Tales of the Alhambra, Madrid and Skipped Flights

Leaving on this trip, I went through the effort to find a tent in Niger, not an easy thing to find. Thanks to my PCV neighbor, Meagan, I was able to get a 'BugHut,' which is basically a mosquito net with a door held up with poles. It's great for Africa, light and easy to pack around. We used it a bit in Tunisia, the only problem was when it started to rain; no rain-fly so I had to hustle all my stuff under cover... at least the BugHut dries out quickly in the sun.

So coming into Granada, when will and I learned that there was absolutely NO available hostals in town, we thought 'oh, hey, we can camp.' Then we checked the weather. And we were assured by weatherunderground.com that no rain was coming. So we went for the camping option.

Unfortunately Granada is a bit colder than both Niger and Tunisia... go figure. It was just cold at night really, being in the mountains. Our first night I was FREEZING, even all bundled up in a sweatshirt and long pants, a stocking hat and SOCKS!

We ended up staying in Granada for four or five days.

Granada -

Granada is a nice place. I think it might be the capital of the bohemian world. You can see many, many... well, what Americans might call 'hippies,' but not quite the same thing. Our buddy, David from Poland, put it a good way when he asked, 'What do you call them... natural? This is the best place in Europe to live homeless, since it's warm and the people are nice.' And that about sums it up. Natural and living off the kindness of others. But man, do they have awesome dogs. So well trained. I even saw a dog helping itself to water from a water fountain, up on it's hind legs lapping at the stream of water spurting up. Quite cool. Good dog.


The big highlight of Granada is the Alhambra (which in arabic means, The Red One, so really, people keep calling it, The TheRedOne). Up on a hill overlooking town, it is quite a sight. We were shown a great vantage point by David a couple nights before we were to visit the actual Alhambra.

The Alhamba is famous mostly thanks to Washington Irving, who wrote the book 'Tales of the Alhambra,' saving it from being lost to time and forgotten. What a life that guy had. Traveling around Europe learning the language and culture for years. Became an ambassador for the states to Spain. Just writing and traveling. Wouldn't that be a great way to live? Ah... the aristocracy.

It actually requires buying tickets in advance to get into the highlight areas of the Alhambra, even with a specific entry time on the ticket. It is never fun to feel like you have a time-limit to see a place, especially when paying 13 euros. So maybe that has something to do with my opinion of the place, but I found worth the visit, but no more impressive than the alcazars we had already seen in Sevilla and Cordoba. Inn really it is more impressive, but it's due to the setting and not the architecture really. Set up on the hill, overlooking the city, a little hut would still be an attractive place to visit.


It really was a great place to visit, especially the Generalife, which, though it appears to refer to the insurance company, actually means 'Architect's Garden' in Arabic.

Will and I had a great time just sitting on the main path in the Generalife people watching, he sketched the scenery and I just happily wrote away and wandered off to take photos every once and a while. Good afternoon.

It was a nice time in Granada, aside from the cold nights. We boarded an overnight bus for Madrid a couple hours after seeing the Alhambra and woke up at the southern bus station for the capital.

I think many of my best pictures on this trip so far were taken here, so check out the picasa album.


Madrid -

First off, arriving at 630 in the morning, we had a couple hours to kill before we could check into our hostel... So we sat in a park near the place for two hours. It was so cold, I did something I hadn't done since I visited Paris last December: I put on shoes and socks. Shocking, I know.

Our first day in Madrid was full of museums. We saw the navel museum, which, if you're into models and swords and stuff, is a cool place. And of course, we were, so it was a full two hour visit. Plus it's FREE.

Then, that evening we were able to visit the Prado museum, again, for FREE. Everyday, from 6-8 the museum is absolutely free. What a great way to give people access to the arts. Two hours is NOT enough to really appreciate the museum, so most people visiting the city for just a couple days would probably still pay for entrance. But if you lived in the city or were visiting for a couple days, what a great way to see the art inside without breaking the bank. Two hours here and there, taking your time to see smaller sections... very nice.

Some of my favorites from the Prado were Goya and Velazquez. Especially the Goya pintars negra, his black paintings. So different from his portraits, dark, indistinct faces, but still full of emotion. Many twisted and... yeah, good stuff. Dark, but good, especially considering that this was all in the age of doing light portraits and landscapes. I always find those transitions between types/eras of art very fascinating.

