A Day In The Life...

Hello everyone. We hope you are all well. I posted two blogs, the last one is our calendar of events that we will hopefully continue to update throughout our service. But here is a brief outline of what one of our days look like, just a glimpse. Enjoy the rest of the advent season.

Peace and love,
Lee George and Christine Zwicky
B.P. 222
Nouakchott Mauritania

5:30 A.M. Awake to prayer call from a mosque 50 yards away. Hopefully fall back to sleep, and often times sleep right through it.

6:30 A.M. Awake to recitation of Koranic verses by our host dad's Koranic students. Roll out of bed (matalas on the floor). Take down our mosquito net and put our matalas and daggo (plastic mat) in our host sisters salon. We sleep outside on our roof every night. Lately we have been using our sleeping bags brrrrr.

6:40 A.M. Walk downstairs give the morning greeting, An wuyi jam (was your night peace), to anyone who happens to be in our groggy path.

7:00 A.M. I go to the garden, womens co-op, and spend anywhere from an hour to two hours watering, helping people transplant vegetables, talking about soils, etc.
Christine prepares for her day. She seems to always be working on some health related work. Studying from her "Where there is no doctor" book, looking over french presentations and figuring out how to trnaslate it into Soninke.

8:30 A.M. Breakfast. Bread and Kinkillaba. Kinkillaba is a coffee drink made from the leaves of a tree that grows in a nearby village. Sometimes Christine cooks herself oatmeal to try and regain some of the 30 lbs she has lost.

9:00 A.M. Some days Christine goes to the infirmary where she works with the nurse on basic issues of cleanliness and order to the clinic. This also gives her a chance to work with the clinic attendnt who she hopes to set up with further birthing training (as of now there is no midwife in the village) and with the women who frequent the infirmary.
During this time of the day I usually go to my host dad's fields and help or watch what is going on. Currently we are harvesting the millet. Or I walk around town to talk to people and see their gardens.
Of course for both of us there is not always this much activity. Somedays we use for research, reading, or recouping from illnesses. And there are the daily chores that need to be done like washing clothes in a bucket, things never get entirely clean.

11:30 A.M.- 12:30 P.M. People usually return from the fields at this time. Say the mid day greeting Kira(goodday, response: Kira jam) We spend time with our family in the compound. The women are pounding corn, cooking rice and meat, and getting lunch together. On days when we cook for ourselves we go to the one stand in town that sells vegetables and pick up onions, garlic, potatoes, and squash (pretty much the only vegies we can get on a regular basis).

1:30 P.M. Eat lunch of rice and meat.

1:30 P.M.- 4:oo P.M. This time is spent taking naps, readign, hanging out with the family, doing research, working on presentations, and drinking tea, and visiting people. Going and sitting with people under their hangars is a huge part of people's social lives.

4:oo P.M. I usually go back to the womens co-op to water my plots and talk with the women about gardening, and the history of their garden. Greet the women Xa Lella (good afternoon to all of you). Working side by side has been a great way to integrate and learn about what problems they have had, and still have growing vegetables.
The afternoon is when Christine and I both usually do presentations. This is the time of day when most people have finished their chores or are going to the gardens anyway.
Side note: If you are wondering greetings are a big deal here. I would say Mauritanians are even worse than midwesterners when it comes to saying hi or goodbye. People here will call up a relative in France and spend the whole conversation doing greetings, even if they haven't seen them in a year! Here is a sample of just some of the greetings:
A: A moho (how are you)
B: Ma Jam (I have peace)
A: An Xiebarre (how is the news)
B: Jam (peace)
A: An Ka Moho (how is your house)
B: I Jam (they have peace)
A: An Gole Moho (and your work)
B: O do o me (we will do it together)
A: An tewe moho (and how is the heat)
B: Jam (peace)
A: Torrah su n e (no problems)
B: Jam (peace)
A: An do fa ma (don't remember what this one means, but we say it anyway)
B: Ma famata (same with the response)
A: Leminu moho (how are your children)
B: Jam (peace)
A: An na koyi ma (see you soon, if they are travelling)
B: Animine (Amen)

6:00 P.M. The work day comes to a close. People start to relax. People in our compound are less stressed. We have visitors that stop by or we go visit other people's houses. Right now is when we occassionally bathe (three times a week). We use about five to six liters of well water, a bucket, and a cup and the water is freezing. It is really unbearable but luckily since it is so dry right now you don't sweat that much.

