Here goes nothing...

I got the audio loaded. There's even a nifty player on the left side of the page there for you. For those of you who listen to podcasts, you can subscribe with the button underneath, and for the rest of you you can just listen on the site. I know they are a bit out of date, but it's a start. I will try to start recording every day or so, and publish them when I get into town. Probably whenever you see a new entry here, there will be new audio. but, on with the news...

I got back from Zinder today, that was a long bus trip! 12 hours is a long time, even when you have three seats to yourself. Today I got to ride in the newest bus that had tv's and speakers over each seat. That just means it's more annoying when they play the local music. There's no escape! If I hear that song with the laughing/crying/pooping baby again I might go balistic!

Zinder was really nice though, kind of a smaller version of Niamey. They have restaurants and such, artisans, etc. They just don't have grocery stores and nice western style restaurants. The transit house there is really nice as well. I'm jealous every time I go visiting. Balleyara's hostel is nice, but it doesn't hold a candle to zinder, or even Gotheye, at least they have cement buildings. Oh well, soon I won't have one at all, but it's a fiar trade to have an air conditioned office with internet :-).

I am going back to the bush tomorrow, and I'm not sure when I'll come back into town. I think I'll be in for the COS party on the 17th, but it will only be for the evening and I probably wont' get on the computer to chat much, MAYBE i'll have time to update the blog, but I'm going out again the next day. I've got to get this grain bank rolling! Hopefully the villagers have done some work without me, but I'm not going to hold my breath. I don't know if I'll make it into Niamey for Thanksgiving, we'll have to see how the bank is coming along. I should probably pick either thanksgiving or the COS party, as I haven't been in the village much lately. We're also down to less than a month till Mom & Dad come! It will be a lot of fun showing them around.

Wish me luck on the grain bank. I'll try to get the audio going. And that's all for now!