The next day we were able to get into the Reina Sofia for free also. The same idea as the Prado. Brilliant! We also played frisbee in the park with a couple of dancers, Sarah and Maryann, from New York and Marco, another of the Italian guys we've met. Sarah and Maryann were Americans, but unlike almost every other Americans we met, they didn't make us cringe and speak in Haussa or Zarma so they wouldn't know we're Americans also. They spoke Italian and Spanish, were traveling right, in our opinion. Were laid back and into seeing a place for real. In other words, good companions for me and will for a couple days in Madrid.

Why are so many Americans abroad loud, annoying, and totally clueless? They also don't even try to speak foreign languages for the most part, or if they do try to speak, it's all American English-ized. Of course, we should probably distinguish between backpackers and what we've been calling 'tourists,' the people who have a tight schedule to keep, secluded hotels to stay in, and no interaction with the locals, other than in souvenir shops. But enough of that... onto the Reina.


The Reina is more focused on modern art, featuring a large collection of Picasso. It houses his masterpiece, Guernica. What is especially impressive about the exhibit is that in the adjacent rooms to the painting, the museum displays a series of studies Picasso made for the piece and a series of photos for the work in progress (including changes Picasso made part-way through). A cool look into the way such a piece comes together.

The Reina also has Miro and some famous pieces from Dali, like The Great Masturbater. It's a very living museum and the exhibits seem to change all the time. Also, it's great at incorporating a variety of art, not just painting and sculpture, but sounds, video, even dance art (no caged dancers, but the costumes and videos of performances).

Madrid definitely has it going in terms of art museums.

After two days staying in a hostel, we met up with Will's friend, Carrie, and stayed with her and her fiance for a night. They gave us a GREAT walking tour of Madrid. We saw the big park (I forget it's name), and quite a few different neighborhoods. We went for tapas and tea and hookah, and more tapas, and then a birthday party. Great great time and why you should make friends with people in places around the world so you can see the real life of a place.

Thanks to Carrie and Alberto!!!


So unfortunately (well, actually turns out it could be fortunate), my plans in the UK fell through. Josh's buddies had second thoughts about having us come to stay and join them on their trip (word must have reached them in advanced about who was actually coming) [too many parentheses?].

So, showing up to the airport a couple, four, hours before our flight to London, will and I decided we didn't want to go to the UK if we were to just continue getting hostels and seeing sights. Let's face it, the UK just isn't that exciting and it's EXPENSIVE. I've been there before. I would like to hit Scotland or Ireland again, but not now. So before our flight took of, I had decided to skip it, bought a ticket from Madrid to Brussels in two weeks time and decided to just jump back onto my original plans there, cutting out the middle.

So now I'm here in Benavente, staying with my Peace Corps neighbor, Meagan, the very same Meagan who gave me the BugHut. So not only did the BugHut return home, but I have a place to stay, free of charge for two weeks. Working on my Spanish and cooking real food in a real kitchen. Plus I'm going to take a bath tonight. A good break from the constant movement of being on the road, recharge for the last leg. Plus, it's a good start to the adjustment to a new, colder, climate.

More on the town and our visit to Salamanca later.

New Picasa albums for Granada and Madrid.

¡Hola!

Wrote this post about a week ago now, but have been waiting to get some pictures uploaded before I posted it. So, a week later, here's my post about Barcelona, Sevilla, and Cordoba. I'll get one about Granada and Madrid up later this week.

[Just a quick update on what I'm up to now: My buddy's friends in England sort of un-invited us to their house and their trip to the lake district in the North, so my and Will decided to stay in Spain. I've moved in for two weeks with Meagan, former neighbor across the river from me in Niger and now English teacher in Benavente, Spain. More on all that in a later post]

-10/10/09-

So it´s been a good long while since me last update; why break from established proceedures and write frequently just because I´ve left Africa?

We´re in Granada, Spain at the moment, and what has encouraged me to get back into this blog a bit is that we´ve found a cyber cafe that will let us upload pictures to picasa! So I´ve been catching up on uploading photos from Tunisia (and a second album of new Tunis pictures), which are a good three weeks old now, and will be working on the Spain ones soon as well. Incha Allah.