7:30 P.M. We cook ourselves dinner, pasta or soup.

8:00 P.M. Visit with family and occassionally eat with them.

9:00 P.M. Get our mosquito net and matalas, say the evening greeting (jam na wuyi, may your night be peace) and go to bed.

Calendar of Events

We were pretty sure that most of you would find it very uninteresting if all of our blog updates were simply a list of who we had been hanging out with, what work we have been doing, etc. But, we didn't want you all to think we were waisting precious tax payer money, so we decided to create this page, which we will continually update, for our events. We thought people would like to know what "productive" things we have been up to, so here are brief descriptions of what work related things we have been doing.

10/09/06 Presentation of creating insect repellent (Neem Creme) from the leaves of local tree species. 20 women attended and many more asked about it afterwards.
10/12/06 Went to a ladies house and taught here indivdually how to make Neem Creme, and talked about the benefits of producing it in mass quantities and selling it.
10/28/06 Installed a scale, which Christine designed from local materials, at the infirmary. This will help us weigh infants.
10/29/06 Callobrated scale and illicited help from Mamadu Gui Camera, local store owner and member of the health committee, and treasurer of the infirmary.
10/30/06 Measure childrens arms ages 1-5 and weighed kids 1 year or less. In total measured 241 kids.
10/31/06 Measured kids in the morning. Presentation in afternoon. Over 50 women showed up. Mamadu Gui Camera, Bakari Thiem, and Howa Macerie Camera spoke about importance of a clean city, throwing away trash, cleaning streets, and our role as volunteers.
11/1/06 Presentation on Oral Rehydration Salts (ORS). Taught Mia Kudabelli how to make ORS at home and sang songs we made up in Soninke to teach the seven children in her compound about the importance of washing hands.
11/3/06 Planted corn and beans in mens cooperative gardent. Had a small discussion with Samba Lolo Ndiaye about the dustbowl and the benefits of keepin trees in fields.
11/7/06 Composting presentation in womens cooperative garden. Eight women showed up.
11/11/06 ORS presentation with Boyi Sankari and two other mothers. Taught children songs we made up in Soninke about washing hands and drinking clean water.
Arrived with Doulos and did preliminary work for opening the Child Feeding Center (CAC).
11/12/06 Remeasure specific kids for CAC.
11/13/06 Finished preliminaries for CAC.
11/15/06 Started first garden plot in womens cooperative garden.
11/20/06 Composting presentation in womens cooperative garden. 10 people showed up.
11/21/06 Christine did first nutritional presentation at CAC.
12/04/06 Planted garden plots and helped Bonko Ndiaye transplant lettuce.
12/09/06 Finished first layer of womens coop compost bin.
12/10/06 Dug compost pit with Cruella and transplanted lettuce.
12/11/06 Taught Jagelli Dianiafaba how to use hot compresses to relieve puss in childs abcess.
12/12/06 Finished last layer of Cruellas compost.
12/10-12/06 Helped transplant eggplant, lettuce, and tomatoes in womens coop.
12/13/06 Christine gave a presentation to the CAC concerning dehydration. It was well attended. Lee had a hand washing station and taught a hand washing song in Soninke. Doulos gave out food to the mothers and taught one mother how to care for all the childrens wounds.

If people have specific questions on any of these events please let us know by posting on our page and we will fill in more details.

Learning to Play the Violin

As Christine said "trying to speak Soninke is like trying to play the violin. Every day you walk around town with your insturment and everyone is so excited to see you. They ask you 'play something, play something'. Because you have taken very few lessons you screech out a simple melody like Row Row Row Your Boat and you get laughed at and told how bad you are".

Mauritanians are competitive. People say their ridicule is just their form of encouragement. Kind of hard to believe when it disables you so much. But there is no doubt they are competitive. A quick demographic sketch:

Moors: In Woulloumboni they run all the little shops. They have and aristocratic air about them which I think is perpetuated by their placement in the majority of Mauritanian political offices. They are friendly, at least in Woulloumboni; this is not the case in every city. They are wary of outsiders, nomadic in their roots, and stoic at times but vibrant when it comes to politics, the land, or cards.

