sahara shantytown surveyor

2007-06-22T13:38:00.000Z

SOUTH AFRICA was fantastic... like no other trip I've ever taken. I spent two weeks there with my parents in April, then we spent two days in Zambia. We spent a few days in Cape Town, which was quite metropolitan and attractive, and then we set off to see some wildlife. South Africa was extremely comfortable, and had quite a bit to offer in terms of food, animal sightings (at Kruger National Park), cultural activities and overall friendliness. I can attest that it is truly like no other country that I've ever been to. My parents also were highly impressed. I would highly recommend that you check it out!

2007-06-22T13:29:00.000Z

My House!

Here's where I unwind at the end of the day.

2007-06-22T13:05:00.000Z

Thoughts on Leaving Mauritania

Now I am almost exactly a month away from ending my service in Mauritania. I have tried to appreciate each day, make the most of my work opportunities, and learn hassaniya. I've summoned up my courage and patience, and tried to take full advantage of the chances I have to teach people and learn from them in return. I keep reminding myself that I will probably never again live in a community like this one.
I probably will never again be a one-name act. What I mean is this: when I'm out walking around, kids yell out "Heidi!" From my interactions around town, I get the impression that many more people know my name than I know theirs. My last name is unimportant since I'm the only Heidi in town, and the only hassaniya-speaking white lady as well. Even the school administration doesn't care if I have a last name.
It was a horrible ordeal at the time, but the burglary of my house in March provided a fine occasion to gauge the level of responsibility and concern that the community of Aioun feels toward me. My close friends and family were quite sympathetic and willing to share the misfortune with me. My host father immediately recruited a highly reputable sorcerer, whose services I graciously declined. Even weeks after the fact, people I don't even know would approach me in the street to express their sympathy and inquire if I retrieved my belongings, which I did.
Of course there are downsides to this lack of anonymity but I interpret people's overall reactions to me to mean that they accept and respect me. Two years is enough time to really establish yourself in this town, and it is also enough time to figure out how to deal with the intense scrutiny, and how to lead a decently comfortable life despite the heat, lack of water and monotonous food, etc.
I am thankful to have had the opportunity to develop these coping skills since you don't normally have the chance to do so in America, where convenience reigns supreme. Thanks to my experience in this country I've become a more patient, resourceful, and focused person. Hopefully that'll come in handy soon.
During my first year of teaching I often wondered how many students I actually got through to. The results of my efforts took time to become evident. It was just during my second year that I realized how wide my potential audience was, and how lucky some of my students and fellow teachers felt to have me here. There are still uber-conservative Islamists in Aioun who don't get the point, but they are getting old and obsolete, so I don't bother with whatever they think/say. It took discipline, persistence, and hard work to get to the level of ease that I now have when I'm teaching a class or leading a session at the Girls' Mentoring Center. Now I'm proud that I have a great classroom presence and the ability to anticipate Mauritanian children's needs. Since they constitute my target audience, I've had to get good at creating lessons and activities based on their interests and needs. I hope that with time the efforts of people like me will result in Mauritanians placing a higher value on education in general.
To me, the saddest thing about leaving my host family is the fact that I'll never see how their little kids turn out. When I got here two years ago they were all so much smaller, one hadn't yet learned how to talk and the baby hadn't even been born. I bet those little kids will eventually forget that I stayed with them. I intend to maintain contact with them, but I'll always wonder just what kind of people they grew up to be.
Some more things I'll miss: the overall pretense, the ease with which I can just walk into people's homes during mealtimes, and burping with no holds barred. I also appreciate people's prudishness at times (remember that this is an Islamic republic) since I don't often want to shake some creepy guy's hand or talk to a toothless whacko in a taxi. This extreme straitlaced-ness reigns in bad behavior sometimes.
Before my arrival I couldn't comprehend the ins and outs of life organized on a small scale and centered on Islam. Since I've been here so long the adaptations that I've made in order to survive here are second nature. I guess that when I go back to America my readjustment experiences will be the gauge of those. I don't expect that I'll want to return to my life here, I should note that. But overall, this has been such a positive and worthwhile experience that I honestly wouldn't trade it for anything. I am proud that for one, I was able to make it here for two years and secondly, that I've been able to fill them with meaningful work and relationships. I am happy to have been here and I'm happy to be getting ready to go.

2007-06-22T11:54:00.000Z

Letter from a former Student

(This came from a very intelligent and meticulous student I had last year. It is easier to understand if you often substitute 'us' for 'we.' If you aren't impressed, remember the foreign language you studied in high school.)

"the letter of farewels from Saedna to Heidy"
Heidy, the first, I tell you Good Luck, and a good trip. I wish for you good life with your friends and your family, and with your new friends in Mauritanie. And I wish for you too every happy, I hope [that you] love Mauritanie very much, and you love her people and her life, and everything here, and her habit like tea.
You [are] a good teacher and you learnt we very good. Everybody we love you and How no? You are our teacher and I think you love we because you came from far for you help we. We thank you for every things. We never aren't forget you [especially] me. But, I'll tell you one words please you Never forget we. I hope to be in your heart and in your head. [I hope you love Mauritania] not just now but in everytime in morning and in the night and in the angrys, and in the happys and in every things. Now, I'm afraid one things is: when you know a new students you forget we, that is bad. For we you are a best teacher. If I have the money I will do for you a best party, but that problem because this year I prepare for the [college entrance exam]. You know, I am very buzy by study and I don't have any time, I go to school every day, no interesting, but this is the life. In the life always you have many works, in the life no money if you don't work. I tell you one thing, please you don't sit and work always, and you don't forget your friends here, and you can visit we when you like it.
your student always,
Saedna

2007-06-22T11:36:00.000Z

The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Can
Here's an informational placard that I saw in the bathroom lobby of Mauritania's first-ever skyscraper, which at ten stories towers above all other structures in the supremely mediocre capitol city.
If you saw this kind of thing in America, you'd assume it was somebody's attempt to avoid a frivolous lawsuit.
But here, flushing toilets are rare enough that most people have never even seen one, and therefore need to know that you shouldn't stand on the rim, for example.
Only problem is, the target audience probably doesn't know how to read French. It should be in Arabic.
What these people need is a real-life demonstration, but I'm not going to lead it.

2007-06-22T11:04:00.000Z

PLEASURES OF EATING FLESH
I didn't eat much meat before I left for the Peace Corps. Since being here in Mauritania I've sampled some unique meat dishes, and I definitely didn't pass up any chances in South Africa to sink my teeth into the local beasts. Here's a list of some stuff I've tried. See if you can guess which one I threw in there as a prank.
1. Antelope: kudu, wildebeest, and springbok
2. Camel: served atop couscous and as a pizza topping

3. Ostrich: in jerky form and on a savory pancake
4. Goat: usually on rice and harmlessly, accidentally sprinkled with sand
5. Balsamic baboon: glazed with wild berry confiture
6. Fish: hake, kabeljou, dorado, tuna and others
7. Pot roasted pork: in white wine with garlic, fennel, and and rosemary panchetta baked onion
8. Mopane worm dried (pictured above)

9. Crocodile in delicious, mildly spicy golden sauce
10. Sheep: with Brian Zoeller's help I dismantled the head and cooked it into a tagine with cinnamon, peppercorns, dried chiles and cloves

