We Made it Back Alive

Thank the lord. I'm not kidding, James and I must be blessed. I spent my last 50F on a breakfast of spicy beans upon arriving in Gao (en retour from Ghana) and then headed to the bank.

Our transport luck ran out--and we were stuck in Tamale Ghana forced to stay in a pricey hotel and then even once we got across the boarder to Burkina the timing almost worked, a car was supposed to leave an hour after we arrived, but then we ended up spending the night in said car parked at the station, for we were too cheap to go to a hotel (though it did give us the opportunity to get out into Ouaga on the night of Eid el-Fitr (the end of Ramadan) and eat good pizza).

We made it to Niamey, Niger on Sunday before dark at least mostly due to the nice boarder guards. The moment we got out of transport, a guide approached us asking "Boston or Peace Corps?" He knew we were one of the two because of our water bottles. Ha. I never did get a chance to see the program run by my alma-mater, alas. Another trip. We did see the giraffes of course, which was expensive but A-mazing. And got to hang out with PC Niger which has a totally different vibe. They like being at site despite having this beautifully furnished hostel to stay-in in Niamey. I also appreciated being understood in a capital city--half of Niger is "Zarma" an ethnicity who speaks a dialect of Songhoy. So again, a future option for development work!

After our day in the bush with the giraffes, we found out we could only get official transport out of Niamey on Monday mornings. Oops. It was Tuesday. So a friend I called who does business between Ansongo and Niamey tells us to get whatever transport we can get to Ayorou, Niger and from there it is "easy" to get to Ansongo.

"Easy" he said. Sure, we did get transport to Ayorou. And then we sat. All day. At the guards-station leaving town playing dominoes while the kids watched us anasarey hoping SOMETHING would pass. I've climbed atop a shipping/produce truck before, and I'll do it again. We were desperate. Finally (after one guy offered us two seats in his 4x4 for 125000F--hahaha, you think we have money left? No! We had 15000F and some pocket change), a truck passes at sundown heading to Ansongo. They ask how much we can pay and we give them 10000F...which is the price of a bus ticket from Niamey all the way to Gao, and we were only going to Ansongo and already in Ayorou. Ugh. I fell asleep, only jarred a few times, once by a near axle-breaking dip in the road and then the boarder crossing guards. In fact, Jojo was so sleepy from being on the road since Friday, I was asleep when we arrived in Ansongo at midnight. Pitch black. I was so embarrassed to be lost in my own town!! I didn't see where we had turned off the road or anything. So...we circled around a bit me desperately searching for a landmark I knew. Finally I saw the hill up to the radio tower and found Dave's place. He wasn't home but we let ourselves in and Zubbu even got up to make us some sardine soup with bread. Oh, was it good to be home.