more nigeria notes...

Last night [three days ago] we went to a Chinese restaurant for dinner. Chinese in nigeria, I am happy to report, tastes just like Chinese at home. Interesting cultural melange: sitting in Kano with a Nigerian family, eating American-style chinese food with, improbably enough, chopin playing in the background...
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Yesterday evening [ie three days ago before chinese] went out and played soccer with Rashid, his brothers, and some Pakistani friends. Football, universal language, balh blah blah. i embarrassed myself with an abysmal lack of fitness -- damn the summer spent in front of a computer, and the heat.
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Rashid and I spent much of our time sitting in the shady driveway, conversing about life, the universe, and everything, like old men on their wooden porch. Had some really good conversations.
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Spent this afternoon [day after chinese, two days ago] driving around with rashid, his brother, and a friend. Did a bunch of visits to Rashid's extended family (I was just a sack of potatos). Then we went and saw the real Kano: polo fields and golf course. Enjoyed watching the polo practice -- one of my long-term 'things to do' is learn to ride a horse. Seems exciting and fun -- and polo seems v. fun too.
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I've probably committed to a week more here than I should have. It's not a disaster, but there isn't much to do. Life is slow, and we are spending lots of time doing nothing...
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Kano is a sprawling and full of spread out low-lying mud or (mostly painted) concrete, Jacksonville-style buildings...Not nearly as compact as many other developing world city.
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Ach! I've now been twice-mocked by Rashid and even Rashid's brother (who has a good but somewhat shaky grasp of english) for sounding british! The second time I actually noticed it myself...not accent per se but intonation. Horrible though...
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All of the religious people we've met have been v. nice, so it was a bit of shocking reminder about the oppressive nature of religion to see giant billboards on the entrance of the Kano University that say "Earn Respect...Dress Decently" with pictures of hair-covering women...
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The most depressing thing here is listening to Rashid's brother and old friend (who lived in the US for a few years) talk about Nigeria. they (esp. the friend) are relentlessly cynical and bitter about the country "every agreement has to do about money" "of course our people are too dumb to..." "that politician must have made this law because his brother...". And there's the (tragic?) hope that "things will be differnet when we are in power", that "we will change it."
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For the first time in a while I was laid low by food poisoning last night [two nights ago]. We ate some street food that just looked dodgy...only had a bit, and that's probably what saved me from getting violently sick (merely tossing and turning all night with an unquiet stomach). Everyone else was okay, but I'm a weak foreigner etc.

In general, however, today was better than yesterday...Woke up early (9am) to go to the KLM office to convert our e-tickets into paper tickets, because the airport can't handle e-tickets.

Then we went off to explore the Kano markets. Not spectacular, but reasonably interesting -- more or less like any 3rd world market. Notably clean, though, and the sellers were surprisingly subdued -- very few tried to aggressively hawk their wares at the tourist. I would have liked to spend more time there, but Rashid's brother (our guide/driver) walked us rather quickly in and out. I think that he didn't see any appeal/interest in the grubby market.

Next we went around the traditional dye pits, which had 4 colors: light blue, blue, navy blue, and blue-black. The pits were essentially 3 foot wide short cylinders, in which the workers placed textiles in a bath of ash and indigo for 1/2 hour to 4 hours, depending on the 'color'. In Morocco, if I remember, the pits were much bigger, like small pools. But that might be because I was smaller...Still, the color(s?) was nice.

Finally we ending our day of travel with the University of Kano, which was a massive, sprawling conglomeration of run-down concrete buildings. Lots of money is spend on the buildings, but none on maintenance, so everything is dirty, yellowing, peeling, chipped, and broken. The exams results were publicly posted on the walls, so everyone could see everyone elses results.

Ate late lunch at the Lebanese club (there are many Lebanese all over West Africa, and they are relatively prosperous). Like everything here, it exudes an almost unbearable aura of decline. This old buildings has been repainted in a couple decades, the linens inside are all soiled and stained; the wall are dirty and blotchy. According to Rashid it was once v. popular and happening; now it is empty and listless. In general much of the infrastructure here seems likewise 'wasted': houses haven't been painted; streetlamps were laid out two decades ago but now stand darkened; roads haven't been repaved in similar amount of time.

Of course this isn't universally true -- there is a shiny new Lebanese-owned French cafe, lots of grand new houses, etc. But they stand beside so many once grand now neglected houses.



A late start to today [actually today], but we got out to the first-world style pharmacy, with above-west prices, where I bought bug spray -- damn mosquitoes have eaten me alive.

Then we visited the Summit school, which was v. nice. A success story/heart warming/etc. Rashid had been the first pupil, after his mum pushed the Ghanian couple to restart teaching after they had quit the university b/c of beurocracy there. Now it has grown from one pupil to over 500 pupils; from a small garage to a modestly sized-leafy school ground with a small library (named after Rashid!). Of course, the school has faced all sorts of problems from government regulations (three years to register; now they are being forced to expand to 9 years of schooling because the government has passed a law that requires all primary schools to also provide secondary education). But it's managed to thrive despite this...