Strange happenings

A few weird things have happened this week which makes me wonder if I’ve slipped into a parallel Abuja…. On Monday which is always the worst day of the week just because it’s Monday, I didn’t have to haggle for either of my taxis. Now this might not seem like much to any of you but the whole haggling for a taxi every time you want to go somewhere is really annoying. There isn’t much choice for transport round our way and you have to haggle EVERY time you get a car anywhere. Anyway both drivers to and from work just waved me in when I said “It’s 250” there I was all ready to haggle as I do every other time but no not today Oyibo.

Had I magically found a way to make it clear with my tone that 250 was all I was willing to pay? Did they just know by looking at me that they were never going to win? Had I passed some special Taxi haggling test after nearly three months of living here that meant I never had to do it again? Apparently not all back to normal on Tuesday, looks like I Just managed to find the only two drivers in Abuja who couldn’t bothered with the hassle, it was Monday after all.

The second bout of weirdness came this morning in the office when I found myself talking to the giant cockroach climbing the wall behind me. Weird because I didn’t even flinch when I spotted him. Now I’m not frightened of cockroaches like I am some other beasties but they are especially gross and up until now they have tended to make me shudder and/or yelp, usually just as I am eradicating them with a well-aimed jet of Raid which sends them into a frenzy ending with them squirming on their backs for up to a day before they finally die, poor blighters. Anyway I didn’t yelp, or shudder or even move in fact I got my camera out (god knows why) and then started to talk to it, well no one else was around to talk to.

I was asking Mr. Roach where he’d been, what he was doing now and telling him that I could still hear him when he hid behind the filing cabinet. Then he came out of his hiding place and my colleague walked in and took his shoe off and thwacked him. Goodbye Mr. Roach. I have a feeling you aren’t supposed to thwack cockroaches though, something about if they are lady roaches they carry their eggs inside them and you just disperse them or maybe that’s a myth. Or maybe I’ll come in tomorrow and have lots of conversations with lots of baby roaches. Oh dear I think I may have inhaled too much raid or something.

Mr. Roach

The final weird thing is that I think I might finally be starting to, wait for it…….tan. Having spent the first 29 years of my life lily white and freckly this is a strange concept indeed, so far this miraculous occurrence is limited to my arms and face. The tan on my feet keeps turning out to be dirt that washes off in the shower (despite this being a city it’s still very dusty here).  I don’t think I’m ever going to be brown but I do seem to have ceased glowing in a fashion that causes people to shield their eyes when they look directly at my skin. It is possible that my freckles are just merging of course. I hasten to add that I have been very good with sun cream and have only had one incident of sunburn since I’ve been here which is pretty good going really. I have no desire to look like a piece of shammy leather when I’m older but it is quite a novelty for me to have a bit of colour. Let’s face it one week back in blighty and I’ll be glowing again.

All quiet on the western front

I’m sat here on Sunday night realising that I have been especially quiet this week. Actually I don’t know where this week has gone it has literally flown by. After the excitement of seeing Jimi last Friday the rest of the weekend was fairly quiet so not much to report there. The week at work was also fairly quiet in that no one seemed to be around much so I plodded on with proposal writing regardless.

Some vaguely exciting things that happened this week, I found a ‘Spar’ close to where I work, it’s the most like a supermarket at home that I’ve found here but I can’t really afford anything inside, good times bad times.

I went to the clinic on Wednesday and whilst I was there I asked to be weighed (first time ever) and I’d lost 32lbs. I was over the moon, that’s in just over ten weeks so pretty good going I think. Definitely good times.

We went out on Friday to some new places and had a great night but I woke up on Saturday with the mother of all hangovers having not really drank that much, good times bad times.

In my hungover state I then had to go and meet a VSO volunteer who had picked up a parcel for me from Calabar. Think blazing heat, pounding head, getting into a moving vehicle (with a driver that had no idea where he was going), and general nausea, bad times. It got a bit worse as when we finally arrived at the 'National Library' that actually looked more like an apartment block. I had run out of credit so couldn’t call to say I had arrived and there was no sign of Henry who I was supposed to be meeting. Thankfully there were three security guards one of whom kindly took me to find credit and actually ended up going on a proper mission to get it for me as the first guy was out of my provider. Bless him, he probably took one look at my ashen face and realised I might keel over at any given moment. When he came back I was taken to a nice bench in the shade to sit down whilst I waited for Henry to appear. I could quite happily have had a little kip but I’m not sure what they would’ve made of that although you do often see people having a little nap in the shade, all part of the integration.