Pulaar: They seem to us like pirates of the desert. They have a wild, wandering look accentuated by their role as herders wandering the "brousse". The men wear gold ring earrings and their hair can be anything from neatly picked out to chin length straight hair usually sticking out from under a knit cap. They wear necklaces and charms around their necks and arms, and sometimes carry a short herding staff which gives a sense of rustic nobility. A characteristic both the men and women have is their ability to laugh or find humor in things. Granted I have no idea what they are saying but they always seem jovial. Their house are usually on the outskirt of town; mud huts with thatched roofs out in the open.

Soninke: Soninke people are more permanent. They are farmers tied to the land and rivers nearby. They are gruff, usually shouting commands across the courtyard, and rough to an extent. They are hardworking and survivors, sending siblings to other countries in order to find work. They are rich in tradition and not easily persuaded to change their ways. Thir houses are large and made of cement or clay, crammed together in the middle of town.

The groups in Woulloumboni are divided but how these lines are delineated I am not sure. There are three separate mosques for a town with 2000 or less people, a sign of their religious dedication but also their wealth. There seems to be no pattern to who goes where. It might have something to do with prestige and class. Competition between families is rooted in last names and heritage of nobility or slavery. All Mauritanians play one card game with slightly varying rules except that it is permissible to cheat. Even today as we left before sunrise to go to Selibaby our truck driever, Moussa Joulo, honked his horn at the truck ahead of him. There are only two taxis in town and they leave every morning at the same time from the same place. He knows this other driver and is no doubt friends with him yet he honks his horn like he is in a traffic jam of hundereds of cars. Each truck seemingly races each other through the street; one leapfrogging passed the other as they pick up the morning passengers.

Our ride today into Selibaby was smooth, only 17 passengers which is 10 less than last trip. We pass mostly flat terrain with faint hills on the horizon highlighted by the pink rays of the sunrise. Sporadic water bloated Baobab trees tower over the rest of the desert shrubs. The grasses are turning brown again and will fade into the sand as we come to the end of a mediocre rainy season. Selibaby is our refuge for a few days, breaking the monotony of Ramadan and Mauritanian cuisine. Breakfast, bread and coffee; Lunch, sonbi, boiled rice with sugar and a touch of milk; Dinner, lots of rice with a few cubes of goat meat and stringy okra. Fruit and vegetables will be a welcome luxury these next few days.

Further reading:
"Sahara" Marq de Villiers and Sheila Hirtle
This is a good over view of cultural, historical, and environmental factors of this area.
"Skeletons on(of) the Zahara" Dean King
This one starts out kind of slow but is a really good story.
"Disposable People" Bales

This last update is a little late. Internet in town has been really sketchy. We will try to post again before Christmas. WE hope the advent season finds you all well. This will be avery interesting one for us. Thank you all for your support and love. Thank you CArl for posting the last update with care package information. And to the grad student who posted on the last update, feel free to use anything from our blog in your paper. Good bye for now.

Peace and Love
Lee George and Christine Zwicky
Corps de la Paix
B.P. 222 Nouakchott
West Africa

Care Package List

Hello everyone. This is Carl (Lee's bro). Lee wanted me to let everyone know that he and Christine appreciate the packages, letters, and emails that everyone has provided over the past few months. If you are so inclined to send future packages, then below is a list of items that Christine and Lee would enjoy receiving from you (but whatever you send, they will gladly accept). They both say hi to everyone and think about you all often. Take care.


Items:

dried fruits (cherries, cranberries, apples, apricots)
dried parmesian cheese
dried peas and beans we only get cow peas here
any herbs and spices, flavorings
dry sauce packets (pasta, gravy, cheese, salad dressing) we can get noodles in country
beef jerky
gatorade mixes
velveta cheese (yes it will keep)
baked beans
peanut butter
canned meat (chicken, ham, crab etc) stuff in those sealed bags is good and lite
centrium multi vitamins
nestles's semi sweet chocolate chips
brown sugar
crisco shortening
starbursts
laffy taffys and other candies
chocolate candy bars...twix, dark chocolate milky ways, 100grands
chips (cheetos potato chips)cake, muffin, cookie, brownie mixes
granola bars, granola, and rice crispee treats
q tips
cottonballs
ziplock hard storage containers and bags
aaa and aa batteries
us stamps and envelopes
peoples favorite books
and letters from people with all the mundane things of life in them, what movies did you see were they good or bad, what books have you read, what have your kids been up too, what good meals have you eaten lately. we just want to hear from people, because it is hard for us to keep in contact with everybody.
if people ask just let them know this information.