2006-12-13T17:31:00.000Z

CLOSE CALL!
Last Friday night I was sitting on a disintegrating foam mattress by myself inside my host family’s one-room house, reading Freakonomics after dinner (cous cous and meat) when I came face to face with a snake.
For a split second, I didn’t believe my eyes! Its dark coloration, camouflaged against the carpet, allowed its thin, long, slow-moving body to slither right up to me (within arm’s reach). Without even realizing it, I stood up, heart pounding, and moved to the doorway. Pure, unadulterated bewilderment somehow prevented me from yelling out to my host family, so in a voice that was so calm as to be completely mismatched to the situation; I stated “I saw a snake in the house. Come here. Quick.”
Before then, I’d thought that snakes only existed in the outskirts of town, where there is less human activity. My host family and I live in the city center so I didn’t ever expect to find one at home. But even the downtown residential area is so marginally imprinted by humans and so sparsely populated that these nasties occasionally make their way in.
My host father was the first to arrive at the scene. Someone rather belatedly handed him a large, crooked and blunt tree branch that he used to jab twice in the general direction of the offending creature, which by that point had gotten on the defensive and edged toward the opposite doorway of the room. Within a minute or so, le serpent had gotten away from us and found temporary refuge in the tin storage shed outside the house.
This was a first- time occurrence at their household, and not just the children were scared. Several neighbors and friends, some wielding flashlights, came to our assistance and their general consensus was that he was hiding somewhere beneath the pots ‘n’ pans in the shed.
Of course people couldn’t refrain from making comments of a religious nature, I guess for the purpose of reassuring themselves. Allahu Akbar! Or In the name of God! I wasn’t kidding when I said earlier that people here always involve God in the conversation.
I have to say, I wasn’t terribly anxious at that point. I’d seen the snake and it saw me, and it was probably more afraid of me than vice-versa. Instead of sleeping with a few others inside the house as usual, all twelve or so of us clustered under the covered patio (remember that there are no “beds” here). I didn’t think that the snake would come back out and confront us after my host father’s attempted assault. I was more frightened in the sense that it had gotten so close to me and I didn’t even know it.
The next evening, they apprehended the scaly intruder. I am not kidding when I say it was about two feet long. I missed this final episode since I was busy hosting a Thanksgiving dinner party for some friends at my own house.
I’d like to end by commenting that I don’t absolutely abhor snakes.
Throughout my childhood I used to like to take evening classes at Gove Community School. I started in tap-dancing, then moved up to origami, pottery, drawing and painting… Marlena was in sixth grade then and described the point as such: to get kids hooked on crafts, not crack.
One time, though, the course offerings must have been extremely scant since the only thing my mom signed me up for was snake handling. That was taught by an extremely offbeat, middle-aged woman whose seminars consisted of showing us several pictures of different snake species and then, on the last day of classes- I swear I am not making this up- rounding up her rather sizeable personal collection of vipers, which she transported to the classroom in canvas sacks, pillowcases, etc. (much to the janitors’ horror). I noted that I was the only girl who signed up (I think that Charles Marshall was in the class too) and I didn’t take any risks handling her snakes. I can’t honestly remember how many of them I picked up or whatever, but I was probably relieved to revert back to my doodling pad and paintbrushes when that was over.
But in view of the fact that last Friday night I didn’t scream or go ape-shit, I sincerely believe that I benefited from that bizarre stint at Gove Community School. It must have lowered my apprehension level around snakes. Hooray for experiential learning.

2006-12-13T17:30:00.000Z

Ode to Bissap and Tamarind
In addition to their zriig and tea, Mauritanians love a sweetened beverage called bissap juice. I don’t think that the plant known here as bissap exists in America, but it is related to hibiscus. If you ever drank Red Zinger tea, you may recognize it as the tart-tasting element that gives the tea its signature color. At any rate I don’t think it is very well known in America.
I can go to the market and find a baggie of dried and dusty bissap leaves. I soak them in a few liters of water overnight, throw the leaves over the fence to my neighbor’s goats, and then add sugar to the bissap-infused water according to my taste, and it’s ready to drink. The bissap juice itself is extremely bitter and tart, practically undrinkable. But with a little sugar it is very palatable: delicious, tangy, sweet!
Bissap-based products are always very dark-colored yet their taste is citrusy and very flavorful. I think bissap could be a successful beverage in America, since unlike zriig and many other singularly Mauritanian creations, it’s not incomprehensibly weird. It’s also reportedly high in vitamin A. Women and children sell bottles of homemade bissap juice on the streets for a less than a quarter.
Another ingredient with some major potential here is tamarind. I don’t think tamarind has made many inroads in American/ Western cuisine, (maybe due to its unusual appearance?) but it can be used to add a noticeable perfume (sweet and sour) flavor to meat and vegetables. The first time I ever saw it was in a bowl of rice and fish, and its appearance disgusted me. Unfortunately, people don’t cook with it too often.
Tamarind comes in the form of little black pods that are part of a root, I think. They are clumped into balls, which cost about a dime. I don’t know if they are ever totally cooked, because when you eat them, you just suck on the pods and spit out the rest. I think they are the final ingredients in other sauces, maybe just heated to the point of softening up. They confer a pleasant, mouth-watering aroma that compliments sweet potatoes, tomatoes, etc. I have never seen them cooked down to a sauce of any kind except when Brooke (another volunteer) and I tried that, which turned out nicely although I feared that too high heat or too long in the pan would either destroy the flavor or make it too bitter. With tamarind, a little goes a long way.
Write a post if you have a memorable experience with either of these flavors.

2006-12-13T17:28:00.000Z

You know you’re living in a lawless land when…

…you don’t need any kind of identification card to withdraw money from the bank
…people refer to troublemakers (in English) as ’cowboys’ and ‘bandits’
…the concepts of intellectual property, noise pollution, food safety, and safe driving -among countless others- are completely unknown
…nobody has a satellite that is not pirated
…police officers let you pass through stops just for being able to say “Hi, how’s it going” in their native language
…the installment of the national guard in your town gets robbed at night because the guard was sleeping- on three separate occasions
…when you go camping you can start any kind of fire you please and any time you dispose of trash you literally throw it away
…workers themselves are responsible for all on the job injuries
…so few people can read that virtually no one would know what the law decrees
…nothing is non-negotiable, wink wink nudge nudge

