A Basic Haircut

An important question presents itself: what to do about the hair situation? I could spend $2 for a haircut, but the male trainees who have visited the local barbers so far would have been better off giving a rusty tuna can lid (as Patton Oswalt might say) to a toddler and saying “have at it!” Instead I gave my electric shaver to Jordy and asked for a basic haircut. What I ended up getting was a haircut for basic training. I thought Jordy was a safe choice because she's Italian and went to art school. But perhaps one should not entrust their head to a modern Italian artist – they might pursue a harsh premise, such as the Fellini Creative Crisis look, or in my case the Timothy McVeigh coif. But I joke, actually I quite like my first “buzz cut.” It’s fun to run your hands through it, I don’t need much shampoo, and it’s COOL. While I can’t really see what it looks like (my mirror is missing so I have to resort to looking in puddles of water), ladies of various nationalities have given me good reviews so far. "Nte shebib," they say (in my head), which means "you lookin' GOOD!"

=== We Love Maaouiya!!! ===

As you might have heard, there was reportedly an attempted coup d’etat in Mauritania. The political situation is truly a mystery to me 400 km from the capital, and don’t worry, I’m not in any danger, I swear! As a response to the “events” in the capital, a pro-Maaouiya rally was staged in Kaedi the other day. That’s President Al-Taya’s first name; apparently everyone knows him very well as you always refer to him as Maaouiya. The rally consisted of a few hundred, maybe thousand people who wandered around town shouting slogans and hob-nobbing with ministers and semi-bigwigs (Maaouiya stayed in Nouakchott). 1950’s looking trucks loaded down with happy but slightly bored looking folks and sporting a loudspeaker sputtered dust, smoke, and happy slogans along the road.

My vantage point was the roof of the auberge behind Sydu’s epicerie, where we talked Mauritanian politics. “Sydu,” I asked. “If you went out there and started saying ‘Maaouiya sucks! I hate him!’ would you go to jail?” “No,” he said with a smile, “but it would not be a good idea.” The conversation later turned to the United States and immigration (coincidence that talking about local politics makes him think about leaving?). “I know a guy,” he began, “who went to America for six months to work, and when he came back he built an enormous house, bought a new car, and got nice clothes.” I nodded, trying to guess where he would go next. “And do you know what he did there?” I shook my head. “He slept on the street, and everyday for money he would take peoples' dogs for a walk. That’s all!” I asked Sydu if he would do that if he had the chance. “No, not me,” he replied. "I want to stay here." But what if I could get Sydu a visa to the States, would he come? He’s single, no children, and he’d drive a cab, sweep up, mow someone’s lawn, and probably even walk their dog if he had to. Sheikh, the manager of Sydu's sums up a common feeling here. "I want to go to America to work, but I'm afraid of America." Afraid of what, the culture, I ask? "No, I hear that a violent crime happens every second!"

=== The Near Death Players ===

Town Hall Meeting – the periodic talent show at the Peace Corps training center has been an unexpected bonus for me. I’ve become the de-facto master of ceremonies and have been able to re-explore the realm of stand-up comedy. But I’ve thrown away my old open-mic shtick (sorry, or you’re welcome?); now all my jokes are about goats, gastro-intestinal distress (ok, no change there), bad food, and sometimes donkeys. It’s fun, even if the materials works about as reliably as a bush taxi. And I’ve even thrown in a few guitar performances to torture the audience in different ways.

For the most recent show I decided to try my hand as a playwright of sorts. In between classes I hammered out a one-act about a Peace Corps trainee going in for an evaluation with the Director. The boss calls him the worst trainee he has ever seen (You SUCK at the Peace Corps!). But it turns out he has the wrong file – same name but wrong year. He’s actually a model trainee and all is forgiven. Get it? Ok, so it’s no Moon For the Misbegotten, but it's my first attempt. As for the casting, the aloof director was perfect for Tarn, our highly-cultured PCT who isn’t afraid to drop “Tristan und Isolde” into conversation. And the trainee had to be Keith…why? I dunno, Keith just has that ability to connect with an audience, and, well, he’s easy to talk into last-minute stuff. They both agreed, but a couple hours before showtime, we have a problem. My stars are sick. Keith is laying down "in his trailer" groaning like a donkey pulling 50 sacks of rice, and Tarn is limping around the lycee with a Tubercular cough that echoes all the way to Selibaby. “Don’t worry, I’m fine,” Keith says, looking up at me from his mattress. “Hack hack- I’m up for it- hack hack hack,” Tarn assures me amidst a fit of consumption. But when showtime rolled around they were dynamite. The skit went over well, despite the fact that the writing was too dense and the punchline slightly mixed up. Keith’s character grabbed his file from the director, “Hey, this file says 2004!!!” Uh, Keith, you’re supposed to say 1994, I say silently from the audience. “It IS 2004, John,” Tarn shoots back. Oh well, it’s Town Hall Meeting, not Masterpiece Theatre.

