[rim] Moving

[Will Holcomb]

I am back in town once again. I just got back from a week and a half
of whirlwind adventures through the interior. I've significantly
developed my criminal resume, but all that must remain secret at least
until I can't get kicked out of the Peace Corps.

I rolled into town from Kaédi at about 1am on the 3rd. I didn't even
go home, but instead headed straight to Obie's house for his election
party. Since we are five hours off the east coast the returns were
just starting to come in. I sat around playing Risk and watching
States come in until about 5am when I crashed out on the couch. I
awoke to find Ohio under debate only to those willing to live in a
fantasy land.

I've been spending the last three months being jaded and trying to not
have any faith in the intelligence of the American people. Despite my
best efforts I allowed a spark of hope grow only so that it could get
crushed by the election. Fortunately, Obie had large quantities of
cheese and ice cream on hand that I used to drown my sorrows.

I won't even ask of you all what exactly the hell is wrong with all of
you. I'll just assume that they're putting something in the water back
in the States and you are all high as kites. I've got plenty of
Mauritanians to commiserate with here.

This morning I got up pretty early, but I didn't really get moving til
nearly noon. For the party in Kaédi I took my laptop down with all
fourteen of the Simpsons' Halloween episodes on it. I still had my
laptop with me, so I lay around watching Simpsons and reading a David
Sedaris book I lifted from the Kaédi maison.

About noon someone stuffed a letter under my door addressed to
"Tenant." Generally these are not a good sign. I'd not paid my rent
yet (since I'd been out of town) and was hoping that they weren't
going to chastise me for my tardiness. I found some clothes and
wandered out to find my landlord's English speaking son chatting on
the phone. He told me that the house is being sold and ought to be
office space within a couple weeks.

So, I may soon be a homeless person. This is not wretched since I'm
sure I could tell Marc or Carl that I need a place to stay and they'd
put me up.

I've actually been thinking that it would be good for me to move for a
while. I've done a reasonably good job of making some Mauritanian
friends, but I've definitely not done as well as I would like to have.
It seems sort of silly to live in this place and not really get
immersed in the culture.

As it is, I've definitely gotten a better taste of life here than the
average expiate, but I've not really gotten down and rolled around in
Mauritanian society. I never would have moved on my own though because
I love my place so much. It is a great location and a great price. My
landlord is really nice and everyone is friendly.

I've got one offer right now from my landlord. He is moving into a
place that should be about as far from the University as where we are
now. I like the idea, but it is farther into the nice (and Western)
part of town and will go counter to my goal of getting to know
Mauritania better. It also does not have an external door like my
place does now. I sort of like the idea of running into the old guy
more often, but I also often hang out with people until three in the
morning and the layout will have to be such that I can come in at all
hours without disturbing him.

I'm planning on going and checking it out. I'm also going to talk to
some of my friends in the poorer parts of town and see what they
think. It will mean giving up hot water almost certainly and I dislike
that, but I think I can manage. We get sort of cold here in the
mornings in the winter (since we are right on the ocean), but I can
always just bathe at night.

Giving up running water would be harder and I'm hoping to avoid that.
The problem with the poorer parts of town isn't that there aren't
water pipes, it is that there is no water pressure. You get one faucet
for the whole house and it they dig out below the ground level to
install it to try and increase pressure. This doesn't really work
though and all you get is a trickle. So, what you do is put a bucket
under the trickle and every few hours you have a full bucket of water
to use for whatever purpose. I feel like a bit of a diva not being
willing to let running water go, but unless the place was really cool
or cheap I don't want to.

So, things will be changing one way or another soon. I'm glad about
it. I've been dealing with a funk for a long while and maybe mixing
things up will help.

Love,
Will