First Day

Ok so technically I came into my new office yesterday for the afternoon and yes technically this is also my second placement, ignoring those two things my first today in my new office has gone really well. Yesterday afternoon I was brought in after meeting up with my new employers at the Programme Office of VSO shown around and introduced to my new colleagues so that sort of doesn’t count as a proper day at work. For those of you that don’t already know I will now be based at the National Mosque in Abuja working for an organisation called USI (Ummah Support Initiative).

Everyone has been really friendly and today it was lovely to get a taxi all by myself to work from just opposite the end of my road to the gate of the mosque. I have to wear a veil/scarf to cover my hair when I’m in the public areas of the offices (thanks Ceri for your handy gift who knew it would be my staple work wear!), I felt a bit special putting it on in the taxi but wasn’t actually sure what classed as the ‘public areas’ i.e. is it ok just inside the gates to not be wearing it, or should I already have it on by then?? Anyway in I went at the agreed time of 10am, until I get my own key to the office I will come in a bit later as currently the staff are all volunteers and travel in from outside Abuja so they don’t arrive until around 10am as there’s no one to open up. They have promised to get me a key so that I can come in to do a full day’s work though! I was very much relieved to find that there is plenty here I can do and that as soon as my initial work plan is agreed they want me to ‘hit the ground running’. At the end of my first day I was offered a lift home and I arrived back at the flat feeling very positive and excited to go back into work the next day, how often can you say that happens?

New Home

I’ve updated my album with some photos of my new home and they uploaded so quickly I thought I’d try and experiment and see if I can actually put some pics directly into my blog. The connection in Calabar wasn’t great so it wouldn’t let me do it but it seems to be better here so I thought I’d try….

My new room, complete with mosquito 'fort'

The lounge

Kitchen and water storage bins!

New Beginnings (again)

Five weeks to the day after arriving in Abuja for the start of my VSO placement and In country training I was back. I decided my sooner than planned return journey to Abuja would not be by bus this time and that I would pay for myself to fly. Clearly in Nigeria the cost of flying is far out of reach of the ordinary Nigerian and so this was a very different experience all round. It also blew most of my additional ‘travel’ fund that I brought with me from home but I still think it was worth every penny to avoid 12.5 hours crammed into a sardine can on wheels and to be subjected to a roadside search. Although the check in experience at Uyo Airport was quite special. I had to accompany my bags when they were scanned at the check in desk through a door that was marked ‘No entry, authorised personnel only!’ so that if anything suspicious was identified in my luggage I could unpack the bags to show them, flashback anyone?.

Anyway I arrived safely and met my new housemates at my new flat and got to unpack all over again, this time with no tears, hooray! We went out to get some supplies later in the afternoon and I got my first gander at my new neighbourhood, I already know where to get my fruit and veg thanks to Susan one of my new housemates. It sounds very odd but at the bottom of our road there is a sort of big yard behind a fence and inside are the men selling the fruit and veg, you go up to the gaps in the fence and tell them you what you want and they bring it you and pass you order through the bars!! I’ll take my camera next time, I’ve never bought food like this before but it was surprisingly good value for money compared to Calabar. I was expecting everything to be more expensive here with it being a capital city. We also went to a supermarket and yes they had corned beef but alas no gin, sad times. I’ll have to hunt for that elsewhere as I had to leave my previously purchased bottle behind in the very capable hands of two VSOs who I know will enjoy it just as much as I would have!

So my first impressions of my new home are very positive ones and I’m about to hit the sack at only 9pm as it’s been a very long day, it started with a phone call at 4.50am from the taxi driver informing me he was picking me up at 6am instead of 6.30am, thanks for that! Tomorrow I go into the programme office to find out more about my placement which I’m really excited about, onwards and upwards as they say.

Ooh in a totally unrelated but very noteworthy point can I just say well done to Torquay United for beating Bristol Rovers yesterday and giving every gulls fan the satisfaction of seeing Paul Buckle lose his first home match against the team he left in such a nice fashion at the end of last season. Brilliant and indeed highly satisfying!

A month

What a month it’s been. It looks like the next 11 will not be spent here in Calabar as I will be moving to Abuja. The reasons are a bit complicated to get into on my blog but let’s just say I am happy about it and looking forward to moving, only downside my blog title wont sound quite as snappy, ‘Kasia in Abuja’ doesn’t have quite the same ring to it….

As soon as I can I’ll tell you all about my new placement and where I’m living but for now I’m going to have to work out how to pack everything back up again and this time, I’m definitely flying!

Milestones

Today marks 4 weeks in Nigeria, I have to say there were times when I really didn’t think I’d make it this far so this feels like a big milestone to me and Tuesday makes it a whole month, working on technicalities. It seems very strange only five weeks ago I was having a weekend away with some of my friends and wondering what my life would be like right now, where would I be living? What would my housemate be like? How would I be finding the heat, food, culture etc? I was sat pondering these things in beautiful landscaped gardens sitting under a sun umbrella because it was actually a hot and sunny day for once and it seems like a million years ago. Ironically it was hotter that day than it is here today!

