Village excursion part one

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2-21-06
the problem with big adventures is that I’m so tired after them I don’t get around to writing about them for awhile, after I’ve recuperated a little and forgotten some more.
We went to Yussef’s mom’s village, Konni Kayne, it should take ‘bout 15 minutes outside of Niamey. If all goes well that is. We left here surprisingly early considering how long it takes me to get up and out. We took a van to kwarra tegi and walked to "presque" the end of the city where the bush taxis take people out and beyond. We bought provisions and goodies for the day; tonko(peppers) albasan(onions) savon(soap), omo(another kind of soap), alumettes(matches), spiga(spaghetti) two galette sandwiches, bean curd deep fried in oil in a bed of bread with hot sauce. We saved two seats in a falling apart peugot pick-up truck with an overhead metal cage for attaching big sacks of grain, animals, and wood, bundles of things bundled in pagne fabric, calabashes. We rushed to get in as the guy was yelling ready to go words and then ended up sitting in the back for thirty minutes, slowly adding more people to where you wouldn’t think they would fit. The three last people to be added to our clown car were all over seventy, two old women and an old man, all of whom sat on the floor with knees folded. I think the final count in the truck bed was eighteen with three in the cab and three on top. After a lot of complaining about waiting around, losing time at the market to sell goods, we started off. . .
TO BE CONTINUED, EVENTUALLY

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Comments

[Farida]

That is uncannily reminiscent of our travels on the box of no doubt a similarly-outfitted vehicle through the bush of Hadija's village during our Peace Corps days. I think we had more like twenty five people though. Oh, village life...I miss you.