No Joy in Kateville

Hi to All!

I apologize for the spottiness of my letters since I’ve been in Mauritania. For some reason, I haven’t felt the same about writing here. In Bol, something would happen and I’d think, “Ha! I’ll write home about this!” But here, I dunno. Maybe because it’s not really an adventure anymore. Or my adventure tolerance has risen so high after the evacuation adventure that now ordinary adventures seem everyday.

For the moment, I’m struggling to keep the glass half full in Magtalahjar. There was another mosque meeting last week. The imam told people that he’d heard from a reliable source that I w as trying to convert people. Yes, though I, can barely communicate in Hassaniya, I was evangelizing. I wonder what the Good News would sound like in my Hassaniya. “I go church. Jesus good. You go church too.” Convincing, huh? When I heard about the mosque meeting, I was upset, but not too bad because I was looking forward to the next day’s mail run. Letters! Love from home! Welllll, so I waited around that morning listening for a PC car to pull up, but none came. Around 11, the volunteer from down the road called to say that the mail truck had blown through Magta and dropped off our mail in Aleg!

Okaaaay, deep breath, no worries. I’ll just go to Aleg and bring it back- that way I’ll get to use the internet too. So I went to Aleg (only 1 ½ hours away) with visions of battered envelopes and familiar postmarks dancing in my head. When I got to Julian’s, I hurriedly greeted Julian (Greger’s site mate) and Greger (the other PCV who transferred from Chad with me) then demanded, “Where’s my mail?” Greger went to retrieve it and returned with two small padded envelopes from Mom, one containing a coffee mug in a sad state of international mail-induced fragmentation. No letters? Nope. Aigggghh. Of course, I appreciated the love from Mom, but where were the letters? I don’t know. I still have only gotten 4 letters (Lois Riley, Mom, Kathy H, and a PCV friend) in all of my time here. I don’t know where they’re going. I’m sure you’re all sending me notes, but they’re disappearing. The address again is:

Kate Van Roekel
s/c Corps de la Paix
BP 222
Noakchott, Mauritania
West Africa

(Maybe the letters are all going to Mauritias, an island off the coast of…somewhere)

So, in order to cheer my sunken heart, I thought, “I’ll go do email!” But alas, there would be no joy in Kateville that night. The internet was down. Okaaaay, deep breath, no worries Let’s go to Boghe tomorrow! Boghe is 45 minutes south of Aleg and on a totally different planet. It’s colorful and bustling. There’s west African music blaring and the women wear equally loud, flowy dresses. I felt at ease, for once not worried about my ankles or bangs showing. Unfortunately, most of the volunteers were gone to the Jazz Fest in St. Louis, Senegal and the cell phone network was down, so we couldn’t get in touch with the one girl who was there in Boghe. After far too long struggling to find the key to the office in the PC regional house, we truged to the office with a bundle of keys, hoping at least one would work. We tried each key about three times, just in case we’d somehow inserted them wrong, but no, none of them worked. I sank to the concrete. I was NOT a happy camper. Here’s a sampling of some of my thoughts: “I am not wanted at my site. I got no letters. The mug was smashed. No interent in Aleg, can’t get in here. I just want something to be easy. I just want some comfort. If I can’t check my email and hear from my Chad friends, I swear to god, I’m packing my bags. I’m tired. This is IT!”

But, okaaaay, deep breath, no worries. We went back to the house to try again to find the keys. As I sat on the veranda thinking thoughts very similar to those above, the concession gate opened and this tall, smiling PCV walked in going, “Hey, y’all!” Her name, we learned is Nancy and Nancy was a total day saver. She took us back to the office, opened it with her key, tested the phone line and decalred it dead. No internet. But in her sunny, slow Kentucky drawl, she invited us to stay the day with her and her host family. We talked and laughed, at goooood rice and fish and went swimming in the river. When we left for Aleg in the afternoon, I felt refreshed and hopeful.

And since then, it really has been better. School is over this week, so that means no more trouble for the time being. On Tuesday of this week, my APCD (boss) is coming and we’ll make a decision about whether I’ll get to stay in Magtalahjar or be moved to another site. I really want to stay here. Settling in is HARD and I’ve already put so much effort into learning Hassaniya and visitng neighbors and setting up my house. Add that to the emotional process of grieving Chad and I just don’t have the energy to do it all over again for a third time.