has become a family since coming here and I was very grateful to be with them for the holiday. I was thinking about all of you at home, though, and hoping that you were all having a happy Thanksgiving. There is so much to be thankful for: family, friends, laughter. A few other things I am especially thankful for on this Thanksgiving in Niger:
-malaria prophylaxis (even though the Mefloquine gives me crazy dreams)
-my host family (especially petite Razaac with is always chewing on something, be it a dirty flipflop or aluminum sardine can)
-Fullbar (a candy bar that is sold at one of the local Hamdallye stores. I get instant euphoria when I eat it. It costs 50 CFA, the equivalent of a dime).
-The stars. It is calming at night to simply look up at the stars that extent from horizon to horizon. They are a great reminder of why I am here. The full moon recently is beautiful as well.
After we were stuffed with so much food, we had a little dance party and games. The dance party was fun, I am thankful for Lady Gaga :). Currently, we have a new exercise underway called Language Immersion. This is two full weeks of ONLY HAUSA in a village. We are leaving Hamdallye tomorrow and will take a 10/12 hour bus ride to Maradi, and then a bush taxi from there to our village. We are in smaller groups with a teacher. We will have a few hours of class each day, but will be expected to only speak in Hausa for the entire time. We will talk with people in the village, learn about their daily activities and lives, and lead small sessions on hand-washing and rehydration solutions. The immersion is essential because it gives us an idea of what village may be like and how much language we have to gain in order to be able to communicate. I am excited to overload on Hausa. There is going to be a lot of new verbs, vocab and grammar to learn, but, because I'm a complete dork, I can't wait to get started!!

Tabaski

20 Novembre 2010
Hello people!! I hope that everyone is well and that you're all getting excited for Thanksgiving that is just around the corner! Life has been good since my last post. We came back from demystification in Maradi and have been in Hamdallye in classes. Hausa language learning is going well. Recently, we have learned the vocabulary for money and how to bargain at the market, or kasuwa in Hausa. This past Wednesday the 17th was the Muslim holiday of Tabaski. It was exciting to be in Hamdallye for it. Here is a bit of history about the Tabaski holiday:
According to the Muslim story, Abraham was told by Allah to slaughter his son. Abraham had a strong faith, so he brought his oldest son, Ishmael, as a sacrifice to Allah. The angel, Gabriel, saw that Abraham was going to sacrifice his son, and so he exchanged Ishmael for a sheep. Abraham sacrificed a sheep and his son was saved. The holiday is a reminder of Abraham's faith to Allah.
In Hamdallye, our Wednesday morning began at nine o'clock. At this time, there is a whole-village prayer. We got dressed up and walked to the mosque, which is a large speaker outside on a hill. At the mosque, the Chief of Hamdallye led the prayer and everyone prayed together. I have never seen so many people pray at the same time. After that, everyone walks back to their home to slaughter a sheep. In our home, our host dad Loyola and the eldest son, Abdu, slaughtered the sheep. All parts of the sheep are utilized or eaten in some way. The insides are cooked and eaten first. We had those for lunch with rice and meat sauce :). Yum! The rest of the sheep is slowly cooked, or smoked, over a fire for the rest of the afternoon. The meat is cooked all the way through and will last the whole family for the next week or so. It was interesting to walk around the village and see all the sheep being cooked outside. Ellie and I walked around and visited other trainees during the afternoon. We said "Barka da Salla" to everyone we say which means "Greeting on the holiday!" The response is "Barka kaddai" or "Greetings to all!"
On Thursday morning, the children of each household take meat and bring it to friends, family and poor people in the village. The holiday is not only about slaughtering a sheep and remembering the story of Abraham, but it is a reminder to give to the poor and be thankful for what you have. In a way, the holiday reminded me of Thanksgiving, except the turkey is replaced with a sheep or two. Also, when children in the village say "Barka da Salla", we gave them candy. Similar to Halloween and trick-or-treating in that sense. The kids had the whole week off of school and spend time in the home with their families.
...For health training this week, we learned about health providers and moringa. Health providers in this country are very different from the US. Because it is rare for people to go to college and earn degrees in healthcare, the majority of training is taught to providers in the clinic or health hut. The training is informal. They are taught how to consult with pregnant women, teach about nutrition, etc. We have visited two local health clinics, one in Hamdallye, one in the neighboring village of Barchewal. The clinic in Barchewal was staffed by one woman who provides all the consults, medicines and education for people who come by. The Hamdallye clinic is staffed by several women. She said that their busiest time of year is during the rainy season, when a large number of people get malaria. During that busy time, they average 200 consults a day. During the slowest time of year, now, they average 20 consults a day; the majority of consultations with pregnant women to give them iron and vitamins. In our villages, we will most likely have a health hut and not a clinic, but it was still important to see how the clinics run. We also learned about Moringa. It is known as "the miracle tree" because it is a quickly-growing tree that doesn't need a lot of water or fertile soil to flourish. The leaves of the moringa tree have, gram for gram, more potassium than bananas, more iron than spinach, more calcium than milk, and more Vitamin A than carrots. In Niger, the most common method of eating moringa leaves is to boil them for an hour and add them to couscous. Unfortunately, they lose the majority of their nutritional value when boiled. So, when we go to our villages, one of our projects is going to be education about how to harvest and prepare moringa in order to achieve the greatest nutrition from the leaves.
...Our host fam is doing well. They were all happy to have this whole week off from school and to spend time playing and working around the house. For Tabaski, our host dad constructed "walls" in the compound. The material was something similar to bamboo, but he roped them together and made walls around the house. It's difficult to explain, but it looks really cool. For Tabaski, Ellie and I gave our fam dates that we bought at the market. And we gave the kiddos candies when they said "Barka da Salla!"