2006-12-13T17:22:00.000Z

MAURITANIANS OF THE YEAR, 2006
Some countries in this region have genial, folksy connotations. Senegal, Mali, and Ghana fall under that heading. The Islamic Republic of Mauritania, however, stands alone. Paradoxically, Mauritania is an exceedingly hospitable country, yet in an aloof, laisse-moi faire kind of way. Its doggedly traditional and oftentimes xenophobic tendencies give it an entirely different character from any place I have previously known.
FRANKLY, Aioun el Atrouss is not a desirable place to live unless you are a member of a certain ethnicity. It’s no secret that the friendliest, most open-minded and at ease populations inhabit the extreme south of Mauritania and not the vacuous desert lands up north, where the Moorish culture prevails. Despite the challenges of living in this atmosphere, it’s possible to find some sympathetic folks.
I have met a lot of people in this town, and I reckon that everybody here knows my name and what I do here. Within my circle of acquaintances, those who have earned the most admiration and respect are some members of my host family, a few teachers I know, a religious leader in a nearby village, and some guys who do laundry on the street. Here’s some more on that.
The first time I ever met Mohamed Sow was at night. At that moment, I was just having a cursory look at the house that I later chose to live in (in large part due to the good things I’d heard about the neighbors), and the only things I noted about him were that he was black and that he shook my hand. Typically, men here refuse to shake women’s hands, and vice-versa. I also realized at that brief, initial introduction that he had a very calm presence. When I moved into the house a few days later, he officially became my host father.
Over a year has passed since that time, and I have gotten to know the family well. Mohamed is intelligent, has an idea of what the world is like beyond Aioun (most people here do not), and is completely devoted to his extended family. He is among the few people here who can speak French well, and he has consistently given me friendly hints on how to do things here. He isn’t from Aioun so he sympathizes with some of the ‘outsider’ difficulties, but at the same time he is a positive and resilient guy and all the children in their home (most aren’t even his) worship him.
His wife, my host mother, is ‘Lailuha. I can’t directly communicate with her on such a variety of topics since she doesn’t know French, but I can verify that she is a model of kindness and decency. I don’t think there is a single person she doesn’t get along with. I never miss a chance to greet her profusely, since that is the polite and correct thing to do here, and she always greets me enthusiastically in response. I often totally wonder what her age is, but knowing that she has a daughter about my age and a one-year-old gives me a rough idea.
All the people in my host family are generous and insistent. In this culture, any time that you are serving food, you at least offer to share it with whoever else is present. They would never let me go without a meal. For better or worse, I truly feel like a family member.
Mohamedou ould Saleck is ‘Lailuha’s oldest son, probably 21, by a different father than Mohamed Sow. It’s plain to see where he gets his calm demeanor from plus there is a strong resemblance between the mom and son. “Papis” as he is commonly called, sought out my help in supplementing his English knowledge and I also invited him to the English club at school. He can often be seen in tee-shirts promoting Bike to Work Day 1998 and Coors Light that came from the closet of my real dad.
But Papis stands out because he is very diligent and well-mannered. In Mauritania, for every one person like Papis, there are thousands of slack-assed, dim-witted heels.
Jemila Bâ Pathé is an Arabic teacher at the high school. In this society, most women are barely literate and have zero intellectual or professional prospects. Jemila, who also speaks French fluently, is competent, reliable, and in several good ways exceptional. She has also been my primary hassaniya tutor lately. This fall she moved into the house across the street from mine, next to my host family, so I am lucky to have her as a neighbor too. Her kids are cute and polite (most children here are absolutely awful).
Alassane Sarré is also not from Aioun, but he has been teaching English here for six years now. Alassane is probably the single most motivated and disciplined Mauritanian I’ve ever met- he helped create an NGO here in Aioun that has been really active on a number of issues (health, education, environmental, and so on). Alassane has an unrelenting commitment to education and refuses to lower his standards and give into the cronyism that plagues this place. Alassane speaks seven languages fluently and was my main collaborator in the English club. It’s people like Alassane who push this country forward; come to think of it, he should be the next president. Most Mauritanians aren’t personally engaged in improving their country, but Alassane embodies that very idea.
Ousmane Sow actually lives in Kobenni, but I see him in Aioun from time to time. In his mid-thirties, he is a highly esteemed religious leader, which gives him the moral and social authority to mediate all manner of disputes, but in addition to that kind of cred, he has the kindest and most unpretentious manner imaginable.
When I go to Kobenni, I look forward to dropping by his mud-hut around mealtime with the Kobenni volunteers. Last time I was there, he joked that since Kobenni is about to have electricity put in, it will soon be second only to New York.
About Ousmane, Jarad said, “That man doesn’t have a mean bone in his body.” You could trust him if you had any sort of problem, and ask him just about any question. For who knows how many years he’s been the main go-to guy for Kobenni’s volunteers, no wonder why. Ousmane Sow is just the height of virtue, period. I heard that his father was a saint.
Next I am going to mention three people whose names I don’t actually know, but I like them since they unfailingly greet me every time I see them and have never, ever annoyed me. Those are two super friendly guys who do laundry near the market and a Muslim Brother shopkeeper known among Aioun volunteers as “Pip” since he is about four and a half feet tall. Pip is obviously of a different and extreme persuasion, but he is super polite to us volunteers and ensures the proper transaction. Merchants routinely attempt to prey on ignorant foreigners, but you can be assured that Pip is a fair and brotherly businessman.
Before I left Denver, and I had no idea where on earth I would wind up, I thought that wherever I live, as long as I find some decent people who are making the most of their situation by having fun, I could befriend them and learn how to deal. The people I’ve listed here fit into that category. Many of them aren’t exactly thrilled to be living in this corner of the world, but they don’t get discouraged and do their best given the limitations of the situation.
In these circumstances, where the culture is so radically different from home, there are plenty of people who I either don’t relate to at all or flat out dislike. (And then there are lots of people who are fine, who don’t piss me off but didn’t make the coolest people list.) Sometimes the jerks discourage me and that overwhelms my entire impression of the place: imbeciles and bozos galore. But in reality I am graced to have these people, since they are real, trusted friends. If we could drink champagne here, I would toast to that.

2006-10-14T10:41:00.000Z

An early call for a Christmas present:

Here’s one thing you can send me to help ease the pains of being so far away from the comforts of civilization: mix cds.

Good music is the balm that soothes any trouble . Since I like all kinds of music, I would love any kind of mix. At this point, I could even rock out to the muzak that floods the aisles of Woolworth’s.

So please take fifteen minutes and burn me a cd of some sort. The mix concept doesn’t have to be profound. Just anything to drown out the sound of braying donkeys and such. Take it to the post office and mail it to:

Miss Gehret

Corps de la Paix

B.P. 222

Nouakchott, Mauritania

West Africa

Once I get receive the cd, I’ll use my blague space to give a little shout out to you and thank you for your efforts.

2006-10-14T10:37:00.000Z

20 areas that merit further investigation

for me upon my return to America, inshallah

1. trying my hand at making chocolate truffles

2. join a German speakers’ club

3. make booze with materials other than hibiscus flowers

4. resume teaching English to refugees

5. make peace with having to wake up to an alarm every day

6. attend a Renaissance festival for once

7. learn how to play golf

8. go around giving talks at elementary schools about an as yet undetermined topic

9. acquire some of Frank Zappa’s albums

10. go horseback riding

11. learn how to identify trees and houseplants

12. learn how to grill

13. experiment with homemade granola

14. attempt to do a keg stand

15. get a better idea of what’s on t.v.

16. apply for a job at Peter Tat-2, inshallah

17. knit some scarves

18. cook things with fenugreek

19. attend a laser show, for old times’ sake

20. take a shower and dry off with a fluffy towel

2006-10-14T10:35:00.000Z

Here’s one way to piss me off: try walking in my shoes.

Immediately when you set foot in a Mauritanian home, you slip out of your sandals and find a place to sit on the floor.

Lately it seems that every time I get up to leave after paying someone a visit, I can’t find mine. Somebody else has put them on to go take a shower, get a glass of water, or taken a moment to stroll in them… to see what the Nasrani’s shoes feel like.

My flip-flops are almost always the biggest, cleanest, most comfortable ones you can find in the pile that crowds the entryway. My shoes do not suggest poverty or down-and-outness. In other words, they are inviting. So that’s why they look like a good pair to test drive.

2006-10-14T10:26:00.000Z

HOW TO SPEAK HASSANIYA

Hassaniya is an unwritten dialect of Arabic that made its way here a few centuries ago. Hassaniya is one of four or five languages commonly spoken in Mauritania, and it is the most important one. Hassaniya is the preeminent language here since overall, the country fancies itself to be an Arab nation.

So take a few moments to acquaint yourself with the basic workings of this quaint, prestigous tongue.

It takes an initial period of confusion to realize that it is actually rather easy. Furthermore, folks are extremely tolerant of goofy pronunciations and other blunders, so there is no need whatsoever for self consciousness. The mere fact that you are making an effort to learn it is seen as so endearing that some folks will insist on promoting you to family-member status within twenty five minutes of meeting you. But in many situations, you could get by knowing less than ten expressions.

Let’s get started by introducing a few consonants in the repetoire of sounds in hassaniya. There are numerous sounds that don’t exist in English, but here are a few of the most outstanding ones. In my opinion, the most difficult is the rolled r. I can’t seem to get this one down, even after years of attempting, but I can fire off a close approximation. Secondly, we have the guttural scraping sound (think throat clearing) that stands out to English speakers when they hear German, for example. Third, the forceful h, which has a different meaning from regular h. Get out your glasses and breathe on them as if you were about to wipe off some smudges. Bingo- that heavy breath is the sound we’re looking for. For the next consonant, prepare yourself by saying “uh-oh.” Somewhere in there, lurking in between the “uh” and the “oh” lies a nearly silent, key player linguists call the “glottal stop”. This subtle consonant can be very hard to detect and conjure without hearing repeated examples, but there’s no way you can correctly speak hassaniya without it. It alters the way that the sounds following it are produced, and the result is a kind of creaky, low-voiced, stacatto punctuation in the stream of vocalizations.

And finally, we can discard the letters p and f found in English. Hassaniya speakers simply don’t register these, in the same way that most of the preceding “letters” may have vexed you.

