Monthly Archives: April 2013

Hidden gem of Mauritania: the beach. So beautiful. The first time I went it was cold and foggy and windy and I was struggling to keep up with DOD guys. Since then, the weather has become very conducive to beach-going, so that’s where we spent my first weekend in Nouakchott. Also, we spent our time sitting, swimming, and walking. Nothing too strenuous. Not too shabby:

Doesn’t this make you want to come to Nouakchott?

There’s a guy who set up a cafe right on the beach next to an abandoned building project (of which there are sadly many here). But the cafe has AMAZING food  – check out the moules frites:

We decided to recommend that the Foreign Service add pictures of the beach to recruitment materials for Embassy Nouakchott, as neither of us remembered seeing any sign of the beach when we were doing post research. Beautiful water, usually pretty empty compared to most U.S. beaches that are clogged with people, coolers, umbrellas and frisbees, within a 10-minute drive of downtown. How many places offer that?

Final thought: in certain scenarios, an abundance of sand is awesome. Also just to clarify, I’m not anti-people, coolers, umbrellas, and frisbees. All good things, but moderation is key. 🙂

One week at Embassy Nouakchott down, two to go. I want to try avoid focusing too much on work here, as part of my effort to use caution with regards to what I put online for all to see, but I know people are curious, so I’ll give you a sense of what it is I’m doing here.

The Public Diplomacy section of the embassy is in charge of press relations as well as cultural activities. (This goes for all embassies, not just in Nouakchott). But as the name suggests, “Public Diplomacy” is very wide-ranging. The best explanation I’ve heard is this: while political officers work with government contacts, public diplomacy officers work with the rest of the population. Which means the responsibilities of the section range from press conferences and media interviews to english language support, women’s rights, encouraging democracy and good governance, and recruiting and selecting candidates for exchange programs (like Fulbright, for example).

A crucial part of all sections of our embassies are the LES (Locally Employed Staff). They generally represent most of the institutional knowledge at the embassy, since FSOs come and go every 2-4 years, but LES stay. Plus, since they are usually from the country where they’re working, they are invaluable to newbie FSOs like me who are desperately trying to get up to speed on local culture and customs!

The 6 local staff members of the PAS (Public Affairs Section) in Embassy Nouakchott are fantastic. They are friendly, eager, and passionate about the work they’re doing. They have been more than willing to explain the ins and outs of Mauritanian culture. Plus, they’re patient while I stumble and stutter my way through French 🙂

So as far as the job goes, in addition to reviewing grant proposals, interviewing candidates for exchange programs, writing remarks, etc, etc, a big chunk of time is spent on, well, public diplomacy. Which means going out into the real world and meeting with people. So far this has been the most interesting part. I have accompanied the PAO to several meetings with journalists, as well as to several English language groups. Not many people in Mauritania speak English, but people are really interested in learning it, so English clubs and classes really enjoy having native speakers to practice with.

One afternoon, we spoke to two English classes back-to-back. One was at the American corner in a Mauritanian university (American Corners are Embassy-funded areas, like libraries or “corners” of libraries, where we provide American books and other materials for use by locals). Most of the students in the group had a really good command of English and were very vocal and interesting to talk to. The second English class was at the Islamic University in town, where they were equally vocal, but their English level was more basic. It was quite the challenge to remember to speak slowly and in simple sentences! Both groups of students were great – they were really enthusiastic and asked us lots of questions, and even when they touched on some more controversial policy stuff it was very good-natured. Thankfully I’m being afforded the luxury of easing my way into the “answering the tough questions” part of this job!