So what have I discovered in the last four weeks? Well I think in some respects I’m both tougher and weaker than I thought I was. Things that I thought I wouldn’t find hard or be bothered by I have been and some things that I thought I would struggle with haven’t been a problem. For example, I really thought the erratic nature of the power here would be a problem for me but I’ve adapted to it really quickly and no longer bat an eyelid when the power goes off. I always have a torch to hand and always have everything ready to charge as soon as the power returns. It makes me smile when you hear one of the neighbourhood children shout “NEPA!” when the power does come back on. The power company here in Nigeria used to be called NEPA, fondly known as Never Expect Power Always (or Again) and it changed a while ago to PHCN, Problem Has Changed Name. I don’t actually know what it does stand for, Power something Company Nigeria maybe? Everyone still calls it NEPA though and you will often be asked, “Did you have NEPA last night/over the weekend?”. It was big news when the President sacked 4 top PHCN executives for failing to resolve the issues with the power, we shall see if their replacements make any difference…..

In terms of other discoveries, I’m finding the lack of anonymity very hard. I think I’ve mentioned it before in another post, I didn’t think it would bother me as much it does and it's not something you can easily ignore.

I still don’t like the prospect of going anywhere on my own which aged 29 I find a bit pathetic. I do however get great satisfaction when I do go somewhere on my own and manage to get home again, however this also makes me feel quite pathetic.

I want to get out and explore but the weather here really is very preventative, when it rains it really rains and the streets sort of turn into rivers and you really don’t want to think about what’s in the water. Supposedly this month should see the rain easing off a bit which will be good.

Other interesting cultural learning, Dog is a delicacy here in Cross River State (I wasn’t very good at hiding my horror when told this) as is Goat’s head. I won’t be eating either, EVER. I’m rather relieved I’m still not well and can’t eat properly at the moment as at least I have a legitimate excuse to avoid anything I’m uncertain of like is that meat dog? It all backs up my reasoning to become vegetarian for the duration of my placement, unless it’s corned beef out of a tin of course. I hasten to add that I have eaten Nigerian food and do intend to eat more of it but my tummy says otherwise at the moment so I’m sticking to a rather bland diet of crackers, noodles, tomatoes and corned beef sandwiches. It’s doing wonders for the weight loss!

And so it begins

The football season that is. Whilst back in Blighty I didn’t get to see my boys play all that often because being a Torquay fan and living in Newcastle didn’t aid me with getting to many matches. However I used to get regular telephone updates from my Dad at all the home matches, he’s been doing a gate at Plainmoor since he was about 15 (correct me if I’m wrong Dad!) and if I was watching a premiership match with friends in a bar in the Toon I’d always have one eye on Sky Sports watching out for the League Two scores coming in.

So whilst I didn’t get to many matches I will very much miss my interactions as the new season starts, I’ve been assured that I’ll get text updates with the scores, thanks Dad and I can of course log on to BBC and the Torquay Website for a full match report. I just hope when I come home in January for a visit that I can make it to a match (I bet it snows and they’re all postponed!), in the meantime I shall have to rely on my mobile to get the scores, as League 2 is about as real as Harry Potter here. First up its Torquay v’s Burton, come on you Yellows!!!

A police escort

Picture the scene if you will, it’s ten past eight on Tuesday morning and we’re running a little late, it’s raining pretty hard and we’re standing at the our usual spot trying to catch transport to work but everything is full because of the weather so it’s not looking good. Then a policeman comes and stands next to me. He asks if we’re trying to get a drop. I tell him no drop (because we can’t afford them), but he’s quite insistent that we should be trying to get one. “No drop, we’re only going to Watt” I tell him. “Ok sister, you will come with me”.

Normally you wouldn’t accept lifts from strangers but he’s a policeman so it’ll be ok, right? Well we thought so, so he flags down a car, tells the man he is paying and that we are stopping at Watt to drop us off on the way. I feel a bit unsure about this but get in the back of taxi with Sarah anyway. He then asks where we are going next so I tell him that we work in Bayside on Edem Street and we normally get transport to Watt and then walk down to Edem Street from there. Apparently we are not allowed to do this in rain, so they will take us all the way. He wouldn’t let us pay anything and dropped us at the door of the office. It was a very lovely experience, all done out of goodwill and nothing expected in return. I have no idea where the policeman was going but I’m pretty sure our bit of the journey was definitely not on the way.

When we did get in the office I took the opportunity to take some photos of our surroundings and have updated the album so you can see where I work and the area around it. It was a very grey morning I’m afraid but at least it had stopped raining!