In addition to throwing out p and f, we can stamp out the verb “to be” as we know it. Therefore, no need to memorize translations of I am, you are, etc. So questions like, “Are you hungry?” would be phrased like, “You hungry?” I asked my neighbor Abdallahi what happened to this seemingly essential aspect of communication, and he said it stemmed from the religious philosophy that’s indelibly imprinted into hassaniya, which dictates that everything that is comes from God. Therefore, mere mortals should not going around pronouncing what is. Seems like a huge communicative handicap, doesn’t it? It’s actually not that hard to get used to.

Let’s elaborate on the topic of how spiritual beliefs influence the language, particularly with respect to their classification of time. Hassaniya speakers make frequent use of a few phrases that acknowledge their belief that everything that is, was, and will be is due only to God.

A statement about the future (and sometimes the present) is virtually always concluded with inshallah, which means “if God wills it.” This convention is mandated by politeness and common decency, plus a desire not to appear presumptuous. Therefore, inshallah can nearly be translated as “hopefully” but it isn’t an exact match since nobody I knew in America went around compulsively tacking “hopefully” to the end of their statements. Unless perhaps they were in dire straits. We Americans tend to make plans for the future and count on ourselves to complete them. If something prevents us from carrying out our intended activities, then we don’t normally attribute it to an act of God. Unless the event in question is a catastrophe.

Inshallah, though, is a pretty useful invention. It’s a back door, a responsibility deflector, and a good sarcastic retort to stupid questions. On the other hand, it’s an endless source of frustration for those of us who want schedules and deadlines to be respected, or to have any meaning. The inshallah mentality is difficult to reconcile with the desire for transparency.

Now, relating to events that have already happened, and the results of these: the role of the almighty is recognized by the term mashallah, which means “as God has willed it” and is often pronounced with a little rise in intonation that seemingly signifies contentment. Here’s an example for you, uttered last night by my host grandmother Jemila when she came over to my host parents’ house. This dinner turned out great, mashallah! Statements about favorable situations or occurences are always punctuated with mashallah. The idea is to give credit where it’s due, i.e. the man upstairs. But even in adverse circumstances it can appear, for example a friend of mine used it while describing her toothache.

And lest one’s religious convictions be doubted, hassaniya speakers further reinforce their piety by regularly substituting a simple “yes” with “By God yes” and likewise with “no.” And it doesn’t stop there. I could cite many more examples of this kind.

These tendencies of the language were hard to get used to for a person whose only regular ‘God vocabulary’ consisted of “Goddamnit,” “Oh, for God’s sake,” and “Oh my God.”

Just in case you have the impression that hassaniya speakers went around sounding something like members of the clergy, allow me to go about disabusing you of that notion.

What we’d call curtness and downright rudeness are endemic to hassaniya, except when addressing one’s elders. Americans, on the other hand, chronically soften the effect of their statements to the point of convolution. Say, if you think about it, or if you get a chance, would you just go ahead and grab me a glass of water when you’re up? would in hassaniya be condensed into Gimme a drink!

Most women speak almost entirely in gruff-sounding commands. Get up! Move! Go gimme a kilo of sugar! Eat! Drink! Go to sleep! And that is just how people do business and conduct their households. Imperatives rank among the most important aspects of communication.

People here just don’t see the point in being extremely polite or indirect in most circumstances. Likewise, our notion of formality is pretty much irrelevant. I suppose that they think that coming across as overly friendly amounts to a blatant attempt at deception. So for that reason, it is acceptable to take a severe tone (e.g. downward intonation) when talking to other people. I hadn’t even realized how good I was getting at this until my new site mates pointed out the way I talk to the undesirables who approach me while I’m working in the Peace Corps office. I tell ‘em to Beat it!

This frank manner of speaking is striking. I told my new site mates that they ought to permanently talk like they’re describing some sort of problem, or sound put off, or just unconcerned, and that will capture people’s attention and interest, and ultimately earn them respect. Certainly as a schoolteacher I have no choice but to talk to my students in an unswerving, authoritarian way.

I cite the pervasive, all-encompassing insult Igasar umrak! (meaning “May God shorten your life”) as further evidence of the tendency towards the overall flippant and crass communicative style. Although I have only said it at most three or four times ever (once to a goat), everyone else says it repeatedly, and at the slightest offense. This could possibly be the most important phrase in the whole language and should definitely form the cornerstone of your knowledge of verbs.

The vocabulary of hassaniya is also relatively easy to acquire, largely due to the fact that the environment it’s spoken in is rather predictable and enclosed.

Several French terms have infiltrated the lexis of hassaniya, though, and apart from that, the language strikes me as very economical in expression. ‘Building’ is ‘big house’ and ‘truck’ is ‘big car’ for example. Also, the adjective zayn (pronounced like ‘Zane’) is adequate for everything postive; ranging from fine/acceptable to great and fabulous. It astounds me that so many degrees of ‘goodness’ are compacted into one catch-all term.

To my knowledge, concepts such as hangover, mermaid, blowdryer, wafflemaker, happy hour, are foreign to hassaniya speakers, so there is no need whatsoever to learn those terms. On the other hand, you need to learn two words for water well (which differentiate the building material; concrete-lined or simple stone) and two words for sand (luxurious light-colored sand, versus ordinary orange sand).

Folks back home have asked me, “So do you speak in clicks and clacks over there?” Actually, yes. Clicks emanating from the back of the throat, signify ‘yeah’ or ‘I’m listening.’ On the flipside, there are a couple sounds which involve the lips and tongue that I can’t adequately describe. But those are important as well since they mean ‘no’ or generally signify discontentment.

And a final word about enunciation. By enunciation I mean articulation, the degree of effort that is put into pronounciation; in other terms, the active involvement of the lips and tongue and teeth, etc in speaking. It’s something that public speakers (and English teachers) must grasp. I’ve noticed that many hassaniya speakers, Haya for instance, just barely enunciate- perhaps this ties into the economical expression idea I threw out above. With a smidgen of practice, she would make a fine ventriloquist.

That calls to mind the way my mom typically pronounces the words, “I’m not sleeping. I’m just resting my eyes.”

Hopefully you can see that the aspect of memorizing new words is itself a task apart from comprehending the religious and cultural currents that inform the spoken language. And learning new words is definitely more difficult when dealing with an unwritten language.

One of my foremost personal goals as a Peace Corps volunteer was to plunge headfirst into language-learning, and although I certainly haven’t attained expert status in hassaniya, I am proud of what I can manage to spit out.

You may be wondering what the long-term value of knowing hassaniya is. I think it will come in handy when telemarketers bother me. Overall, though, I am glad to have taken it up since it’s a fine opportunity to learn, and I often feel like I am making discoveries of various kinds. It’s been been challenging and fun. Hassaniya zayn.

2006-09-25T09:05:00.000Z

HOT AND BOTHERED!

Before the rains came in late June, the heat was inexorable; it permeated absolutely everything. The break of morning started off at a foreboding eighty degrees, before the sun made its brutal ascent. The sand and the rocks trapped so much warmth that they continued to radiate it long after the sun had gone down. They never ever truly cool down, not until late December perhaps.

Imagine this. You wake up outdoors and plot the course of your day’s activities around the menacing heat of midday, when the mercury climbs as high as 114 degrees. Ice is the first item on the agenda. You don’t bother to change out of your pajamas, because you don’t have any, and there is no shame in wearing the same outfit day after day here. You drop by your neighbor’s homefront boutique and purchase a block of ice that is about the size of two baseballs for a dime. You go home and pour filtered water on it and quaff. There is a danger in consuming unfiltered water in the form of ice, but it’s a risk that’s worth taking. Chugging water that’s eighty or ninety degrees is difficult and unsatisfying. You continue to drink long after your thirst is quenched. The thirst will return soon anyhow.

As I write this, in late September, it is still hot and sunny by all means, but it isn’t nearly so brutal. Now we are treated to occasional cloud coverage and wind! Back in May all we got was a gentle breeze. Like somebody was holding a hairdryer in front of me.

