When methodologies collide....

Sometimes we see things here that are frustrating. Normally we try not to let them get to us, to walk away and wipe them from our psyche and hold no ill-will. Sometimes that task is a little harder. Let me tell you about yesterday. Actually, first, a little back history. Our house is in front of a school. Like directly in front of it. If there is a stiff wind while the kids pee on the school wall (lack of latrines) it might hit our front gate. That's how close we are. This is a National Government school, which means it is often on strike, but when it is functioning we see the kids, they play with our kids and neighbors. I speak with some of the teachers who might come and sit on the bench under the shade of our tree once in a while and chat during the afternoon break. I am learning how their school functions, where they grew up, what their lives are like,etc. I don't know if I would call them friends, but everything is a relationship in progress :)

The school yard from the vantage point of my front yard

So yesterday afternoon during the school time two trucks came filled with white people. I am saying white people simply because they were white, spoke english and I don't know what country they were from, and I won't identify here which organization was emblazoned on the door of the truck. I am guessing a short term visiting team? They brought with them boxes of books. More specifically, soft cover Sunday school type materials with Bible stories in them. They emptied all their boxes and handed out these books to all the children. They video taped the whole event while handing them out, smiling children, etc then they drove off. Paul walked up just when they were leaving and found out what had just happened. He was not impressed to say the least. He saw some of the kids jumping up and down on piles of the books, tearing out the pages and flinging them around and jumping on them. Small fires were set for some. The teachers didn't try to stop them. Our neighbor boy, who does not attend the school, also had a copy which was torn and dismantled within minutes. This morning when I walked outside you can see the sand littered with bits and pieces of the pages all over the sand.

Shredded pages of the books blown up against our garden fence.

This one struck me as particularly poignant. I remnant of a page that is torn and says only "Dieu voulait" - God wanted.

This morning a bunch of parents (around 40 according to my guard outside) descended on the school, clearly very mad that the school (a govt school in a Muslim country) had allowed this to happen on school grounds, and if they hadn't given permission for it (we have no idea if they did) that the teachers allowed it to happen. I will give them the benefit of the doubt that they did in fact get permission from someone higher up, that they have a relationship with someone in the school who maybe invited them or told them it would be ok? That just never got passed on to the teachers or parents. They were extremely upset and mad and mistrustful of the strangers who had no relationship with the school and just descended in a "carpet bomb" of literature at a public school, took pictures, then left. A few of the teachers said they didn't know anything about it ahead of time and were surprised and upset it had happened too. I guess they didn't feel powerful enough in their own jobs though to go challenge these people handing out freebies on their school yard during recess.

I feel sad about the waste of those books. Had they been more appropriately targeted then lots wouldn't have been shredded and destroyed. I know there are local churches here who would have probably really appreciate them. I feel fairly sure the supporters who purchased those materials would not be happy either. I am sad that the school teachers and especially parents are totally mistrustful now of the efforts of white strangers and we worry about impact on our own relationships there. I am trying hard here to understand. I am trying hard to see a benefit of this type of drop off. There was no relational context at all and to our guards and neighbors.

I know that my heart and personality beats for building strong long term relationships and working in development to better the lives of the people here. I know that people have different approaches, opinions, etc. I really do get that and by no means think there is only one approach to love people and reach them. But really I am struggling with this one. My other neighbors are angry as well. They are a well to do Muslim family we have being slowly befriending ever since we moved in next door. Our guards saw it happen and were mad at the "typical missionaries!" (their words - not mine!) Haven't we learned and grown as people and grown in our respect and love for each other, for cultures and for building relationships. Really - I just don't get it. I am not trying at all to slam this effort or their hearts motivations, I am trying to understand.

Pray for us as we now talk with these neighbors and parents who are angry now. We aren't sure ourselves quite what to say.

For us, sharing our faith is very relationally built. As I sit with my language tutor, the village ladies etc, eventually they want to know about me too. They want to know why I would leave the land of riches (North America) to live here in the "heat and poverty". And I tell them why. I have hours under their straw roofs to talk and share tea and watch our kids play. We talk about hygiene, education, breastfeeding skills, crops, cultural mess-ups I have made, words I don't yet know and our children. We also talk about love, life, faith and hope. And I love it.

Feel free to share in the comment section your thoughts, insights, experiences etc with different methodologies, maybe you have some insight or words I could really use to help me understand this one. Opinions are welcome on the issue. No bashing please. Slander won't be tolerated and will be deleted. I believe above all that we are all here to love the people of Niger and no one is trying to purposely hurt the ministry of people, or act in an unintentional fashion.

So this may be a little heavy and more theological than our normal blog fodder - but this is our life :)

How to keep cool in Niger - a tutorial

The hot season is on. Well, not like it ever gets turned off here, with the temperate daily average rarely dipping below 30 even in COLD season, but this season, which I think lasts from March-July mostly, is miserably hot before we get some rain the end of July. The daily average in the SHADE these last few months has been 45 degrees Celsius (113F). The house usually seems to sit inside around 36 degrees with the fans running. So with this kind of heat for this long we need options to keep our brains from frying! We have found many different options on how to help keep us cool and active, rather than falling into a sleepy, grumpy, dysfunctional hot mess. Here are our  ideas for "beating the heat!"

The daily recommended 8 glasses of 8 ounces a day is just over one of these bottles. Paul and I drink about 3 each a day, and the kids one a piece. So this table represents the minimum our family drinks per day around here. I also have 2 or 3 bottles that are half full in the freezer than I top up with water when I go out somewhere to ensure lots of ice cold water in the heat! At least hopefully we won't get heat stroke from being dehydrated. We have three fabric carrier bags with straps that insulate and carry our water everywhere. We even have an extra for visitors (hint hint!)