After spending a couple days in Tunis, seeing the Bardo museum and inhaling as many cwarmas as we could, we spent a long night in the Tunis airport waiting for our flight to Barcelona. So, the buses and trains to the airport stop running at eight PM or so and don´t start running again until around seven the next morning, meaning that to catch our 7AM flight, we would either have to catch a Taxi or spend the night there. Seeing as the taxi costs money and sleeping on the floor at the airport is free.... well, being ex-Peace Corps volunteers traveling on a small budget, that was an easy choice. I bet it made for quite the sight to see us three set up in a corner of the sidewalk just outside the airport entrance cooking pasta on a camp stove. Not sure we could have gotten away with that in Europe.

At the airport in Tunis, the third musketeer, Josh, decided to split ways with us in Spain. He´s currently walking the Camino de Santiago, and if all goes well, we´ll be seeing him again in Madrid.

So, arriving in Barcelona, our trio became a two-some of Will and myself.



Barcelona -

What a great city to visit. And I imagine a pretty good place to live as well if you can get just out of the most touristy areas. The parks, oh the parks! I think we spent every day in Barcelona seeing a new park. And we could easily spend the entire day in just one. Park Guell, the landscaped area just north of town, designed by Gaudi was very impressive. The park at Montjuïc was massive and includes the Olympic facilities from the 1992 games. It would be great to live in a city with so many fine sports grounds.


The arcitecture on many buildings is amazing. Again, Gaudi can be thanked for much of the most impressive areas, but other Modernist arcitects also contributed. That, combined with the gothic and enlightment era buildings creates something akin to Paris with medival village, with something almost futuristic.

We didn´t actually go in the Sagrada Familia, but it was impressive from the outside and we spent at least an hour sitting on the sidewalk enjoying it.... and another hour in a small park across the street which also has a nice view of it over a pond.


We, almost literally, ran into our Niger PCV friend Vicky and her sister on the street one day. Small world! So they joined us for something of a high-lite day of park viewing. They´re traveling kind of the same course I am from here, but hitting everything first and in a shorter time frame.


So after a good five days enjoying Barcelona, meeting some great people, and sitting in the sunshine in the parks we decided we should really see more of Spain since we´re here, so we boarded a train heading south to Seville.

Seville/Sevilla -

The train ride was long. The night BEFORE the train ride was a long one too, so I think we spent most of the first five hours sleeping. I was awake for the first hour or so, and watched a truly impressive sunrise over the city. With the train sliding along, the sun would appear and disappear between the buildings and over the water. Was a great sight.

In fact there were quite a few sights to see outside the windows. Spain is a very pretty country. I would love to spend some more time here sometime. Maybe bike across it. The plannning begins....

We pulled into Sevilla about 7, something around twelve hours on the train.

Central Sevilla is a maze of twisting streets, as it has been since medieval times. We found the hostel alright, but got lost that night walking around (without a map) and learned to never leave the house without one; a rule that was broken at least once and resulted in half an hour of wandering back from a bar. But, really, it wasn´t that long till we got a hold of the city.

Sevilla made a great first impression on a friday night. It has a laid back atmosphere, but people, as with everywhere in Spain, came out about midnight to enjoy life. We wandered along the river and then through town and in every square there were groups of people sitting around socializing and drinking. The bars were going till late, and not just with young kids, it´s a common thing for older generations to stay out late as well. It´s a wonder anyone can get up in the morning at all, but about 9AM the city comes back to life.

We stayed in two different hostels in Sevilla and met quite a few fellow travelers, as you tend to. That´s the great thing about hostels, the common living space lubricates the social contacts you make and, then again, so does a shared bottle of wine.

We saw the sights of the old part of town. We actually paid (!!) to go into the Alcazar, which is a centuries old conglomeration of moorish and christian palaces and royal accomidations. It started out originaly as a muslim fort, and then the Almohades built the first palace on the spot, which was constantly updated by subsequent rulers (muslim and catholic alike) until the 16th century. The parks here were great, and as we´ve become park experts, you can trust me on that. Lots of water integrated into the landscape and flowers. Ended up taking a nap in a little corner of the place, only to wake up to a giant peacock wandering on by. Good way to awaken.

