Like I said in the titel of this log... Want to help your fellow human being?? Take a look at either of these two website's... I absolutely know that anything you buy or sent to either of these two organizations will completely go to the local people involved. In both the projects a fellow Dutch VSO is involved, and he is very involved with everything that happens in BUDAP and the orphanage...

 

Go to   www.budap.org/index.htm for your traditional East-African drums and to www.bartlacroix.nl/weeshuis.htm (sorry only in Dutch for now) to help the orphans in a Tanzanian town called Bukoba.

Am I getting less tolerant since I've come back from Nigeria, or is this country really changing and becoming very strange... I had to go to the Travel clinic in Rotterdam today for my medical, seeing that travelling by car in Holland in the morning is almost as slow in Lagos the whole day... I opted for going by train and metro. The whole journey went fine, not even a minute delay (and even then I'm used to that now, waiting for 3 hours for a car to fill up and finally leave for your destination is more rule then exception), but on the way back with the metro to the trainstation, there were 2 young boys (well, you can fool me, but they didn't look a day older than 16) sitting on the other side of the walk way...   Frist they were drinking some sort of orange juice and eating Sultana (of which I was pleasantly surprised, instead of coke and chocolate), but then I looked up and these boys were making a joint!!!! I'm not joking, they were really making a joint in the metro.. I was so in shock that I started laughing inside...   Hello, have I missed something here... is it normal now for these two young boys to do this... was it already normal before I left or have my morals and values changed??

My culturshock is really continuing-o.... This morning when I wanted to ease myself (going to the toilet to urinate) it was so dark and I still was so sleepy that my brain figuered out that it must be around 5am. When I walked up the stairs again I thought I could still sleep for at least another hour or so. Getting to my improvised bed (2 airbeds on top of each other with very thick blankets) I looked at my phone to see how late it was exactly. I was in complete shock and couldn't believe what I saw... It was already 7.30am for crying out loud. I never ever expected it to be that late already... In Nigeria you get up when it gets light, around 6am, but if you do that here you would still be in bed by 9am....

 

Another thing that is very different is your (the Dutch) way of speaking... I saw 2 of my girlfriends 2 days ago, and one of the first things they did was tell me that I was speaking very funny... I'm repeating things twice, saying eh the whole time, putting Pidgin English things in my Dutch language like abi, sha, oooohhh, now and more of those nice, funny things. They were laughing at me every time I did it, but I must say, I still do enjoy the language very much, and can't miss it yet... Wetin u dey talk? For where? E no go gree-o..... And I can continue like this for very long...

 

I just jumped out of bed just now, to make sure I take advantage of the complete day I have ahead of me... I should be resting you said... well, in organised Holland there is no time for that at the moment... Ah wel, NO WAHALA!  

Jaja, ik ben er weer... Ben vanochtend weer veilig in Nederland aangekomen... Wel raar om weer terug te zijn, maar volgens vele teruggekeerde VSO'ers went het heel snel...

 

Zal binnenkort nog wat Nigeriaanse verhalen en foto's op de site zetten... aangezien ik nog niet aan het werk ben heb ik daar mooi nog even de tijd voor....