A New Home

It is cool today. A slight breeze carries away the heat. A chanting prayer is broadcast from one of the three mosques this small village has. The melody floats past date palms and versatile neem trees which rise gently over the burnt clay and cement houses. The cooler weather is welcomed.

Christine has seen the results of malaria and dehydration in children and adults during her mornings spent at the health clinic. She has been going early most mornings as a way to introduce herself to the community. It has been rewarding and challenging. Language barriers make it difficult to communicate even simple ideas to people; like writing down vaccination dates or cleaning off a child’s arm before injections. Many people are thrilled that she is there but are unsure of why exactly she is there. People are used to thinking of medicine in terms of treatment instead of prevention. They don’t understand yet that Christine’s information on ays to prevent malaria and the spread of other sicknesses is just as useful as and less expensive than the medicine the nurse gives out. Christine has told kids not to pound and suck on old batteries that are in the street. She has found joy in the fact that they actually listen. Sanitation and cleaning the streets will probably be Christine’s main project. As of now peoples urine and waste water run directly into the roads and walkways. It is smelly, unsightly, but most importantly very unsanitary. This is a massive project which will only succeed if there is community interest and involvement.

A sustainable approach to development work has been difficult to figure out. There are many things we would like to see done in Woulloumboni but we realize that without the communities interest it will make no difference. Part of the challenge lies in persuading people that we have come here to help give ideas but not to do. It has been proven over and again when work is done, or medical/food are given to a community in a developing country it does little to stabilize and sustain them. It at times weakens a community’s creativity in finding solutions to their own problems.

From and agricultural stand point I will be harnessing few resources that aren’t available to the people of Woulloumboni. The last few mornings I have been going out to our hsot fathers (Samba Lolo Nji, my namesake) fields to help cultivate it. Because of the very clay soils here it has been like scrapping off dried cracked sunburned skin. Satisfying but difficult. Soninke people are wonderful farmers. They have been doing it for decades. So it has ben a little more difficult to see how I might be utilized here. Of course we realize that we have only been here for two weeks and we have many people yet to talk to. As of now I have talked with many farmers who want fruit trees. They have tried in past years to grow lemons and mangos but all except one or two non-fruiting trees have died. So, I will look into the cultivation of fruit trees and the reasons they have trouble growing here.

Ramadan has begun. Fasting sunrise to sundown is no easy task. Work still needs to be done and with no water or food every day tasks become difficult. Even though Christine and I are not fasting it is a challenging time. Everything slows down in a place where time seems to crawl along anyway. Work in the fields is cut way back and it is a inopportune time to hold town meetings, or go around and talk with people. They tend to be tired. The children who don’t fast are returning fromtheir morning work and static plays over the radio. The buzzing of bad reception is what is admitted from Mauritanian’s radios 75% of the time. I don’t know why they don’t change the station or turn it off. I will add this puzzle to the pile of mysteries of Mauritania and hope that after two years maybe some will be solved.

"I've got soul but I am not a soldier"

Lee George and Christine Zwicky
B.P. 222
Nouakchott, Mauritania
West Africa

Our New Names

In country over a month; we can now be identified as: scorpion smashers, Sonike (our language of choice) learners, left hand butt wipers, rice and fish eaters (lietarally every day), couscous eaters everynight, outdoor dwellers, on the floor sitters, no bed sleppers, cultural assimilators, off road travellers, toubahb superstars, bucket bathers, nutritious food cravers, desert gardeners, sand storm walkers, and I am sure there are a few titles I have left out.