We also tried to get into the Cathedral, which we heard was free on Sunday afternoons, but after standing in line for 20 minutes, we found out it really does cost 8 Euros to get in, and so we about-faced, and went back out, browsing the souvenir store on the way. Fun fact about the cathedral: during the 16th and 17th centuries Sevilla was THE place to be in Europe, rich and far reaching power as the gate way to the Americas. With the influx of money, the catholic leadership decided that they needed a cathedral to show off the importance of the city. So they wanted to, quote, "Let it be a church so beautiful and so great that those who see it built will think we were mad.¨It´s big alright. And Christopher Columbus is probably buried inside (though there´s a chance, the remains are not really his, having been moved from the original grave in the New World).

One cool thing we saw, FOR FREE, was the Archivos General de Indias, housing a huge collection of documents from the Spanish explorers plodding their way across the new continent. It was interesting to see many of the maps and letters they have on display in the small museum attached to the archives, but mind-boggling to think of all the thousands and thousands of pages stored away in the floor to ceiling shelves on two floors of this big building.

Last thing I´ll ramble on about in Seville was the amazing graffiti they have down by the water. In a rather drab park along the water there are tons of different pieces done by a variety of graffiti artists. Some are really good. Most are pretty decent. It´s too bad that 1) graffiti gets such a bad rap and 2) that taggers will tag in places they shouldn´t, for instance, the Plaza de España, which is also in Seville and a very beautiful building, but has been tagged in the upper balconies by a plethora of people, sad really. I guess 2 causes 1 really. Fortunately, for the most part Sevilla keeps its graffiti in the right places and it´s very enjoyable, good quality art. Check out my picasa album here for some shots. And I just found this blog on graffiti, originally (2007) in Seville and now about graffiti in general. Check it out if you´re into that.

Cordoba-

So after five days or so in Sevilla, we decided to push on and ended up heading out to Cordoba. We had heard some good things and bad things about Cordoba. First impressions were not so favorable, it seemed to be a more modern city and not something to write home about, but that was really just around the bus station. As we moved into the center of town and found our hostel we warmed a little more to the place.

Unfortunately we then went for a walk through the old, touristy part of town and ended up crossing the restored roman bridge to walk the other side of the river and found a..... well, either a very poorly done park, or one in the process of being completed, but it was not so nice. Day one impression up till dinner was only so-so.

But we made ourselves tuna sandwichs for dinner (with tuna we found in the previous hostel... thanks Wendy?) and went up to the terresse on the roof to eat them. Turns out that night was a free tapas night at the hostel bar and before we knew it was packed with people. Met a bunch of great spaniards and foreigners that night. In fact, one British cat, Liam, invited us to out the next night. He took us for tapas and beers and then back to his place where he made us a great spread of tortillas and tapas again. We shared wine with him and his house mates and then went on to hit a club with them as well. It´s so great to meet great people like that in the world, especially while traveling in a new place.

Other than some good people, we were lucky to run across a free entrance into the Alcazar in Cordoba. Not quite as impressive as the one in Sevilla, it was non-the-less a great place to see arcitecture and some wonderful gardens.

Having seen all that, we left for Granada, where we´re currently encamped, and I mean that quite literally. All the hostels were booked up, so we ended up on the outskirts of town in a campground. It´s not bad at all, but for the fact that my sleeping bag, even with an extra liner isn´t the best at keeping me warm, so it´s bundle up with extra layers and a hat. Still, brrrrr....

---Back to the present---

Check out the new picasa albums for Tunis Round 2, Barcelona, Sevilla, Sevilla Graffiti, and Cordoba. I know that's a lot of photos at once, I had to edit them down from many, many more after all. In fact I'm still trying to motivate myself to give them all captions! Also, as I'm still trying to grow as a photographer, any thoughts and criticism is warmly welcomed.

I will try to get a post and pictures up for Granada and Madrid later this week, but I'll give both you and myself a while to get over this glut of images and info. Until then, adios.

Tunisia almost at an end

When we last saw our intrepid trio of tenacious travelers, they were heading south into the hills and valleys of the Tunisian mountains after a week of lounging on the beaches along the Northern coast.

Let's check back in with them.

Since the last post they've made a loop of the Tunisian interior.

First was a southern leg from Tabarka to Le Kef, via the ancient Roman town of Bulla Regia. This was one long day of travel, but well worth it, both in the scenery of the ride, and the site of Bulla Regia. Heading south out of Tabarka, the road gradually rises from the seaside to some impressive hills and mountains. There were moments along the twisting and turning two lane road that it seemed our bus was just perched on the precipice, inches from toubling down the steep slopes. But the views were great and the small towns and villages seemed very picturesque, it's an area I would like to spend some time exploring in the future perhaps.

