i think i’m drinking a frappuccino

Less than three weeks left.

Finding a stable internet connection has gotten to be a more and more difficult task as time has progressed, but luckily I’m able to spend the afternoon at Friends Cafe, probably the nicest one I have seen so far. It’s in Nassarawa, the other side of town from CITAD and Mambayya House.

I was able to upload pictures, here are some. You can see the rest of you click the icon below:

three weeks left

one of the stickers at citad:

mambayya house, the compound i’m staying at:

my digital storytelling workshop:

bayero university:

where’s waldo?

guess the harddrive:

in Abuja with Umar:

in the linen market, he wanted to take a picture with the bature

YZ and Paul, they are kind of a big deal

Jummai, who works for DFID, needed to make a short slideshow/documentary about Ramadan and her work. Since it wasn’t Ramadan yet, she took me to her house and pretended to break fast with her family….at 2pm.

how i get around

hausa-wear

Saturday Kailu from Mambayya took me to Sabongari and Kuri markets and I’m finally starting to understand why Kano is known as the Centre of Commerce. Apparently people come from all over West Africa to visit the markets here, which are like huge bazzaars of shacks and rooms. It had just rained, so we trekked through the mud to stop here and there checking things out and saying hello to Kailu’s friends. I was surprised to come across a couple of shacks with modern, fashionable clothing with mood lighting and ambient music. Most things are from China, and apparently it’s not uncommon to see Chinese businessmen around the markets. Hence a few people asking if I was a “China Man”. I’ve heard Lebonese, Israeli, and Egyptian, but Chinese is definitely a first.

Kuri market is the linen market with stacks and stacks of cloth everywhere. I picked out a fabric I liked and took it to the tailer, where I had a proper Hausa outfit made. Maybe I’ll upload pictures later…just maybe.

the audacity of slow internet- scott finishes books

Last night I finally finished reading Dreams of my Father by Barack Obama. I picked it up in the airport in Netherlands planning on giving it a try and then passing it on as a gift to someone in Nigeria. I had previously kept away from it because I was still a Hillary supporter at the time or I just assumed it was another sterile “autobiography” from an American politician. It also has an incredibly boring cover, and yes, I often judge books by their cover. If you are going to pay to have a cover professionally designed you better impress me, dammit.

I can now confidently say that it is definitely worth the read. I chose it over the Audacity of Hope because he wrote Dreams before his political career, fresh off graduating Harvard Law School. I was really surprised by his honesty and the way he paints himself as an incredibly vulnerable and unsure person, trapped between conflicting expectations and images that connect him to a deep racist history in the United States and colonialism in Kenya.

I never imagined it would be as complicated and profound as it is, and as I passed the book on to my friend Umar to read, I actually felt proud that this person might be president. After the past eight years that means a lot, especially considering I expect so little from mainstream politicians.

That being said, I need to take more time to understand Obama’s policies (where they exist in some concrete form). It’s kind of a bizarre situation with this incredibly important presidential election coming up. I feel like I should be converting every McCain supporter I can find, but, I live in California and do we actually need to worry about California going red? I don’t think so. So what is another Obama bumper sticker driving through Santa Cruz? The best I can think of to do is focus on the propositions and make sure Obama is accountable to his promises and rhetoric once elected.

Oh, and we should start planning a coup d’etat just in case America totally lets us down and votes for McCain.