After those visits, I was let off the leash and sent to meet with the director of a new TV station, which has opened since Mauritania’s press freedom laws were liberalized about a year or so ago. The LES who liaises with members of the press went along with me, but as the American, I was expected to take the lead in the meeting. So I did. In French. I think they may have even understood what I said. At any rate, I spoke to the director for a while, who seems like he’s an aspiring Ted Turner-type. Really interesting guy. Then I was given a tour of the station – turns out they use the same editing software that we did at MSNBC – and ended up in a room full of the station staff. I was not expecting that at all, but apparently that’s how you roll in Mauritania – go with the flow. And it was great. The reason they sent me to this particular TV station was because of its uniqueness in that the majority of its employees are women, a rarity here, it seems. So I spent the next hour engaged in a Q & A with the women (and the handful of men, though they mostly remained quiet). It was really interesting to hear their perspective and learn about their struggles for equality – it’s really not so different from life in the U.S. just a few decades ago. I was able to share some of my experiences working for TV news back home, and all in all it was quite a successful and enjoyable afternoon.

I also have to mention just how invaluable the LES who accompanied me was. Many Mauritanians only speak Hassaniya (Arabic) and never learn French. This is especially common among women. So the session ended up being an amusing mix of my shaky French, their shaky French, Hassaniya translated into French, and my English translated into Hassaniya when the question called for a more nuanced answer than my French would allow me to give. Thanks to the trilingual local staff member accompanying me, it all worked out!

Next up – I am being dispatched to read picture books, in French, to small children. Most people who are reading this know my track record with small children. It is not extensive. New adventures!

Final thought: the cafeteria at the embassy is amazing. The fresh fish is to die for. Also, I have been introduced to bissap, a Senegalese hibiscus juice. It looks like grape juice and is kind of syrup-y, but it’s a really interesting, tasty flavor.

You know all that Nouakchott sand I mentioned? I went running through it. Now, I’m an OK runner. Maybe a tad on the slow side, but I can hold my own. Sand, however, is a whole new ball game.

A couple of the DOD guys who work at the embassy accompanied me and the PAO to the beach to go for a run. It’s really the only place to run here that’s not on a treadmill, as the security rules prohibit us from walking around too much downtown. Also, it’s apparently not recommended that girls go to the beach by themselves, so we go with big tough military guys to protect us from the evils of the world.

Driving to the beach was an adventure in and of itself. We took a paved road to the outskirts of town, then turned off onto a packed-sand path wending through more sand. Are you sensing the theme of sand yet?

The weather was – I am told – very strange for Mauritania. There was an eerie fog everywhere and through the fog the sun looked like the moon. As we drove closer to the beach, a sprawling, half-built hotel appeared. Apparently the people who were building it ran into too many roadblocks and abandoned ship. The area was completely deserted – it was chilly and very windy – so the PAO and I parked (ie stopped at the end of the path; there was definitely no parking lot) and waited for the guys to show up. We waited outside the car until a rogue donkey started charging towards us and we jumped back in.

Once the boys arrived we headed over to the beach (the donkey had run away by this point and was no longer a threat). Other than a small group of people dancing around in a lean-to/hut type of thing, the entire beach was empty.

Unfortunately the tide was pretty far in, so we had to run through some pretty deep sand. It became clear almost immediately that running on sand is NOT ANYTHING LIKE running on asphalt. I suppose I knew that in theory, but to experience it was something else altogether. Especially when trying not to look like a wimp in front of a couple military guys. (No luck on that attempt, unfortunately). I felt like I was hardly moving but very quickly my lungs felt like they were about to explode. They didn’t, though, don’t worry. Anyway, I survived – we only ran about a mile and a half, dodging the incoming tide as well as dead fish and birds along the way. Good workout, though!

Final thought: The title of this post would probably be a great metaphor for trying to make diplomatic progress – you’re kind of moving forward, but with every step some geopolitical complication drags you back a few inches. Or something like that. But I don’t have enough energy to flesh that out right now. So we’re sticking with the literal.

Check! I made it. It was fairly uneventful. I took a direct flight from Paris to Nouakchott, where I was met at the teeny tiny airport by an embassy expeditor (a guy who meets you at the gate, whisks you through passport control and customs, and delivers you to a car in the parking lot. It doesn’t happen at all embassies – or actually most embassies – but it did in Nouakchott and I was grateful to see a smiling face holding a sign reading “Kelli Long” as soon as I walked into the airport).