To make the moment even more surreal, the table serving as the Director’s desk was covered with about 50 opened condoms, left over from the medical session “demonstration” that morning. Your tax dollars at work… ;)

=== Riddle of the Week ===

What has thicker skin than an elephant, makes you cry, and is green, is the size of a grapefruit on the outside, and is the size of an orange on the inside? A Mauritanian Grapefruit!

=== Into Africa ===

Banana trees with their wide floppy leaves hanging down. Sprawling vegetation and oppressive humidity. This is the “Africa” that many have in mind when they apply to Peace Corps. Man do you get a raw deal in Mauritania, where you’re lucky to see a tree every 50 feet, and you soon learn to recognize 100 shades of brown. But the other day we got to go to the REAL Africa, a citrus grove near the village of Rindiau (just 10 minutes by car outside of Kaedi proper). Situated right on the Senegal river and well irrigated, this lush oasis of fruit trees is a rare site in Mauritania. Of course I’m kidding about being cheated out of the “real” Africa. There’s no such thing except for the fantasy one gets after too many episodes of Tarzan. And frankly, after a few nights sleeping outside in Kiffa with no mosquito net (and no bites the next morning), I might say that pictures of the Cameroonian rainforest will suffice, thank you.

=== Your Hassaniya is…a Joke ===

Hanging around at Sydu’s today I made myself comfortable on a stack of boxed milk as the chair were all taken. This was at the manager's suggestion; normally I try not to sit on the merchandise. Eventually a chair opened up and I pounced on it. “My butt is cooking the milk,”*** I offered in Hassaniya as a justification. One of the guys spoke up after the laughter died down. “Aziza and Fatimatu, they are learning real Hassaniya. But you, Hasan, you are learning JOKE Hassaniya.” It’s true. If it doesn’t rhyme or say something obnoxious, chances are I won’t remember it. I save up lists of meaningless rhyming phrases like “ebkem ib kem” (how much for a mute?) and “atrash b’ash” or (how much for a deaf?), sort of like Eminem preparing for one of his rap wars. Eventually I will meet a Hassaniya rapper and DEFEAT him in his own tongue!

*** Thanks to comedian Lord Carrett for introducing me to the concept of “butt-heat” and it’s workings.

We Built This City On Rock & Sand

Hello everyone. I just returned from my first visit to Kiffa – soon to be my home for the next two years. It was a good trip, and compared to the 20 hour road trip the Atar trainees faced coming back, a relatively easy voyage.

We went from Kaedi this time which takes most of an entire day (as does the Nouakchott -- Kiffa trip), and leads you north-west and then hooks east at Aleg, the home of MEAT in Mauritania. On our way home we practically watched our sheep get slaughtered and barbecued before our eyes! On the way over it was eight or so of us in a Peace Corps 4x4, pretty comfortable, all trainees and two facilitators, one for the Kiffa group and one for the Ayoun group (further east down the Road of Hope). The way back three of us brought facilitators for our planning workshop here in Kaedi, to facilitate our planning for the planning of many facilitations to come. Or something like that.

I should report that I had my first angry tirade against a shopkeeper who tried to sell me milk at 250 ougiyas instead of 200. A little backstory: I buy a box of milk or two everyday and it's always 200 in Kiffa and Kaedi, so before we left Kiffa, we stopped in an epicerie and I chugged my milk down on the spot. As I handed the woman 200, she said no, it costs 250. My travel-mates all had gone back into the car and were waiting for me as I argued with the lady. "EVERY DAY I BUY THIS FOR 200!" I practically yelled, feeling indignant not over the 20 cents but the PRINCIPLE of the matter. She was just trying to rip off a Toubab and thought she could get away with it. I heard a voice from the car, "Hurry UP, Luke!" I yelled back: "If you want to leave then come help me! I'm having a problem with my milk!" Several hours later, Adriana's counterpart was still laughing about that. "He couldn't get proper change for his milk, ha ha ha!!!" Oh, but I got it, and that shop keeper learned a LESSON! You don't mess with Luke's milk!

