the supermarket we went to, one of the main streets leading to the petit marché in niamey.
the entrance to the grand marché - which was insane! i wish i could have taken pictures inside, but logistically it was just too hard unfortunately, with all the crowds etc.
just driving around niamey...
dr. ghaichatou - the woman we stayed with, plus her niece and ali and me on our last night in her house, right before she took us to the airport. she was amazing! such a wonderful person, i'm completely indebted to her for letting us stay at her house.so i thought i'd post some last things on niger, which i admit i am missing already. i do love being back in oxford, but man - that trip was just so short and it's so sad that it's now done. anyway, like i said, elliott sent me a bunch of good questions about niger so i'm going to answer them on my blog in case anyone is interested:
Tell us more about the food there. the staple food that all nigeriens eat is millet/sorghum ground up with some sort of sauce. 80% of the people live in rural communities, and that's all you can really grow out in the bush/sahara. only wealthier people eat meat occasionally.
And the women you're meeting in the hospitals. i mentioned more about them in my older post, but like i said, they're almost all illiterate, from villages out in the middle of nowhere, and the majority have been abandoned by their husbands due to their fistula. they're very kind and open and friendly - they were fantastic.
Where did the doctors get their training? How do people pay for healthcare? there is a medical school through the state university, that's where dr. ghaichatou got her training - but i was talking to one student there who said that the teachers and students all go on strike every month at least, because the government "forgets" to pay for the facilities. classic. but the national hospital is a teaching hospital, and there were tons of students around all the time. people have to pay for healthcare themselves, there's no national program and i never heard anything about any sort of insurance. this makes it so that people only go to the doctor when they're basically about to die - because they can't afford anything else. there are health clinics in a lot of the villages in niger, but they cost 1,000 CFA per visit (about $2.50), and hardly anyone can afford that, so they go unused. (or they go unused because there's not enough medical staff to run the things in the first place)
What happens to the women when they get out of the hospital and go back to their villages? that's a tricky thing - most just return to their mother's homes, some will go back to their husbands now that they are healed. but they have to be really careful about having more children, since their vagina has basically been reconstructed. and it's hard for them to come back for the necessary check-ups etc. when they live so far out in the bush.
What about the history of Niger? I know nothing about that country. niger was colonized by the french, but part of the "afrique inutile," or useless africa - because it's mostly desert, the french sort of ignored it. it got independence in 1960 and has a series of military coups and dictatorships ever since. quite a typical history for an african nation.
What do people do for work? well, unemployment is shockingly high. people who live in rural communities are basically just subsistence farmers, just planting their fields, tending their animals if they're wealthy enough to have them. in the city, people sell things in markets or work for NGOs (there are soooo many in niger).
Do families live together in multiple generations? yes, everyone lives together in a compound-like home. even in the city. ghaichatou had her own house technically, but her uncles and cousins lived adjacent, and everyone was around all the time.
Do they sit at a table when they eat dinner or on the floor? on the floor, with a communal plate.
Do they have toilets or outhouses? outhouses. but i had a toilet, which was wondrous.
Do most people go without electricity? yes, the rural communities are basically completely devoid of electricity. and niamey itself is pretty dark - electricity is very expensive, and there are long power outages all the time (which made it nearly impossible to sleep - no fan! ah, too dang hot)
Do people drive cars, bikes, or walk? walk mostly, ride animals (camels, donkeys etc), some ride bikes - there are bush taxis in the rural areas to take people from village to village, and taxis in the city, which is what i used.
Are their highways and railroads in Niger? no railroads, and yes highways which are pretty dodgy and disappear in most places so you're just driving on sand.
Do they use a national currency, or money from somewhere else? Or do people barter? they use the CFA, which is a west african currency used in about 10 countries including senegal, burkina faso, togo, benin etc. etc. people don't barter in the city, but maybe in the villages?
Where do people go to buy food--do most use grocery stores, or do farmers set up stands in the towns--or do most people grow their own food? in the rural areas everyone grows their own food, but there are markets once a week as well where people sell extra veggies etc. in the city rich people go to supermarkets, and then there are street markets selling vegetables, meat etc. that people go to. but most of the country lives off food they grow themselves.
How do people cope with the heat? oh man, they find it almost as difficult to bear as we do - march and april are "la saison de mort," or "the season of death," according to nigeriens. they find shade, and basically avoid going out from 12 - 5. really cuts back on economic productivity...
Are there problems getting clean water given that they're in the Sahara? yes, absolutely. water is scarce and quite dirty. the water we used to wash ourselves smelled absolutely awful, and this was in a nice city house. i can't imagine what it's like in the bush.
ok, there you go. sorry for the lengthy post - but if any of you were in anyway interested! :)