Nowadays, due to the lower temps and occasional rains, mosquitos are able to proliferate. They couldn’t thrive in the constant, blistering sauna that was May and early June. That is the single, solitary, one-and-only upside to the whole hellish inferno: virtually no pests.

Unfortunately, vegetables couldn’t take the heat either, so the selection of food available in our market diminished. I also couldn’t find eggs (an important source of protein) in boutiques around that time, probably because they cooked themselves and rotted just sitting on the shelf. People don’t refrigerate them.

Normally I like to go jogging in the countryside. I enjoy it so much that I don’t mind wearing a long skirt and a head covering while I do it. But in May and June I perspired excessively in my sleep! There was nary a dry moment, so forget about working up a sweat intentionally.

I recall noting that water boiled in about five seconds flat back then. Even water coming out of the tap felt searing hot. Pouring water onto myself for a bucket bath did not produce the simple comfort that it does at this time.

The heat altered the texture of everything. Gels seemingly lost their viscosity, even shelled chocolate melted. I got a heat rash on my scalp! The heat abated my appetite. It was very easy to get by on just a little nasty food. I didn’t feel hunger like before. Only while eating I began to realize how hungry I had been. The next sensation I felt was being uncomfortably full.

Today is the first day of fall, and somewhere out there, that means something to somebody. But here, we’ve still got sun, sun sun! It’ll stay quite hot, though not eyeball-fryingly so, until late November. At least the worst part is over!

2006-09-25T09:03:00.000Z

20 things i have done/tried/experienced
for the first time ever, here in the r.i.m.

1. purchased a cell phone

2. rented a home

3. lived “where the streets have no names”

4. mastered the art of eating in a communal bowl with one hand

5. simultaneously thrown up and shat uncontrollably

6. regularly slept outside, under a star-filled sky

7. received a letter of apology from the manager of a brothel

8. sat on a toilet seat and caused it to crack (that was actually in senegal)

9. ate a camel pizza

10. ate the small intestine of a goat, as well as other unidentifiable organs

11. been called ‘monsieur’ on an almost-daily basis

12. felt overcome with emotion upon hearing a low-quality, synthesized version of Toto’s “Rains down in Africa” while riding in a taxi

13. been present for a coup d’etat

14. successfully propogated the concept of T.G.I.F. among highschoolers

15. learned hassaniya arabic

16. bucket bathed regularly, and washed my clothes by hand

17. watched moesha dubbed in French

18. ridden in a canoe alongside a swimming horse

19. received a baseball bat-sized sausage by mail from my parents

20. caused small children who had never before seen a white person to cry

2006-09-25T09:01:00.000Z

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO BE NUMBER ONE?!

It takes a multitude of unfavorable circumstances to be the “number one hardship country” in all the Peace Corps worldwide installments, but that is the position we RIM volunteers have attained since the Chad program was suspended earlier this year.

What do we get out of the deal? We got two cool Chad PCVs who decided to complete the remainder of their service here. That’s good enough for me!

Of course, this kind of label is largely speculative, but just like a natty old goatskin, it holds water. It’s presumably based on several things: the culture (of noncompliance?), the poverty and squalid living conditions… not least of all the dearth of booze that makes similarly dismal places like Niger and Mali more liveable.

A year ago in training, I first heard that our program was notoriously challenging. The news hit me like a slug to the chest. Two years in le trou de cul du monde! What terrible luck.

Well, “who cares” is all I think now. I actually have come to appreciate many of the aspects that, at first glance, seemed so problematic. In a year, you can truly adapt to an amazing extent if you make a sustained effort and don’t mind making an occasional fool of yourself. Slowly things start to make sense, according to Mauritanian logic, and you begin to appreciate an alternate way of doing absolutely everything. At least that is how it worked for me.

‘Cuz two is not a winner and three nobody remembers.

2006-09-25T08:47:00.000Z

Haya

The SECOND TIME AROUND…

I got a bit of a surprise recently, when my host sister Haya, who is my age, got remarried. A year ago, when I arrived in Aioun, she had been divorced for an indeterminate period of time. I assumed that she had few prospects. At that time I heard that her ex-husband, who is also the father of her 2 or 3-year-old daughter Saala, was living in Nouakchott. I remember hearing that they had divorced because his mother disapproved of her, in some vague way.

I had been visiting friends in an adorable nearby village called Kobenni when the decision to remarry her ex-husband was made. I don’t know who made the decision or for what reasons. The precise workings of the insitution of marriage here continue to baffle me.

Why did they get back together? Did he decide that he just couldn’t go on living without her? Was his absentee status as Saala’s father nagging at his conscience? Was it her cooking- her special way of combining rice and meat- that was just too delicious to forsake? Had there been another woman? And was it Haya or her father who gave her ex the green light?

Beats the heck out of me. Those would be impolite questions here, and I have not yet consulted my inside source on these matters, so I’ll continue by describing the big day.

The major celebration took place on the very same, sweltering day I found out about their nuptials. Around 6:30 that evening I walked across the street to my host family’s house. I had deemed the occasion important enough to don a veil, and have the wrinkles ironed out of it. The festivities predictably began with rounds of tea, and slowly neighbors and friends began filtering through the courtyard. My host family had set up several extra mats over the sand in their yard, in order to accommodate a large number of seated guests, and they had also borrowed a tape deck for the purpose of playing traditional-nomadic-wailing-music. There was some dancing: imagine restrained, rhythmic pacing accompanied by the wrist movements demonstrated on the senior fitness television program ‘Sit and be Fit’. We made light-hearted conversation and dined on very delicious ‘tagine’ which consisted of beef cooked in onion-flavored sauce, into which baguettes are dipped.

Marriage parties here are certainly festive, joyful events on some level. I certainly didn’t detect the level of glee that I anticipate at my real sister’s wedding next summer, though. I can think of two reasons why brides here intentionally repress a great deal of their enthusiasm. One, so as not to appear too eager to be separated from their own families, and two, so as to demonstrate their meekness and acquiescence to their future in-laws. Although getting married is the single most important event in Mauritanian women’s lives, social customs dictate that they feign otherwise, especially if they are young (less than 20).

Only one family member, El Alyha, seemed somewhat pumped up about the wedding, at least when Haya was getting the requisite, elaborate henna designs applied to her hands and feet earlier that afternoon. My host father was not even present for the occasion. I imagine that at that time he was engrossed by a BBC program on the neighbor’s television. The guests left and the night ended with El Alyha remarking to me, about the groom (in a fusion of hassaniya and French) “He sure isn’t attractive.”

I guess that since marriages here are way more practical than romantic, and husbands are providers, not necessarily “Prince Charmings” or “Ross Gellers…” there’s simply no need to work oneself up into an overly emotional frenzy.

I did witness something of a frenzy the following day, though, when my host father came home from the market with a brand spanking new extension cord and electrical plug to replace one that their goats had chewed on. The children were genuinely elated. Apparently that socket merited cries of happiness.

2006-07-05T05:33:00.000Z

update: SAME OLD BROAD

I am back in the states for a few weeks. My mom told me that prior to my arrival, she dreamt that when I came home, I was shorter.

But as far as I can tell, I haven't drastically changed this past year. I am pleased to report that I'm pretty much the same old broad.

2006-06-26T01:57:00.000Z

Yes, there is at least one Chinese restaurant in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania. Check out their special menu for Peace Corps volunteers, a.k.a. American peaceful volunteers.

2006-06-20T13:40:00.000Z

Here's that cool place that I was telling you about: "Creamy Rag."

2006-05-17T09:00:00.000Z

This year, I have alleviated the stress of my 15-hour work weeks by taking four vacations to Senegal. Each time, I take a 10+-hour taxi brousse ride from my home in the eastern zone of Mauritania. Taxi brousse is French for “vehicular instrument of prolonged distress.” There is no way that I could exhaust the particulars of public transportation in this part of the world.

Luckily, I can travel with my region-mates most of the time, and these journeys also usually involve a stay in our country’s modest capitol, Nouakchott.

