paizay-le-tort
In early June, when the travel restrictions lifted, Kaspar and I bought train tickets to go visit Max and his mother out in western France as the George Floyd protests erupted back in the States. Images from Nouvelle-Aquitaine and déconfinement thoughts.
confinement : interiors
Interiors and self-portraits from confinement.
confinement : exteriors
The world outside changed dramatically over the course of a few days.
distanciation sociale
tired of manic zoom calls
fondu enchaîné, boucle sans fin
to quentin: solstice d’été
It’s summer in Brooklyn and I’m so in love and happy. I don’t want much else than this right now.
to quentin : cold season + lobiri
We’re entering into “cold” season. Mornings are almost chilly, but by 9, it begins to get warm. There’s not even any hope for rain to cool things down, at least not until next May or June when rainy season starts back up again.
aftermath
Post-election discussion with Sibiri
étude de milieu and tabaski : autumn in lists
I’ve been at Tioyo for about two months now. The past month has been hellish, a slow torture, punctuated by brief moments of levity with friends and this little cat.
the breakdown
For the entire first month, I was running on an adrenaline high. Everything was novel and exciting and I greedily devoured the tiniest details of this new place. I fell quickly in love with the heavy rains, the bike rides, my host family, the new foods. Other trainees would vent to me about homesickness, host family problems, and language stresses and I would listen patiently, but never quite know how to connect.
on language
I used to have my Moore classes in the field of a high school that has let out for the summer. We would drag out tables and chairs from the abandoned classrooms and set up underneath the shade of a shea tree. I sat beside two girls with twin stars tucked behind their ears.
becoming nassara
Nassara, nassara
“It means white person in Moore,” Sabrina explained to me.
“Foreigner,” our country director corrected.
site visit
At the end of our first week in country, we piled into buses with our belongings to make the trip to Léo for PST. During this trip, our LCFs handed us slim manila folders labeled with our names and a village name. Our site assignments. We anxiously leafed through the sparse packets and unfolded oversized maps, trying desperately to glean information about our home for the next two years.