I hoped for a quick getaway as I really needed to lie down but Henry wanted to show me the school that was hiding inside the National Library building and then I had to try and be professional and talk VSO type business with a nice lady who gave me a notebook and talked about training (I think). She has my email address though so I’m fairly sure she will be sending me the details of what we discussed.  After this I found myself a drop and went back to the flat and into a vertical position under the fan and pretty much remained there for the rest of the day. I promise to try and be more exciting this week.

Jimi Hendrix

It’s fair to say that when I left home for Nigeria I wasn’t expecting to encounter Jimi Hendrix, but last night I did. Well I saw the Nigerian version of him live on stage and bloomin nora maybe it was the couple of (ok few) beers I’d had but this guy was the spit of him and he could really play as well!

We started our night at the British Village where we inadvertently gatecrashed the kids disco ooops, stayed for a couple drinks and our tea then headed home for a couple of drinks there before getting a taxi to a live music place on the other side of Abuja. My flatmates had been before a couple of times and for one reason or another I had yet to venture with them. I had been warned that there was a female singer who has a tendency to lead you out in front of everyone to dance, but if you avoid eye contact with her when she approaches you are usually ok, so I’m told. Not so for one of my flatmates who seems to get picked on every week. All credit to her to she got up there and danced away with the singer, I’m practising my ‘don’t even think about it’ face if she tries it with me.

It was a great night, the band were awesome and most of the singers were amazing. There was one point where the music totally reminded of being on holiday in Chamonix a few years ago and it made me all nostalgic for that and then the set list a bit later was just like being at a club we always go to back in the Toon called World Headquarters and I got all nostalgic for that too. I also kept thinking of people at home who would be loving it, my mate Tom who would love the Jimi Hendrix guy, my step dad who would love the fact he was playing the Eagles etc. Then it dawned on me here I was thinking about home again when actually I was having a really good time here in Abuja in my new life, making new memories. No doubt in the future I’ll be sat somewhere else and it will remind me of here and now and I’ll think of this with a smile on my face (and hopefully not with my head in my hands thinking ‘dear god how embarrassing when I got dragged up in front everyone to dance’).

It was great watching how the crowd reacted to everything as well and observing the cultural differences. Here in Nigeria it’s common to show your appreciation by getting up and literally placing money on the band members you are enjoying. You could be merrily banging (technical term) away on the drums and some guy will just walk up and put a 500 naira note on your face or throw it in your general direction. Another thing I noticed that would never happen back home is that guys would just randomly get up and dance with each other, I mean like guys that don’t know each other. It’s like, ‘hey I’m having a great time, I want to dance, oh look you are too let’s dance together’ and that’s just fine and dandy. Imagine that happening back at home, I think not! It was brilliant to watch everyone was just so HAPPY!!!!

You might be thinking that I should have photos but apparently you aren’t allowed which is a shame, I might try and sneak one or two on my phone next time we go but they will be pretty dark and you won’t be able to see the Jimi in all his glory but trust me it’s him, or his Nigerian cousin at least.

Monkeys and Magic (or a lack thereof)

In complete contrast to my last post (my life does seem to be about contrasts at the moment!) I just had to comment on my trip to the cinema last night. It was a tad surreal to say the least. I met up with some volunteers who were in Abuja for a meeting/workshop linked to their education placements and it was lovely to see them and go out for dinner first and head off to the cinema as a lovely treat afterwards.

I haven’t been to the cinema here yet and it was really bizarre, in that it wasn’t at all bizarre. There was a spar in the complex downstairs which was the first thing that made feel as though I had stepped into some weird portal back home and then when we actually went into the cinema I was convinced at the end I was just going to walk out back in blighty and head out into a no doubt rainy and cold car park and drive home to my flat in Gateshead. It was really odd.

Of course that didn’t happen and I had to barter for a taxi home to Maitama but for a while I thought I was the subject of a movie about rips in the time space continuum or some such sciencey type thing. Anyway the real movie of the evening was surprisingly good, we saw the new planet of the apes one and I wasn’t exactly expecting to like but I really enjoyed it. So there you go, Apes take over the world and Kasia doesn’t get magically transported to Gateshead. End of blog post.

Where to begin…

I commented in a recent post on some of the things that have become ‘normal’ to me now and it dawned on me today that I actually feel like I live here now. I don’t mean I’ve become fully integrated or anything like that, just that I feel like a resident rather than a visitor. The idea of how truly integrated we can ever become was something discussed at great length during our VSO training, however much we may think we have become fully fledged members of the community to an extent we are always going to be outsiders. Anyway I’m not claiming that I am now magically ‘Nigerian’ after only two months in country and I couldn’t tell you when the transition from visitor to resident happened but for the next ten months this is home.