In Kiffa we stayed with the family of Amicire, my counterpart and instructor at the city’s vocational school. We took a quick tour of the campus – there’s workshops for woodworking, masonry, metalworking, and electricians (what is that field called anyhow?), as well as a computer room where I can teach computers or whatever else I decide. For now, I think I’ll focus on teaching how to build refrigerators using discarded milk cartons, as it seems to have about as much chance of success as me talking about basic accounting skills! I haven’t kept a check book since high school!

=== Hurts So Bad ===
Parody is like chewing gum for me. When I’m bored, nothing to do, don’t want to study, etc, I make fun of things. Which explains my growing list of Mauritanian parody songs… I’ve yet to figure out most of the guitar parts and transitions, but I’m planning a monster medley for the upcoming Town Hall Meeting (talent show) at the training center. Here’s a list of what I’m working with so far followed by the band who did the original:
We Built This City (On Rock & Sand) – Jefferson StarshipIt’s Hip To Be Moor – Huey Lewis & The NewsTin Shack – B-52’sSmooth Camel Racer – SadeDonkey’s Making Love – Bad Company

If you have any good ideas, or preferably BAD ideas, send them along and I’ll give a special PRIZE to any song parody I use in my medley. Prize delivery might take 12-14 weeks, on approved credit only, $12.99 shipping and handling fee.

Going To Kiffa With An Achin' In My Heart

Hello everyone,

Just a short message to let you know that my site has been selected; I'll be going to Kiffa, the capital of the central/southern Assaba region. This good news, I think. Sorry about the bad Zeppelin reference in the title of this email...

Here's a map of the countrywww.only-maps.com/mauritania-map.html

At around 32,000 people, Kiffa is one of the biggest cities after the capital Nouakchott. It's predominantly Moor with a few minority communities including Pular speakers and even some Malian immigrants. It's hot, of course, but relatively dry (my trainer said she rarely saw a mosquito) which is good for the malaria issue... I might well have electricity, cell phone no problem, but running water is still a work in progress, I hear...

My job will vary depening on what I decide I want to do and how the wind blows, but officially I'm assigned to a vocational school as a Business Education Advisor. Typically in this role volunteers teach basic business or computer classes, but I hope to do some more general small business/cooperative consulting in the community as well. I think they might go well together. I will not be taking over for another volunteer -- there has not been a PCV in Kiffa for a year or more... but I don't mind (I can do it MY way)!

And in other good news, Adriana and Andrew, two of my favorite stagiaires who's names start with A, will be in Kiffa too... teaching and doing health work, respectively. Caleb will be a couple hours south of us working the agriculture angle, along with my new friend Annika (Berkeley grad, as is Adriana) who is a 2nd year volunteer in Kankossa. And we're on the paved "Road To Hope" that goes from Nouakchott all the way to Nema 1200 km away so it's not too difficult to get around (not EASY, but not as bumpy) and volunteers should be passing through every so often.

There's even an airport that has flights every so often. I leave tomorrow morning at 6:30 am for a 5 day trip. We'll meet our counterparts, get to know the area a bit, and then take our first intra-city public taxi trip back to Kaedi for the remaining weeks of pre-service training. In a wacky coincidence, my counterpart is the husband of a former Peace Corps volunteer who I met in DC at a film screening...

Should be fun! More to come.

--Luke

Dust & Locusts: Two Potential Exports

=== Dust Storm Coming ===I’ve just started my (camping!) shower one Saturday afternoon when I look up into the sky and notice some clouds. Why does it always seem to rain the day before we go to or from the training center, I wondered, feeling bad for the trainees who come in from further away on bad roads. Then, a moment later I look up again and see a fast moving cloud, and brown as the sun was hot moments before. Uh oh, a dust storm, and here I am half wet, in the buff, and my laundry is hanging on the clothes line. I figured I had about two minutes to get inside. Throwing my clothes back on and leaving my shower hanging from the wall, I dashed out of the bathroom and saw Bayeh (host sister) already taking my laundry off the line, one of a dozen acts of kindness you receive here daily. I got inside my room without eating too much sand and tied some twine to my door and anchored it to my backpack to keep it from blowing open… and here I am… typing the latest AIM dispatch in my clay bread oven slash bedroom.

