First blog entry from Kate: A ga kanu ay se, a ga bori ay se!

After four weeks in Niger, I am happy I came. And maybe I am starting to adjust, just maybe. Definitely because my mom writes to me every week so that I always have mail. Definitely because life without running water or electricity in my house isn't that bad (going back to my roots, my dad would say. Definitely because the night sky is incomparable. Maybe because I have a mosquito net, an iPod and now a cell phone. Maybe because I am starting to understand the language. Maybe because I am realizing how lucky I have been. Maybe because I have amazing friends both in Niger and America. Hopefully because I am going to last the whole two years here. Hopefully because joining the Peace Corps was the right decision. And hopefully because I am figuring out how to be myself, just myself in Africa.

Philadelphia is the beginning. Aside from the obvious nervous awkwardness, everyone seemingly hit it off right away. And after two days of receiving limited amounts of information, worrying about chariot spiders and lack of toilet paper, and getting our first round of vaccines, we boarded the plane a makeshift family. And somewhat surprisingly, I managed to pack less than 100 pounds of luggage and while I didn't have the least luggage I certainly didn't have the most. The first good omen for the trip was the American flag debit card containing 180 dollars to pay for our Philadelphia expenses. The second good omen for the next two years was that all of the bags made it to Niger. The first week went by extremely slowly but the last three have flown by. I am almost half way through training!

My day usually starts at about 5:30 am, when the prayer call blares over the town speaker system. An African alarm clock, the prayer call, lets me know I need to get out of bed in 30 minutes- the roosters are the reason I actually get out of bed at 6. I head into town at 7 to buy breakfast which normally consists of coffee and a beignet typefood (fari masa). Then I head up to the training site where I have a full day of technical (municipal community development), medical (howto deal with diarrhea, skin infections and malaria), cross cultural (what not to do in public), and most importantly language (ZARMA!) training. We eat lunch at the site and then get kicked out after a full day of learning at 615. I then go home to my host family for dinner. Sometimes I go for a run and other times I read or write in my journal. I take a bucket bath just as it is about to go dark and then I am in bed by 930.

A few things that happened this week: a cow died in the neighboring field and smelled up the neighborhood, I looked into buying a small donkey (to be purchased when I am at my post), I got some phone calls from America!, I reached intermediate level at Zarma during my first language assessment (which means I can swear in to be a volunteer on time), I visited a maire and learned about budgets, decentralization and taxes, and tonight I am going out to dinner in the capital!

Next Week: I find out where my post is!!!!!!!

Funny Story of the Week. The title of this blog entry is a direct quote from my seven year old neighbor. Literally it means, "it's good to me, it's great to me". My friend Hamas lives with this family and he woke up one morning to the kid dancing naked under a floral umbrella singing it. It's a pretty good way to start your Sunday morning and now we sing it about five times a day.Thanks to everyone who called and sent me mail! It makes my days! (If you want to call me from Skype my number here is 011-227-96349589,-I put it up wrong before sorry! and the best times are either at midnight east coast time or 2 PM east coast time)