I think it has partly come about as the things that felt really alien to me when I first arrived are now part and parcel of everyday life and I don’t really notice them anymore. Like all those things I mentioned in my earlier post about the washing and water etc. It already makes me wonder how I’ll adjust when I do come home, I guess I’ll have my visit in January as a little taster, will I get reverse culture shock I wonder? This is something to ponder on much nearer my departure time next year but it’s already running through my head because I realise just how easy my life was before and it’s not like it’s incredibly hard in the grand scheme of things now, definitely not compared to the vast majority of the population in this country. This is where the guilt comes in.

It’s not like I come from a background of huge wealth but I’ve been very blessed in my life and have always been looked after by my parents and step dad. Growing up I never went without food, water, clothes, toys, school books, a roof over my head and knowing that I was loved and cared for. I never went without. This is all brings me to my visit today and realising how very lucky I am to have had access to everything I did and that all things I whinge and moan about back home really pale into insignificance. As well as feeling lucky, I couldn’t help but feel very guilty as I was shown around various schools and communities today. I’m not sure if that’s an odd reaction or not but that’s how I felt.

School might not always have been everyone’s favourite place to go but looking back I’m sure we can all appreciate what our education has allowed us to do in life and also appreciate the environment in which we were able to learn. My sister is a teacher and my mum used to teach as well and I’m pretty sure they would both have been very upset by some of classrooms I saw today. I promise this post isn’t all doom and gloom by the way.

The first school I was taken to was in the communities of Gasaki and Cheta, I knew this was likely to be pretty bad as my organisation has just received a small grant to help repair the school thanks to the work of the previous volunteer but even so I was still shocked by what I saw.

Gasaki and Cheta Primary School

The 'hanging' classroom

The children sit on the benches or the floor

Would you want to spend time in a building like this?

The classes line up between these plants

After visiting the school, we went on into the communities which sit side by side and I met some of the people who have been helped by USI. I couldn’t resist getting a picture of these children as they all came running over to see us when we appeared by their houses.

They are classed as OVCs (Orphans and Vulnerable Children) and have been helped in various ways receiving nutritional support, healthcare, HIV/AIDS testing and counselling, reintegration into mainstream education for those that had dropped out of school and their caregivers have also received help with healthcare and grants to assist with income generating activities. On the surface they appear to have very little but these children (although not in the picture I grant you!) were smiling and happy and according to my colleague looking much healthier than on a previous visit. After having a tiny baby thrust into my arms, soooooooo cute and then alas taken away I was taken to visit one of the chiefs.

Mum you would’ve been so proud, on entering his special ‘receiving guests room’ which consisted of an armchair on a big concrete step with some mats on the ground around it, I managed to walk into a huge spiders web and collected both the web and the spider on my person. As you will know not my favourite things spiders BUT I did not scream, have any kind hysterical fit or embarrass myself in anyway shape of form (hence you being proud mum). I merely brushed it off as if it were nothing and then sat as far away from the area where the thing had landed. Now it wasn’t HUGE but it was big enough that back at home or indeed anywhere else not in the presence of a chief I would’ve had cause to scream. My colleague then casually picked cobweb off me as he sat talking to the chief in Hausa whilst I smiled and nodded like I knew what was going on and tried not to think about where the eight legged freak was. All in all I did quite well until I nearly fell over putting my shoes back on as we were leaving, so close Kasia, so close.

The visiting continued through the day and went to three more schools only one of which actually seemed to have any children in it (it is around the end of holiday time) and I took photos at just one more where we are hoping to get some funding through a new proposal, some of which will be used for renovations of the classrooms and installing toilet facilities as there are none currently.

All in all it was a brilliant day but a day of contrasts for me. I have come away feeling as I have already said very lucky, lucky to have been born into a country where schools have tables, chairs, equipment and walls. It also brought out feelings of guilt, I know that I didn’t take someone’s chance at that life that I was just born into it and that was my lot in life and for that I’m very grateful. I feel guilty for all the times I complained about school, whinged about going or that something else was crap in my all too easy life. I know now that when I do go home I will not take things for granted and if I have children one day I will want them to know just how very lucky they are. So here endeth the unloading and tomorrow I will channel everything into my proposal writing and hopefully we will be successful.

Finally!

Ever since I started my new placement they have been promising to take me on a site visit to see the work they do in the local communities and I haven’t wanted to push it and be rude but I’ve been here 4 weeks now and we still haven’t been anywhere. Tomorrow and Wednesday I will get to see what it’s all about, finally! It’s fine to read about an organisation or be told about the work they do but I don’t think you can really get a proper understanding until you go and see for yourself the projects in action and actually meet the people that have benefited.