The events and negotiations leading up to the first step into the taxi are usually incredibly adverse, and for that reason it is necessary to summon up all the composure and serenity that one possibly can. I walk up to the so-called ‘garage’ (which is actually a parking lot) and tell someone my destination, and immediately I am swarmed by droves of imbeciles who are pretending to help facilitate the transaction. In reality, these dildos are of no assistance. They must be deranged morons seeking revenge on normally well-adjusted people, there is simply no other explanation. Or they are trying to single-handedly nullify the concept of Islamic hospitality. Since garages are notorious havens for brief dealings with the dregs of society, this is a prime opportunity to indulge oneself by reciprocating the obnoxious attitude.

Although the price can usually be haggled down to something decent, I can’t help but think about how pleasant and carefree air travel, for instance, is in other countries. On a related note, although there is an airport in Aïoun el Atrouss, the planet Mars has probably seen more landings in recent years. For the price of seven thousand ouguiya, (about $25) one can purchase une place in the back seat of a ramshackle Mercedes that would provide enough room for a small child to comfortably fit one buttock.

Since it is custom to forcibly cram four adult travelers- often rotund white Moor women- into the back seat, it is advisable to purchase an extra seat to avoid spillage out the windows, suffocation, or implosion.

It is also common practice to seat two adults in the passenger side of the front seat, with the effect that one is virtually sitting on the gearshift. In effect, taxi brousse rides are a perfect opportunity to get up close and personal with Mauritanians, and to even lose oneself in the folds of their ample clothing.

These arrangements cause me to recall a brief period of time during high school, when Sarah was the only member of my group of friends who had gotten a driver’s license. Thus our frequent lunchtime excursions to Wendy’s necessitated some similar maneuvering.

Only once did I have to suffer the painful four-in-the-back arrangement- that was my first trip out of Aïoun. My host sister Zeinabou accompanied me to the garage to see me off on that fabled voyage, and advised me to attend to my muumuu when the hassles of boarding the craft caused it to slip and reveal a small section of my shoulder. Twenty minutes into the expedition, I had stared at the profoundly vacant scenery long enough to unruffle my feathers. In fact, I willed myself into a trance-like state, as I sought numbness from the passage of time. Incidentally, I was also experiencing a lack of sensation due to the weight of the other women’s hulking thighs and upper arms pressed up against me- truthfully, one could not easily have found room to place so much as a compact disc between us. I decided that I would avoid all unnecessary conversation- as well as the grilled goats’ guts that are served at roadside stops- in order to minimize my anguish and suffering. A kind, black Moor woman seated in the back did sort of take me under her wing, though, and generally cued me in along the way (“Tu urines ici!”), on the assumption that I would eventually convert to Islam.

Nowadays when I take these trips, I occupy my mind by pondering where on earth the chauffeurs come from, and precisely what form of psychosis they suffer from. The only criterion for getting the job must be passing a twelve-point insanity inspection checklist, there is no other standard that would unify them all. Not since I worked in a wig store have I seen such a mixture of nuts.

The scenic highways of Mauritania offer little for the eye to feast upon, although I always keep my eyes peeled for my favorite town, whose name is pronounced exactly how you’d think. As you can imagine, there is not a whole lot to Kremi Rag- just a few nomadic tents, surely a mosque, a couple permanent structures, and a handful of zombies. To all intents and purposes, Kremi Rag is nothing but a piss stain on the map of Mauritania. But these insignificant townships make me feel like my hometown Aïoun is an important, cosmopolitan hub by comparison.

Speed limits, lane markers, turn signals, street lights- nothing of the sort exists on the open road. There is but one paved road that traverses the country East-West, and it is called the Road of Hope. Sadly, I can only imagine Hope cruising down this road, cranking up the A/C and blasting Funkytown, or something irreverent. There is a generous sprinkling of police stops along the way, although the policemen’s exact purpose and responsibilities are unclear. Seatbelts are absolutely never worn, either. The standard safety assurance mechanism here is to say a small prayer at the beginning of the trip.

A good chauffer will drive at 100 km/hr. However, sometimes all the instruments on the dashboard are broken so the speed is unknown. I sometimes hope the tape deck will be broken too, to spare myself from a deafening medley of three Lebanese pop songs played at the wrong speed. Overall, the inside of these cars demonstrate a high level of damage and wear. Not since stepping inside the Neon formerly operated by Scott Woodrow have I seen such utterly dilapidated gear. Some drivers average 130 km/hr, which makes for a terrifying- but briefer- ride. In that case, the time is spent contemplating my own mortality.

In conclusion, the taxi brousse voyage is many things: an assault on the senses, a means of transportation, and the best time to block the world out and take a shot at uh, transportational zen. Of course the pleasures of the destination outweigh the benign aggravations of the journey. As I take a combined total of four taxi brousse rides to Dakar next week on my way to America, I will be thinking about how to retrieve my old self in time to get to the states. Anything can happen but it usually makes for a decent story.

2006-05-17T08:45:00.000Z

ALL IN THE FAMILY

Now and then I spend weekend nights at my landlord’s home. She is such an amusing character that one day I might devote an entire blague entry to her. The Mischievous Personality and subtly Villainous Ways of Mati mint Mohamed.
Anyhow, on a recent morning Mati briefly and unemotionally recounted the news of her divorce. On the Feast of the Sacrafice, her then-husband called to say he was leaving her for a younger, black woman. “Do you have a boyfriend in the United States?” she then queried me. I paused and said, “Well, there’s someone that I’m interested in.” Her next question was “Is he the son of your paternal uncle?”
In this society, there is no ‘dating’ to speak of- if you think about it, 'dating' is kind of bizarre and ambiguous anyhow. Dating is isn't really necessary here because consent for marriage is usually given by both parties’ families, and often within them. So it isn’t such a laughable question. According to an item I recently saw in Newsweek, it is estimated that in neighboring Morocco, between 10 and 50 percent of the population have parents who are related. There was no data for Mauritania, but I would wager that the same holds true here, since the population is smaller, holds very true to traditional ways, and has less contact with the outside world than Morocco.
So quite a few people here are married to a cousin. Mauritanians who advocate marrying within one’s own family point to the high rate of divorce here and say that a family member is more trustworthy. Also, since marriages involve large cash payments to the bride’s parents, why let that wealth slip outside the family? Plus, as far as compatability goes, they think that a relative would be a safer bet than some stranger from of a different breed. Also, if it’s a practice that has gone on for ages, why stop?
Repugnant, no?
I had been here three months or so when I realized that there seemed to be a good deal of fucked up-looking, retarded people lurking about the place. I also noticed that many people have an eye that doesn’t operate in tandem with the other or just doesn’t budge at all. I gave thought to the general inclination towards trollishness and other physical defects, especially on days when I was frustrated by living with the residents of this town. Maybe inbreeding accounts for some of these instances.
From what I recalled writing a couple years ago in my Anthropology notes, marrying a relative is not a great idea due to the greater likelihood that that person carries the same genetic mutations as you. For example, you might appear to be normal, but carry the gene that causes dwarfism or albinism, for example, if it is paired with another one like it. Your cousin, who is also healthy, may carry those genetic variations too. Then pick any random person you meet in a bar, that person has a very different genetic palette.
The two seemingly- normal but related people have a higher chance of producing an albino dwarf- they came from the same genetic stock. The risk of giving birth to freaks of nature is doubled, although it is still low, so the stranger in the bar is a better bet. But since genes combine in numerous and unpredictable ways, the offspring of two related people are not always fucked up and retarded.
Do people perceive any risk if they tie the knot with their first cousin? Probably not. Of a whole slew of kids, if one or two turns out half-baked, according to local wisdom, that’s an acceptable loss, that’s how God has willed it. Tradition triumphs.
In America, twenty-four states have laws forbidding cousin marriages and another handful mandate genetic counseling for cousin couples intending to reproduce. But our revulsion on this topic is something relatively recent, I think. Plenty of people have married their cousins throughout history, and we’re all probably a little bit more inbred than we’d care to think.
My mother jokes that it’s a good thing that my dad didn’t marry a highschool classmate, since everyone in his graduating class and hometown seems to be related. Incidentally, my parents met in a bar. Not a family reunion.