The bus dropped us off on the main road, at the turn for the Bulla Regia site, about 3km distance. We hiked in with our big packs, leaving them at the museum desk to check out the underground villas in the town. The roman town here has houses build underground to stay cool in the summer and warm in the winter and quite a few of them were very well preserved and you can just wander on in. Many great mosaics were left intact as well. The most impressive villa open had many underground rooms centered on an open-air atrium complete with a fountain.

From here we moved onto El Kef (Le Kef), having to hike up hill to get from the bus station to the town's center, based around the Kasbah (castle) perched on the top of the hill. El Kef has been a defensive point in Tunisia for millenia, for punic, carthaginian, roman, namibian, and islamic civilizations. It is a nice, laid back mountain top place with great views out over the surrounding rolling farm lands.

After two nights here, we were set to move on. The plan was to hit the Roman town of Haidra and the hill fort of Jugurtha, south of El Kef, but on route our bus broke down for a couple hours and we missed our morning window to find transit out to these remote areas so we decided to continue on and she the Roman town of Sbeitla just outside of Kesserine, an interior transit hub for Tunisia and an area much easier to navigate through.

Turned out to be a good choice since Sbeitla was a great site in it's own, complete with some great towering temples. Three of them were built right next to the town's forum, one each to Jupiter, Minervana, and Juno and they're the highlight of what's left of the place, but it's also home to a great theatre and the scale of the city from one side to the other gives you a sense of the size some of these towns could be. It's a good half a kilometer from one side to the other and just packed with streets, houses, a market area, the forum, baths, amphitheater, theater, all your good ol' roman trappings of a town. And this wasn't even that big of a place. I would have loved to see it during it's hey-day.

From here, we were on to Kairouan, one of the seven holy cities of Islam and home to the oldest mosque in North Africa. The city has a great medina and of course more mosques and mosoleums to holy Muslims than you can shake a stick at.

We were here for the last couple of days of Ramadan, so we got to enjoy the Medina's night life as it came to the end. We had many cups of tea, ate good sandwiches and played a lot of hearts. It was almost sad to say goodbye, but the time was right to move on again, this time to Sousse.

Sousse. What can I say about Sousse? Don't go here. It's a tourist trap, artificial atmosphere place with way too many euro-trash vacationers in their gaudy clothing (or what only sometimes partially passes as clothing). What a striking difference to Kairouan, a real tunisian (and islamic) town we loved. We ended up staying two nights in Souse, just because we didn't realize how bad it was till it was too late. Oh well, live, travel, and learn.

So we hoped the train back to Tunis and rolled in here Tuesday night. We went straight to make the ferry reservations and it's a good thing too, because we found that all the ferries were booked solid for two weeks, meaning a scramble for a new itinerary and course of action. We settled on a flight direct from Tunis to Barcelona. That unfortunately means cutting out Sicily and the South of France, but it does mean we get to spend an entire three weeks in Spain, giving us the time to make our way leisurely about. I'll just have to hit Sicily and the South some other time.... still on the to-travel list. We fly out on sunday.

So for the next couple of days, we'll be killing time in Tunis. We visited the Bardo yesterday. The Bardo is Tunisia's biggest museum and home to some great mosaics from it's roman archeological sites. Spend a good deal of time picture taking and wandering the rooms. Unfortunately a lot of the place was closed down for work.

The beach was our target today. And it probably will be tomorrow as well. And Saturday. Unfortunately the cyber cafe here isn't letting me do much to upload photos, I'll try again later, but for now, there's only a couple new ones to see at my picasa album.

Will catch you all up again later from Spain. Bi'salama!

Tunisia Photos

From Tunisia

Not much more to add, we've moved on from Bizerte to Tabarka on the Norhtern coast. Now near the Algerian border. Will pass a couple days here and then head south into the mountains. Added some pictures at picasa to check out.

Ma'as-salama for now

From Tunisia

From Tunisia

From Tunisia

From Tunisia

Tunisia

So it's been just under a week in Tunisia so far. Of course the first day was mostly traveling, but since arrival we've had some great beach time and seen carthage and the medina, some good touristy things. Now we're trying to get off the path a little and onto the quiet beaches. It is off season now so really there isn't much in the way of crowds anyway.

