Rain! Work! Cat! Ghana?

Well, its been about a week or so since the last post, so its about time to write again I guess...
This past week has been extremely hot, but with not one, but two suprising middle-of-night rain showers in my village! The sound and smell of rain is probably almost as exciting as.. well, I dont know, its just really exciting. The first night it rained, I wasn't prepared ("one month til the time of 'sky water'"-'sai wata guda, akwai lokacin ruwan suma'- thats what my villagers kept telling me) so, that night at first I was really excited sleeping under my woven-grass shade hangar, when I felt the first rain drops.. about 45 minutes into the storm I was soaked through and freezing (I didnt know it was possible to be 'freezing' in 93 degrees..), so needless to say, the next chance I got I went to my market town and bought a large roll of plastic, and waterproofed my shade hangar. The second time it rained it was bliss....
So a small piece of big news, I got a cat! Yes, I am alergic, but I got him anyway; he was sitting at this little cafe stand near the peace corps hostel and I just asked, can I have your cat? and they said yes.. So I put him in a box and traveled the 3 1/2 ish hours to my village.. Its a kitten, so its still really whinney and obnoxious and drives me a bit crazy, but suprisingly, he's growing on me :) Still no name for the thing, so send ideas my way.
WORK! Finally, I feel like I have stuff to do! Right now Im in Konni buying seeds for my big field project Im planning... Well, actually I wasnt really planning it per say, it just kinda fell into my lap. So, I was talking to my women's group leader in my village, and I asked, so, can i help you with your field this season? Learn the ropes, figure out how to do it, so that next year I can do my own field project? She was like, sure! That'd be great! So, then a few days later I was talking to her again, so what are we going to plant? Well, we're planting millet, beans, and peanuts... ummm... how big is this field? Oh, we have two of them... What?? oh... so you have the seeds? Oh, no- you should go buy them. Oh...
So instead of this just being a learning experience, I'm going to work with one of the agriculture programs here that does improved crops and seed varieties- I'll plant some of their 'improved seeds' and work with them on data collection to help them create better seed varieties with higher yield. So, trail by fire.. it'll either turn out great, and it'll be a nice demo plot for my villagers to see an imroved seed variety, as well as improved techniques (chemical fertalizers, etc), or, the test-'improved' seeds could turn out to produce less yield than the local variety and my villagers can just enjoy watching the 'batura' (white girl) working in the field. Anyway.
Other than that, not much new to share! Its been hot, sweaty, and it seems neirly everyone (volunteers) is escaping off to Ghana to spend a couple weeks on the beach. I was going to wait on a vacation and buy a horse now, but, as my villagers have pointed out, horse feed will be pretty expensive right now until harvest season-- so I might jump on the band wagon and head to Ghana sometime in August and buy the horse, instead, coming October, harvest season.. which seems so long away, but I've already waited 7 months, I spose I could wait a few more! And, with a trip to Ghana, maybe coinciding with the time of the Harry Potter 6 reliese of course, the wait wo'nt be too bad!

A few photos!

So, not much time left on the internet after uploading these so just briefly: the first one, some kids in my village- they all love cameras and getting their pictures taken- it gets a little overwelming sometimes! The second one is at the zoo in Niamey- never have I ever seen a hippo this upclose before!!

Next is also in Niamey, just a mechant hauling his wears from one place to another- the way they can carry stuff on their heads.. A-mazing!! Next is some SWEET henna I got done in Tahoua, Heidi and I splurged for her B-day last march!

Some of my Fulani neighbors and their camel- I love the hats they have, I'm determined to buy one, but since usually only the men wear them, they might think it a little odd... so Im going to wait until I have a horse and they already think that odd for a women to ride a horse.. so Im just going to add the hat on!