=== Babow, Locust Fighter ===

There’s a new addition to the practically defunct Kaedi airport – a plane! And with that, a pilot, Ahmed Babow of the Mauritanian Air Force, I guess you would call it (no jets, as of yet). I met Babow at Sydu’s, the epicierie (basically The Peach Pit for you 90210 fans) which sits next to an air conditioned hotel of sorts… Our first interaction went like this:

Me: Isellam aleykum (Peace be upon you).

Babow: Are you a Muslim?

Me: No.

Babow: Then why are you speaking Arabic?

Me: I dunno… Are you English?

Babow: No.

Me: Then why are you speaking English?

Turned out he was kidding, and the conversation did continue. When he said he spent two years in Florida learning to fly, I couldn’t resist. “Oh, you graduated from Al-Qaeda’s flight school?” I asked. He laughed, and held out his hand for a semi-high-five-slap-hand-shake, a sign here that your joke was appreciated. In fact, when he left the Sates after graduation (he attended a civilian flight school in Ft. Pierce, Florida, with the sponsorship of the Mauritanian military), his American girlfriend advised “now don’t you go flying into any buildings, you hear?”

Babow is one of the lucky ones, and by that I mean Arab looking folks who want to learn to fly planes. He graduated just weeks after 9-11. Within a few days of the events, he said in so many words that the FBI knew his favorite flavor of ice cream and whether he cries during sad movies.

The other day, Babow asked me if I wanted to see his plane up close, and I agreed with the ecitement of a small child, partly my boredom talking, partly my life long interest in aviation. We walked out onto the tarmac past some other stagiares (sorry, ladies, I asked if you could join us but he said even one was probably too many) up to a boxy and tired looking Defender (an old British twin engine turboprop, from World War One, Babow joked). She holds up to nine passengers and goes slow but plays an important role right now in Mauritania. Tucked under each wing are tanks, holding not fluel but insecticide. Babow’s job is to fly straight into the locust swarms you might have heard about on CNN (one visited Kaedi last week) and score a few points for Mauritanian farmers and herders. “How many have you killed, Babow?” I ask him in front of a few other trainees who don’t know the back story. “Millions,” he replies, coldly, holding his smile just long enough to make the others uncomfortable. The plane was a veritable crime scene, with locust guts splattered all over the engines and windshield and front side of the wings. His first request to the maintenance crews? Windshield wipers.

Babow has all the swagger of Val Kilmer’s Iceman and claimed that his boubou cost $100 US. I’m not saying he’s lying, but I’ve asked him to take me boubou shopping to see if they really do get that expensive. I’m still not convinced that you stay cool in one of those things, especially with the poofy pirate pantaloons underneath, but they do look really nice and I should get some local threads while I’m in Kaedi, which is apparently known in West Africa for its fabrics and tye-dying. When I finally do get you some photos, I hope there’s at least one of me looking like a white guy trying to look like a Mauritanian guy.

=== Daily Thought ===

In our health handbook there’s a recipe for Home Made Roach Bait, which includes such mundane ingredients as flour, water, a chopped up onion, and then voila, boric acid! That’s probably how some would describe my tuna casserole. Bad dum bum. But then it goes on to say, “be careful, boric acid can be irritating to the skin.” CAN be irritating, they say. Are there people out there who LIKE boric acid on their skin? Is this a new trend in cosmetics? Ok, this bit is going nowhere, hope you are all well!!!

-- Luke

Watching Your Language

== 17, 18, 19, ummm, let’s skip to 30 ===
Hassaniya can be a bit of a tight rope walk. One tiny slip and you’ve said something drastically different from what you intended. “I’m going to tickle you” can easily come out as “I’m going to take a, um…well… a you know what on you.” And I learned why kids here laugh when you teach them English numbers. The word “twenty” means “my little female reproductive organ” in Hassaniya, except not so delicately worded. So when I went to the bank the other day and said “Will you accept this 20?” maybe that’s why they escorted me outside?

