The Drive to Diffa

This is going to be a tough clean up.

We left Zinder on Sunday mid morning and I felt I should have been more excited than what I was feeling. Up until Thursday, I’d never been east of Maradi and here I was about to travel to one of the last outposts in the farthest reaches of Niger near the Chad border, but too many long nights working in front of a computer screen had left me drained and edgy. The long hours had also left me somewhat of a mute; I felt I didn’t have enough accessible memory to run the language software in my brain with everything else going on inside. We were five, including the driver, and riding in the back seat sandwiched between Sanda and Moussa made me miss having my own personal chauffeur and Land Cruiser. Carpooling: just another sacrifice made in the name of the “Emergency.”

The road leaving from Zinder soon became a mosaic of asphalt and potholes. That I was even able to nap during the drive is either a testament to our driver’s ability or my overall fatigue, or perhaps both. During my waking moments I noticed less millet planted and more sorghum, and then, eventually, I stopped seeing anything planted, aside from Neem trees in the villages that bordered the road. Acacia trees could be seen farther from the road being visited by camels that used their height advantage and dexterous tongues to strip the young, tender leaves off the thorny branches. The colors out east, or at least those visible from the road, seem different to me than those in the west. My father wouldn’t find the red, red soil and rocks that imprinted so vividly in his memory during his trips to Niger. The soil (and the houses made from this same soil) look washed out, grey, and tired. It seemed to me pure folly that humans inhabit a place like this. But the human race has proven itself highly adaptable to even the harshest environments, and I would submit that Niger ranks in the top tier of the “Hardest Place to Live on the Planet” contest.

While seeming particularly hostile to humans, this part of Niger seemed perfectly suited for camels, goats and sheep. Seeing a goat perched up on its back tip toes trying to reach a tasty morsel that dangles temptingly just above its reach never fails to make me smile. Looking at the scene from afar you could easily think the goat is talking to the object of her desire, almost persuading it, from the oral gymnastics it’s going through to gain some purchase on said morsel. If goats ever figure out how to cooperate to make a goat-ladder, the Sahel is going to be in real trouble.

From the road, the pasture looked decent, but I was told that at this time of year the thickness and the color of the vegetation should be denser and more lush. And, during a pit stop I walked over to look at the grass and saw it was sharp-edged and filled with evil briars, not exactly prime grazing material. Still, the animals I saw looked surprisingly healthy. A few of the cows and horses looked more like skeletons, wearing their skin pulled tightly across their bones, but these were in the minority. Other than finding adequate forage from seemingly nothing, the other talent that sheep and goats posses, I’ve noticed, is sensing when to cross the road at exactly the right (or wrong) moment to make you stop or swerve to avoid hitting them. I’d like to think they do this on purpose, to have a good laugh with their buddies afterwards at our expense, but I don’t think so. All you have to do is look into the vacant eyes of sheep to know that they’re just not smart enough to pull something like that off.

At some point during the drive, sand dunes appeared. They weren’t the grand dunes that you might associate with the deep desert that go on and on, and disappear into the horizon, but were more low-slung and some were partially vegetated. But they’re on the move, no doubt, and they’re hungry. They have a particular appetite for the road and at certain points the sand had completely buried the asphalt. Not that this is an entirely bad thing in the right context. While we were stopped, so the others could pray, I took a moment to stretch my legs and I noticed a Peugeot station wagon, cum bush taxi, parked along side the road up ahead with its passengers sitting off to one side. I figured it had a flat tire or something and walked over to investigate. When I got to the car I saw that the bonnet had been completely removed and the entire engine compartment was filled with sand. The bits that weren’t covered in sand were charred black, visibly burned. The driver told me he didn’t have any water to put out the fire, but thankfully there was no shortage of sand.

Hadjia and Moussa spent a lot of the trip reading Koranic materials. Moussa, who made the pilgrimage to Mecca in 2003, was reading an Arabic/French dual translation of the Koran, with one page written in French and the other in Arabic. He had the French side covered with a piece of paper in an attempt to better his Arabic, but I could tell there was a lot of peeking going on. Hadjia seemed to prefer shorter pieces, all in Arabic, maybe the Islamic equivalent of the Upper Room. It wasn’t until we were about two-thirds of the way to Diffa that the significance of the date struck me: it was the fourth anniversary of 9/11. I didn’t think about the horrific details that took place four years ago as much as I thought about the perception of Muslims and their faith.

I wish more people could have the experience that I’ve had living in an Islamic society and alongside devout Muslims. Since being back, I’ve noticed how familiar the daily cadence, punctuated with the five daily prayer calls, feels to me. And I’ve slipped back into the habit of beseeching the will of Allah when I speak of things in the future that haven’t happened yet, and which might not happen—that’s only for Allah to know. The image of Islamic radicals who foment violence against others couldn’t be farther from my image I hold of people in Niger. Given the level of poverty and lack of education you might think these are volatile combinations that Islamic radicals would prey upon to recruit fellow zealots. But, by and large, it just doesn’t exist. I think most people would be shocked to learn just how tolerant Niger is of other religions. In fact, in the car ride I discussed with Moussa the unusual relationship that the Malagche have with their dead. I could tell he was somewhat shocked, especially the part about exhuming the remains of ancestors and fêting, but he didn’t pass any judgment. I don’t know what it is about Niger’s make up that produces such calm and tolerance, but it’s definitely a good thing and I wish there was more of it.

We finally rolled into Diffa around 6 o’clock. It reminded me a little of Konni in some ways—a little bit of a border town feel (Nigeria is only a dozen kilometers away and Chad is relatively close, I suppose), not many paved roads, and a kind of sprawling town layout. Noticeably different in Diffa, though, is the lack of the ubiquitous “cobble-cobble” drivers found in Konni: moped taxis, usually driven by teenage boys that queue along the road waiting for passengers.

We made the rounds at the office before retiring to CARE’s guest house. I made a quick tour of the facilities and in the kitchen, written on the wall, I saw, « 13/04/05 1ere pluie, 15h-16h». So little says so much: a promise and hope for another year, insha’allah.