2006-04-17T19:05:00.000Z

A COMMENTARY ON THE NUMBER OF HUMAN BEINGS I HAVE BEEN OFFERED

GOOD THING I am not a human trafficker. About a month ago in Aïoun I realized that I had been presented with the opportunity to accept a lot of human donations. I could recall five occasions when someone (once a total stranger) said to me “Shall I give you this kid?” or “Do you want this baby?” On two occasions the offer was less blatant and couched in more indirect terms.

I’m not exactly sure how to interpret this, but here is a shot.

Like anywhere else in the world, people here love to joke around and tease each other. Certainly people regularly try to embarrass and rib me, just for grins, since I am an easy target and they are curious about how I will respond. Usually these exchanges follow a predictable line of questioning, such as “Why aren’t you married?” or “Don’t you want kids?” and usually end with chuckles all around and high-five style hand slapping.

However, the social context of people offering me their a part of their brood can’t be entirely written off as jest. Initially I figured that perhaps parents made these comments to me as a kind of warning to their son or daughter, as if to allege, Shape up or we will send you off with this woman who is totally not like us, who doesn’t have any other kids, and does not appear particularly well-fed. In that case, the joke would be at the child’s expense. On one occasion my response was, Well, does she speak English? I don’t have much use for a kid who doesn’t speak English.

But I have reasons to believe that it has less to do with the child and more to do with me, particularly my status as a single, rich woman.

One time I was given a choice between two boys, probably ages four and six. In Mauritania, where families of at least five children are typical, children are considered a sign of wealth and a source of pride. In fact, a person isn’t truly considered ‘grown up’ until they have at least gotten married. People here do not generally agree that the parents of two children are more capable of caring for them (by allocating more resources to each child) than in the instance of eight more kids. Consequently, most people’s approach to family size is whatever God wills. Take for example my host father, whose children range in age from four months to 28 years.

People here can’t easily understand why at age 25 I don’t want to be married and loaded down with infants. My line of thinking is not apparent to them, and come to think of it, I only once attempted to candidly exchange ideas on the differences between Americans and Mauritanians in this regard. Thinking back on that conversation now, I am kind of surprised that it even took place because in Aïoun the people are way too conservative to even broach the topic.

As I write this, I am realizing that I ought to upgrade my Hassaniya vocabulary to convey the nuances of the following phrases: Why would I want to do that? About 95% of the ‘eligible bachelors’ my age that I’ve ever met have been dweebs or duds, or too short for my taste, whatever. Or likewise, Who in their right mind would marry me? Then again, I could reply that I am only following my mother’s advice on the topic, which was lightheartedly dispensed long ago- so long ago that I could hardly appreciate it at the time: Marry an old man with one foot in the grave and the other one on a banana peel. Although it’s worth a shot, my company would probably not fully grasp this retort: If I wanted to hear the pitter-patter of little feet, I would outfit the lizards that run amok in my yard with tiny shoes.

Anyhow- people would never ask, but they probably assume that something is wrong with me, and that accounts for my regrettable lack of progeny. But as a professional person, I have a good source of income, and in fact I am extremely well off compared to most Mauritanians. The fact that I have all this money and no little ones to divert it to is even more lamentable, in their view. What a waste of perfectly good spending money, right? If they could spare a youngster, surely I could use that extra help around the house, they reason. I have seen people here put their children, especially girls, to work performing every imaginable variety of household duty at all times, much more than the average American kid factors into his weekly chores. In this regard a litter of Mauritanian children justifies its existence by providing a valuable service: that of a short crew of unpaid and poorly compensated janitors.

Since young ones are a valuable source of labor here, people have historically given their kids to friends and acquaintances as a means of currying each other’s favor, paying debts, establishing relationships, and such. The practice of slavery was only outlawed in 1980. And it has been repeatedly abolished since then, because the first time wasn’t sufficient in stamping the practice out. There remain an estimated ninety-five thousand slaves in the country, which has an estimated population that is similar to Denver’s.

Abolition has been hindered by a plurality of factors. In some cases, family traditions of servitude are so strong that the slaves refuse freedom. Certainly religious and racial dynamics are at work in preserving the system. In extremely isolated areas, villages of 20 people or so, gross lack of employment options and an appalling level poverty enable this practice to continue.

Last summer, I listened with great interest to the story of a man whose father gave him away to a friend, as an act of generosity and goodwill. He must have been just about the youngest of several children, otherwise he would have been too valuable of a commodity, I suspect. He recalled being treated basically as a slave by this new family, in particular getting ordered around by the women of the family and getting handled more harshly than their children. It pained his father to see him in such conditions on the few occasions when he would visit. Eventually this man was freed from that life and went on to become a very well-educated and respected professional.

In this society, incurring someone’s favor can yield very big dividends when the other party reciprocates. Maybe that person will forgive a loan, or give consent for you to marry into their family, vouch for you, lend assistance or protect you in some adverse situation. Having friends, connections, and personal relationships is of paramount importance here, and undoubtedly people have historically regarded the practice of giving their kids to each other as the noble thing to do, or at least offer. The mentality of using people as bargaining chips is unfortunate, and difficult to change.

Mauritanians take a look at me and they wonder what I could do for them. They figure there is no harm in asking, no harm in just throwing an idea on the table. When given the choice between the two little boys, I said I preferred the younger one because he was cuter, and he had on an adorable toddler size traditional Arab men’s robe. But I went home empty-handed. After several discussions with my friends, I have settled on the explanation that the meaning of any proposal here is whatever you make it to be. There is no inherent meaning in any remark, ever; it is the interpreter who assigns meaning by relying on his own culturally-influenced mental devices to mentally digest and garner a sense of what has been said. And for me, a foreigner to Mauritania, making any sense of what people say is sometimes more difficult than getting a lizard to hold still long enough to lace up its sneakers. At the end of the day, the practice of offering one’s children to a white person like me is probably just a benign way of pointing out one of the numerous differences in our lifestyles.

Now that I have had ample opportunity to reflect on this, I will have a number of tactics to pull out of my sleeve the next time this happens. I admire the short-and-sweet approach taken by Loic Hudson. When asked “Would you like my child?” he replies, I’ve already eaten. Molly McCollom advises that repeat offenders, those who incessantly and aggressively nag you to take their kid, should be taken up on the offer, but with several terrifying qualifications. I have decided to rename her Shannon and re-gift her to some rich folks in Ohio. They’ll ensure that she grows up right: ignorant of Islam, boozing early and often, and munching on fried pork skins. OK, I have embellished that last part a bit, but it’s up to you, after all, to break down what I’ve written here, recombine as you see fit, and make sense of it.

2006-04-04T22:02:00.000Z

A treatise on the consumption of zriig.

In my past life, c’est-a-dire, I used to dislike drinking milk. As a kid, I loathed the fact that going over to my friends’ houses inevitably meant getting served a big, lukewarm glass of milk with dinner. And usually it was not the kind of milk my parents bought, so to nobody’s surprise I grew up to be one of those people who shamelessly prefers soy ‘milk’.

In my current and vastly different state, I realize that I regularly consume very large amounts of milk which come from myriad sources. I have actually become a heavy drinker of it, sans exageration. My fondness for milk is inversely related to the availability of other protein and calcium- rich provisions.

In this posting it is my aim to elucidate a few aspects of milk consumption that, in my view, are particular to the Islamic Republic of Mauritania. Although tea is the hallmark of Islamic hospitality, milk is an essential ingredient. I have scrutinized and reviewed every source of milk within reach, with the exception of my lactating host mother. I herein provide an alphabetized list of some variables relating to the satisfaction of each milk-drinking experience, and I conclude with a list of pointers that will give you an idea of how to drink milk here, comme il faut.

Locally harvested milk is ... raw, and that's what makes it dangerous, and exciting for those of us who have consumed pasteurized milk our whole lives. It comes from the cows, camels, and goats that share our living space. Powdered milk is also very practical due to the lack of refrigeration and its low cost.

