Six Months in Senegal, A Reflection

Well, this is not really a reflection as much as it is a list of observances. A reflection might imply it is more personal or with really deep insights. This is neither, really.


So this past weekend I celebrated my official 6 months In Country, as we say. Yea, 6 months, weird huh? When a fellow PCV in another country near me hit her 6months, she wrote an email listing all of the things in her life that had drastically changed, keeping tally in a way of her different experiences. While I don’t have a tally, I have some general thoughts, listed in no particular order

Ways my life has changed in the past 6 months:
-I now get almost daily marriage proposals
-I bathe outside in the sunlight, with a bucket and well water
-I live in a 3x4m hut with a grass roof, `nuff said
-I am malnourished… (working on overcoming that though)
-Coffee is Nescafe with powdered milk rather than a beautiful and delicious latte
-I LOVE buckets
-I hand wash and line dry all of my clothing
-Rarely do I really understand what is going on around me
-I can use up to 4 different languages in daily interactions
-I realized that I cannot kill every cricket in my room, but have the right to be annoyed by them, but especially by frogs and mice in my hut
-I am rarely ever actually clean
-I hate traveling in this country, but also cannot stay in my village for more than a few weeks without going more than a little crazy.

Ways my life has remained the same:
-Ridiculous things happen to me or around me on a daily basis
-I have great friends and family (in the States and in Senegal)
-I love mail and email
-Simple things make me happy
-I dance a lot
-Oatmeal with peanut butter and bananas is still my favorite breakfast, when chocolate chip pancakes aren’t available
-Crowds and lots of people overwhelm me
-I journal a lot

There are a lot more than listed for both, but these are the ones that really stood out in my head as I sat typing at the Kaolack computer this morning.

It is crazy to think about how much things have changed in my life in 6 months. I constantly feel torn between thinking I still know nothing about life here and realizing how much I do in fact know. I’ve been here 6 months, but that’s still only 6 months. However, I was able to reasonably answer new trainees questions about life in Senegal, which made me realize I do actually know a lot. Another Volunteer, 1 year in, mentioned that 6months in Vols shouldn’t be invited to help with PST because we are too new and thus know nothing, but then some COSing Vols stood up for us, saying the first 6months is when you really learn the most in the shortest period of time because life is just soooo different and you have to adapt fast. It was energizing meeting the new trainees and knowing that my Stage is no longer the newest group In Country. I see some things in them that remind me of my Stage and it’s good to be able to observe things in them that I’m sure the Vols we met during PST saw in us. Really, it is like high school or college. My Stage is now the sophomores of PC Senegal, or "wise fools" as the word means. I think it is quite fitting.

back in Thies...again?

Yep, i am back in Thies (and on this blasted XO laptop again), just 2 weeks after the end of IST. Why you may ask? Well,I was kindly invited to help prepforthe new stagiares (trainees) whoare in flight to Senegal as we speak, inshallah. I have been here since Sunday and will be here until next Wednesday morning, after they have headedto their village homestays. Myself along with another are working hard on rewriting some of the cross culture assignments trainees have as well as orienting them around Thies and probably leading some cross culture and adaptation sessions. We are both freakishly excited to meet these new kids. Arrival in Country is traumatic and while I am glad not to have to do it again for the first time like I did that late night back in March, but I am looking forward to seeing the responses of the new trainees.

Right before I came back here however, I was actually kindof having work todo...ieI went toplace outsidemy compound and sat whilepeople talked. Ididnt do anything, but itlooked like it. Just kidding. I actually did start helping with my village's summer school session, mainly with English for the middle and high school students. Nevertheless, it has been fabulous (and exhausting) to be back here in Thies,working hard. Its a good feeling.

So this Saturday marks my 6months in Senegal and hopefully I will have agood post in celebration...or not. I cannot believe that we are approaching 6 months and nolonger thenewbies. Even weirder isto think that fall isapproaching in theStates. Bizarre...

All for now.Maybe i will have some good stories later this week, we shallsee. Also, still thinking about a vacay around the holidays. If you areinterested, please let me know. Also, now is time to start entertaining the idea of a visit toSenegal smoetimeinthe next year and a half. However, itis not for the faint of heart.

back in the Delta!

