Novelty, in that shiny dollar store kind of way

I need to write more often, to chronicle the rapidly changing conditions of my vie en rose (I’m surrounded by concrete painted pink, remember?) and maybe to keep track of the date.

The theme this morning: how to combat novelty? In the past week, I have endured three invitations from my landlord (lunch, dinner, and the ever-so-sketchy “ride into the country”), an enthusiastic offer to help m carry shelves (the driver actually threw his truck in reverse to catch up to me), a smattering of more or less innocuous compliments re: my zweyne (cute) melifa, and an earnest – if not sweet – request to watch the sunset from the roof of a friend we met through a former PCV.

I realized last night, while receiving Mauritanian-style catcalls like “eywe, shiftu bidhani” (translates roughly to, “ooh, look at the pretty local and/or embodiment of white moor beauty”), that this unwanted attention comes regardless of my appearance. My landlord’s invite was offered to me after an evening of sleepless, violent illness – not a pretty picture. If I had accepted the sunset proposition, I’d have trekked to the roof in a wrinkled, dirty, PCV hand-me-down skirt and dingy grey tee shirt. My shelf-carrying melifa – apparently worthy of catcalls – is a faded periwinkle, painfully plain, obviously cheap and as integrated as my fashion ever gets. The point is, I used to accept a compliment, wherever its source, as exactly that: complimentary. Coming to terms with the reality of Mauritania, therefore, is a blow to my ego; these come-ons are less a testament to my beauty than to my novelty. And unfortunately, I am only capable of modifying the former.

A few days ago at the bureau, Kristen asked me, if there was one thing I could change about this country, magic-wands and all, what would it be? I said, with little hesitation, whatever is going on between me and Mauritanian men. She empathized and echoed my concern. “Yeah,” she asked hypothetically, “what can I wear so that you will leave me alone?” Our concern goes beyond cultural appropriateness; I want cultural anonymity. I want, more than integration, invisibility…

Considering my center-of-attention personality, it is strange to want to be ignored, to disappear into this dusty, bustling, pseudo metropolis. And by strange, my logic reminds me, I mean futile. Even with five of us in Atar, I am always going to be “the nasraniye” when I shuffle into the market, melifa or not, just like all the other PCVs. We are the main attraction in a two-years-long circus, and language skills, wardrobe and integration notwithstanding, all eyes are permanently on the center ring. Can novelty day in and day out become monotonous? And am I qualified to confirm this only having lived here ten days?