Hi everyone! It’s been a long time since I’ve written. But hopefully this entry will give you an idea of what has been going on over here. Common questions I imagine you have:

1. What was training like?
New volunteers go through approximately eight weeks of training in Hamdallaye, a fairly small town about an hour’s drive away from Niamey, Niger’s capital. During training, we lived with host families (usually in pairs) and would walk to the Peace Corps site each morning. My “hutmate” was Maeghan, one of two other people from Wisconsin. Maeghan and I had a really welcoming host family and are excited to visit them when we’re in Hamdallaye again. (We’ll be returning there in December for two weeks of additional training). Training was pretty busy. We would walk to the Peace Corps site each morning and have language and cross-cultural sessions from 8-5. After that we would stay on site for an hour or two to relax (read, play cards, etc). and then walk home to shower, write letters, etc before dinner.

2. When did training finish? What happened after that?
Training finished in mid-September and we were sworn in as official Peace Corps volunteers during a ceremony at the U.S. ambassador’s house in Niamey. The director of the Peace Corps (for all the countries of the world) came to our swear-in, so it was an even bigger deal than usual. Overall the night was fun- hopefully I’ll include some pictures of swear-in here.
After swear-in we spent a few days at our regional capitals getting ready to go to our individual towns. (Volunteers are split into different “teams,” each team having about 20 or 25 people. Each team has a hostel in the regional city where volunteers can come every once in awhile to enjoy cold soda, electricity, the presence of other volunteers, etc.) I’m on Team Maradi, which is about a 12 hour busride from Niamey. I’m really lucky in the fact that a lot of the friends I made during training were also assigned to Team Maradi.

3. Where is my town? What has life been like there?
My town’s name is Mayahi and it’s a medium-sized town of about 10,000 people about 90 km northeast of Maradi. It’s the biggest city for quite a ways, meaning it has fun things like electricity, numerous NGO’s, a radio and a cell phone tower (I have a cell phone, so if anyone would like to spend the money on a calling card, let me know and I can give you my number). It also has people selling cold yogurt, cold soda, and egg sandwiches (who know that scrambled eggs put into bread could be so amazing?)
A few other volunteers are clustered around me (woohoo Will and Katie) and they will probably come in most Mondays to participate in the radio show and of course take advantage of the amazing food….

4. What is my typical day like?
I sleep outside at night, on my little cement terrace (with mattress and mosquito net). I get woken up with the first prayer call at about 5 in the morning and spend the next hour and a half trying to fall back asleep but usually failing. (What’s a prayer call? 90% of people in Niger are Muslim and Muslims are required to pray five times a day. The mosque in each town has a loudspeaker which announces when it is a time to pray). The donkeys, roosters, little kids and women pounding millet usually contribute to my inability to fall back asleep, so I’ve really become a morning person here…who would have guessed?
Eventually I get up, make myself oatmeal and eat it on the cement outside while listening to the BBC world news on my radio. I leave my house at about 8 to walk to work (the Inspection, the place in charge of all schools in my region) and I study Hausa at the Inspection for a few hours. In the afternoon I come home, make myself something to eat, and read, do laundry, dishes or other chores in the afternoon. Sometimes my afternoons are interrupted by small kids banging on my door, some of whom are really cute, some of whom are pretty annoying. (There’s a pair of twins, a boy and a girl, who are five and who really make me smile…most afternoons they knock on my door and ask “Akwai bonbons?” – “Is there candy?” and when I let them into my house they look at all the pictures I have on the wall and ask me who all the people are. I think they’ve memorized everyone’s name by now…so some of you should know that some small kids in Niger know who you are -and have a lot of trouble pronouncing your names…:)) In the late afternoon I usually head over to a house down the street where I eat supper with the family. (They’re really welcoming and have been friends with the two volunteers before me). Sometimes we have rice with sauce or pasta with sauce, and sometimes we have tuwo, pounded millet with a gooey consistency- yes, it’s as bad as it sounds, but people here love it. The family has a satellite t.v. and after dinner we watch really ridiculous soap operas, most of them from South America. Although I have to admit, much to my own dismay, that I’m becoming slightly loyal to one of them, “La Femme de Lorenzo”- such beautiful people! such unforeseen circumstances! After I walk home I get ready for bed and fall asleep under my mosquito net.

5. How often do I think about home? What do I miss about the U.S.?
The two things I miss the most are definitely people and food. Food might slightly outweigh people, but no one should take that personally…J Just kidding. I think about a lot of you and wonder how things are going- school, new jobs, old jobs, new apartments, new people….you should write me to let me know how you are! I can promise a hand-written letter in return. (And if you want to send me food, I would seriously love you forever and pay you back by taking you out to eat once I’m back in the States…trail mix, fruit snacks, cheese powder/sauce, etc).
There are a few things I miss about the States, but I’m also really happy to be here…I’ve had a pretty good transition from training to life as a volunteer, and I’m thankful for that.
This past weekend I went to Maradi for our team’s monthly meeting and (afterwards) our post-Halloween Halloween party. It was really nice to see friends and relax.

6. What will my work be like?
I’m an education volunteer (there are also agriculture, health, and municipal and community development volunteers here in Niger) and so the projects I choose to do will deal with improving the education sector here. A lot of volunteers do presentations on the importance of educating young girls (there are significantly fewer girls enrolled in school than boys, because parents sometimes don’t see the benefits of sending their girls to school), “English clubs” (which I’m working on starting for adults in my town, as there is a big demand among educated NGO workers to practice the English they learned in school), or setting up things like kids’ reading clubs or student councils. There’s a lot of freedom to do projects that you feel passionate about and that you feel would benefit your specific community.

I’ll try to be better about updating this, which won’t beas hard as I thought it might be, as there is a UN project here that has internet…which I’m using right now (for free, as they really like Peace Corps volunteers) :)