Hi friends. Unfortunately, I dont have a lot of time for a long post as I am nearing the end of my hour of internet here in Foundiougne, but I did want to send a brief update. First of all, after being lectured by the postman on Sunday, I finally made it back out to the Post Office here in Foundiougne and to my great surprise, found several packages and letters, so thank you everyone very much! (V, I didnt receive yours, but I am sure its on the way)

I arrived back at site Thursday evening and just yesterday had the chance to finally unpack and give out the last of the cadeaux I had brought back from Thies. There was a big US AID funded summer camp in town that Jamie orchestrated, so I was there, standing around and occassionally helping with murals. It was good to see the camp because that may be a project for me to work on next summer after sshe has COSed. Daniel, a Vol from Kedegou, came through our area Friday and was at camp and my site as well which was fun. We went down to the river, which was at unusually low tide, and saw a few flocks of flamingos!!! I had never seen them outside of a zoo or Disney World and man, they are beautiful (and pink)!

Yesterday was the only day I have had yet to relax, clean, and unpack, and man was all of that necessary. During my time away, a plague Moses-style was cast on my hut, complete with lots of mice, frogs, crickets, weeds, and many different types of animal feces. Oh Africa. And yet with all of these animal adventures, I am still here, remarkably. As my sister said, "I am just trying to imagine how you, of all people, are doing with all of these critters." Haha, yea, me too. This week might be busy-ish as well. Post office/market/etc today, meeting with an NGO in town tomorrow (not exactly sure what for, but they approachedme during the summer camp and asked me to come), ans summer school in the village starts Thursday and they want me to at least come the first day. I am glad to have stuff to do...my huge pile of laundry can wait until next weekend, I hope.

Ramadan started today, we shall see how this turns out!

Pics

With the fam: Codou, Me, Moussa

(full photo shoot available on my picture website)

Me and my bro Ameth--he's a science and math teacher in a nearby village
Oumi and I
Watching the Olympics on our last day of training, I think it was an intense track event that the US won...
Typical lunch at the center: rice with meat/fish in huge bowls
My village family would probably fit 20+ people around a bowl this size. At the Center, we average 3-5...

I’m an Aunt!!!! (again)

Haha, Katie don’t kill me, I’m only kidding. Well, not really. I have a newborn nephew. I just found out that my 22-year old sister in the village gave birth to a son last Tuesday. I talked to my family twice in the past week and did anyone mention this? No, of course not. It’s evidently not news. I found out from one of the teachers who lives in Dakar right now, today when she called me this morning after I texted her telling her I was in her city. Sadly, I am missing the baptism which I believe is today and is also when the baby will receive his name. I was hoping for a girl because of the 4 babies in my compound right now, 3 are boys, but I’m just glad that they are both fine. I was hoping to be around for the birth as well as the baptism, but I don’t doubt that one of my many fertile sisters in the village will get pregnant and deliver in the next year and a half, though we will see.

Anyway... Greetings once again from Dakar! I’m here for a mixture of med appointment and SENEGAD (Senegal’s Gender and Development Program) meeting, after finishing IST on Saturday. Dakar is full of PCVs right now bc there is an Environmental Ed conference, COS conference (for those finishing their service in the next few months), plus SENEGAD meetings. Most of my stage came here together after going down to Mbour for a day on the beach Saturday. Many Vols have new Dakar homestays with ExPats, but I didn’t get one and am staying in the Med Hut bc of my appointment and the fact that a cold decided to be kind enough to visit me from Saturday afternoon on.

IST is now over, which is really crazy. We are not just official sworn-in Vols (we were that in May), but now we are just 2.5 weeks away from being PC Sophomores as the next Stage arrives in country September 11 (really, ndigil ndigil?). Yea, unbelievably my Stage has been here 5.5 months, which seems crazy—time has both flown and dragged (ie neverending hot days in the village). To any future PC Senegal trainees out there, welcome! Get excited bc this will be the most exciting, insane, amazing, and generally ridiculous 2+ years of your life, or at least mine is going that way already… Get over yourselves before coming here and be prepared to learn to laugh at yourself, otherwise you won’t survive. Oh, and eat a lot of good food (fruits, veggies, dairy, coffee!) before you come here, just a suggestion.

I’m coming out of IST with some basic Wolof skills, which is fab, even though I found I wasn’t super excited to learn it (Serere pride I guess), but it’s nice to be able to understand a little more of what is going on around me. I also learned practical skills like gardening, murals and visual aids, porridge making, and creating new and innovative lesson plans to help the teachers teach health and environmental-related classes in the elementary and middle schools. We also heard from different NGOs and US development programs, discussing their work in different parts of the country (very few health-related programs exist in the Delta, which is dumb but maybe we can change that...) and how we as Vols can collaborate with them on projects and work more efficiently. The whole IST was a mixture of empowering (yes! Ideas! I can really do this!) and overwhelming (shoot, where do I even start?!) at once. Thankfully, my APCD is going to go on tourney after Ramadan ends at the end of September, to every health and EE site, to meet with village leaders, and help them create a long-term Action Plan to address the problems and needs of the community. The Action Plan will serve as a guide for my priorities throughout my service and will carryover to the Volunteers that will replace me after my two years of service in the Delta. I’m really excited about this meeting, though it probably won’t happen until November because my APCD has a ton of sites across the country to visit. I feel like while I don’t know exactly how my work is going to start out, there are some potentially big events on the calendar for the next few months, which will make long village weeks much more tolerable.