No pictures yet, I need to load them onto my tumb drive for the next posting....

We found Tunis to be a great place. It's Ramadan right now, so that limits our ability to enjoy the food and cafés, but Tunisians make up for it at night with an almost carnival atmospehere of shoping and eating in the streets of Tunis. Was great to come back from the beach at 5, eat and nap till 9, then head out for tea and people wathcing on the streets. Wow, Tunisians love their shopping! I've never seen so many shoe stores side by side.

Currently we're just outside of Bizerte on the Northern coast, camped at a little ground just off the beach at Remel.

The weather has been (mostly) perfect, warm enough for swimming, but almost chilly in the evening (last night it was down right cold by niger standards). Night before lastwe had a bit of rain. Me, being in the tent with no rain fly, I had to scramble to find a dry place in the camp ground. Ended up sleeping on the walkway next to the closed caffeteria, but then had to move when it started to flood. Ended up on the covered area just outside the bathrooms. Was able to get to sleep despite the damp sleeping bag and was later awaken by the guard of the grounds telling me to go sleep in one of the rooms they have, which he had opened for me. It was a long and cold night up to that point ad I've got a bit of a cold to remember it by, but that's the adventure of traveling.

Next morning (yesterday) I got up to explore the shipwrecks about 2 miles down the beach. The storm from the night before was still hangning around, but looked like it would head inland. It gave me some slight mist on the way there, but as soon as I reached the wrecks it took an abrupt left turn, headed back OUT to sea and came right over top of me. I ended up seeking shelter in the shack of these two Tunisian fisherman hidden in the brush on a dune just above the beach. Here's me, soaking and these two who don't speak a lick of french. Conversation was just gestures and 'Bush... (thumbs down). Obama.... (shrug, we're not sure what to make of him yet body language).'

Hung out there,wishing I had brought the travel book which has a scant section on Arabic so I could learn a little, when the foreman of the company tearing up the nearest Wreck to shore came by. I was invited to come get a closer look and see thm pulling the wreck apart beam by beam and rivet by rivet. A lot of work.

Well my hour on the internet is approaching quick. I hope to do more short posts on route (with pictures!)

Until then.

Goodbye

So I guess I've been avoiding writing about my immanent departure from Niger, both here and in my handwritten journal. It's not like I trying to pretend I'm staying here, that's not it, I'm very actively packing, re-packing, and searching out souvenirs and music to send back home. I think what it comes down to is that I don't want to analyze this experience yet, to look back and think about everything I've done, attempted to do, failed to do, never even started.


Peace Corps is a strange and wonderful experience. We left our homes, families, and friends, to come live like and with the people of a country we knew nothing about before landing. We learned the language, we integrated, we made friends and found new families. Some of us did work, some didn't, but the fact is just in coming we ALL did something.

Peace Corps has three stated goals: 1) to aid developing countries with their need for trained men and women, 2) to bring American culture and an understanding of Americans to a foreign culture, and 3) to bring that foreign culture and understanding back to Americans at home.

The first goal is 'work.' The other two are 'life.' Peace Corps really should be all about the life part. Yes, it would be great to see volunteers help to develop a country, but, as currently organized and funded it volunteers really have no chance to do anything about the 'development' of a country. Not in terms of buildings or gardens or any of that. What Peace Corps should focus more on is the "ambassadors of America" type of idea. Send Americans out, good examples of Americans to live in foreign places, to introduce new ideas and different ways of thinking. THAT is how volunteers can really make a difference. Help people realize that there is another way of living out there; corruption doesn't have to be rampant, children don't have to die of preventable diseases like malaria, you don't have to have twenty kids. But that kind of change takes a long time and needs constant deployment of volunteers. AND that type of development doesn't produce the numbers.



If there's one thing that frustrated me about Peace Corps it's the emphasis on numbers. How many people did you convince to go to school? How many people understand better how to grow meranga? How many will send their girls to school?

Every four months we have to provide the numbers. And you know what, it's all BS. Who can actually tell you how many people are now making Oral Re-hydration Solution for their babies with diarrhea after listening to my radio show? But in order to have funding we have to show numbers, even if they're just fabricated out of thin air.