If you are a guest in someone’s home, you will likely get served a bowl of zriig. Zriig is a beverage consisting of milk (fresh or fetid), untreated water, and sugar. The milk might come from an animal raised in that person’s home. Accepting zriig is tricky, though, as there are health hazards involved in consuming it (especially if you are new to the country and haven’t developed a resistance to the general filth), and at the same time there are social repercussions involved in declining to drink it. Further complicating the matter is the issue of precisely what quantity you ought to drink. You will be offered a generous amount, but it is up to you to judge exactly how much you should knock back in order to flatter the host and yet avoid appearing gluttonous. Maintaining composure, as always, is key.

These criteria are salient in shaping the satisfaction of each sip.

* Aftertaste. Camel’s milk has the most pronounced aftertaste, which is hard to explain. “Afteritch” might be more appropriate. After asking around, I have concluded that camel milk consumption- as well as the nation, come to think of it- is chiefly governed by ethnic factors, namely, the lighter-skinned people whose ancestors arrived here on camels. I have only met one black person who has this predilection for camel’s milk. Most agree that the imprecise- yet potent- aftertaste acts as a deterrent.

* Color. For some reason, powdered milk has a more dingy, yellow color than any kind of prepackaged milk, with the exception of “Melon milk” which is completely gray, but delicious nonetheless. Additionally, camel’s milk tends to run a more beige hue than cow or goat’s milk.

* Conditions the animal was kept in. It stands to reason that better environs for the animals makes for tastier, higher quality dairy beverages. Most of the goats here subsist on paper trash laying in the streets, so their nutritional input isn’t top-notch. However, their milk is not nearly as bitter and generally “disagreeable” as the milk produced by camels, who roam the countryside, subsisting on trees and above-ground organic matter.

* Container. This is taken to mean the vessel that the milk is stored and served in. These are rarely if ever ‘washed out’ and can take the form of anything from a wooden or aluminum bowl, an old brake fluid container, to a goatskin, n’importe quoi. My preference is anything but a goatskin. The goatskin is not at all aesthetically appealing and may cause hair or other particles to get into the milk, yet it has the added advantage in that it acts a natural cooler. It is an unfortunate reality that sometimes, the container seriously detracts from an otherwise perfectly enjoyable milk-drinking experience.

* Degree to which your mouth gets coated. Goat’s milk does not coat your mouth very much at all. The dilution and sweetness of zriig tend to prevent mouth-coating. Your mouth gets coated most often when drinking cow’s milk, undiluted. I once attempted to boil local cow’s milk in order to render it ‘safer’ since I had purchased the ‘ass end’ of the bucket from a kid on the street and didn’t want to take chances. Incidentally, I produced something that had the same texture as ricotta cheese. Chewing was necessary. But a little sugar and cinnamon went a long way.

* Locally produced/Imported. It is most economical and practical to purchase milk that is locally produced. Mauritania produces virtually nothing noteworthy, as a matter of fact, and imports onions from Northern Europe even, so from that angle it makes the most sense to purchase domestic milk.

* Microorganisms. This is an obvious risk, but one that has to be taken nonetheless. Tuberculosis can be transmitted through unpasteurized milk, and giardia and a host of other illnesses can be transmitted through untreated water in the zriig. Often there are so many flies (which are vectors of amoebas) that a few fall into the bowl and it is up to you to politely draw them out, using the right hand! I once picked five out. The low level of cleanliness is so widespread that, on the occasions when you do become miserably ill, you can never attribute it to a single glass of milk. I should also point out that there have been occasions where I was sure that the zriig I was drinking (out of politeness) would wreak intestinal havoc, but it never did.

* Nutritional Quality- Note to self: LOOK ONLINE FOR NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION

* Nuttiness. I think that camel’s milk has the most pronounced nutty flavour, which could also be described as sort of burnt and buttery. Nuttiness compliments the other complex flavors present in camel’s milk.

* PH- factor. This is something I don’t have the instruments to measure, but I assume that most milk is basic, with the exception of stale milk, which is more acidic.

* Price. The cost of one liter of domestically produced cow’s milk is $1. The same quantity of camel’s milk is about 85 cents. I do not know the cost of goat’s milk. I suspect that since virtually every family keeps goats in their home, and since goats produce the least quantity of milk, it is not sold as frequently as the other two varieties.

* Quantity I’m expected to drink. This is always difficult to judge because it depends on the situation. I always take a few generous sips and wait for the host to command me to drink more before proceeding. Mauritanians appreciate the opportunity to be generous with their guests, and any serious offer of zriig will be accompanied by the imperatives “Shurbi!” (drink!) while you are partaking in it, and usually statements to the effect that you didn’t drink enough afterward. It is probably best to say that you’re satisfied before you reach mid-bowl, and pass the zriig on, because undoubtedly there are children or other family members who will get the next sips. And besides, there is almost always some sand or other bits of Dieu sait quoi resting at the very bottom of the bowl.

* Rancidity. Some people (mostly white Moor ‘hicks’) prefer to consume their zriig with milk that is aged. Local milk is almost never refrigerated, so it stands to reason that it might separate, develop a yogurty consistency and a strong, rotten smell. In these cases, the robust aroma of the beverage makes it hard to put the bowl to your face into and gulp. But you gotta do what you gotta do. As my mom would say, “Give it a good ol’ college try.”

* Salinity. Like the aftertaste and nuttiness categories, camel’s milk has the most pronounced tendency toward a salty taste, probably owing to the camel’s inclination towards foregoing water for extended periods of time. This is another aspect of the taste that is hard to get used to. I have often thought that a little pepper would compliment the essence of camel’s milk, but I have never tried that. Most Mauritanians do not own pepper anyhow.

* Stirring Mechanism. This can range from a whisk-type device (which is ideal) to a person’s ignoble left hand. The shameful left hand should never be placed in the milk bowl, but that type of infraction does occur nonetheless. Tant pis.

* Temperature. Zriig is almost always served at room temperature. Room temperature here is between 80 and 130 degrees.

* Thirst-quench-ability. In my opinion, there is no kind of milk that quenches your thirst as well as plain water does. Having stated that, I have been astounded at how little of anything most Mauritanians drink throughout the course of a 100+ degree day here in the Sahara desert. When we got here, the Peace Corps advised us to drink between four and six liters a day. Mauritanians, on the other hand, do not drink while eating, and they don’t sip glasses of water throughout the day either, so I would wager that most consume less than two liters of fluid per day. I, too, have gradually become accustomed to consuming far less liquid than I used to.

* Uniform distribution of unidentified particles. In this event I advise you to use your teeth as a natural strainer, and not fixate too much on what caused those particles to get there.

* Viscosity. Does anyone know of a good recipe for making yogurt or ricotta cheese (intentionally)?

General Guidelines on Milk Drinking

1. Be a responsible milk drinker; be aware that you have limits. With the exception of pre-packaged milk, it is best to wait until you have been in the country for a few weeks before drinking. Even then, proceed with caution. My first host family in Kaédi advised me thusly: start out with a small quantity and if you experience no problems, you can drink more next time.
2. Say “Bismillah” (which means “a beginning in the name of God”) before you take the first sip.
Definitely avoid swirling milk around in your palate and do not do any more pre-first sip sniffing than is absolutely necessary.
3. Don’t slam the whole bowl at once. Wait for cues from the host to “Drink!” Do not ask the host if beer-bonging equipment is available.
4. Do not chase milk with any carbonated beverage, ever. On one particularly thirsty occasion, I made the mistake of immediately following a half liter of expensive flavored milk with a Coke light, and then hurled, thus wasting the $1.50 I had spent on those drinks.
5. Be mindful to call the animal by its proper gender. Refer to camel’s milk as Lait de Chamelle and not Lait du Chameau.
6. Avoid drinking in public, but in circumstances that necessitate it, always be prepared to share. Never consume anything in public during Ramadan. Polite Mauritanians always offer whatever they are eating or drinking to whomever's around, and they expect you to do the same.