2000-01-23 - 10:08 a.m.

I am finally starting to "work"!
Or so it feels like at least! :-)
When I got back to Mauritania after my trip to Italy I stayed a couple of days in Nktt to meet with "bureau" people to present some project ideas and get helpful feedback on "future steps" to follow...

After about ten days in Maghta Lahjar I was off again - this time to Kaedi for a double-purpose trip: to spend the Tabaski fest with my original host family and to start doing some research for one of the projects I am working on. It's now my fifth day here and I've been having a really great time! Unlike my first stay in Kaedi, during PRe-Service Training, I was able to really reach out to the various ethnic groups present in town and spent some great time with various families from Moor, Puular, and Soninke background as well as seeing the other volunteers who work in the area! Everyone has been wearing new clothesfor the occasion and the colors floating in the streets and filling the homes are amazing! The women also braid and decorate their hair, adding extensions and jewels...beautiful! Delicious food abounding, thousands of goats/muttons being killed and prepared for the feat, music flowing from virtually every house... A great "fete"!

I visited various tie-dyeing cooperatives to research the costs involved with this activity (equipment, materials, supplies....), as well as the time expenditures, different "couture" and "dyeing" techniques, as well as different possible ways of organizing a hands-on training for a group of women in Maghta Lahjar. These women currently "tie" the fabric but then send the veils to Nouakchott or Kaedi to have them dyed because they don't know how to do it themselves, wasting time and money, having to resell the veiles at much higher prices and reducing their profit margins. Paired with the tie-dyeng training would be a Business Skills workshop, involving Cost Determination, Purchasing and Inventory Management, Marketing, Feasibility Studies, etc.

The idea is for me to research all the costs involved so that I can write a grant request, hope and pray it will get approved then purchase all the supplies and materials, "hire" the trainers, design and implement the training program and finally monitor and evaluate the results...Inshallah!

Factors that need to be taken into consideration are language barriers, literacy and numeracy barriers, ethnic and cultural diversity of participating women, water supply deficiency, logistics of transportation/lodging of trainers and supplies, "post-training" barriers to sustainability and how to overcome them, etc. Really an interesting, challenging, and rewarding job so far!

The plan is to return to Maghta Lahjar, or my region at least (Boghe or ALeg), tomorrow Inshallah... I then will be leaving again for a few days to accompany a Caritas/World Food Program(WFP) mission to distribute food rations to five villages in my area. Then again to Nouakchott the second week of February for In-Service Training. All this Inshallah!

Last night I was laughing so hard all night long!!! My Host Family's brother in law works for the local branch of WFP and was receiving an official visit from a Nktt director and the WFP Director of Information Systems for Latin America and Arab Countries whose headquarters are in Rome. OF course they asked me to attend the "invitation" so that I could also be the translator of the night... it was a great night! Sitting under the moonlight, eating great food, drinking mint tea, conversing with this French woman who had a really amazing career and life, realizing I really do know the language pretty well now and I am pretty well-versed in the local customs and culture, and having so much fun watching her get beautiful henna on her hands and feet as a "welcome" gift from my family!

Genevieve first started her international development career at the age of 25, when she moved to Algeria to live and work for three years with a small French NGO. Since then she has lived and worked with the UN (FAO) in France, Guinea Bissau, Niger, Mexico, Nicaragua,Italy, Fiji, Samoa, Mauritania, Philippines, and other countries I can't recollect at the moment... I was just awe-struck!!

Alright, must go now... I hope you are all doing well and that your 2005 started with a pleasant and exciting first month!

Thank you for the Birthday Wishes!! I spent it half in Aleg with Nina and half in Kaedi with Jen, Jae, and Keith. I managed to learn how to use a "brousse oven" and made chewy chocolate brownies, courtesy of the Kaedi volunteers' kitchen! DELICIOUS (real Hershey's cocoa from the US)!!!

Love and hugs,

Jordy

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