First post in Niger :)

5 November 2010
Hello everyoneeeee! Sannu! Ina kwana? That means "Hello, how are you?" in Hausa. I am currently at the Peace Corps training site in Hamdallye. Our group of 43 flew into Niamey, Niger on Friday, October 22nd. Here is a recap of the training and experiences since then:

Saturday: Orientation about the training site and welcome from the Peace Corps Country Director, Valerie. Introduction to medical by the Peace Corps Medical Officer, Walter. We adore Walter, even though he gives us lots of shots :) (I've had five thus far since arriving). The afternoon on the first day was very busy. We had medical interviews to talk about what antimalarial medicine we will be on and ways to keep us healthy with the change in diet and environment. Then we had interviews with the person in charge of our sector. Our "stage" of 43 people has two sectors: CHA and FARM. CHA stands for Community Health Agent (that's me) and FARM represents Forest Agriculture Resource Management. Also, during that afternoon, we had a cultural fair which featured many local people to show us different traditions and customs we will be exposed to in Hamdallye and our sites. The fair included various types of food that we will recognize as well as singing and dancing and how to pound millet. The last event of the afternoon was a language interview. I interviewed to test my French-speaking skills. I passed :) which means I've retained French from high school. In the evening we had din and a free night for sleep catch-up and journal writing/playing cards.

Sunday: The morning began with a pre-service training overview so that we all could get a grasp of what was going to happen over the next 70-or-so days until swear-in as a volunteer. We then drove into Hamdallye to meet with the Chief de Canton, or the city king. He is the primary social figure and acts as the correspondent between the Nigerien government and the people of Hamdallye. He also acts as a lawyer figure. If two people are fighting about land or livestock or business matters in the village, they both approach him and settles their arguement by listening to both sides of the issue and determining what happened. Also, if people want to get divorced, he assists them to make that motion happen. It is a grand honor to meet with him and we all introduced ourselves to him and shook his hands. In the morning, we also learned what language we would be studying based on the previous day's interviews. Our group is factioned into Hausa and Zarma. It is estimated that 85% of Nigeriens speak Hausa, so the majority of us will be learning that language (myself included woot woot). But there are some villages that we will be volunteering where the people primarily speak Zarma, thus some in the group is learning that language. Our first class was good and gave us a chance to learn basic greetings before meeting our host family's in the afternoon. We had a host family debriefing following language class, and then got picked up by a host parent. We are staying alone or with a roommate in one of four village surrounding the training site: Hamdallye, Fandoga, Barchewal or Abaka. Tghe majority of us are staying in Hamdallye because that's where the most Hausa families are :). My roomie is a gal named Ellie from the Boston area. At first, I kinda wanted to be alone with my fam to better learn the language and have my personal space. Since living together, though, we have been so grateful to have each other for support, understanding what our fam is saying to us, and for borrowing each other's things. Our host mom, Hinda, picked us up at the training site and brought us back home for the evening.

Monday: CORE day, which means we were at the training site again for the whole day. In the morning we had a debriefing about our first night with host families. We then had an extensive medical session about getting sick, food hygiene and water filtration. We covered a lot of necessary information and learned how to filter our own water and what food to eat to maximize our vitamin intake. And what foods to stay away from (unwashed vegetables, "street food", unpasteurized milk). In the afternoon, we talked about learning objectives and what we will learn through sessions in the upcoming weeks that will prepare us culturally for living in Niger.

