Foreign Familiarity

I have a bunch of pictures I want to share with no particular theme in mind. They were taken with my phone (often through the pick-up window) so I apologize ahead of time for any glares you might find. All photos were either snapped in Niamey or on the outskirts. 

To me, they are sights of home.

Foreign Familiarity.

There are always cattle on the capital's streets. 

 I absolutely love bougainvillea trees. 

She might hate me for putting this picture up, but we had a blast riding in the back of the pick-up. Just like old times. She's beautiful.

 Grocery shopping.

 The local Gap.

The local Starbucks...just down our street. Looks like she is doing homework on the job! I'm thankful she has the opportunity to learn.

These next few were taken on our way to see giraffes--just outside of Niamey.

 Baobab. 'Nuff said.

It's amazing how much women can carry on their heads.

Although these pictures aren't super clear, I still really like them. 

Drawing water from the well.

 Back in Niamey.

 Traffic jam!

 Another Starbucks!

 "Welcome to the Hair-Styling Specialist"

How fun it was to wear colorful pagnes!

Although I did not grow up in Niger, the sights, sounds, and smells of West Africa are similar enough I felt at home nonetheless. The frequent honking and crazy traffic, the dozens of little shops that line the streets, the smell of urine and garbage, the fine sand that gets between my toes and coats my feet with red and brown, the daily reminder of hunger and poverty and sickness, the pick-up soccer games played barefoot in the neighborhood streets every evening, the sweet taste of glass-bottled coke, the toothless smiles of weathered men and women who are probably decades younger than they appear, the mosque boys running around with tin cans to raise money, the swarm of beggars desperate for a nickel or a dime, the bright colored prints on the clothes people wear.... 

These sights, sounds, smells, that are foreign to me because I still do not fully understand them, belong to them, or come from them, are in some great paradoxical way familiar to me because I have seen them, smelt them, heard them since I can remember. They are familiar enough for me to say, they are the sights, sounds, smells of home.