On that note, I’m getting ready for a vacay, it’s needed. I’m not taking it right away, but am exploring the possibility of a trip to Europe in December or January and am putting out the call to any loved ones out there interested in meeting up with me somewhere—wherever it may be (Eastern/Western/Northern/Southern Europe, or even Morocco or Egypt). Many people from my Stage are planning vacations for that time as well, whether to other places in Africa, Europe, or the States (which I would do, but have already promised to come back next summer for various special events). It’s been forever it seems since I took a vacation and am thinking by then I will be about 9 or 10 mos in country and will need a breath of fresh air, even if I’m not sure exactly how I will afford it, but hopefully loans won’t have totally eaten away all of my personal money by then. A fellow Vol is planning on being in Paris during that time so I may plan it with her, but would love an opportunity to see anyone willing to make the trip. Please think about it and let me know if you are interested.

Well, this is a pretty long post. I will probably post once more before going to the village, but that’s all depending on internet reliability and power, so one never knows in this country. For those of you who have kindly sent mail my way, I’m headed to the post office next Tuesday (inshallah) to pick it up and hope the post people aren’t too angry with me or try and overcharge me for the fact I haven’t been there in a month, we’ll see. Also, thanks for the blog comments, I love checking them and am glad to see my family members are tackling the world of blogs. Heidi, my friends here are continually impressed by your use of haikus to comment. Way to be!

Sunday

It is a sunday inthise, which means all volunteers arecampedd out at the 3 cafes in townwith wierless, attempting to getstuf done,moe or less successully. less for me,however, i did, with the helpof marissa's computer, upload a bunch ofpics to my picassa album, so checkthem out!

trainingis goingwell. wolof isstarting to makesense, evenwith the melange of languages flooting through my head, english, french, serere, and now wolof. im really enjoying having a fixed schedule these few weeks, soi am not minding the long days and extrawork. not at all, though i may be aminority.

just one mor eweek of training left...then to dakar sunday for a meeting with other volunteers to giveout scholarships to girls for lycee for this coming school year. i will probably be backin thevillge next thursday or friday. then ramadan starts monday...yipee...

dad, yes,thetypos arefrom this crazy laptop. le pere de cru, "cru" and i just had a convo about how poorly this computer actuallyworks.

Maangiy dox

(I am walking, en wolof)

So we ar enow inweek 2 of IST and inmany ways it still feels like the fisrtweek, mainly bc the languageclasses started this week which also means that mostof the language tutors showed up for the first time since PST and the center feels like "normal." I started Wolof, which will become the 3rd foreign language I usein country. i am bsically learning it to better communicate wiht people outside of mysmall serere village. while i dont really want tolearn it right now, bci still dontknow serere perfectly, i recognize thatit will be a goodskill to have. alli really want to learn, however, is to convey basic ideas while shopping at the market and how to insult children/men in wolof when theyannoy me and theserere doesnt work9like when i am inkaolack). wolof is going ok and it is much easire thn serere grammtically speaking, howeve i am constantly mixing up serere words with wolof and remember how hard i twas to just start learning serere backin march too. that being said, iam still known aroundthe training center to most people as "serere oo,"rather than by my name, american or senegalese. as a serere, it basically meanstht anyone and eveyone willpick on and tease me at thecenter bc as one of twoserere speakers (and theres only a smallgroup of staffers who speak the language) i am in a smallminority. its okthough bc they only do it bc they knowi can take it and dish it back out too, lol. thatbeing said, if i had been assigned to another languge, i doubtiwould hve themerelationship wiht all of the taff that i have right now. as a fellow vol said thisweek, "who knew how much thelanguage you were assigned in the fisrt week in country would come to impact all ofyour interactions here?"

well, i am going togo now. i have wolof homeworkand it isgettingdark. the lightbulb inthe shower t myhomestay dosntwork anymore, so iam going tohaveto take a showerinthe pitch black, whether itake it tonight or wait until tomorro am before training. talk to you alllater and sorry for the typos and lack of spaes, this xo is weird...