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday: non-CORE days, which means that we stay in Hamdallye for classes. For language classes, we are split into groups of either two or three people and are taught Hausa/Zarma by a native speaker. In class with me are Jacob and Yaa. We have class at Yaa's house. This first week our teacher is Mai-Moussa. Each week the teachers will rotate. We learn a lot but we have some fun, too. Yaa and Jacob are always making fun of me because they say I'm too serious about the language work. What's new, right? We learned greetings, basic vocab, forming questions and more recently, wants and needs. Hausa is fascinating to learn. For years and years, the language was never recorded until it became a French colony. So many of the sounds in the words have no Roman alphebatical equivalent, which makes for interesting lessons. And some words, although to us appear to sound the same, mean entirely different things. It is vital for us to learn the language in these weeks at training. The most important part of our volunteer service is begin accepted into our community. Or "integrating". If I had a dime, or 10 CFA if you will, for every time I heard "you need to INTEGRATE", I would be a millionaire. That is where the language becomes so important. When I move to my volunteer site on January 1st, I must be able to speak at an intermediate-medium Hausa level in Peace Corps terms. Personally though, I want to be better than that. To communicate with the people in my village and earn a mutual respect, I need to be able to converse with people on a level higher than simple greetings and questions. On each of these three days, we had language for 6 hours total. In the evenings, we went home to our host families and talked with them and ate food. Food in host homes usually consists of a grain (rice, sourgum not sure about the spelling on that, maize or millet) with a sauce (tomato, meat or ochre based). Our host father, Loyola, makes tea for us almost every night. It is very sweet and strong :), so Ellie and I have to be careful about drinking it too late because we don't want to stay up all night. We are fortunate that Loyola is a "Francais formateur" so he is fluent in French. We have been trying to talk to our host mom Hinda in Hausa mostly but when we need something we ask Loyola in French. The French has definetly been coming in handy. it shocked me how quick it has come back considering I haven't learned any new material since high school (Thanks U-32!!). Loyola has two wives, Hinda and Zanabu. They are both very nice. Zanabu speaks Zarma so it is more difficult to communicate with her. It is very common for men to have multiple wives in this Muslin culture. The more wives a man has is viewed as a positive thing and proves that he has a good job and can support his wives and children. Zanabu has one child, Lamine. Hinda has five children: Abdu, Aisha, Abdu Raham, Saminou and Razaac (from oldest to youngest). Razaac is Ellie's favorite kid and my fave is Saminou. They are so cute and lovable. It is nice to come home after a day of language lessons and destress by playing with the kids. All of the kids, minus the youngest (Razaac and Lamine) attend school. It is a nightly ritual after din to study. The kids all get out their school notebooks and practice by flashlight/one overhead light. Loyola assists with the French. Ellie and I assist with...guess...English. They assist us with Hausa :). It is nice to practice languages together. Loyola told Ellie and I that if we have a free weekday, he will take us to school with him. That would be great to see what his classroom is like and how the lessons are similar/different from those in the USA (especially Berlin Elem)!

Friday: CORE day. Safety and Security discussion in the morning followed by malaria medical session. The S&S discussion was great and taught us tools on how to minimize risks and keep ourselves safe. For the most part, these tools are common sense: use the buddy system, don't stay out late at night, know your surroundings. These lessons are useful anywhere. The biggest thing that was stressed was, once again, INTEGRATE! If we integrate and have a strong presence in our volunteer village, then everyone will watch out for us. In the afternoon, we had two hours of language followed by sector meetings. In our CHA sector meeting, we designed plans for what we need to learn in order to follow the Ministry of Health's goals for health development in Niger. These goals are: 1. Maternal Nutrition, 2. Child Nutrition, 3. Disease Prevention and Treatment.

Saturday: Language for four hours in the morning, followed by a free afternoon. For the free afternoon, Ellie and I spent time with our host family as well as relaxed and read.

Sunday: FREE DAY! Happy Halloween :) Ellie and I spent a lot of time cleaning our gida (thatch roof home that we keep all our belongings in). We didn't have a chance to thoroughly clean and organize our belongings until this time. It felt nice to clean and prioritize what we need in the upcoming weeks and what can remain in the suitcase until a later time. For the rest of the day, we took some walks around Hamdallye to visit friends and spent time with our host family playing games and reading.
Looking ahead in our schedule, most weekdays for the rest of training will be similar to those described in my first week. Here and there variations will occur I'll talk about those individually.

Monday 1 Novembre: Language day as well as start our own gardening plots. Even though the majority of us are health volunteers, we each are given a gardening plot to use for the duration of pre-service training. All the health and FARM volunteers worked together to prepare the soil for plantation. Ellie and I have plots next to each other, plus a third for our family so we can all plant things together. It felt really good to do some manual labor and get our hands dirty, literally, in manure to mix with our sandy soil. The smell reminded me of Vermont a lil bit. One of the language teachers, Ila, helped Ellie and I with our plots. Maybe we looked helpless :) and like we couldn't tow the soil on our own. We've been good about watering our soil, and are looking forward to planting next week.