I’m really excited about it and we are actually going to do some work and not just take me for a nosy into these people’s lives. A new proposal has just landed which we’re busy working on at the moment and tomorrow is a fact finding mission to get some stats and generally scope things out so I know what I’m chatting about because I’m winging it at the moment.  I will take some photographs (with their permission) and report back tomorrow on my visit and again on Wednesday.

Two months and Egg shaped balls

Well here I am two months in and I can safely say the second month has been a much happier one than the first. I’m still learning things all the time such as we are apparently dead when are asleep (don’t quote me on that I was informed this at work), cockroaches are persistent little buggers but Raid will kill them eventually and never get undressed under a ceiling fan if you want to keep your limbs intact. Ouch.

Things that are becomingly weirdly normal now…

·         Having to fill the huge water buckets up during the week so we have water over the weekend for washing, flushing the toilets and cooking etc.

·         Washing my clothes by hand in a bucket, I’ve got a system going now so I’m quite good at it but even so I suspect that the thought of doing washing in a machine at home will never seem arduous ever again. I also ignore the fact that things never have that nice ‘clean’ feeling you get from a machine at home, that musty smell isn’t me right?

·         Haggling for transport, it’s normal now but none the less annoying!

·         Drinking beer, I was a spirits girl before but have turned to ‘Star’ and ‘Harp’ when we go out because it’s cheaper. I’m pretty sure I’ll revert as soon as I get home though.

·         Boiling my water and filtering it before it I can drink it, life really is ever so easy back home, oh for the ease of just putting your glass under a tap.

·         Accepting that Peppe is a way of life here. EVERYTHING comes with peppe, you learn to like it or never eat outside of your own home. Even the chips over the road at our local bar come with a side of Peppe.

In other news the Rugby World Cup starts today and I’m sure a few of you are aware that I actually had tickets to a couple of matches. I am trying not to be sad that I’m not in New Zealand right now but it was always a dream of mine to be at this world cup. I ended up applying for VSO after I had put into the ballot for tickets to all of the England group matches and a couple of the quarter finals at the RWC (which I never thought I’d get). When I got the email saying I had tickets to the England Vs Georgia match and one of the Quarter Finals I was over the moon to say the least, by this point I had already applied to VSO and was awaiting contact from them to find out if they wanted me to go to an assessment day. When I got the news that I was off to London to meet VSO I was also very happy and decided that I would see what happens after my assessment, they might not want me after all and I would have no tough decision to make. We now know they did otherwise this is a very cunning ruse I’m running and here I am in Nigeria.

So do I regret my decision? I have to be totally honest and say that there is a part of me that REALLY wishes I was in New Zealand right now. I know the country will always be there and it’s somewhere I plan on visiting after I’ve done VSO, but with it being such a rugby mad nation and me being such a rugby mad loon I really think it would’ve be awesome to have been there for the RWC and I’ve missed my opportunity for that at least. However, VSO is something I have also wanted to do almost since I left university when I first heard about it and looked into the possibility of doing it and everything timing wise in my life was telling me that now was the right time to go for it and more importantly they said yes. So whilst I am pining for my resold tickets I am also glad I’m here, mostly I’m just glad that I can actually get to watch the matches at the British Village, some are early starts because of the time difference but that’s a small price to pay in my book.

p.s. Tom I expect you to be on full Johnny Wilkinson duty in my absence, I will do the same here in Nigeria and even try to find someone to assist with the conversions no doubt through the now patented Johnny Wilkinson Secret Communication methods.

An eventful day….

Every morning when I set off for work there are a gaggle (collective term) of taxis waiting at the corner of our road so I never have hail one down to get work. Every morning I have no problem getting myself a driver who will take me to work for the usual price of 250 naira but this morning the drivers weren’t playing ball, what they didn’t realise was that neither was I. The first one point blank refused to come down from 300, so I told him fine I’ll go ask the guy parked next to him. When I start negotiating with him he wants to find out what his mate quoted me and they start conferring and he says 300 as well. I then said “Fine I’ll get another car” and walked to the roadside and hailed a taxi, at this point they both start beeping their horns and trying to get me to come back I just turned around and said “Jog on dudes, Jog on” and got into my taxi for 250. They clearly had no idea what I’d just said to them but I was not in the mood for being messed around this morning and that much they knew. The lesson, never mess with the Oyibo on a Monday morning she won’t play ball.

