Almost there!

Well, in about 3 hrs my swear-in ceremony will start and I will become an official Peace Corps Volunteer. It's hard to believe that my service here is only just about to begin. All that's happened so far has just been prep.

I'm really psyched about my village. As I said, I'm living with Fulanis, the herders of Niger. I totally win at posts. My village is really spread out, with each family group having it's own little compound int eh middle of their fields. I'm in the Maigari's (mayor) compound with his two wives and all his grown up sons. My concession is huge and I have a huge two room house (maybe 20ft square). Also my neighbor has a tv with solar panel. I'm 7k along a laterite road to the paved road where my sunday market is. That's also where I would go to get a bush taxi to Niamey. Also I'm so rediculously close to Niamey it's stupid.

Alternatively, I can go down the laterite road teh other way to the neighboring village which is only about 3k from my house. This town is a more typical denser town than mine. It even has power after 6pm...so all my villagers go there to charge their cell phones. This is also right on the Niger River...so I'm only a 20min walk from the river, a cool breeze, and fish. I spent about half my time There while on site visit. From There I can take a boat across the river to a town that has a Saturday market, and then get a taxi there to Niamey. All in all, from my door I can be at the PC Bureau in 2hrs.

I've already gotten in well with some of my villagers. One of the Maigari's sons has been very good at getting me out of my house and meeting people. Every day pretty much we would go down to the river and see if there were any fish for sale and hang out with people in that village. In the evenings he would bring me to the school director's house in my village to drink tea and chat with all teh neighboring men in the village. Nigerian tea is amazing. It's so concentrated it's like espresso, and then they add a shit ton of suger. It's so good.

Anyway, so I've met a good number of relevent people in the village and gotten on well with them. I'm really psyched to get to post and really get settled. But first I have to party hardy after I finally get sworn in. After tonight, I'll actually be a PCV and not just another wannabe.

BTW. this will probably be my last post for the next month as I'm not supposed to come to Niamey for my first month. So that said...kala hando fo.