My Journey in Niger

Life among the Sokoto Fulani of Niger

Friday, May 26, 2006

something(s) to think about

I go to sleep on a normal mattress, but wake up in a water bed.
Often there is a gigantic, invisible dragon blowing dirty, flameless fire on me.
When the dragon is asleep, God’s natural A/C kicks on.
It’s hot, yet I want to wear long sleeves to alleviate the baking sensation outside.
There is no need for a hot water heater; tap water is already hot.
Evidently people think I am Santa Claus, because they’re always asking for gifts.
I can literally wring the sweat out of my clothes.
There are more than 7 languages spoken in Niamey and the surrounding area.
There is a different dialect of Fulfulde when you go to the east and west an itty bit.
I am learning a mixture of Fulfulde, Hausa, English, and French (Hausfrengulde.)

Fulfulde, the language I am really learning has a verb for nearly everything.
A few examples:
-to be yellow, to be red, … and other colors. Yes, each color has its own verb. Wait, but not green. If you want to say the car is green, literally you say the car is fresh grass.
-to run away from your husband
-to put eye makeup on
-to stand around fire
-to be a woman who no man wants to marry
(yes, in Fulfulde one word describes these phrases)

Look at Luke 8 and the explanation of the Parable of the Seeds. The seed represents the Word of God and the ones who hear the Word. How can that be? We translated this story for language class earlier this week and our language teacher pointed this out to us. He encouraged us to think about it, because he believes Fulani will have a hard time understanding that the seed represents the Word of God and people. What do you think?

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