Community Barbeque

We have been settling in at Galmi for a few weeks and, unfortunately, most of that time one or more of us has been sick. I guess that comes with the territory. Tab had a full week of work last week and I did a day or so, but, unfortunately, we keep getting interrupted by our kids vomiting on stuff. We have been taking prophylactic anti-malaria medicine for several weeks now but that did not stop one of our kids from getting malaria. We also had some sort of food contamination issue the other day. I was lucky enough not to eat any of the offending food and, therefore, I got to be the one that ran around with buckets and rags cleaning up while everyone else was sick. Thankfully, everyone seems to be on the mend and we should be back to our regularly scheduled programs soon. 

One of the more interesting activities we have participated in lately is a community barbeque. One of our friends has a herd of sheep and one of the lambs got the bloat. There is no vet here and they tried several things, but nothing worked to cure the problem. It was clear the animal was going to die, and the only real option was to euthanize it. 

Typically, the customs here do not allow for eating animals that are dying. In fact, there are quite a few things one must do before butchering an animal for it to be acceptable to eat. There are some good reasons not to eat an animal that is sick especially if you don't know why it is dying. However, in this case, it was just an animal eating the wrong thing or too much of it. I don't think that poses a danger to our health. So, our friend set up a butcher to come cut it up and take it to a man who would cook it. It was all a very interesting process. 

One of the more interesting processes is the cooking part. Back home, there is barbeque culture where people use charcoal or propane or smokers to cook and finish meat. Often people have very strong opinions of what is the best way to cook a hamburger or steak or brisket on a barbeque or a smoker or what-have-you.  

Here, there is also a serious meat cooking culture. They set up a fire very spread out on the ground and put sticks and rods through the carcass making it flat. sometimes they have a grate or grill to lay it on.  They spend hours and hours roasting it next to the fire adding spices and oil quite frequently. Then, when it is done, they wrap it in a paper bag and deliver it to the feast. It doesn't always look great, but I can assure you that it has the tenderness and flavors that everyone can love. 

After the meat was delivered, my friend took the meat off of the bones and onto a serving tray, and since there was so much meat that is best served hot, everyone here was invited to come and bring a side dish. It reminded me of a 4th of July barbeque, with kids running everywhere with food and sugary drinks. It was one of the better meals I have ever had in Niger, not just because of the meat, but also because of the community that was a part of it. 

We arrived

After a week of quarantine and a one-day delay for the weather (wind/dust storms), we boarded the small plane for the last leg of our journey to Galmi. 

The four of us in the back row. 

The kids (especially Eo) were thrilled to discover that our friends had stocked our new home with plenty of children’s books to enjoy!

“Quarantine “

COVID. Some things became more hectic, many things slowed down. And while the slow-down can drive us crazy, many of us have realized the benefits of a less hectic schedule and are choosing to continue to slow down and focus on the things that really matter. Right now, we are experiencing another “slow down” as we quarantine for a week before moving on to our final destination. 

In the era before planes, trains, and automobiles, traveling across the ocean to another continent required a journey of weeks to months.  Now it only takes hours to days. There are some advantages to having a longer transition time. For one, no jet lag! Also, time to process the leaving of friends and family and to prepare for arrival and new relationships. 

Now, I’m not saying that I want to go back to the days of packing all of your belongings into a coffin to travel for weeks to a foreign land. However, a week of imposed “down time” for COVID quarantine turns out to be not such a bad thing, and is even helpful in several ways such as:

• Time as a family without places to be or the demands of work and school...even our grocery shopping is done for us. 

J learns to mop the floor

 

Wearing googles to go outside in a wind/dust storm.

• Flexibility in adjusting to the 8 hour time shift. With little kids this is no easy matter. They say it usually takes a day to adjust for every hour time difference- so by the end of the week maybe we will be on a normal schedule?! One can hope.

• Time to recall how to make yogurt, use cloth diapers and a gas stove, adapt to power outages, convert tablespoons to grams, etc.
  

Power outage fun

“Dad, you really do know how to make popcorn another way!”

• Beginning the process of adjusting to the heat- and to drinking lots of water.
  

  Baby, it’s hot inside
So far it has been great to spend time as a family and prepare ourselves for the work that is ahead. Just a few more days, one more COVID test, and we should be on our way!

Can you eat lizard eggs?

The kids have enjoyed watching the various lizards run up and down the walls outside. They are intent on catching one for a pet, but as of yet have been unsuccessful.

Today as Luke was digging in the sand looking for a shovel the kids buried, we found some lizard eggs! We’ve never done much digging in the Niger sand, so this was a new discovery for us.

The kids wanted to know if we could eat the eggs. Apparently it’s safe to eat lizard eggs (turtle and crocodile being the most commonly eaten), but we decided to put the eggs back instead so the baby lizards can grow.

We made it!

After a thirty+ hour journey, we have arrived in Niger! Overall, the kids did very well on all three flights. 

Transiting through the Niamey airport turned out to be the most trying part of the journey. What often takes thirty minutes ended up taking almost three hours. And three hours seems like forever after thirty hours of travel with very little sleep.

Filling out ten entry forms (one each for the ministry of health, one each for customs) was harder than expected-trying to remember our French and keep all of the passport numbers, birth dates, etc. straight... while keeping the kids from wandering off down the enticing escalator. We were the last people to get our passports stamped.

At baggage claim our luggage was the only stuff left and our bins had already been loaded on to carts ... we counted and thankfully 14/15 checked bags had arrived with us in Niger. We sorted through fifteen airport luggage labels to find the one that matched the missing bag. Then, we reported the missing bag at the counter. 

We moved on to the final step where they put all of the luggage through X-ray. They pulled Luke back in to a side room to ask some questions. Turns out the donated batteries for the Galmi X-ray machine looked suspicious.  They X-rayed all 14 bags again. They opened the bins.  By this time, Winnie had had enough and she  just cried/screamed. Even candy and Octonauts on the iPad couldn’t calm her.  It was miserable. We were the last travelers in the airport. They lights were shut off. Still we waited while Luke talked to the officials. After over an hour of inspection and explaining and showing our paperwork/letters, etc. we were able to go with all of our luggage. 

We were very relieved to be greeted outside by our friend who had wait waited patiently to pick us up. We loaded into the car and took the final short drive to our quarantine house.  

We are so very grateful that the airport was renovated a few years ago to include jet-ways, enclosing the baggage claim and adding air conditioning.  If we had had to do all of that in 100 degree heat- we all would have been crying with Winnie!