Mail, garbage, water

Let me tell you about how ordinary things for me, and I guess for most of you, works here.

First of all, there is no "garbage service". You have to take care of your own trash. We have two buckets, one for organic waste and one for the rest. Our daytime guard takes care of this. The organic waste we compost. The other stuff Tarlif (the guard) either burn or give to a guy that comes to collect trash occasionally, and then put it somewhere else.


About the water; I drink the tap water. It is perfectly clean (but not that cold!). The water comes from the river Niger. I am glad that I don't need to feel bad about using the water here. There is plenty in the river. And, even if it's not used yet to serve the whole population in Niamey, there is a big aquifer under the city. The wastewater/sewage you need to take care of by yourself however. We have a tank (don't know where!) in the garden.


And about the post. The houses doesn't have any mailbox. If you want to recieve mail, you need to get a post box. So, if someone would like to send me a letter. This needs to be addressed to IRD's post box. Then IRD will give it to me. But the other thing about the post is that it takes around 3 weeks to get something from Europe... And vice versa...