I am staying with the Embassy’s Public Affairs Officer, who I am here to help out for 3 weeks. We were one A-100 class apart and met several times in DC before she left last August. This being my first time in Mauritania – actually my first time in Africa – having someone I know to show me the ropes is very comforting! Also she’s young and fun, so that helps too 🙂

One advantage of working in Africa is embassy housing is HUGE. Take the house I’m staying in, for example. You open the front door into a palatial foyer, with tile floors. It’s not a terribly efficient use of space, since having that large of a foyer is kind of pointless, but it’s impressive nonetheless. Off off the foyer are a dining room, living room, kitchen, bathroom, and a large pantry/laundry room that is about the size of my entire New York apartment. Proceed up the tiled staircase and you find 3 bedrooms, 2 more bathrooms, and another living room (’cause obviously you need 2).

I guess if you had a family this place would make sense, but for one person it seems excessive. Although already in the time I’ve been here the space seems a bit less overwhelming than it did at first glance. But still, even the super rich in NYC don’t live in places this big.

I jumped right into work the day after my Saturday arrival (since Mauritania is an Islamic country, their workweek is Sunday-Thursday) and have been busy getting a crash course in the practice of Public Diplomacy. I’m SO happy to finally be experiencing real life at post, even though it’s just for a short time.

Nouakchott bonus point: people here switch to English a lot less than they do in Paris.

Final point for now: Mauritania has a lot of sand.

I’m really not a quote person. I don’t post insightful, uplifting phrases on facebook. I don’t “like” other people’s posts of that kind. Call it cynicism, pragmatism, or whatever, but I generally can’t get past the cheesy factor. I feel the same way about most Hallmark cards. HOWEVER. I happened upon the following quote while waiting for my flight in the Paris airport, and after being in Nouakchott for a few days (more on that in a later post) and observing the widely varying mentalities of the Americans who work here, and their resulting attitudes toward life, I think this particular quote is highly appropriate and applicable to Foreign Service life in general. So enjoy:

“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven…”
-John Milton, Paradise Lost

Full disclosure: I was not reading Paradise Lost at the airport. The quote appeared in an article in Runner’s World magazine. I have only read part of the abridged version of Paradise Lost, and that was in 10th or 11th grade.

Check! I’m in Paris. (Oh, and TDY stands for this). And the meetings I was supposed to attend today happened, I was there, I was awake, and I think I even managed to spit out some intelligent-sounding questions. So overall the last 24 hours go in the positive column, although my French-speaking ego suffered a bit along the way.

I took an overnight flight from Dulles airport, arriving in Paris at 5:45am (which allowed me plenty of time to get downtown and to the building where my meetings were to take place, but meant very little sleep happened.) However, I generally like long flights. I’m not accountable to anyone, I’m not expected to check email or call anyone, I can pretty much just mind my own business and watch a few movies (“Hyde Park on Hudson” – FDR has weird affair-like-things with various women including his 5th or 6th cousin Laura Linney while the King and Queen of England are visiting. The takeaway kind of seemed to be “remember the good old days when presidents could cheat on their wives in peace without the media going nuts?” – huge snoozefest. The other one, “Quartet” – not amazing, but very enjoyable, particularly because of the presence of Maggie Smith. She can make anything good. Come to think of it, they should have cast her in “Hyde Park on Hudson”.)

Anyway. I arrived in Paris at 5:45 am, which is early and horrible, but it also means the airport is very empty, which kind of makes the early hour worth it. I got to the hotel and dropped off my bags with about an hour and a half to spare before my meetings started. Fear of sitting down on one of the hotel lobby couches and passing out for the better part of the morning motivated me to go for a walk. Paris is lovely in the morning – it was 8:00, but very few people were out on the streets and many poissonneries, boulangeries, etc, were just opening. Comparing that to the crazy hours people work in NYC and DC, it seemed very civilized. It wasn’t until 8:30 that the streets really started bustling with commuters and parents walking their kids to school.