 

In the morning if there is a breeze, we like to sit outside on the terrace to do language study or work. It is still in full shade, and when there is a breeze it makes the heat quite manageable. The same is true for the evening when the sun is down and the air is moving. You can see we are in the middle of screening in a little room here. We hope to be able to sleep outside when it is hot and the power goes out inside, and give us a refuge at night to sit/read/study/visit people or play guitar. We need the screen for bugs and lizards. At night hundreds of bugs are attracted to the lights and drive you crazy, and malaria season is soon upon us, so the screens are a must.

When inside, the heat and humidity would be intolerable without fans. At least being able to get the air moving around you feels like it drops the temperature by 10 degrees. So if we are in a room, the fans are turned on. Really irritating side effect is that all your papers get blown everywhere. We have lots of little paperweights now.

This fan below is a new model dual purpose fan/hair dryer. Yes, this is what I actually use 90% of the time to dry my hair, especially in hot season. The normal hair drier isn't strong on its cool setting and the normal air  makes my hair wet with sweat faster than I can dry it! And if I am feeling really hot and sweaty I go stand in front of this fan just to dry off and cool off. I call it the "jet engine" since it is really large, powerful and noisy.  Paul says he feels all proud with this "industrial" fan around.

 

Sometimes our power goes out, and when that does, the heat instantly settles in the room, with no fans to chase it away. This is particularly horrendous if it is 3am and you wake up with no power, no fan and a puddle of sweat and wet hair where your pillow used to be. So I made 4 long fabric tubes, with divided partitions, that hold a mix of lavender, corn and beans. These sit in the freezer all day and when the power goes out, we distribute one to each member of the family. At night this means we can fall back asleep and it will keep my head cool for the 30 minutes or so before the power comes back on usually (thankfully we are close to the power plant and come back online near the front of the pack!) In the middle of the day we will get them out and wrap them around our neck while studying, and Bennett especially likes pulling several of them out and laying under them as seen here. Arielle seems to like the heat the most, and Bennett the least. He always wants to be as cold as possible!

Another option we have here is the swamp cooler, or you may know it by the name "Evaporative cooler". It uses a motor and fan to pull air through a mat/screen of water which cools the air. As you probably already thought, this also adds humidity to the air. So in the really dry part of the year, these work really well for a single room. As the humidity starts to rise, as it is now, they becomes less useful since the air gets too humid so you are dripping with sweat from that too. Sometimes you just can't win! Also, these do wrack up the electricity bills, using about 40%  more power than just running the ceiling fans alone. We have been calculating and keeping track!

Our final option in the house is two air conditioning units. They are located in the bedrooms for us and the kids (who share a room) during hot season last year we had all four of us in one room. These are only big enough to cool the bedrooms. We try to only use the minimally and only at night. They are the most expensive option and one of our largest expenses every month is electricity. In the cooler season from October to March we didn't use them at all almost, but now in hot season we run them at night so we can sleep.

And when all else fails - the power is out and we have no escape from the heat, we do what any self-respecting Canadian would do, we head to the closest pool!! (This is a picture of our favorite pool at a local hotel where you can pay $5 per person to come for the day.

So come to Niger, and beat the heat! We have lots of options. Feel free to share your ideas if you know some others. We are always looking for new ways!

 

Until next time,

Chantelle

My buddy Souliman

 

I would like to introduce you to one of my favorite little friends here. His name is Souliman and he is the second youngest child of my night guard Ismaguil. He is 3 years old. We first met Souliman shortly after we got here when we got the scary call one night that he wasn't breathing and they needed our help (vehicle) to get him help. Paul rushed over to their hut and found him lying on the floor. Paul's heart sank as he thought that he was too late. However, he was still breathing, although struggling. We discovered he had whooping cough and taught them how to treat it.

As we slowly spent more time with this family while learning the language and hanging out, we learned what a joy this child has. Every single time we come to his place as soon as he sees me his face lights up and he runs full speed up to me with open arms to be lifted up into a big hug. He insists on sitting right next to me as much as possible. He doesn't care if we bring treats or not, he is just genuinely happy to be with us. If Bennett is there he follows Bennett everywhere and can't wait to play with him. I will get a video loaded here if I can soon and you can see him discovering bubbles for the first time in his life. A thrilling experience.

Another thing about Souliman is that he suffers from really horrible skin eczema.  I have never seen a case so bad. If you look at the photo below you can see his arms and legs are blotchy and discolored with rough dry patches and flakes that itch. At times his feet and ankles were so full of infection and puss that he couldn't even walk. My poor little friend.

 

 

A closer look at the skin on his lower leg.

 

Through the generosity of some of you I had two tubs of "George's cream" sent from Canada, which I know is excellent for this purpose. I had the honor to wash and clean his feet, give him a bunch of new pairs of socks and shoes and teach his parents how to care for his skin problems. Although he will likely always deal with sensitive skin and flareups, I am happy to report that his feet are looking so much better! His parents make him wear the socks almost all the time, which keeps out the dirty sand and infections sources as much as possible. Hard to do when you live in a hut where the floor itself is sand! (notice he is still grinning and playing with bubbles!)

 

Thank you for supporting us here. People like Souliman brighten our days and without your support (and generous care packages of cream!) we wouldn't be able to be here. We have the privilege of taking care of people here, including Souliman, and my life is richer for him.  I hope one day you can come to visit and meet him for yourself!!