place2place

concert

Last night's Fati Mariko concert celebrated the release of her new CD and was slated to start at 8:00. Around 8:00 I called Sue, see below, who was already at the Palais de Sports for another event earlier in the day, to ask her if it was was starting. "They haven't taken down the basketball equipment yet," she told me. I called her back at 9:00. "There are like, ten people here," she said, "they're still setting up." If I waited any longer I'd get too tired and decide not to go, so I left the house at ten after ten.. The Palais de Sports is five minutes from my house, I got a parking place five spaces away from the front door. Think I'll get that kind of parking at my next concert? I went in and found Sue in the front row, there were maybe two hundred people in a venue that will hold a couple thousand. Why it wasn't packed I don't know.

A karaoke warm up act sings on stage, it includes a midget dancer, who actually is good. Then we have some clowns who are not. Then a single guy sings karaoke. I complain that if this were the US, everyone would be stamping their feet on the hardwood floor and screaming, "Fati, Fati!" There would be an MC to whip us into a frenzy. Instead the Minister of Culture gets up with a thick packet of notes and makes a long-winded speech. The only Americans there have not lived in the US in the last two decades and have lost touch with how exciting a concert is suppose to be. I want to scream, but am too bored. Someone walks around giving away (badly designed) and now outdated posters. Finally, finally, Fati Mariko is in the house, takes the stage.

And yea! She's great! Six dancers are with her, and their costumes are beautiful and the dancing is amazing and the singing is fabulous! And everyone sits politely in their seats with their hands folded on their lap.

This reminds me of a Neville Brothers concert in Switzerland where everyone sat in their seats, really rocking out by tapping their toes. At that concert I was with other crazy Americans and we ended up going on stage and dancing at one point.

So then Fati Mariko sings my very favorite song of hers, Bébé, and she's amazing. I mean, really, like a $60 ticket at the Filmore. She sings four songs, and then we have a couper d'electricité, and the venue is plunged into utter darkness and silence. Hundreds of cell phones light up. "Did we rock too hard?" I say to myself and "I guess that's the set." We sit in silence for ten or fifteen minutes, no announcements are made, no effort is made to get the show up and going. Everyone starts to leave. I don't want to find my way out of a pitch black building by myself, so I leave with some friends. I asked Sue today if the electricity ever came back. "Yeah, they got it back on, but we left before they started the show again." Maybe they really got going in the middle of the night.

mother's day 2008

Happy Day to all the moms out there, and those with moms.

chimp mother, in zarma

Meet Sue Rosenfeld. She runs the program for exchange students for Boston University here in Niger. (Listening to Hungry Like the Wolf, distracted, uh, oh yeah, Sue.) If you google Niger, the first hit is Sue Rosenfeld. She has lived here twenty six years, five months and three days, she will tell you. She comes to our house once a week to watch some version of reality tv, I bribe my non-embassy friends with AFN, and Sue is addicted, so it works out great. Then we talk about books.

Sue a. lives without air conditioning, because her students do b. speaks English of course, but also French, Zarma and Hausa, c. has superstar celebrity status in Niamey, if you go in a restaurant with her, it's like you're there with Madonna, better than Madonna, because here they may not know who Madonna is, but they WILL know who Sue is d. received an award from the National Ministry of Athletics for her involvement in basketball, (Camille, age ten, is taller than Sue) e. is Judy Blume's first cousin, f. once had her dress torn off at the zoo by a chimpanzee.

In this photo Sue was dancing in the first rain. Scarlett had called us while we were at lunch to say "The sky is red," (it was going to rain for the first time in nine months.) Sue's response: "The eagle flies at midnight, what are we talking about here?"

From the Quoteable Sue: Why have cat when you can have a dog? Why have a dog when you can have a chimpazee?

dinner at midnight: hungry like the wolf

Peter keeps asking when I'm going to post this picture, so this week seems appropriate. The wolf is scary, but Little Red Riding Hood doesn't seem too concerned. We went to a costume party at the French Embassy compound, a pirate had a pop gun he kept shooting off. We ate dinner outside next to the river at what felt like the middle of the night, then danced to Brenda Fosse music with our friends.

In Idol news, and really what else is there? I'm sorry to see Jason Castro go, but he seemed ecstatic to be voted off. Love that kid. Simon: "Jason, what were you thinking?" Jason: "I was thinking Bob Marley! Yeah!"

musician

Stefan has been taking piano now for a couple months, he's really into it, he plays piano off and on all day. He doesn't like to read music much and easily memorizes his pieces. He also plays fly-swatter guitar.

it has something to do with the sun

Last night when Peter came home Stefan and I were in the pool, and Peter ended up jumping in too. It's the super hot season now, yesterday the embassy thermometer said 125 degrees. But if you jump in the pool, then sit under the fan in the pilote, the palm trees wave around, bouganvilla blossoms drop in the pool, the bananas hang in the trees, Stefan pretends to be a dolphin...sweet times I don't want to forget.

the doctah

Right now he's in telling Stefan about how he use to camp as a little kid.

smoking

Aicha impresses me with the fine lines and beautiful designs she paints in henna, and she's so fast! The henna smells like incense. After the henna dries, which happens quickly in 105 degree heat, you wash it off and can barely see the designs anymore. Then you put your hands into a huge pot that has in the base of it smoking embers. You sit slumped over in an inelegant position with your hands in a pot of smoke for five or ten minutes, the longer the darker the henna.

Here people usually get painted for a special celebration like a wedding. Don't worry Mom, it's temporary.

no one ordered the agouti

Up some stairs, on a outdoor terrace, under some strings of half-funtioning lights, we ate dinner last night at Maquis 2000, (say ma-kee-deu-mill) my new favorite restaurant. Choose huge beef brochettes, chicken, capitain (river perch from the Niger) pintade (guinea fowl) or agouti (river rat.) Each entree comes with either an entire plate rice, a serving bowl of a tomato-polenta-aspic kind of thing, or a pile of fried plantains. Your chicken, fish, beef or whatever comes grilled, smothered in onions and tomatoes with a pile of fresh garlic, ginger, peppers or lime. About $10 a person. This is my plate of capitain gingembre. I want to go back next Friday.

starbucks in niamey!!