=== Molasses. Glaciers. Sloths. Internet access. ===
Some things were just designed to be slow, and the internet access in Kaedi is no exception. During a presentation to the Peace Corps business trainees, the new general manager of the Association of Mauritanian Internet Providers spoke about the challenges of providing service in this country. I don’t envy him. There’s a government monopoly on the supply side, basically meaning that an internet café pays $300 or so USD a month for about 64 kilobits per secord or roughly enough for one dial up connection. Split amongst 15-20 computers it’s not hard to see why sometimes it takes 20 minutes to send one email. And when the line goes down, you still pay... Sounds a little like the heyday of AT&T, but worse…

He quoted the investment in the internet café in Selibaby as being $100,000 US. It’s hard to imagine how you could spend that much here on an air-conditioned room with 15 generic PCs, but I guess anything is possible… maybe it is expensive to make the required 12 color copies of the President who stares at you from every corner of the room? And is it just me or does he look like Vicente Fox’s long lost twin?

Back to the financial situation, some back of the envelope math led me to believe that at 200 ougiyas (less than a dollar) an hour you’d need five or more years to make your money back, assuming a pretty healthy profit margin an, ahem, that all computers are occupied 24 hours a day. In other words, government (or foreign aid) subsidies will be floating my ability to send emails for the foreseeable future.

Goat Head Picnic

Greetings everyone. The weather in Kaedi is cool after a big rainstorm last night -- thunder and lightning and gusty winds forcing me to sleep inside my room, or oven as I prefer to call it. Everything is going fine -- I look forward to hearing from all of you, and my apologies if I can't respond to individual emails very effectively. Take care! -Luke, 222-688-0095

=== Goat Head Picnic ===

Last weekend I joined fellow trainees Jess and Jordy for a picnic in the country. Information was minimal as we headed out of town. “They slaughtered a goat.” “Somewhere outside of town.” “You’re invited.” That’s all I needed given the monotony of my routine the last couple weeks. Class, cous-cous, hang out at the deserted airport, a bottle of milk, more cous-cous, sleep… I realized I hadn’t left a 2 mile radius since arriving in Kaedi a month ago. So we piled into a 4x4 and rumbled out of town down a dusty road as jerry cans filled with water sloshed in the back. After 20 minutes we stopped at a large thorny tree and sat on mats. One of our hosts was already lighting charcoals next to a plate spilling over with meat. At the base of the tree, the remains of the goat rested ominously. Intestines, lungs, skin, still properly arranged. I tried a joke: “This goat looks sick.” As the cook went to work, we played cards, drank round after round of tea, and enjoyed the relatively cool breeze. The flat scrub around us was surprisingly green after the recent trains; I felt like I was on a poorly maintained golf course. After maybe an hour, one of the Mauritanians pointed up into the air. Hanging from a branch not 10 feet from our noses was the goat’s head. Now that’s a picnic! (picture of me with the goat head forthcoming)

The meat was good, the ice cold mango juice beyond description, and the company was great – six twenty-something Mauritanian guys, who all ganged up playfully on a seventh, a lot like my friends and I might do back home. He was a good natured and resilient character, with lots of catch phrases, such as “It’s good for your color,” which he said whenever he offered something to eat or drink. Every so often they’d wash and turn to the east to pray and I’d turn to the west and wave to America, or so I imagined.

In true Mauritanian fashion, we stayed a long time and drank gallons of tea. And also in Mauritanian fashion, when we roared off in a cloud of dust that afternoon, we left behind dozens of cans, bottles, bags, and other pieces of trash. The goats, or donkeys, or someone else will deal with it, I guess the thinking goes. Or perhaps with the lowest population density in all of Africa, there’s always a clean tree to sit under next time…

=== Blister Beetle Blues ===

A blister beetle lands on your arm. Three guesses as to what happens next… we were all told about this little beast upon our arrival, but I got to meet one face-to-face, unfortunately. Hanging out one evening, I felt something on my arm and looked over too late to catch the culprit… some redness, probably a mosquito bite, I thought (incorrectly). Had I washed the spot immediately I would have been fine, but some hours later I looked again and a one inch square blister had broken out, puffing up off my skin with a jaundicy yellow like make-up in a horror film. Ok, maybe not that bad. Taking the advice of some Mauritanian staffers, I waited about 24 hours and then popped the sucker. It was awesome! Ok, maybe not that good. (Don’t worry, I sterilized the entire city with alcohol swabs first…)

Though I thankfully haven’t yet seen some of the scarier insects Mauritania has to offer, I still feel as though I’ve been bitten or roughed up or harassed by pretty much everything you can think of… mosquitos, fleas, ants, beetles, and bugs I can’t yet identify. My sheets are already stained with the blood of the bugs unlucky enough to sneak their way into my mosquito net. I now feel like the “heroic” John Kerry when, posed with a death penalty question during a debate long ago, he apparently responded, “I know something about killing.”

