04 janvier (night)

Have you read "Oh, The Places You'll Go"? Do you remember "the waiting place"? This is where I spent most of the day.

Waiting for car to come back. Pretty ready. Haircut. Did some snips myself. Calling it done. Should I get the motorcycle helmet. Probs, but didn't want to deal with it. Notes to stage? Can't focus on it. Study Zarma intro stuff? Got some here and there, but always interruppted. Nervous about moving in, making first impression. Apprehensive about all the work laid out before me (e.g. learning Zarma now without a teacher, in a TOTAL immersion setting, or not having a sched and needing to totally define what I will be doing).

Found out the US is now accepting NO mail, including letters, from Niger. They stopped accepting packages a few weeks ago. Something to do with Al Quida. Hambaga (maybe) my letter to Bella's class held up. Friend noted the soldiers we see on the side of the road by the bureau may be the highest level people. They are color coded by berets. I forget who is who. The guards outside the hostel are armed, and someone said they patrol INSIDE the hostel compound during the night. Reminders we're not in the safest place in the world, though in ville we could probs never know about any unrest in the city.

Waiting. Ready?! Dressed. Looked in mirror. You're a PCV?! Big moments here. Want to do it right. Though of the quote grandma emailed me. What a big moment these will be. Nervous to do it right.

Found out we will do only the introductions to some important people, maybe drop off my friend if time. The morning drop off took too long. One of those things that you waver on (do I want to go today or tomorrow) and then when it's decided for you, the choice becomes clear (I want to go today!). Don't want to be left behind. Don't want to be on back end of drop offs (which I'm not really. More like middle of our stage on the whole, although friend and I will be the last two in our region). Don't want to have to unpack for tonight. Don't want to have to wear my fancy clothes twice. Fuck.

Noted attitude...don't want to habituate to thing, like for example, things never happening on time. Should we worry about calling my ville to tell them I won't be there today. Maybe not, since people rarely show up when they're supposed to. Well, why not do it right, right? Want to stay sharp, energized for the WHOLE two years. I don't clarity of vision and energy are ALWAYS for the naive. Jadedness and sloth are overrated.

Dropped off my friend at his village. It felt a classic "Africa" scene. People waiting for us. They sat and stood around us. The PC woman did a long introduction about all sorts of stuff. The sun was going down. We walked over to his hut. They moved stuff in. We pulled away, and he stood there, in his mini concession, behind dozens of Nigerien faces. The women were in elaborate attire, with their hair sometimes elaborately braided in a Star Wars-esque style. Some people looked intimidating. Others looked friendly. I wished I could read them. want to be able to read people...in Zarma. Sometimes thought, wow, here we are being dropped off in the middle of Africa. Or, this is classic National Geographic. But then...I thought, wait, we're not just being dropped off. I can speak ok. Actually NOT like the first night with out host families when, FR aside, the culture and native language were completely foreign. We have been prepared.

On way back, cell phone distracted me from driving through the Nigerien dusk. A big reason to put it away as much as possible at ville. Mixed blessing the phones for sure.

Scripted some comments to make to my village in Zarma in my head in the car ride back. If I can hit this as scripted, I will rock it.

Around 2000, we stopped so the driver could pray at a few hutts by the side of the road. Kinda a wha? moment, but thought about squeezing in runs and cals here and there, for example during a road trip, and just thought it was interesting. Neat that they can just pull over at some random place and hop in on the prayer.

Crossing the Niger River in Niamey on the ONLY bridge in the entire country, we hit lots of traffic. An old feeling...frustrated with traffic. NYC? GW Bridge wha?

Was dragging today meeting the important people. Want to sleep mad much and be sharp for MY introduction tomorrow. REALLY...this should be it this time.