That mentality needs to change. The idea that you can quantify development and the human condition. I understand the need for oversight and all that, but there are better, more subjective ways to do that (and subjectivity is necessary in this type of field, dealing with humans).

But anyway, this is the exact type of thinking I have been avoiding by not writing as of late. Let me fill you in on the facts of life as they have been:

I''ve moved out of Gaya. Took a Peace Corps car up from Gaya on Tuesday. Did my last radio show the week before and spent the week saying goodbye and passing out my e-mail address, though that's unlikely to get many messages. Check out pictures of my last week. It wasn't all that hard to leave. Some people cry, some get depressed... I guess I'm just not the type to dwell in one place all too long. I'm anxious to get back on the road.

I met my replacement. His name is Brian, he's from Massachusets. I think he'll fit in well in Gaya. We had a good time, I spent my last two days showing him around - work, important types, like the mayor and prefet, and of course my friends and where to get good food and the occasional beer. Took him to the border to introduce him to the guards there so he won't have much trouble getting across.


It seems weird now to think I won't be going back because it still feels like I should be going back next week. It's strange to think that I'm leaving this country on a plane saturday morning. When will I see goats as passangers on motorcycles again? Or hear Zarma? It's so satisfying to hear a local language and know what people are saying about you, then to bust in with a comment and watch their floored expression, "You hear Zarma?!" Yes I do.

When will I ever be able to do that again?

So now I'm in Niamey doing paperwork, hanging out with my friends here I may never see again, but that's life isn't it? Things are constantly moving forward, changing. We can't stay still in the present like statues. That's living. I guess in some way I've throw myself into a live that will always constantly be flowing. If I had stayed at home, settled into a job, I would have the same friends, the same city, same house. Maybe the small things would change, but the essence of my life would stay. That can be a comforting and pleasant thing, something I will one day want. But I'm young, this is the time when I can pursue an international career, I can travel, see and do things, develop a world view that I could never settled in one place.

Traveling plans for now:

Tunisia - Sicily - Italy - France - Spain - UK - Iceland

My and my buddy's Josh and Will are taking to the air, road, and water on a cross-europe trip. Should be a pretty good time, these two guys have become some of my better friends over the course of the last two years and this will be a great experience to share.

-Route to be Filled in on the way, South to North-

It's not as spectacular as our envisioned motorcycle trip (Niamey to London on bikes!), but given the hassle of borders and Al-Qaeda of the Magreb and cold european weather to ride through in November.... well I'll take the beaches of the mediteranian at a liesurely pace over that right now. Just get me to the water!

- Original Trip route -

If anyone knows of willing people that have places we could crash at or places to see along the way (staying mostly along the coast, traveling north from southern italy all the way across france to spain) let me know.

Happy trails for now

Close of Service Conference and Giraffes!

And of course, sticking to the way of doing normal business a month has gone by and not a single post has gone up. At least this time though I can say honestly that it's because I've been quite busy. I've gone on a week long bike ride in Benin, had our close of service conference in Niamey and spent a week in Gaya trying to get everything finished up in terms of work and the text books.

Bike Ride in Benin -

Being that I'm right on the border, my closest PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer) neighbor is in Malanville just across the river from Gaya, a mere 7km away. She knows I'm into biking and invited me along on their Family Planning education bike tour from Kalele to Parakou in central Benin. Got the project and ability to travel cleared through the Bureau and was off on the bike ride from May 27th till June 2nd.


Differences between Benin and Niger Peace Corps experiences:

Food- Oh my god, what good food they have in Benin. Even the pounded stuff is better there; it's yams and rice instead of millet. They have cheese!!!! Cheese in all every sauce in fact. And there's juices, bisap, much deliciousness was to be had.

