1 Year Old in Nigeria

I am happy to announce that I have reached my 1 year mark for my VSO experience here in Dutse, Jigawa State. And although I have been here for over a year now, I am still having many new experiences.

Here is one ‘wonderful’ example that I would like to share with you:

At the end of August we celebrated the Muslim festival Eid ul-Fitr which marks the end of the fasting period of Ramadan and once again we enjoyed the 3 day long parading of horses, music and dancing throughout the town, known as the Durbar.

Then, happily trekking back from a different adventure a few days later (greeting our guards wives) we witnessed many children playing ‘Durbar!’ They had made horses out of sticks, with cardboard for the nose, feathers for ears and scraps of material for the decoration to resemble the horse’s costumes from the Durbar. You can see turbans and huge gowns made from cardboard. They are shaking their fist as that is how you greet the Emir. It is a sign of respect and meaning ‘may you live long.’

I am happy to share this with you as I don’t often see children playing. It seems to me that they have little time to play as they are either attending one of their many schools or completing the necessary chores of daily life.

Ranka ya dade! (May they live long!)