...yesterday was supposed to be my last day in Niger, but I'm still here. I showed up at the airport at 3am this morning to find out that my flight to Casablanca had been cancelled. I hadn't thought to call and confirm, and apparently they had notified me via email but not until last night...and there is no such thing as demanding to be put on the next flight when there is only one flight per day at best...so I'm leaving early tomorrow morning instead. It's a bit surreal because I had kind of wrapped everything up yesterday and now I have more time...but, as with all unexpected changes of plans that happen when one travels, I see it as a gift.
So yesterday was the day to get everything done, which is no easy feat here. I started off with my to-do list (those who know me well are fully aware of my obsession with lists...), first stop being the bank. Niamey is quite spread out, and I am staying in a neighborhood a few miles from the city center, so I needed to take a cab.
I haven't talked about the Niamey cab system yet, which is fascinating and infuriating at the same time. First you flag down a cab and tell them where you are going--but you can't give an exact address because, first of all, the streets are not well marked and second, none of the taxi drivers here seem to know addresses anyway, so you have to give them a landmark, which is tricky if you have only been here for a few weeks--then they tell you whether they can take you or not, depending on the direction they are headed, the other passengers in the cab (because they pick people up until the are full), often by either nodding or grunting. The fare is generally 200 francs but if you are going further out they'll ask for more, and of course they never have any change. So basically I spend a lot of time standing on street corners saying "Quartier Dar Es Salaam, deuxième pavée?" in a hopeful tone to a number of taxis before someone agrees to take me.
Yesterday I didn't have anything smaller than a 10000 franc bill, (about $25), which is very hard to change...I started walking in hopes of finding a place to get change, went to several hotels en route but no one could help me, so halfway downtown, after walking for half an hour in the heat, I bought some useless product at a pharmacy just to be able to find a cab...out on the road again, I tried to flag a cab but an older man and a teenaged boy in front of me flagged it first, and as the car came to a stop they lifted up a goat and put it in the trunk, then got in and sped away. I decided it wasn't worth my time to share a cab with several people and a goat.
So I finally got to the bank and waited for half an hour before I was informed that they would not exchange my dollars there, I had to go to the central branch. That necessitated another taxi, and therefore some kind of idea where that was...I got to the central bank, stood in line for another half hour, finally changed my money, then foolishly determined that I had enough time to stop by a tailor to pick up some clothes I had made before meeting my friend Ali. Bad idea. I had the directions to the tailor written down, but when I got into the cab, it became clear that the taxi driver had no idea how to follow them. I finally had to call Djibrine and have him talk to the driver, at which point he realized that he was going in the wrong direction...then the other passengers started to complain, but not to him. They got mad at me. The old woman next to me said, "you can't just rent this taxi, you know!" I said it's not my fault that the driver got lost, but then the driver started getting annoyed with me too. So I got out, because it didn't seem to make sense to stay in a cab with three haters. In the end, I got to the tailor's shop, but it took two and a half hours to run two errands.
Today I have no errands to run...the only items on my agenda are to eat, do a little work, and hang out on my last (no, really my last) day in Niger.
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