Weather- We biked 20km at 1pm, and no one died. I don't think that could be possible in Niger. It was hot in Benin, by Seattle standards, but not by Niger standards, maybe mid 80's to low 90's, nice biking weather in my opinion. Plus it rained on us once, which up to that point hadn't really happened yet. Funny story on that episode; it was our first day riding and we were on the last leg of the day. As we were getting ready to leave the village we heard our first clap of thunder and the clouds that had been slowing growning more and more ominous took on an especially dark look. We thought, "hey let's try to outrun it" and so we took off. It seemed like everything would work out fine, the road ran opposite from the approaching storm which blew at our backs a refreshing breeze. Then, in a 'turn' for the worst, the road curved so that the last 10km ran perpendicular to the storm's path and before we knew it, rain started up in big wet drops. Luckily, the lead biker saw a three room house that for some reason these two Beninois guys had built in the middle of nowhere and we (20 people) were able to take refuge inside one of the (small) rooms for an hour till the front blew past. Played the harmonica a little bit inside and, with the heat and sweat, it felt sort of like being locked away in a small prison cell. But at least we weren't rained on...

Language - This is one area where PC Niger has Benin beat. We hear the local languages. Every Niger PCV is taught a local language and so we are able to be a little more connected with our communities, especially bush villages, rural places where education isn't so good and people might not understand french. In Benin, the problem is really that there are so many languages (60) that it's damn near impossible for PC to teach their volunteers the language in their village and so they stick to French. In Niger we can usually get by with teaching hausa or zarma, though other languages are around these predominate and most people can understand at least a little in either one. Volunteers in Niger have also organized trainings for themselves on other native languages like Fulan or Tamachec when they thought it would be usefull.

Clothing - It's a lot more casual in Benin. I wore SHORTS for an entire week. Wow. Plus I saw girls' knees; I had to be physically restrained.

The Volunteers - Not too different. They complain about the bureau, they love and hate their experience and the country (mostly love), and they can drink a grand biere in about 5 minutes flat.

The Work - While the health and environmental sectors are basically the same, Benin has small business and english teaching volunteers that Niger doesn't. Our education volunteers, like myself don't teach.

The ride was 160k over 4 days and it was beautiful. We did around four meetings a day, one in each village we passed, talking about the why and how of family planning. Nothing funnier than asking someone to demonstrate condom use on a wooden phalis.

I really love biking and a bike will have to be the first thing I buy back state side. I don't even want a car. Spring time plan is to bike to San Fransisco. Incha Allah.

So that was my wonderful 'work' week in Benin. Couldn't have asked for more on a vacation.

Last week was our Close of Service (COS) conference. The group I came to country with got together for the last time as a whole and we had session on resume writting, readjusting to life, the administrative side of things, etc. Best part of the 'official' conference part was a trip to see the giraffes. Last time I walked, this time, air conditioned car!

We also had a big dinner together, watched a slide show of pictures of our time together and then had a party to celebrate our two years. It's sad to think of not seeing many of these people again, but I'm also ready to move on from this experience to the next, even if I'm not sure what, entirely that will be.

I've been looking into law programs which are strong in international law, and thinking of matching that up with either a masters in public administration (MPA), or a legal masters (LLM) in sustainable international development (UW!) or another international emphasis. Both ideas would be four year programs, but are highly selective for the schools I'm looking at (NYU, Columbia, Duke, UW, American University) AND I'd have to do a lot of the work in applying and looking for money from here.

I might want to take a year off to organize myself and get things together. At least I'm starting to get on it now. Better late than never. T-minus 5 months till application deadlines. First thing - resume and my COS paperwork.


Anyway, some happy news is that the planning for The Trip is coming along well. So far the basic itininery includes tunisia, sicily, italy, france, spain, the UK, and either Ireland or Iceland (maybe both!). Planned out almost three months for travel with Josh and Will. Should be an amazing trip and a chance to move on from this place in style. If anyone has any travel ideas or knows anyone willing to play host to some returning volunteers let me know.


Oh, I almost forgot -

Niger Political Update:

If you haven't heard (and US news being all about presidential fly swatting and not substansive news) Tandja, the President, disolved the National Assembly a couple weeks ago after the constitutional court ruled against his bid for a third term. There was some rioting (they attacked the Governor's house in Dosso, and burned part of it down, the grand marche in Niamey caught fire, police fired tear gas into crowds, one woman died), but most of the protesting has been peaceful and there is no big threat to anyone here or a big chance that the government will fall apart. Everything done so far (even on Tandja's side) has been within the letter of the law. Tandja wants to hold a national referendum on constitutional ammendment in August which would allow him a third chance at election, but recent rumor has him planning on stepping down now that the opposition is gaining strength. Nothing official yet.


Also, I added new Pictures to Picasa in two albums: Benin Bike Ride and Giraffes!!!