After my lovely (if chilly – Paris is cold and I packed for Africa!) morning walk, I made it to the offices of Africa Regional Services (a State Department entity that produces publications, speaker programs, arts programs, internet content, etc for Public Diplomacy sections of African posts.) The idea is that being in Paris puts them in a stronger position to provide materials and manpower for the many Francophone posts (and the lusophone – Portuguese speaking – ones as well). They still don’t provide too much in the way of Arabic-language services, but my hunch is that that will change at some point.

So I spoke to those nice folks for the better part of the day, and, fresh off my victory of staying awake the whole time after no sleep, I decided to take another walk, with a destination in mind. I was going to walk to the Champs Elysees. A decent walk from my hotel, but nothing crazy. Then it started to rain. And not a nice, spring rain. A cold, frigid, drippy, icky rain. And did I mention I packed for Africa? Yeah. I turned around. But the beauty of the lower buildings and the windy streets of Paris compared to, say, the grid and skyscrapers of New York, is that you can see fun things just by peering down a few boulevards:

At the end of the street – The Louvre (I’m pretty sure)

Palais Garnier – I was actually up close to this one

Sacre Coeur

Oh – I can’t forget my ego-busting story! I was determined to speak French to people, since, well, I’m supposed to be able to do that now. I successfully negotiated the airport, cab, and hotel without anyone switching to English on me (a huge punch to the gut for any fledgling speaker of a foreign language). I was especially pleased with my performance at the hotel check-in desk. The hotel is a UK chain, and the French people who work here speak impeccable English. Certainly better than my French. But the guy didn’t switch on me. Hooray! Or so I thought.

I returned to the hotel later in the day to actually get the key to my room (sadly, it wasn’t ready at 8am), and the same guy who had spoken French to me that morning greeted me with an enthusiastic “Hello Ms. Long? Your room is not ready, but we’ve been able to bump you up to a larger one. I think you’ll be pleased.” Now, a casual observer might think I should be thrilled about what he said. An upgrade! That never happens to me! (It really doesn’t). This is fantastic! Well, that casual observer would be wrong. Because the news of my upgraded room was broadcast to me in ENGLISH. My proud French moment evaporated. But, then I looked around and saw the super-cool elevators that were going to take me to my upgraded room, and I got over it.

How can you not feel better when faced with an old-timey (but seemingly up to safety code) elevator?

Plus, there will be COUNTLESS opportunities for me to butcher the French language in my future. I am certain of it.

I’m adopting a new strategy – instead of waiting to tell people that I’m writing a blog until I see if I remain committed to it, I’ve decided to tell people I’m writing a blog in the hopes that it will spur me to remain committed to it (since clearly strategy #1 didn’t work). But it’s been fun to go back and read what I wrote last summer! And since I am finally leaving the country, it would probably be even funner to have a written account of the highlights of my overseas adventures.

That’s right, folks – I am finally being sent abroad. For a bit. But then for longer. I’ll explain.

It was decided by the powers that be at the State Department that Embassy Bangui will not reopen soon enough for me to go there. (If you have not been following the news out of the CAR over the past 5 months, here are a few articles – including the finding of skeletons in (former) President Bozize’s garage. Actual skeletons.)

So, instead of going to Bangui in January, I was placed in the Public Diplomacy & Public Affairs office of the Bureau of African Affairs, where I have been happily toiling away on various projects and figuring out the mysterious ways of the State Department. It’s been a great education and I’ve gotten some really good experience, but I’m ready to get out of the country, so I was thrilled when my boss asked me if I wanted to temporarily go to 2 African embassies and help out in their Public Affairs Sections for a few weeks!

I’ll be going to Nouakchott, Mauritania for 3 weeks, followed by 3 weeks in Kigali, Rwanda!

Then I’ll return to the U.S. for about a month or so this summer before heading to…

Algeria! After submitting a new, mini, bid list about a week ago, I have been reassigned to a consular position in Algiers! Many many many things have to be sorted out before I go, but right now I’m opting not to think about all those things and daydream about all the amazing travel possibilities! And the Mediterranean. I’m also thinking about the Mediterranean.