Wednesday 3 Novembre et Thursday 4 Novembre focused on PACA, which stands for Participatory Analytical Community Action, or in other words, How to Develop Projects in Your Village. We learned how to conduct a meeting in our village in order to assess what the villages need the most and thus can conduct projects that will yield the greatest benefit. It was extensive training and important to learn about.

Friday 5 Novembre: The day was very exciting because the new Ambassador to Niger from the United States came to visit. Her name is Lisa Williams. It was great to hear about her career in the foreign service. She has been to so many different countries representing the United States. She will be at the US Embassy for the next two years that we are here and she welcomed us to the embassy whenever we would like. She said she's very thankful for what we're going for Niger and for the continued service that Peace Corps does in this country.

Saturday November 6 through Wednesday November 10: Demystification. Demyst is an opportunity for trainees to stay at current volunteer's homes to see what life as a volunteer is like. Myself and four other people traveled 11 hours by bus to the eastern city of Maradi. We are visiting a married couple named Alice and Jesse. Their home is so nice; they have electricity and running water. Most likely, none of us will have this at our villages, but we have been making American food like mac and cheese and fajitas. Ha fajitas aren't really American! Oh well! But yes it has been a nice change of pace and shows what life will be like when we are at our villages :)

As a general note, I am still very excited to be here. I feel like I've been talking a lot about what I've been DOING, which has been amazing, but not what I've been FEELING. It is really great to be here and spent time with our host family to get a feel for a typical Nigerien family. It has been hot. I have a thermometer on my clock, and one day this week, the low temperature was 72 and the high was 121. The night time cool of 72 feels very cold and I am fortunate that I brought a nice sleeping bag. One of the days, the thermometer just read H for high because the temperature was above like 130 and wouldn't read it anymore. That's all for now! I miss you all! Talk to ya soon!

Philadelphia Pre-Service Training

Hope everyone is doing well on this lovely Thursday! I arrived in Philadelphia yesterday from Burlington and began Pre-Service Training, better known as PST. PST is the first time all of the volunteers meet each other. My class includes 43 total persons who will be volunteering in either the health or agriculture sectors. Everyone seems very nice. Not other Vermonters :( but that's alright. Many of the states are represented, including many states out west (California, Oregon, etc.). I am excited to get to know the other volunteers further and work together to learn the languages and culture when in Niger.
During PST yesterday, there were a lot of discussion about our expectations for the Peace Corps service as well as what we can expect from Peace Corps. We also discussed anxieties and aspirations for Niger. It was beneficial to know that many of us are on the same page and share similar hopes and fears. We then talked about logistics of the trip and how the next few days are going to pan out.
This morning we went to the Occupational Health clinic to receive Yellow Fever vaccinations. This is the only vaccination we will receive until we get in country. In country, we will also begin malaria prophylaxis medicine.
 We are soon taking a bus from Philadelphia to JFK where we will leave this evening. Our first flight will bring us to Paris, and, after that, Niamey, Niger. I cannot guarantee Internet connection for the next three months of training. I know that we will all be studying language and culture during the day, and then staying with a host family in the evenings and during the weekends. My hope is to write journal entries on my computer in the evenings and then post a big blog when I am able to reach an Internet source. Until then, best of luck and happiness to everyone. Keep in touch please! I will update you about my journey through Niger when possible :)

Sister reunion in Vermont before departure: Sarah and me

Getting Packed for the Journey

Oct. 16, 2010
Hope everyone is doing well. This is my first post on my Peace Corps blog. The anticipation is building as the big day approaches when I will be leaving for Niger. On October 20th, I will be flying from the Burlington Airport in good ol' VT to Philadelphia, PA. I will be in Philly for two days for Staging which consists of an introduction, paperwork and immunizations, among other matters. On October 22nd, I will be flying out of JFK for Niamey, Niger. I am excited to meet the other volunteers that I will get to know for the next two years and to begin Pre-Service Training in Niger. I have started to pack for the 27-month journey. The weight limit on my baggage is 80 pounds for the checked luggage and 40 pounds, I believe, for the carry-on luggage. Items I have bought to complete my packing list have included: solar-powered battery charger, ipod, waterproof windproof raincoat, sleeping bag, Birkenstocks, head lamp, etc. I have so far fulfilled the 80-pound limit with two large suitcases. I may need to rearrange some items before leaving this Wednesday. I will post once more before I leave. I hope to attach a photo every time I post so people can actually SEE what I'm up to, as well as useful links so that those reading may learn alongside me as I go off into my service.

Here is the first:

Me in Australia this past Spring 2010.

Links for followers:

Peace Corps Information peacecorps.gov

Niger Information CIA Niger