Hello from the Sahara desert

Hi, everyone!

I would like to thank all the BBC LE staff and Nuala in particular for the gift, they are handling me by offering this splendid opportunity of blogging here. I am grabbing this great chance with both hands, as we do here in the Sahara in order to show some kind of respect and gratitude.

I also want to greet warmly the former student bloggers, the commentators and all the readers. I promise, though I do not consider my self a great storyteller nor a poet, I will do my best to enchant all of you, tongue in cheek.
I can't describe my feelings right now? I think I have mixed emotions; I am over the moon, as I will have my writing checked by specialist English teacher and hopefully get some critical advices that could help me brush up on my language.
I am also a bit frightened and nervous. Because, believe it or not, I have never had to write even a long letter to a friend ,let alone blogging on a well known site like this one. I feel like I am getting ridiculed into addressing a bunch of people who are more eloquent than me and know exactly what I am struggling to say on this page.
All what I know about blogging is just I need to say a word about myself at the beginning. Well, in the Saharan traditions, we have taught not to talk explicitly about ourselves. Perhaps to encourage us to introduce ourselves to others with what we do rather than what we say. Nevertheless, I will beat myself down and break this rule for you guys.
Here we go, I am a 40-year old man, married and working as the international relationship secretary at a Mauritanian NGO called (Together for Development and Awareness) My job is to contact the International Organizations that are interested in reaching out to our country and offer our help and cooperation.

I am travling quite a bit and these days i am in Qatar About my studies I learned (Islamic law SHERIA and related themes) for 10 years: at the high school and the university. Therefore, I consider myself-without any boasting- a specialist in Islamic theories and ready to help those –if there is any-who might be interested in Islamic culture.
So, I live in the capital of Mauritania. Never heard of it? You are probably not a lone. It is ok. I will tell you about it. Though, we are known in the Arab world with this name (The million-poet country), we are yet to acquire a hallmark that puts us on the international map.

Mauritania is a far flung, West African, mostly desert country. It occupies more than one million KM 2. its border countries are Algeria, Morocco, Mali and we are blessed with almost 2000kl2 on the Atlantic ocean. Our capital Nouakchott is still too young. We start building it on 1960.

Our population is roughly 3 millions, consist Arabs, Barbers and Africans and we are a melting pot when it comes to languages; we speak Arabic French-our former colony language- and three more African dialects. I hope that you don't get bored with all these superficial information.
But I will tell you some interesting information about us .You just need to make some preparations that might be useful in order to grasp our nomadic thoughts. Just turn your watch back to the 17th century if you could.Then imagine that you are in a long trip of adventure rambling in the countryside, have pitched a tent and away from all aspects of the modern life.
You are also surrounded with few people who are so generous, humble and willingly run your errands. But they are probably see the world differently and radically stick up for their odd point of view and could go rogue for no reason at all. Keep that in mind and welcome to the Sahara desert.

Happy Halloween! You know what? Actually, we neither celebrate Halloween nor our day of birth. Can you believe it? You see.
Talking about Halloween, I think it is the high time to tell you the way we dress here.listen to this prank:
The men here wear Boboo which is a very baggy African dress. On 2000, I was in the US . It was the first time to hear about the Halloween; when the restaurant where I used to work held a competition in scary clothes and masks on that occasion.
Amazingly enough, I didn't need to add any changes to our normal Boboo, in order to participate in that contest. And guess what, I didn't win it, but all my colleagues admit that it was so strange and deserve the rivalry. I am getting tired of my maiden writing.

I want to thank you in advance Nuala, for the time you would spend reading this sort of writing. I can imagine what kind of job you have here. But my weak excuse is just what I reiterated here: I am trying to read too much, but I never push myself hard to write.
You can use my turn of words as a typical example for those who taught themselves the language without attending schools.
My PC failed to apload the pics i wanted to share with you . Sorry for that.

I can not wait to read your post.

All best
Cheikh Vall

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