=== Your teacher is crazy ===

Sydu is a 34 year old black Moor who works at a nicely stocked epicerie (like a 7-11, kind of) near the Kaedi airport. It’s on my way to town and language class and has a wonderful selection of refrigerated products including milk, water, soda, juice, and even frozen Western candy bars. So it’s inevitable that Sydu and I would have met, but the fact that we’ve become friends speaks more to his sense of humor/personality. We have fun. He speaks Hassaniya, French, some English, and even a few words of Spanish, so we communicate in a malange of four languages. “Mi casa, su casa” he said with a grin, as he offered me a chair. “Do you have change today?” I ask as a test, handing him 300 ougiyas for a 250 ougiya beverage. He pulls out a gem: “It’s your lucky day!” We both write down new words and phrases, but he has a knack for remembering almost everything I teach him, whereas I can scarcely remember the first letter of the Hassaniya equivilent of someone’s lucky day. He brings out his best new line when Peace Corps Business Trainee Meme (known as Nina back in Chicago) comes by. “Meme, you look like a million ougiyas today!”

=== A Toubab On The Wall ===

All eight or so business trainees were recently paired with local entrepreneurs to learn how the informal sector operates in Mauritania. I sat intently as counterparts were announced. A manager of a microfinance institution… a owner of a car parts store, a manager of a women’s tye-dying cooperative… and Luke, your counterpart is a… welder. A welder? What do I know about welding? What do I have in common with a welder other than that we both wear glasses at the office? I guess I would find out.

On my first visit, I followed PC Business Trainer Racey into the dark office of Mohamad Salek Ould Libchir, owner of the Menuiserie Metallique just off the main drag of the Kaedi market near the taxi park. Without looking at me, saying hello, or acknowledging my presence in any way, Salek turned to one of his workers and said “I’m going to the bank.” I stood confused for a moment, then stumbled up the steps from his office right into the maelstrom of a busy day at a welding shop. A power saw whined to my left as its teeth fought through a metal pole. To my right, a welding torch connected with a door frame, launching a cascade of sparks over my head. I slipped into a corner, hoping to observe the operations as a “fly on the wall” until Salek came back. That role was already taken by 40-50 actual flies buzzing around me, but I did my best. I met the employees one by one. A ragged bunch, ranging from 13 year old apprentice Hussein to 30-something Moussa. At Salek’s welding shop, bring your local language, because they don’t take English, or French if you want to be precise. Hopelessly lost in any conversation, I took in the noises and smells of the business. Metal dust filled my nose. The sounds of a sadistic dentist filled the air. After nearly an hour, Salek returned. I cornered him and asked him questions as he talked to five other people simultaneously. I struggled to understand his answers: between six and ten workers depending on the season, I’m the richest, best welder in Kaedi. Started in 1989, no, 89, no EIGHTY nine do you even speak French????, he seemed to say with his expression. I wrote furiously. He pointed at my pad of paper with a disapproving look. “So I can remember better,” I said. “You shouldn’t write with your left hand,” he said.

This relationship is going to take awhile, I thought…

=== Good Dog, Happy Man ===

Most Africans I know or have heard about aren’t much for pets. My Ugandan friends thought the idea a bit odd, an animal that serves no purpose and takes up resources. The story of the famous Ali-Foreman fight in Kinsasha goes that the Congolese were against Foreman from the beginning as he strolled off the plane with a German Shephard, the same breed the Belgians used as a tool of colonial oppression. So I was surprised to find that my host family in Mauritania has a dog. He’s nice enough, don’t get me wrong, though I would prefer he not crunch on a bone at three in the morning a foot away from my tent. But then one evening during dinner a neighbor’s cow wandered into our compound. A big, beautiful animal, with impressive horns, and a bellowing moan suggesting that he was a little lost. Our dog sprung into action, barking like mad, and guiding the cow out of the area. Ah, I get it, he’s a herding dog! It’s a herding culture. Sometimes it takes a while for things to click for me here. “Kelbne zein” I told my host father after the incident. Our dog is good! He nodded and grunted a little. No crap, he was probably thinking.