In some ways I can understand why they try and get more out of you, there is a general belief here that all white people are very wealthy and in the area where we live there are lots of embassy buildings and big houses behind compounds, so it’s probably fair to say that they believe we can afford that extra 50 naira. However every naira counts, especially when we try and ‘save up’ for treats at the British Village or the like.

Speaking of which, there has been a menu change at the British Village and yesterday I treated myself to the very English dish of gammon, egg and chips and there was absolutely no guilt whatsoever attached to eating it. At the rate I’ve been losing weight the clothes I brought with me are now beginning to hang off my hips, it’s only a matter of time until there’s a terribly embarrassing ‘Kasia the Flasher’ incident. I need to find a tailor me thinks…

Back to today’s events, I was presented with a bag of ‘chi chi’ ??? I need to look that up. They seem to be little deep fried sweet biscuit things, I was kindly given them by someone in the office who said that his wife wanted me to have them which was very lovely. I was expressly told they were just for me and no one else but of course was expected try one there and then and then felt awful that I couldn’t share. So as soon as he had left the room I offered them round, they are clearly very popular as they went by the handful, probably why I was told they were just for me!

I also unexpectedly had to deliver a workshop today. It was something that I had asked to do and had planned myself but the date kept changing, mostly because no one was ever in on the dates we had it planned for (a hint maybe?). So I came in today expecting to be doing it tomorrow at 10am and at lunchtime was summoned to the main office to find the two chiefs waiting for me and then told to sit down. I felt a bit like I was in trouble for something and then they asked me If I would deliver my workshop now as most of the staff and volunteers were in. After a momentary panic I realised I was as prepared as I could be anyway so away we went, once the laptop and projector were set up of course.

I’m pleased to say that it went really well, once again during the introductions I found myself reinforcing that I am not looking for a husband. Once that was established I went over the expectations of the placement, “We have high expectations.” Good, to know. I then led a ‘Forcefield Analysis’ exercise looking at helping and hindering factors affecting the organisation’s current fundraising efforts and finished up by emphasising this is a partnership and I need them to work with me as it’s no good leaving me to work alone until next July I need to be able to share my skills with the staff.

The best bit of the whole session however was when the ducks living next door and I mean literally in the room next door started quacking during the introductions. As some of the ladies who were quite quiet anyway were telling me their names and jobs everyone did that thing when you hear something unexpected of looking around to see if you are the only one hearing it. Turns out that a family had been staying in one of the empty rooms in the offices over the weekend and brought their ducks along too. That goes on a list of things I did not expect to see at work today/ever.

Christmas come early

In the style of Noddy Holder, ‘It’s Chriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiistmmmmmmmmmmmmmas!’ Well that’s how it felt when I got one of my parcels sent by mum and sister this morning, it had arrived in Calabar a fortnight ago and been sent up to Abuja via another volunteer last week and I finally got my hands on it this morning. I was literally like a child on Christmas morning in the fashion of tearing open the parcel to get to the contents inside. I had managed to receive the parcel in a more rational/lady like manner and even managed to wait until I got to my office before I opened it, thankfully no one was around to witness the savage opening of the goodies, I’m not sure what they would’ve made of it! 

Inside were some much needed new tops (why did I think bringing lots of ‘nice cool white shirts’ would be a good idea in a place where I have to wash everything by hand?!), kitchen things, face wipes (the joy!), tea bags, cous cous, sweets, a copy of my subscribed lonely planet magazine that I couldn’t bring myself to cancel and some of the cards I forgot. I am a very happy girl, it’s not necessarily the normal kinds of things that would make you happy but the concept of a tea towel is definitely a foreign one here. Also I’ll tell you the tale of the forgotten cards because it’s a bit spesh….

When I was back in Calabar and putting up things on my walls I got to the stash of good luck/bon voyage cards that everyone had given me before I left and I realised it was a bit thin and I remembered that I had ended up with two piles of cards in the mayhem of unpacking stuff from Newcastle at my mum’s house in Somerset in the few weeks I spent there before I left. Anyway there I was in Calabar putting up the cards I had and as I got to the bottom of the pile I realised that some very special ones were missing and that I had probably left them at home and I promptly burst into tears.  Remember I was having a general mare at the time, anyway I text my mum and asked if she could try and find them and post them out to me, it’s daft really I knew I had them safe at home but I really wanted to have them all with me. So now they have arrived in Abuja via a trip to Calabar and tonight I will be sticking up the newly arrived cards on my bedroom wall, it’s just like being back at uni really but it’s nice to see my photos and cards every day and be reminded of all the good wishes from the folks back home. I might even have cous cous for tea!