It is really an impossible task to try and convey all we have experienced and all the emotions of these last couple of months. Mostly becaue there is nothing else that I have experienced that has been similar to my life in Mauritania. We have been without any Western amenities. We have no electricity, there is no running water, and there is no choice of food. We are in the "brousse". The bush surrounded by nothing but large expanses of desolate land. There are roads to the villages but the two tracks in the sand could easily be 100 yards to the right or left and it would not make a difference.

We made a trip recently to Woulloumboni which is located 65 km Northwest of Selibaby. It is a village that is even more remote than Gori (our training site). We travelled more than six hours on roadless terrain over sand, through rivers, and passed areas of pastures and trees. This will be our home for the next two years, our community of under 2000 people where we will work and live.

The last Peace Corps volunteer was there in 1988. This is a whole generation that is not accustomed to our white skin and strange Western ways. Most little kids run from us crying and hide behind their mothers who hold them and laugh. Older kids follow us in droves curious about our behaviors and the language we speak. Men and women alike welcome us into their homes and are thrilled when we utter any Sonike vocabulary.

Sonike people are proud. There are about one million Sonike speakers world wide. Most of them are here in the Gidimahka area of Mauritania and spread through Northern Senegal and Western Mali. Their cultural boundaries have been split and divided mostly by French colonialism. Even so they have retained much of their identity. They are good farmers and hard workers. They retain much of their identity by keeping their circle small and marrying within the Sonike realm.

It has been a difficult language to learn and at times a difficult culture to integrate into. We have just left our homestay and will be headed to Woulloumboni in a few days. We apologize for not being able to let you know more often how we are doing. There are many things that are inadequate in this country, internet happens to be one of them. We are hoping, at best, to be able to update our page once a month when we get to site. We are doing well despite all of our trials. We are looking forward to our permanent site and in some ways looking forward to living two years with nothing remotely similar to our lives in the states. Our permanent site is even more remote than our training site and will have less amenities. We miss you all very much and enjoy the emails and posts that people have sent. Thank you all for your love and support it helps us get along from day to day. We will do our best to keep you all updated and relate to you our experiences.

If people want more information on Mauritania look at the CIA website. Also there are a few books with chapters on Mauritania. The first is Disposable People. Each chapter is about a different country and modern day slavery. The second is Native Stranger. This is a book about a black mans journey back to Africa and some of his experiences. He has one chapter on Mauritania. The last is not about Mauritania but encompasses some feelings that both Christine and I have had. It is a speech by Ivan Illich called "To Hell With Good Intentions". It is thought provoking in the least.

Lee George and Christine Zwicky
Corps de la Paix
B.P. 222
Nouakchott, Mauritania
West Africa

Finally Here

Hello everyone! Well we finally got to Nouakchott, Mauritania. It took us about three days to get here and two red eye flights. We are running on fumes but things are well. There were no incidents during travel our whole group got through unscathed. We don't have many first impressions on the country because we have been busy with orientation and getting vaccinations. Everyone we have met thus far has been very hospitable. The scenery is dusty with few plants. There is sand everywhere but somehow doesn't seem to get tracked through many buildings? However, this is supposed to be one of the prettiest places. Well my time is running out on the computer hope all is well back home.

Added 6:50 pm (Wisc 1:50 pm): Just so people know we will not have regular internet access for about the next ten weeks. Christine and I have purchased a cell phone but we do not have a number yet. We are driving to Kaedi tomorrow where we will begin our training. We are entering the worst time of the year, which the Peace Corps purposefully plans so that the rest of the year feels terriffic. So we are getting ready for humidity, heat, and lots of bugs. It is also a 6 hour jeep ride through the desert to get there.

Peace and Love,

Lee and Christine

Departure

Hello friends and family. Christine and I are departing for Mauritania, Africa June 26th. We will spend our first 10 weeks in technical, cultural, and language training. We are looking forward to a challenging and rewarding adventure. We are not sure how often we will have internet access so we might not be able to communicate often. But when we do we will try to use this sight so that you will all be able to check our status at your own leisure.Thank you all for your support and love. We have appreciated everyones support as we embark on this journey. For those of you whom we were not able to say goodbye too in person we are sorry. We want all of you to know that we will miss you very much and we look forward to seeing you on our return. Goodbye for now.Peace and Love,Lee and Christine