Niger Adventure

The purpose of my trip was to find a partner for a project we are planning to undertake and after meeting with everyone on my list, a random organization came to light and we went to meet them. They seemed perfect but we needed to see their project in person and my coworker's flight was leaving that night. So that left me and the project coordinator insisted that we had to leave immediately to get out to the site in time. So without much thought I grabbed a change of clothes and then headed off in a 4x4 with two strangers from an organization I had just learned about that morning.

It didn't occur to me that this might not be the safest situation in the world until I was still in the car with them 9 hours later, driving in the dark, with no cell phone reception thinking "hmm, could I get out of this situation if I needed to?" Answer "probably not". I got a little paranoid and tried to start remembering the occasional city signs we passed which was no easy feat since they were usually covered in dust and illegible. Looking for landmarks in the desert was a no go either. Were we getting closer or farther away from that part of the country that is absolutely off-limits to foreigners?

Thankfully we made it to the destination which was the coordinators home and I started to feel safe again. Aren't homes nice? That lasted about an hour until we went to sleep outside on the porch and every car that went by scared the crap out of me. I literally slept with my flashlight and knife. I'm a little embarassed of this, but still.

The next morning was brilliant. My hostess made us breakfast and we chatted about families and life and all sorts of warm and friendly things. I felt so enveloped in protection- like a warm coat of comfort and safety had been wrapped around me in the night and I awoke totally sheltered from my earlier fear. We proceeded to have a lovely day visiting the nicest people throughout the desert. People who were warm, genuine, and curious. I realized that I always feel most at home in villages. It's the cities and the hotels that make my mind imagine crazy things. Sitting with an old lady on the ground in a village feels like about the safest place on earth. I felt like if someone so much as looked at me wrong the village would rise up and defend me. I felt absolutely ridiculous and a bit ashamed for having been scared the night before.

The trip went smashingly. Objectives achieved. I felt really good about starting up a project which would entail me visiting every three months. Subsequently the project fell through and I was truly disappointed. However subsequent to that two young French men were abducted in the capital city by Al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb, brought north to the border and killed during the rescue mission. At first this was just shocking- the capital? That's the one place that's supposed to be safe! Pulled out of a bar? I know that bar! But then I just got really sad. What this means for foreign aid is basically that no one is going to touch Niger with a 10 foot pole. It means those lovely ladies in the village I visited are not going to be the recipients of any new health programs any time soon. It also means that I'm not going back to Niger.